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A brief history:
– four years LCHF eating
– down 21lbs and fluctuating up and down
– Blood Sugars fairly good but not best
– Constant ketosis and feeling great
– Not exercising regularly

The last point, no regular exercise, is something I want to tackle. Let’s face it though, I’m a thinker. I’d rather sit in a nice soft chair with a coffee and think random thoughts all day. To get up and say mow the lawn takes a Samsonian effort. Procrastination is my middle name. My Google blog, which I haven’t posted to yet, is called “Hopelessly Delinquent.”

Of course my endocrinologist, God’s gift to diabetics everywhere *that was sarcasm*, harps on me for not exercising more. According to the holy one, it’s the only way I can lose weight. And after these four years of fighting him, I think he may be right. I participate in many discussion forums, and a common thread I hear is “you gotta work!” The time has come for John to work at getting those fifty pounds off, and if that doesn’t work, we’re going to have a serious discussion with the almighty endo.

I have 400 pounds of standard weights, 7ft, 6ft, and a curl bars, and a power rack. You’d think there’d be no excuses for using it. Mind you the room has been filled with junk all summer as we’ve replaced the floors in the house. But there’s no more acceptable excuses. It’s now Grok time!

I’m hitting a routine I’ve used before, a basic full body workout where I perform three sets of 8 to 12 reps, generally. Some exercises like bench press I’ll do 6 to 10 reps, and others like squats, I’ll do 15 to 20 reps. This is a program out of an old Lou Ferrigno book. It has worked for me before, and I plan on following it for three months to build up my all around strength steadily and safely.

I’m starting out very light, extremely light. People will laugh at my weakness. Pfft. Remember, I’m overweight and out of shape. I need to get my muscles used to lifting and I need to find my points of failure. I will add weight rapidly. Anybody who has ever started from scratch knows that you feel like a convoy of trucks ran over you in the early going. Your stiff all over and your body shakes and quakes from the intensity. You really do need to start out light.

I also know I won’t go real heavy. I work out at home alone. I am protected by my power rack — my squats and bench presses are statically spotted. I can drop 500lbs on my chest and know the bars will catch them. They restrict movement slightly, but hey, I’m doing the exercises. It takes me an hour, maybe a bit more. Joining a gym would cost me two to three hours plus lots of bucks I don’t have. The hardcore trainers will of course cringe, but feel good that John performs safely. He doesn’t lift more than he’s capable of, and he practices good form.

I progress steadily. When I hit my max reps, say three sets of 12 reps, the next session I will add weight and drop the reps down to three 8’s, or maybe a bit higher. I will then progress the reps until I max out again. Here’s an example.
– Day 1 100lbs 10 10 10
– Day 2 100lbs 12 11 10
– Day 3 100lbs 12 12 12
– Day 4 110lbs 8 8 8
– Day 5 110lbs 10 10 10 (previous day felt awesome, so I stepped it up)
– Day 6 110lbs 12 11 10
– Day 7 110lbs 12 12 12
– Day 8 120lbs 8 8 8

You can by following this method of progression my resistance increases steadily. The idea is that the final rep on th third set will be very close to failure. For obvious reasons I don’t go to failure, especially for the dangerous exercises such as squats and bench presses. But if I fails on a leg extension, who cares? I might make a long bang, but I won’t drop anything on a body part.

I listen to my body. I’ve never strained a muscle training before, but if something does happen, I know enough to stop, rest, and seek help. I hope.

My first session was Friday Aug 10. I started with two sets of squats using 70lbs. I did 20 reps each. I proceeded through leg extensions, leg curls, calf raises, bench press, bent rows, overhead press, upright row, bicep curls, and tricep curls. I skipped wrist rolls. I performed only one rep of the last two exercises. These are not major muscles, and I already felt worked. Again, we’re talking very light weights here. 40lb bench presses will not impress anybody.

I’m tracking vitals while I do this:
BP 132/71 before and 120/65 after
BG 6.0 before and 9.0 after then 10.0 an hour later

It’s interesting that BP dropped and blood sugars rose. These were actually expected. Another interesting note is I didn’t hypo later. Past sessions have always resulted in major BG drops through the night.

On day 2, Sunday, I upped intensity. I felt stiffness in my calves, but nowhere else. I barely felt stressed, but I didn’t let that go to my head. I upped my reps to three sets of each, and I upped my squats to 90lbs, 3×15. I didn’t fail at anything; though those nasty 40lb bench presses stung. I’ve always struggled with upper body strength. At one point I could squat 350lbs and barely press 120. Pfft.

I felt worked after this session, and my vitals were once again interesting
BP 130/71 to 108/62
BG 6.2 to  8.9 and it kept rising. I changed my pump set and got it around 7 for bed. I woke up around 7, so once again no major hypos following. This morning I’m feeling worked. I’m feeling muscle tingling and tightening in my legs, butt and chest. I feel the work, and that is an awesome feeling.

So we’ll se how this goes. We’ll see if I can continue, if it helps me lose fat, and if it helps me feel better and write better. I’ll revisit after a month.

[Starting weight: 229.6]