Spark People Food Record
I decided about a week ago that I was going start eat better instead of gorging myself with everything I saw like Godzilla rampaging through Tokyo. A whole box of Mac and Cheese here (1200 calories), a whole box of Zatarains Rice and Beans there (800 some odd calories), and now I’m at 215lb’s at 5’11″. I can’t fit into most of my clothes comfortably any more after buying one set bigger so it’s definitely time, especially since I’m as poor as a jobless hobo, because I too am jobless. I’m just lucky enough to have an awesome family. So…. I went back to Spark People to tracking my food intake and keeping it under 1800 calories a day, or somewhat close to that, and I have started exercising again a few times a week. The lack of food has reduced my energy temporarily but it’s coming back now since my body has made the change to burning calories that are already stored instead of new fresh fuel consumed by my constantly chomping mouth. NOM NOM NOM NOM!
With the exercise I was a little ambitious. Back in High School all of 7-8 years ago I used to be 150-160 while being the same height while I was on the crew team. I figured those crew exercising were great at burning calories so why not try and start some of them back up. One of the best ones I could think of was something we called a “20 Down”. Really, just pick a number and put down after it because we ended up doing things like 30 Downs and 40 Downs I think. The whole premise of the 20 Down was to do five or six different exercises 20 times each, then repeat those five or six exercises one less time till you got to zero. So, your first set would be 20 crunches, 20 lunges, 20 dead fish, 20 leg kicks, 20 jumpies, 20 push ups, etc. Whatever exercises you pick. Then… you do all those 19 times, then 18 times, then 17 times till you hit zero. A big part of the exercise is the getting up and down from each exercise. It’s a lot of work changing positions. On top of that we used to use extra weights when doing jumpies or lunges. Well, I picked to do this but I started with a 15 down since I hadn’t done it in a while and I don’t exercise at all. 30 minutes later I had only gotten to ten and I was panting heavily, had a headache, whole body was sore, and I was just about done. I had slowed down to a snails pace and it was only getting worse.
With my ambition high I had taken on way to much. Not only did I try and do a 15 down, DUMB, but I did half of it with extra weights, STUPID, and added in a run around my house after every set, WAY TO OVER DO IT DUMMY. At 10 I was done and went inside with my headache and sore body. My head was turning and I laid down and passed the hell out for a good hour or so. I guess I learned it’s not that easy to just pop back into things. I’ll work up to doing a full set again, with extra weights. That’s going to be my goal for now. If anybody who exercises reads this, try doing a 20 down or something like it. It’s exhausting and you’ll probably love it because it works out your whole body. 
