Author: steve

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Injured by Yoga?

Suddenly I could not touch my toes.

It’s not like I’m the most flexible guy in the world. Possibly I’m more flexible than most my age, but I think much of that perceived flexibility comes from the fact that my belly is flatter than most old guys, so I don’t have as much fat in my way when I bend over.

No matter.

I went to bed one day last week with some discomfort in my glutes. (That would be my ass, for those of you unfamiliar with the body’s major muscle groups.) It was just discomfort, nothing to think about.

When I woke up the next day, the discomfort had progressed to what I will call “tightness”, which is just discomfort times two. The only time I really felt it was when I tried to bend over, so I thought I’d test it out, and, sure enough, I could barely get my hands to my knees before my body told me to stop.

What the hell?!?!?!? Have I finally really done myself in? With yoga?

Yeah, yoga. I’ve pretty much been doing yoga exclusively for the past few months, and, while I have injured myself in the past with yoga, I’d experienced no trauma that I’d felt during the previous day’s workout, which was Rodney Yee: Yoga for Athletes.

Yet here I was with a problem.

I consulted my fitness expert friend Donna, and she mentioned piriformis syndrome, which is a compressed nerve thing, and that sounded pretty logical to me, because this pain didn’t seem muscular. It was too evenly distributed throughout my glutes, reaching down into the hamstrings.

She recommended some stretching, so I did that, then tried Rodney Yee: Flexibility, which is my go-to yoga routine when I don’t feel like doing anything. I got through it, but with not near the range of motion I usually have for forward bends. Everything else was fine.

The next day, I felt a bit better, but I thought it was time to kick it up a notch and break out the Max Cardio routine from Shaun T’s Insanity. (I really only meant to do the Pure Cardio routine, which is 10 minutes shorter, but I accidentally put Max Cardio in my pre-workout Facebook status update, so I held myself to it.)

During the workout, I noticed that I could only really feel the pain during high knees and jumping jacks, both of which jar the glutes. Outside that, no big deal.

The next day called for rest, then yoga, another Insanity workout, yoga again. Here we are at today, and I feel totally healed.

So, let’s see, what have I learned from this situation?

First, the body is a strange thing. I don’t know what caused the pain, and I may never know. What I did know, though, at the time, was that the injury was not muscular — I could feel that was true — so I felt I could push through it. I am not sure if my aggressive treatment with Insanity sped up recovery, but it sure didn’t hurt.

Second, there’s always a good reason not to do something, but some things are worth doing anyway. This applies to everything in life. You can always find a perfectly valid reason — not something weak enough to be called an “excuse”, but a sound rationalization — for not performing, not working out. The key to fitness success is pushing through and getting it done.

Third, and last, WTF? Maybe this has happened to you, too. But, seriously, what the hell is going on in my body to have that kind of pain just crop up and totally cramp my style? Maybe my body was telling me that yoga is fine, but I need to do a little more punishing work with Shaun T at least a couple times a week. Noted and workout schedule has been adapted!

By the way, I am very happy to report that even though I’ve been doing yoga almost exclusively for the past 3 months, I felt very little soreness after Max Cardio, and, while I don’t have a good way to gauge it except for the way I feel during the workout, my cardio fitness seemed fine, too.

All hail the power of yoga. I’ll need to go through that last pre-pain-in-the-ass Rodney Yee workout, though, and see what might have broken me. Then I’ll own it.

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Going on a cleanse

I saw something on Facebook yesterday that a friend of mine posted entitled “Six people who need to shut the f*ck up!” The piece is from FunnyOrDie.com, and among the people who need to shut up are “People on a Cleanse”.

Challenge accepted.

I hadn’t told anyone but one close friend (different friend than posted the funnyordie piece) that I am on a cleanse, but I am. My goal is basically to give my liver a break.

I am doing this at the suggestion of my favorite low-carb gurus, the Drs. Eades. Yet another friend — yes, I have several — suggested The Six-Week Cure for the Middle-Aged Middle to me, and once I saw the Drs. Eades had written it, I knew I should pick up a copy. (You may recall that they also wrote the book on the health benefits of low carb eating, Protein Power. Or you may not recall it. Either way, they did.)

So, yeah, there are 6 weeks to this plan, and I will probably run through the whole 6 weeks at some point this summer — that bit of extra fat around my middle is just so stubborn — but I felt it was just a good idea right now to give my liver a rest, because I hadn’t done that for so long.

Why give the liver a break?

The liver is all about removing toxins from the blood. We tend to consume toxins in the form of caffeine, alcohol, ibuprofen, food additives, and more. The liver interacts with all that, keeping the blood in our system relatively clean so the rest of the body doesn’t get contaminated, and at some point it seems like a good idea to give it some time off, allow the liver to clean itself out, regenerate.

So that’s what I’m doing.

The basic cleanse rules are

  1. no alcohol,
  2. no caffeine,
  3. no unnecessary medications,
  4. 3 low-carb shakes, and
  5. 1 low-carb meal each day (meal plans are in the book)

Let me say here that the Drs. Eades are not generally averse to coffee and wine. In fact, Dr. Michael Eades has his own YouTube video about how to make an Americano (my favorite way to enjoy coffee).

Today is Day 5 for me. I had only planned to stay on it for a week, but I am feeling good, so I may go through next Friday.

The book suggests, btw, that at the end of the cleanse I donate blood and let it take the toxins with it (don’t worry, it’s still good blood). I may do that. Haven’t given blood in a while, but that’s primarily because it’s not convenient. They used to come to my workplace to get it, but now that I work at home…. Still, I think there is a place down the street.

Anyway, check out The Six-Week Cure for the Middle-Aged Middle for the details. Maybe it’s time you gave your liver a break, too.

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Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels

“Nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.”

