MTheads

Where's the Bottle Holder?

 

A woman who wears 4" heels is psychologically incapable of zooming about on a highly functional, yet dorky looking product.  This has to be photo-shopped.

You're Only Twelve Once....Make It Special

Unfortunately for our daughter, her birthday came at a really busy time for us here in Moscow.  So, after realizing Mom was never going to make her cake, she finally made it herself.  Don't think I didn't feel like the worst mom in the world after seeing what she came up with while I was out at yet another dinner or reception.  Or after I destroyed any sense of pride she felt in her efforts with my cruel laughter.  At least I didn't make her pose with it.  It did taste quite yummy, however. 

Mommy loves you!

Example Workout

I had a great workout this weekend.  I wanted to push myself a bit harder than usual and I did this by upping the reps.  When I thought I couldn't do one more rep, I had my workout partner help me do two more negatives.  And now I'm paying for it!

I did 95lbs deadlifts 10reps x 3 sets  - a bit lighter and more reps than usual - just because.

150lb leg presses 10 x 3

80lb leg curls 3 sets to failure

85lb bench press and then down 10lbs a set for 3 sets

Superset rows and lat pulldowns for a total of 6 sets

Tricep pushdowns 2 sets

Calf raises 90lb 2 sets.  I just do whatever weight the guy in front of me left in place.   Crazy, I know.  Though, if there are four large plates on the machine, I remove two. 

And that's my weight workout.  I switch out walking lunges for deadlifts and occasionally do squats.  I also do the bench press/fly machine here and there.  I like to do shoulder presses when my stupid shoulder doesn't bother me (old injury).  Ditto for pull-ups.  I don't do anything for my belly.  The abs get a great workout anyways, and after four children, one c-sec, and two ab surgeries, the days of the six pack are long gone.

I return to the gym once all my soreness is gone.  If I don't get sore, I change up my routine.  I'm getting stronger and a bit more muscle-ly, so I'm quite pleased with my program. I'll have to post some pictures of me soon.  I have a "before" shot of a wimpy arm somewhere for comparison. 

Why am I bothering to post this?  Because I love to read about other women's workouts -- sort of a way to compare my effort and see where and how far women can go -- I thought maybe someone would be interested to know about mine.  

 

My Subconscious Doesn't Understand Me

One of my recent reading kicks has been for those trendy "how we think and why your brain is no more capable of free choice than a hamster's" books.  You know the books - The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable by Nassim Nicholas Taleb, Everything is Obvious: *Once You Know the Answer by Duncan J. Watts, Thinking Fast and Slow, by Danial Kahneman, The Social Animal: The Hidden Sources of Love, Character, and Achievement, by David Brooks, etc, ad nauseum, and so on. 

These authors are all smitten with the new studies which seem to imply that our subconscious mind is making all our choices for us while we blithely go around assuming we're in control.  I've come to find the methodology and conclusions of these brain studies highly suspect --  rather like modern phrenology.  And for a field whose conclusions lean on the side of questioning everything we think we know about ourselves, their conclusions sure sound suspiciously confident.

All these authors cite studies done on human brains while their owners are in MRIs looking at various pictures or told to think on some topic.  Nothing contrived here!  Nothing unscientific about showing self-selected test subjects researcher-selected photographs while in a metal coffin!  I think we can now definitively say that our brains light up. 

Of all the books, I like Taleb's The Black Swan best.  It is good to be shown how difficult it is for our minds to encompass super big numbers and difficult statistics.  Accurate risk assessment is difficult for humans.  We should constantly remind ourselves of our tendency to rationalize and ignore.  You've got me there.  We do delude ourselves.  Some of us may even be closer to automatons than to Socrates, think of the Occupy Wall Street types.  But to go farther, to assume all of us are automatons in the control of a subconscious that apparently is bent on us buying groceries from the perimeter of the store, is idiotic. 

And in these human behavioural studies, 100% of the time results are never 100%.  Instead, its 80% of the time, or 78% of participants did such and such.  What about the rest?  Outliers?  Margin of error?  Contrarians who are as predictable in their contrariness?  Or free will?  Ask the hamster. 

 

How Goes the Working Out....

Haven't posted for awhile, thought I'd state the obvious.  I have been lifting weights regularly, however.  I'm still doing fairly high intensity once or twice a week.  It depends on how sore I managed to make myself.  Is it normal to be sore after every workout?  I do lift aggressively.  I also switch between certain exercises to keep my muscles confused.  For example, I switch between dead lifts and walking lunges.  After each rotation, I'm sore!  I can't do too much switching with the upper body due to some shoulder issues.  I've found what hurts and doesn't hurt.  Luckily, bench pressing is fine.  But dumbbell presses and pull downs hurt the shoulder. 

I've plateaued on the bench press.  I lift 85 lbs as my heaviest set.  My PR for one lift is 95 lbs.  I won't move past 85 lbs until I can do 6 unassisted reps.  Right now, I can do 5 with help on the 6th bringing it back up.  For deadlifts, I do 115lbs reps for 3 sets or so. 

My approach to weightlifting is very personal and intuitive.  I've found what works for me and, maybe more importantly, I've found what keeps me motivated to continue.

1) I enjoy lifting heavy.  So, I start at my max and go down in weight in successive sets, if I go down in weight. 

2) I don't like warm-up sets.  I go straight into my heaviest set.  Everyone is different.  Many people I know lift heavier after a good warm-up set.  I do not.  No amount of explaining how important a warm-up set is will change this fact.  I have given the warm-up and work-up to max lift plenty of time and found they are not for me. 

3) I don't like most small muscle or isolation kind of lifts.  These are a waste of time for me when I could just spend a bit more time doing the big lifts.  Again, I've done every lift in the books and isolating my quads doesn't work them like doing dead lifts until I hate dead lifts.  My muscles look the same from heavy bench pressing as when I also did curls, flys, and other teeny tiny lifts.  And I'm out of the gym in less than an hour rather than after two.

4) I don't sweat missing a workout.  Sometimes, my schedule will not allow time in the gym.  There are always the people who say that one can always make time to workout.  These people lack imagination and/or children.  That said, I certainly put working out towards the top of my priority list.  I'm just not going to flog myself when life gets in the way of plans.

5) I value sleep over exercise.  Exercising without adequate sleep is like running a car without proper oil levels.  Also, I'm a horrible person when sleep deprived. 

6) I never assume my way is for everyone.  I hate the scolds who have lists of rules for the rest of us.  Telling us what we should wear, or what we should or shouldn't listen to, or what lifts are mandatory for "real" weightlifters, or what "real" gyms should look like is fascist.  Hitler had a list like that, or would have.  These are preferences, not biblical scripture.