Connie's Questions & Answers

[Connie Brown]

Thanks for starting this, Andrew. Can I play too?
I need the same end results....

Those questions:

What is your current physical condition?

- Not so good; 5'3", 260 pounds, some dumbbell-type strength, not much endurance either muscular or cardio.

What are your target goals?

- First recovering movement & strength; then having some fun with play and competitions. Like the track & field throwing events for a focus.

How long will you be willing to go to see results?

- As long as it takes

What's your current diet involve?

- Organic whole foods, omnivore, no refined stuff, no whites/sugars/addictive substances (the Potatoes not Prozac program)
moderate just about everything

What are your current exercise activities?

- 20 min- 2 hours bagpipes 3x per week
- 10-20 min daily CB learning beginning beginner moves
(working on clean to order, basic swing, outward pendulum,
5 x 5)
- weekends on a scooter for fun (kickbike.com - great for coasting)
- avoid walking much - extra weight hurts the feet

Is your job physical, stressful?

- cube dweller, software / tech writing - not physical but mentally challenging - I learned years ago not to take on that kind of stress

Do you have any physical ailments or preconditions?

- Nope other than obesity; but the apple shape gets in the way

What kind of equipment and courses do you have at your disposal?

- dumbbells 1 - 20 pounds
- bench
- kickbike for cardio
- 2 5-pound clubbells
- courses? good park & rec locally I guess

What's your exercise background?

- how far back? athletic as a child so some ancient memory of feeling good. Early sports, anything involving launching things - softball, field hockey, field sports. Ice skating. Quit athletics in my 20s with marriage and children - big mistake!

- Recently, just basic dumbbell weight training a la "Strong Women Stay Young" by Nelson. I tried and rejected walking & stationary cycling because they either hurt or are unbearably boring.

Connie

Connie,

Congrats on geting to here. You will get fantastic advice. The CBs will give you a great all over workout but will not make a huge difference in weight. I would strongly urge you to get Dr. Greg Ellis book and start cutting the carbs now. Not sure what your goals are in that direction, but you posted this info here so I'm guessing you've decided it's time for a change.

Bill

[Doug Szolek]

Connie,

I second Bill's suggestion to look into low carb solutions for dieting. I managed to lose about 40lbs. over the course of 3 months earlier this year while building solid, healthy muscle mass (aproximatly 10 lbs. of it) by eating whole foods, very low to no carbs other than a high fiber intake. The great thing about this aproach is that fiber and protien help you to feel full much faster than other nutrients, and if you're stimulating the growth in daily training, as it sounds you are, then it is really hard to eat too much protien.

I'd also suggest picking up the Zdorovye Health course from RMAX.tv to help you get your joints back up to health after carrying the extra weight.

If you take your specific goals for what you want to get out of your Clubbell training to the Program Desiqn Help forum I'd be happy to work with you to structure an optimal plan of action to get you on fast (hard) road to health and energy.

Good luck, and remember we are all here for one another, let us know how you do,

-Coach Szolek

[Connie Brown]

Wow thank you for your prompt and thoughtful replies.

The carbs are already as low as possible - I have explored that side of things ad nauseum ha ha. I have plenty o protein and veggies at regular meal times, and enough fuel in the form of starch (whole beans, grains etc) to prevent blood sugar crashes and to keep up serotonin (long story but part of my history). (ps did you know that for some people, successful low-carb can deplete serotonin? guess how I found that out)

What's missing is ENOUGH movement. Hormones are also involved beyond the insulin one you mention with low-carb. BTW, the spiky kind of HIIT training drives up cortisol beyond this musculature's ability to handle it - not a good thing. When I am stronger I expect to handle such intensity better.

So. I was hoping to use CBs to get some long-slow-distance type training in, so I will get me over to the program design side. Thanks so much. I am guessing a cardio-endurance protocol based on what I read in the CB book.

thanks again guys,
Conie

[sin_goodfellow]

Connie,

I worked for Apple Tech Support for almost two years. 40 hrs/week at $13/hr with no real financial drain equaled lots of bad food choices. I know what it feels like to wake up and say, "where did my ability to have some good old fashioned physical fun go?" I'm 6' 2" and weighed 275 pounds.

Losing that weight has not been fun and took about a year of work, off and on, but I'm down to 200 or so and pretty trim. I've fluctuated recently do to my weight training for Crew, but muscle weight is good weight :)

I know that everyone is crazy for protein nowadays and carbs have a horrible name, but I did'nt follow any sort of low-carb diet to lose my pounds. This is what worked for me.

My Plan:
*Don't focus on your weight, focus on how your clothes fit.
*Find out your average caloric intake, any nutritional guide should have the metric, then cut that intake by 300-500 calories and do enough exercise to create a caloric debt.
*Try and eat healthy. Greens/reds(salad), fruit, zero fast food.
*Hill intervals. For your situation, I would suggest pool intervals, if you can gain access to a pool. It won't pound on your joints like running ect.
*It's better to eat healthy, but not exceeding your caloric limit for the day is paramount. If you choose to eat all your calories for that day in the form of a pint of ice-cream, do so, but don't eat anything else except for greens/reds or fruit(negligible calories and good for you).
*Drink tons and tons of water.
*Start a garden. My roommate started one and helping out was a nice supplemental. Manual labor is great for weight loss.
*Have a day of relaxation and sin 1/wk.
*Listen to your body, it will tell you what works better than any book/video/doctor ect.

