Some Dude on the Internet

Yesterday was a bummer day for some reason. Well, I have theories but enough emo.

TODAY instead of going straight home from work, I headed over to the Great Western Power Company... the gym I plan on joining. I have a zillion things to do today so I couldn't climb or anything, but I did spend a little time talking to Ryan/guy working there about the place, wandering around checking out the facilities and stuff.

I am so STOKED to join up. Even taking the awesomeness of rock walls as a given, there's a nice little area sectioned off for Cross Fit, a weights and cardio room with lots of equipment I have no idea how to use, and a nice big (huge windows, well lit!) yoga room.

I plan on making as much use out of all of it as possible. Maybe not the cardio equip. Membership includes the other touchstone gyms, which was a selling point for me because I'll probably go to Berkeley Ironworks fairly often, too. There is daily Cross Fit between Ironworks and GWPC, though unfortunately several days a week I won't be able to attend due to work conflict. Yoga classes, too. I feel a need for yoga in my life but that P90x yoga vid is getting old quick, and I feel like there's a lot more that yoga has to offer than what's on that tape, and having an instructor to help my form will be a nice asset, too.

8 minute bike ride from my house, 15 from work.

Awesome.

I regret a little bit (okay, a lot) that I didn't take the fitness test and 'before' measurements and photos before starting p90x.

However, I did, at one point before starting measure my arm around my right bicep flexed and relaxed.

Just over 12" at the bicep with the arm straight, and just under 13.5" same place with the arm flexed.
Today- Just under 13" with the arm straight, and right at 14.25" with the arm flexed.

Not too shabby. (and not quite done with p90x, either)

I just got done with the first part of today's workout (P90x Chest and Back! BRING IT!) and was checking teh eljay friendslist while sipping my delicious recovery drink.

I looked at Lynn's post and thought, aww, I love you, Lynn. I looked at somewhitedog's post and thought, aww, I love you, somewhitedog. I looked at some random poster on lj-comm=ftm and thought, aww, I love you random ftm guy, and then I thought wait. What's going on here?

I've been a grumpy bastard for the past week, hating everyone and everything. What changed?

Last week was rest week in my program. There were no resistance workouts.

Fascinating.

I got a bunch of new weights at Target yesterday. A pair of 10 lbs and a pair of 15 lbs. They were FUN getting home on my bike, I'll tell you that. That's 50 pounds in case anyone doesn't feel like bothering with the math.

I had put off doing my workout until after the Target trip so I could use those new weights, but on the way there I discovered another busted spoke and had to go to two different bike shops to get it fixed (Recycle Bicycle, our normal bikeshop, apparently doesn't do repairs on weekends so I had to go to a different shop). There I learned that apparently the accident a few weeks ago had bent the back wheel, too, enough that it'll probably just keep busting spokes fairly often until I can get the wheel replaced. I have learned a valuable lesson about getting information from people who hit me on my bike so I can hit them up for money for all the repairs. =P

So I didn't get to work out until like 830pm, and when I did I really pushed myself hard with the new weights. Near the end of the workout I started feeling a little dizzy and near-nausea, so I ended up skipping ab ripper even though I actually wanted to do it. I had done a lot of biking, worked really hard in my workout, and probably hadn't gotten enough of the right kinds of things to eat to successfully pull through that last fifteen minutes or so. Frustrating.

I also got a couple new pairs of shorts. Have I mentioned I kill pants? I have to replace them frequently. Back down to 34" waist, had been at 36" most of the summer, and as recently as a month ago tried both sizes and had gone with the 36". Also bought another pair of workout shorts. <3

Also a soccer ball. Edwin and I played around with it a little bit in my room this morning and now I can't wait to take it to the park and kick it back and forth. I miss soccer!

Last in my collection of manly things I bought yesterday is shaving supplies. I skipped the razor that vibrated, but still think that 5 blades might just be overkill... particularly on my peach fuzz. >_< If Edwin's around tomorrow I might get him to help me with that and hopefully keep me from somehow messing it up terribly. Otherwise I'll probably wait until next week.

I've noticed some overall physique changes over the last week or so. Between regular intense workouts and my first few doses of T, I am gaining muscle mass and losing fat. Losing the fat is painfully slow, especially now that I am paying attention to it. It seems like there is still a lot of it on my limbs and torso and face.

I got weighed thursday when I got my fourth shot. 164. Down more than 5 pounds from four weeks earlier. And I know I've put on muscle, so I must have lost more than that in fat.

If I stop looking at the fat that's still there, I can see that I've definitely lost a lot in the hip area. I still have some love handles, but they don't dominate the shape of my torso anymore.

