LIVIN' LARGE: Minimizing yourself and maximizing your life!When you have over 100 pounds to lose it can seem impossible to get started in the right direction.
Hey all. I'm Mario, I'm 26, male obviously, and pretty out of shape. I'm currently 281 lbs, and for the past..... maybe 4 years I've been enjoying loads of fast food binges, mixed with eating really really well for a few months, lol. However, my physical activity is pretty minimal. Shockingly, I can do about 6-10 pushups till my arms shake and I can't do anymore. I can bench, 20 lbs for endless amounts of time, 50 lbs for maybe 10 times, and 100 lbs maybe 1 or 2 times. I just quit smoking on New Years Eve, my diet is back to really balanced, thought out and very healthy. All meat I eat is organic and it's always baked never fried. Veggies are stir fried or steamed, and I am actually loving the new food plan I'm on.
The exercise is the BIG change, since I have eaten well over the years. My main concern is shocking my body with movement will cause some heart attack or something. Today I walked, jogged, ran, walked on the treadmill for 1 mile which took 22 minutes. Mostly walking, jogged 1 minute, ran 30 seconds, walked a few minutes, then jogged another minute and walked the rest. I guess I just wanted to say hi to the "livin large" section, because I plan on dropping at least 100 pounds . I cannot believe I let myself get to the point I'm at, but, I'm more motivated right now than I ever have been. Quit smoking cold turkey after 6 years, don't even think about fast food, and if I do, I can easily get it out of my mind. Well, just saying whats up, and, I'd appreciate any tips, good "livin large" exercise ideas, or anything else.
Welcome to the forum. Regarding the treadmill. There's nothing wrong with walking why not leave off the jogging until your weight is down some? If you need to up the intensity there's always the incline. Are you concerned because you're deconditioned or did you actually have some chest pain or discomfort with exercise? If the former taking it a little easier at first should help. If the latter you should probably see your dr just to make sure.
Congrats on quitting smoking. That's a tough one.
Also want to say you might take a look at the Fat Loss Troubleshoot forum and information. Leigh has an awesome package for purchase but she also provides a lof of information on the forum. There's also a lot of info from other members.
Welcome, Mario! And ditto on the jogging thing. At this point, it seems that walking would be much better than the strain that jogging -- even for short periods -- will put on your body while you're carrying that much extra weight. I've been there, done that. Getting yourself injured right out of the gate can be super discouraging and get you completely sidetracked.
I reckon you probably already know this, but just don't forget that your biggest gains (or losses, that is) are going to come from getting your nutrition right. It's always been too tempting for me to slip up on the nutrition side and think that my physical activity will make up for it. It doesn't.
Thanks for the replies! My concern about the jogging and running were not because I had any sort of pains. I actually felt pretty good and accomplished after my jog and run. My concern was because I hadn't jogged in years, except when I'm running into a store when it's raining, lol. I'm actually a hypochondriac, so, I've had plenty of blood tests and EKGs and all that jazz within the past few years, so, health wise, I think I'm OK. I just can't help but worry that since I've been so sedentary that if my heart rate goes up too high I'll just collapse. I'm scared of raising my heart rate cuz, I dunno at what point it will be bad. (Thats the hypochondria talking, lol).
I watched the national body challenge the other day and saw something about recovering heart rate, where they exercised and saw how well the heart rate was after a minute? I think thats what it was. Well I did the jogging and my HR went up to 155, after a minute it was at 115. I dunno if thats good, but I'd imagine it lowering like that is a good sign, lol. My heart rate when I play with the thing at Walmart is always 60-70 BPM, and my blood pressure is always around 130/70-ish.
If you're not having any pain, then intervals aren't an issue. I know I could do them when I was well over 300 pounds. However, you do have to watch out for joint pain and such. I know that when I went back to exercising (on the track to losing weight again) I had a tendency to overdo it. I ignored the dull ache each night for quite a while. I'm notoriously bad for not listening to my body. So, along the line of 'do what I say, not what I do' just be careful. Especially if/when you get onto the weights. I've managed (touch wood) to not do anything much more than a light (nothing a couple of days of rest didn't take care of) pulled muscle here and there, which I'm so happy about.
Yeah, I'm bein careful. My buddy is a little different. He thinks go as hard as you can, as long as you can. I went onto the bench machine to do some rope, butt, pulls where you tie the rope thing to your leg and extend back or whatever, well it was on 80 lbs so I said "hey, can you put that lighter, i have never done this before." he puts it on like, 60, lol. I was like no, put it on 20, i'm not messin myself up just cuz of my ego, lol. He does the heavy lifting and stuff just to "look" strong. Dumb, lol.
It sounds like you got a pretty good grasp on things. Most people want to dive head first into the water, and it usually results in frustration and eventual failure.
Since you are coming from a predominately sedentary lifestyle I assuming, you will want to transition yourself into a more active lifestyle much more slowly than someone who is trying to shed a small amount of weight. In fact, you may have to "lose a little weight" before you can start exercising to lose fat.
If you stick with good nutrition, you can lose fat without exercising. Exercising is really just a bonus, IMO, for someone who is obese. Sometimes people forget that even doing a couple of bodyweight squats for someone who is 280 lbs can be as taxing as a lighter person doing weighted squats. If you can handle doing light walks on the treadmill, that's great, stick with it and progress at a rate that is comfortable for you.
I would suggest instead of hitting the gym 6 days a week or something to the like, that you try to increase your overall daily activity. You would be surprised how much cooking, cleaning, playing with kids, yard work, and walking a dog can increase your daily calorie burning if you are used to sitting all day. Just some thoughts.
Thanks Defiant. I'm a very outdoorsy person, and love hiking, but I guess its hard in the winter. I could look into indoor tennis or raquetball or something.
Just starting!
Linear Mode