I guess that phrase has been around for a while, but I heard it the other day for the first time — read it in my friend Amanda’s status update — and I really like it, because that about sums it up.

Maybe you’re not there yet. Maybe you think you need that cinnamon roll or that slice of birthday cake or that bowl of ice cream. Maybe those do taste better to you than skinny feels.

Maybe that is because you’ve forgotten how skinny feels.

I was skinny when I was in my 20s. I mean really skinny, like 110 pounds lighter than I was when my fatness peaked in my 40s.

But I’d forgotten how skinny feels.

As I gradually built up my fat stores over the years, I simply accepted my weight gain as an inevitable part of getting older. Thinness is a thing of youth, I thought. As we get older, we automatically gain fat. Look around? All old guys are fat, right?

That is true to some extent — I am having a helluva time trying to lose these last pounds around the middle — but the first 60 lbs sure as hell came off, and stayed off . While I am much more active now than fat Steve was, the vast majority of my success in fat loss is directly attributable to my change in dietary habits.

75% to 80% of our body composition is based upon what we put into it, so, we are, indeed, what we eat. Not literally, though. That is the mistake in logic that’s been destroying Americans for 40 years. “Accumulated body fat causes all kinds of health problems,” we are told, “so we need to stop eating fat.”

The problem with that seemingly logical statement is that it’s simply not true. The science never supported it. Officials jumped to the “dietary fat is bad” conclusion, and then, when the studies didn’t support it, they were too embarrassed to ‘fess up. So they stuck to their guns, and now the American people are overweight and diseased.

Fat consumption does not lead to higher levels of stored fat. It does not raise blood cholesterol or triglycerides.

The science has shown over and over that it’s the sugars we consume that are much more likely to be stored as fat, which, in turn, raises our blood cholesterol and triglycerides.

(Don’t take my word for it. It’s all right here in science reporter Gary Taubes’s book Why We Get Fat and What To Do About It.)

So what was the primary change I made to my diet to lose and keep 60 pounds off? I got off the sugar. If something was created to be sweet, I don’t eat it. Period. No ice cream, no cupcakes, no Cinnabons.

And now, while I am not technically “skinny”, I do know how it feels to be thin again. I no longer need those blood pressure meds I was prescribed. I no longer need that cholesterol med I was prescribed. I no longer feel aches and pains that I was pretty sure shouldn’t be there. And I never want to go back to what I was.

Did I love that ice cream, those cupcakes, those Cinnabons? Yes. Do I miss them? No.

You know why? Because nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.

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A Tale of Two Yoga DVDs

I have been collecting yoga DVDs. Some are better than others. Some are great. Some are not so great.

But recently, on successive days, I tried out two DVDs that each stood out to me for very different reasons, so I thought I’d share my thoughts about them with you.

FOR ABSOLUTE BEGINNERS:

I’ve only been doing yoga for a couple years now, and not daily, so I always do the beginner routines, and if I need to make the poses more advanced during the workout, I do that.

Power Yoga For Every Body is pretty nicely set up, because it allows you to select not only a level — Beginner, Intermediate, or Advanced — but it also allows you to select how much time you have. I selected the 60-minute program for Beginners.

Okay. Wow. When they say “Beginner” during this program, they really mean “Beginner”.

If you are out of shape and have not done yoga before, this is the DVD for you! Many of the poses are demonstrated with a chair for modification, so you don’t need to bend as far. That’s a good thing, because you can hurt yourself doing yoga.

I only got halfway through this slow flow program, though, before I switched over to a Rodney Yee workout to finish up.

However, as I said, for out-of-shape people who have no idea about yoga and want to try it safely, this is the best DVD I’ve seen. Plus, it has Intermediate and Advanced programs, so you can move on up as you get more into it. I may try those out in the future.

FOR REAL POWER YOGA LOVERS:

Bob Harper introduces this workout as being like nothing we’ve ever done before, so tough we won’t believe it. Sorry, Bob. While I really like this workout, you are overstating the case for the Tony Horton yoga lovers out there. Tony Horton yoga (look for the One-on-One titles “Yoga – Fountain of Youth” and “Patience Hummingbird”) is tough.

Despite the hyperbole of this grown-up-Doogie-Howser-with-a-beard-looking dude, Yoga For The Warrior is definitely near the top of my list of yoga workouts.

It’s about 60 minutes long and includes, among all the standard yoga poses, pushups, shoulder presses, and ab work. Traditional yogis might not like adding pushups and shoulder presses into a yoga practice. Fine. They don’t need to buy this DVD. But for my money, Yoga For The Warrior does a pretty good job as a full body workout.

And, yeah, it’s tough. I had to take a break or two along the way, but that is exactly what will keep me coming back to this workout!

Other differences between Power Yoga For Every Body and Yoga For The Warrior:

  • Every Body has onscreen a single guy with a separate unseen narrator. Warrior included three attractive participants (2 women, 1 man) and Bob walking around coaching.
  • Every Body was in a pretty plain studio. I don’t recall hearing music, although it may have been there. Warrior was in a gym type setting and had a music track behind Bob.
  • Both are ranked 4+ (out of 5) stars at Amazon.

That is my tale of those two very different yoga DVDs. I recommend them both, but you should be sure to select the correct one for your fitness level and yoga goals.

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The Difference between P90X and P90X2 — by Tony Horton

In this short video, Tony Horton — the creator of P90X and P90X2 — explains the difference between the two programs.

If you don’t want to watch the video, the upshot is that P90X gets you into shape, and P90X2 focuses on making you more athletic. It’s the same as the difference between Shaun T’s Insanity and Insanity: The Asylum.

You can order the programs through the links above or email me at [mailme] if you have questions. Ain’t nothin’ to it but to do it!