I took a shower today and looked in the mirror before I put my binder on, though already wearing a tee and undershirt. I realized I still read myself as male moreso than even with a binder two months ago. My shoulders are broader- latissimus dorsi bulking up. My biceps, too, are starting to take some shape, though it's hard to tell without feeling them because the fat on my arms is still softening the visible edges.

This week in particular I also noticed a pretty sharp increase in strength. I can hug Edwin so tightly it starts to hurt. He doesn't complain about the increased backrub strength, though, and I found it particularly enjoyable for myself to work my arm muscles and fingers on his back. The muscles wanted to stretch, to be used, and they loved it, and he loved it and that was good.

Another weekend. If nothing else, this one is guaranteed to be better than last if only because I get to go home tomorrow at the normal time. I don't have any plans for the fourth- Eira gets off work at about eight and I'd like to see if there's a park or someplace to ride bikes to and chill for a while. Fireworks or not.

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Edwin and I have been cooking a lot lately, which is good for our wallets since we aren't going out to eat. Last week he made some Zucchini Potato Soup, and while it was good, it was missing something. So earlier this week I made more, and this time made dumplings to put in the soup and it was perfect. If only they had some nutritional value- flour, salt, sugar, baking soda and powder, butter and buttermilk. Can't eat those all the time they're so heavy.

Thursday night he made some hummus, while I made seasoned asparagus and we collaborated on Grilled Cajun Salmon with Tomato Pineapple Salsa. The cajun/seasoning on the salmon was awesome, I'd probably do that again, though with less salt, the cajun stuff we bought had a lot of salt in it so with added salt in the recipe it was just a tiny bit too much. The tomato pineapple salsa was a bit of a disappointment, though. Edwin had picked out the recipe thinking the weird flavor combos would magically come together, but it was really nothing special and just kind of weird. Oh well. He'd been disappointed with the hummus, too, until I was like, "You know what this needs? Some of this red onion we got for the salsa." Red onion and hummus on pita? Perfect.

I've cut out coffee almost completely. Now I usually drink green tea. I still haven't figured out how to make it not taste burnt. It's a little better now that I've been using water that isn't too hot, but it's still nowhere near as delicious as the tea at Yusan's or Ichiban.

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trashedbat asked, in my previous post, how my energy levels have been since going on T. It's a little hard to say because I started making a lot of changes to my overall health right at the same time. I started exercising on a daily basis, and making a very conscious effort to eat healthy foods almost exclusively. I also added some workout supplements before and after my workouts. All these things have a positive effect on my energy levels. If I had to guess, I'd say the exercise has had the most impact, but the exercise is made possible by the good food and supplements I take in. I WILL say, though, that I have found myself to be both lazier and grumpier in the day or two immediately before a shot, which indicates to me a fairly strong correlation between having low testosterone in my system and having very low energy.

I guess my point is I can't for certain say that the T gives me more energy than I had before starting it, just because I have less energy when it is low in my system. I have had more energy and better moods since starting, but again, exercise and healthy eating probably has a lot more to do with that than T specifically.

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I have noticed my Left brain feels like it is becoming more active. That's the math and language hemisphere, as opposed to the creative/abstract right hemisphere. I'm finding it easier to put my thoughts and emotions to words, and therefore to be able to understand them better myself, rather than having all this jumbled up frustration or undefined upset-ness. Now, if I get upset, I can actually identify what is making me upset, and take steps to resolve it, rather than before when I'd just get upset and not know why/not say anything/sit and stew in that frustration.

I probably would be concerned about resultant atrophy in my right hemisphere, but I don't think it's working like that. It feels more like an opportunity for overall growth than a tradeoff. And it feels more like myself, the way I should be, the way I always should have been. Like there was this block between where I was and reaching my full potential, and now I'm starting to chip away at it. It's kind of exciting.

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( Quick (hopefully) update on Exercise stuff. )

Sorry for the spam today. I just got done working out and wanted to write out what I did to make myself feel better. Mostly for my own records later on, but maybe some of you will find it interesting or helpful.

1- posting about it/ writing about it helped. Partially because it got me thinking about what I was dealing with and about how I could start feeling better. Partially because putting it on the internet forced me to realize I'm not completely alone over here. (Big thanks to those who commented with support, that helped, too!)
2- FOOD. I'd had a small bowl of oatmeal at around 730 this morning and maybe 5oz coffee (with about a teaspoon brown sugar and a couple tablespoons of whole milk? Estimating.) And I'm pretty sure with the way I've been burning energy lately it wasn't enough to keep me going through more than a couple hours, max. I ate 4oz yogurt, ~1/3c walnuts, and ~3oz raspberries after making the post and was feeling better before I was done eating.
3- Talking to my friend Dan a little bit about what I was dealing with (sans vagueries for teh internets)
4- After that, watching the Daily Show and hanging out with Eira a bit (rather than alone in my room with the laptop... certain moods that kind of thing has potential to drag me way under.)
5- Took an "Amplified Muscle Igniter 4x" pill *
6- BROUGHT IT to my p90x workout *

Plans for the day? Talk to T&B and see if DESCENT is happening tonight. SHOWER. Get a nap. Clean house a bit. Head up to Berkeley. Will deal with IHSS tomorrow.