In my experience, most diets are simply a way to trick you into eating yourself into caloric debt, aka weight loss. I've changed my lifestyle of eating and that is a good end goal, but a diet you can stick with can work wonders. The above is not a miracle diet, It did'nt cause the weight to vanish in a month, but it kept the weight off. As Coach Sonnon says in Body Flow, we all have grace and physical genius within, we just have to get out of our own way.

I have faith you will find your Flow Connie,
Jesse Wells

[Scott Sonnon]

Connie,

Everything's going to be just fine and you're going to get where you want to be healthily.

I'm guessing that if you start working towards high volume Swipes, you're going to get the stimulation that you're craving. You can find Swipes at the end of my video or can see them here: Swipes (http://www.clubbell.tv/images/swipe.avi) and also pictured here: http://www.clubbell.tv/newcertreqs.html.

We need to take advantage of your daily 10-20 minute Clubbell workout. Can we split that so that you're doing 10 minutes in the morning and 10 minutes in the evening? It's not addition of time, just a split. I want you to commit yourself to 10 minutes 2X/day of Swipes. For the next seven days I want you to practice 5 Swipes per minute for those 10 minutes, and do that 10 minute session in the morning and in the evening. Can you do that?

Can we also find some time in the afternoon for a 10-15 minute range of motion session? If so, I want you to find a quiet place to move your shoulders, elbows and wrists in circles 10 reps both directions. Then I want you to do the same with your neck. Then with your hips, hands on hips swiveling like using an invisible hula hoop. Then with your one leg in the air, close to the ground, and then the next. Then with your knees circling, and finally with your ankles. All movements performed smoothly and slowly. Wrap up with long slow exhales and try and relax your whole body at the end of the exhale and don't inhale until it just begins to feel uncomfortable. Don't try to inhale, just stand straight and allow the air to be sucked back into you. Do this 5 times.

Then I want you to post this as your goal in the Personal Training Logs section. Keep me updated on what you experience each day, and in seven days, we'll look at your progress and reassess which direction to go.

Let's go!

[Connie Brown]

Jesse: thanks so much for the encouragement. You sound trim and great! I specially liked that you understand the sedentary sneakiness of cube life. I worked in a high-stress tech support center once and I think tech support guys are awesome - and now that you are fit, how cool is that.

Coach Sonnon: I started the log under "Brown's Stimulating Swipe-o-Rama."
here: http://www.circularstrengthmag.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=212

I choked up on the CB (shoulda wrote that down) as I am so new I didn't even do armpit casts yet! all seems to be okay.

Thanks for the encouragement and gentle and direct program....

Connie

[Scott Sonnon]

Outstanding beginning, Connie.
Keep us updated on your continued progress!

[sin_goodfellow]

Jesse: thanks so much for the encouragement. You sound trim and great! I specially liked that you understand the sedentary sneakiness of cube life. I worked in a high-stress tech support center once and I think tech support guys are awesome - and now that you are fit, how cool is that.



Thank you Connie for having the courage to make a change in your life. Your an inspiration to me to keep on my road of improvement. So many of us in life just drift along, never bothing to actually swim.

Jesse Wells

[James Boelter]

I highly recommend the book 'Lights Out: Sleep Sugar and Survival' by Formby and Bentley. It will open your eyes and supply some missing links to your ideas about weight loss and diet. Dan John once had an incredibly helpful article about his experiences with 'Lights Out' at danjohn.org, but I haven't been able to find his training and nutrition pages there the last time I looked (the main thrust of his web site is Catholic catechism and education, which is quite confusing the first few times you go there).

[Connie Brown]

Funny you should mention the sleep connection. In my quest to regain health I found out about that too. Eek I had undiagnosed sleep apnea for years and boy does that kill your metabolism furnace among other things.

I haven't read the book yet and will see if I can speed-read it in my local Barnes & Noble.

In my humble opinion the disordered eating causes the disordered sleep - in other words, take out the "white powder" foods and then the sleep is easier. Course one has to go to bed on time. Multivariate problem for sure.

Connie

[Scott Sonnon]

Connie, dropping refined sugar from our diet was probably the major action allowing us to endure the first year of our daughter's life (sleeping 3-4 hours a night.) Powered by organic food-stuffs and not 'leaking' energy through simple carbs and refined sugar (as well as dropping caffeine) allowed us fitful albeit shortened sleep. We agree with you totally that sleep patterns heavily influence eating patterns.

[Shaf]

Dan's a good friend of mine. Here's his site:

http://danjohn.org/coach.html

Also, check out the latest Dolfzine for a recap of his meat, leaves, and berries diet.

Shaf

[Connie Brown]

Thanks for the URL Shaf. Interesting web site!

Coach S: good idea on the sleep sugar situation with a newborn! I never heard of a young family figuring that one out but it makes perfect sense. How great also that you have already figured out the organic whole foods thing. No toddler tantrums wanting lollipops at your house, I am guessing.

Connie,

Just took a look at the MLB diet. That looks like a good shopping list to me. I would just try to avoid having only fruit, or only a salad, for any given meal. I think the order of the list, and the name of the diet, should be a guide. Meat, then some leaves, then even less berries.

Bill