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* EXERCISE YEAH!
So I've been trying these AMP supplements from GNC. First and foremost I am SUPER glad I looked them up online before taking the recommended dosage, wow. The serving size on these are 3 tablets for the 'Amplified Muscle Igniter 4x' (let's call it AMI4x), and 3 scoops for the 'Amplified Wheybolic Extreme 60' (AWE60). Reviews said the AWE60 was pretty good, ~8.5/10 rated. But with 1-2 scoops, rather than 3. I had one yesterday, two today. I think two was more than I needed, even for a really intense workout like I did today. Probably stick with 1-1.5 depending on what I feel I need at the end of the workout. The AMI4x, though, was rated a little less favorably, and most reviews said to take only one to start, and definitely no more than two. I'm having mixed results with it- yesterday it didn't help much at all, though I'd tried to go without any coffee since these pills have caffeine in them, and was getting headachey and probably other factors kept me from being able to 'bring it' as much as I would have liked. (recordkeeping, plyo, I got about 25 minutes in, I think). Today, though, right about a half hour after taking the AMI4x, I was pumped and ready for my workout, and really kept up the pace through the whole thing, only slowing down a little during ab ripper. As I said before I went ahead and had two scoops of the AWE60 today, but I'm feeling a little bloaty in the stomach with that much erf. Also I probably didn't wait long enough after the workout before having it, but I'm not feeling sick or anything, so it's all good.

I thought that deserved its own entry. Lest I ramble on and it gets to the TLDR stage.

On the exercise front, I made it all the way through the first week of P90X. The last couple days (thursday and friday) were hard, I was pretty exhausted and thursday in particular I don't think I'd had enough of the right kinds of food on wednesday so getting up and trying to exercise before breakfast thursday was rough. I wanted really badly to quit halfway through, but I made it all the way through 'Legs and Back', though I did skip Ab Ripper that time. I did it sunday and tuesday, so I guess skipping it thursday this time won't kill me. Yesterday was Kenpo-X, which, as Mel has been telling me repeatedly, was a lot of fun. There were a few moves I had a hard time catching on to, though. Well, that one's repeated every week, even on 'rest' weeks, so I'm sure I'll get it after another try or two.

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Thursday I went back in to the clinic for my second T shot. I got the RN going about nutrition, which Edwin enjoyed a great deal. lol. I had asked if I needed more food to deal with increased energy needs and she was like, "I gotta be honest with you, you're overweight, you don't need more food than you're already eating." Later she kind of retracted the statement like, I didn't mean for that to come out like it did, I mean most americans are overweight and the food industry is trying to kill us. Edwin did back me up and was telling her I've been doing really well with eating healthier the past few weeks but later he had fun saying the RN had said I was fat. (I weighed in at ~169, with stuff in my pockets but no shoes)

I think I'd failed to word the question like I meant it in my head. Because I HAVE cut back pretty hardcore on how much I eat and what I do eat tends to be much much healthier than a month or two ago. For example a month ago I was eating a couple eggs with a bunch of cheese and a bagel slathered in cream cheese and 2-3 travelmugs full of coffee with french vanilla coffeemate every day for breakfast. I switched to a couple eggs with just a little cheese and an english muffin with a little jelly and cut back to 1 mug of coffee (still with coffeemate) a day. Now Most mornings I have oatmeal with about a half tablespoon of butter and seasalt, and often don't finish my mug of coffee, which I'm now making with milk instead of coffeemate. I've also been making a much greater effort to have vegetables, particularly green ones, every day, and preferably a few servings a day. Still want to get better about that because vegetables are awesome. Also planning on cutting red meat back to maybe once a week instead of a few times. Even though that makes me sad because cow is delicious.

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On the physical change front, I expect to start seeing any potential changes from this shot in the next few days, if the first shot was an indication. That doesn't mean I don't have anything to report- I got my first taste of whoaacne yesterday... not so much visible, but I could definitely feel it, especially after biking to work. I sweat way more now than I used to, which is good in a way because sweating is healthy, but it made my face burn for a while when I first got here.

Also my knees look fat. >8[
At first I was like, I don't remember having such fat knees, wth. But I can feel a lot of muscle under there, so I suspect I'm building muscle way faster than I'm losing the fat sitting on top of it which is sadfunny but also makes me happy because I AM building a lot of muscle, I can feel it. I can feel my external obliques under my lovehandles, which is new for me, and makes me hopeful that I'll have nice visible ex-obs once some of the fat is burned off. External obliques are the sexiest muscle, fyi.

I think my lower legs are looking manlier, too. I've always been pretty happy having monster calves, but it feels like the fat is peeling away there a liiitle faster than elsewhere and I'm starting to have pretty defined lower leg muscles. Like my Tibialis Anterior muscles. Whoa, where did they come from? Also the skin itself seems coarser, like it has a slight 'cracked' texture. The pores and hair follicles are more visible, and it's definitely looking like there's multiple hairs growing from most follicles now, even if they're just like transparent baby hairs at this point, and I don't remember there being hair on my knees before. Exciting.

This week has been weird. Somehow I wasn't expecting it, but I suppose I should have been. Friday and Saturday last week after my shot on thursday were fairly normal, though if anything I had maybe a little more energy than usual and my mood was plus a point or two.

Sunday was when I noticed most of the (minor) physical changes. I had very little hair on my arms, and I'm pretty sure the density of my arm hair increased by a lot, though it's still pretty invisible except when seen from an angle. I didn't notice increased leg hair at all, instead the pores on my legs are more visible, which in itself makes them look more masculine. Peach fuzz on the face, though again not visible unless seen from the side. Maybe a tiny bit extra at the corners of my mouth. Slight change in body odor. Maybe a tiny bit of extra acne- not specifically on the face, though, there's a couple spots on my left leg, for instance. *shrug*

Monday evening and Tuesday during the day I want to say is when my energy levels peaked. I felt like I was on top of the world. Did a bunch of working out, felt more energized after working out than before. It was amazing.

Tuesday night, though, I crashed pretty hard. I'd gone over to a couple friends' house, and instead of a healthy meal as I'd been eating lately, we ordered pizza. The friends in question, while accepting of my transition, haven't bothered to try changing what name or gender they use to refer to me. I haven't been hanging out with them as much recently, for this and a few other reasons. It didn't bother me at first, but as the night wore on and the pizza effected my mood, I just kind of sank into a quiet state and waited for the game to be over so I could leave. I didn't feel like raging at them about it would help my situation right then, and have since confronted one of them on aim about it. The other... well I need to confront him about it, too, but if I approach it wrong it'd probably do more harm than good. It's complicated. I don't want to compromise my emotional wellbeing for him, though, so I'm probably going to just not hang out as much until the physical changes are more obvious.

Anyway, Tuesday evening was rough for those reasons and the fact that I hadn't gotten a ton of sleep monday night and got up early on tuesday, was up late again tuesday night, and I'm pretty sure the food was a big one. I had some fruit and green beans before bed, though, so that helped a little.

Wednesday and thursday I was still really low energy. Thursday in particular I fought myself most of the day to keep from sinking into just feeling totally depressed. I wrote for a while in my journal, and that helped, but later on I ended up raging at Edwin for being wishy washy about where we should eat. Dumb stuff to have anxiety over, but it was mostly that I could tell he had an opinion about where we should eat, but I couldn't get him to make a decision, and it turned into a negative-feedback loop for me. I felt better after food, even though I paid way too much for way too mediocre sushi. I passed out pretty quick after getting home, I think.

Friday was much better. I had oatmeal for breakfast, and when I realized I'd forgotten to bring the coffee grounds back to my place from his, I prodded him into getting up and walking to Peets with me. On the way there I realized I was okay. Crashing so hard like I did on weds and thurs really messed with me psychologically, and I had been worried I'd be at that kind of low-energy level until my next shot. Friday morning gave me a chance to recenter and realize that yeah, mood swings are going to happen but I can handle it and there's light on the other side. I wish I'd been a little more energetic, or that I'd found better things to do with my time than watch the last 5 episodes of season 6 of House in the evening. Still, though, definitely an improvement.

Today so far I walked maybe a mile and a half round trip to the farmers market under the macarthur freeway at lakeshore, including about 4 flights of stairs up in this little park that's basically nothing but stairs. I went to the top and wrote in my journal for a while before continuing back here. Did the X-stretch video and feel lazy now, but good. I'm thinking I want to try and start the actual 90-day program, if only so I have some structure to what vids I do every day rather than just picking one kind of at random.

I didn't mention anywhere that wednesday I only managed to do the ab-ripper video (15 minutes long) and there were one or two of the exercises I just couldnt' do or only did a few times. Thursday and friday I didn't do any specific exercise which sucks but I'm not sore anymore, either, which is nice. Keep chugging, I guess.

Just want to start keeping better track of what I eat and do physically on a daily basis. I'll keep it behind a cut for those not interested.

( Read more... )

I intend to edit this post with anything else relevant today (or maybe for the week?).