happy with deadlifts. I really haven’t pushed deadlifts heavy in… a long time. All my work has been lighter weight, higher reps. Even my “max” weeks for 531 were all normally 8+ reps. I wasn’t sure how 455 would go, but the weight flew. First rep definitely harder than the second, but I definitely had another rep, and honestly maybe some more after that. My deadlift strength may be a bit better than I thought.
Deload week, went off program a bit, a few hotel workouts, but got some movement in and worked the muscles without taxing myself, so I think that fits the goal.
Met the girlfriends family this weekend. Received a ton of comments about my physique, which was unexpected but made me laugh. Lots of comments on my arms lol. For reference, I’m about the same size and leanness as my profile pic at the moment.
Also a lot of comments about my eating. Evidently, I am a garbage disposal. Hotel had a breakfast buffet, and I went through what the family is now describing as “a run of salmon”.
@T3hPwnisher@jdm135 thanks! First time meeting them, and it ended up being a big family gathering. Her father and I hit it off immediately, which was a big concern of hers, so everyone is relieved about that. Been together a good while now, about time I start looking at some rings.
@jdm135 currently sitting around after my interviews, so I should be able to tell ya later today if I passed or not.
@T3hPwnisher ive been thinking a lot about what I’ve seen you say before about obesity being a case of malnutrition. People eat high calorie junk, so they don’t get the nutrients they need, and end up getting hungry again.
The past week has just been debauchery for me. (I knew this, planned this, and am completely at ease with it. A week won’t kill me). I have been eating a ridiculous amount. And to be fair, I normally eat a ridiculous amount. But what I eat is very healthy, lots of lean proteins and complex carbs, and I generally feel very full afterwards. This last week? Easily eating 1500-2000 calorie meals at fancy DC restaurants, shoveling away awe-inspiring volumes of food, and I feel engorged after the meal…. But 2 hours later, and I’m ready for more. Funny how all the food I’m eating, despite being high calorie, is still leaving me hungry. (And yes, I totally believe you can eat healthy at these places, but we argued and agreed before hand who would pay for which meals, and I’m just not about to order a steak on someone else’s dime)
Dude, that’s absolutely outstanding news! I’m so happy for you.
On that hunger topic: no joke man. My own log is proof of that: I’ve documented my insane eating habits before, eating something every half hour and ALWAYS being hungry. The HUGE meals I would eat before bed so that I wouldn’t wake up from hunger, only to then wake up and smash a huge breakfast. Dr. Ted Naiman supports a “protein threshold” idea and Dr. Paul Saladino supports a “nutrient threshold” idea, but both are striking at the same point: our bodies signal hunger when they NEED nutrition, NOT energy (calories), and they’ll keep hammering that signal until we get it. Both ideas honestly co-exist anyway, because the nutrient deficient foods that flood America are ALSO protein deficient. There’s no protein in Poptarts or breakfast cereal, and if you try to reach that threshold with those foods, you gotta eat about 6000 calories worth. The “unholy trinity” is sugar (and not even REAL sugar, but HFCS or dextrose or something), seed oils and salt: no protein, no nutrients, hyper palatable. Meanwhile, after my weekend of Turkey on Saturday and Texas de Brazil on Sunday, I wasn’t hungry until Tuesday, haha.
It’s eye opening when you start looking into and experiencing this stuff first hand. So cool you’ve had that chance to experiment.
I would think at this point if you didn’t, you would know lol
I have SO MUCH TO SAY about this at the moment, having spent days with my in-laws. I’ll not clutter your log with it but if I get time I may brain-dump / vent on the subject.
@T3hPwnisher I’ve never looked into Naiman, but I’m familiar with a lot of Salidinos work, and I really like his approach. The “reformed carnivore” he does (I think he says animal based diet?) seems like a great way to just cut out so much junk while still hitting a more rounded diet.
Also, I’ve had 3 doctors know tell me I have IBS. It was always just kind of casually mentioned while I was getting some sort of check up done, and none ever really said what to do about it. I’ve also never felt like it was an issue just because, well, this is how I’ve always felt lol. Seems normal to me if it’s all I’ve known. But i am curious about food sensitivities, and wonder if it wouldn’t be worth it to run some sort of elimination diet just to see how my body responds to certain good types.
@jdm135 ill second what Pwn said, feel free to brain dump in here. I’d love to hear your thoughts on it. I’ll also add this one I’ve noticed. People are VERY wed to breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Going out with the gfs family, we’d meet up at around 9 for breakfast, eat until 10-1030, massive meals. Then come 1200 everyone starts talking about lunch, and I’m thinking “we finished eating less than 2 hours ago. We easily crushed a days worth of calories already. Why are we cramming in another meal now between our massive breakfast and our dinner reservations at 6?” Especially on vacation when I’m paying for meals/trying to do as much fun activity as I can, I don’t want to spend more time or money eating out than I have to. Let me eat 2 really big meals and then I can have a snack if I’m hungry.
Also, we very much DID NOT know if we passed or not lol. The whole process is ridiculous, all grades and performance kept secret until the end, so the last few hours after your final interviews is just everyone placing bets on if you passed or not lol. I wouldn’t have been surprised either way, but I’m happy to make it through first time, especially without a third interview.
Yup. He’s moved away from carnivore, and funny enough is now a pariah in “the community” for gasp eating fruit and honey. Like you observed: there’s more alike than not. Primarily: he’s not eating processed garbage. THAT is the biggest lever we can pull, and from there it’s nuance.
THAT said…I’ll gladly be your spirit guide on a carnivore vision quest if you decide to go down that route. I thought I had IBS as well…or the start of some sort of bowel cancer. 6-7 movements a day, with an “acceptable amount of blood” in my stool. I had NO idea how damaged I was. It’s so weird being healthy now.
And your observation about being chained to meals is too real. I much prefer one BIG meal a day and then some protein feedings through out the day, or two large meals: a breakfast and a dinner. And people look at you so weird if it’s “lunch time” and you say “I’m still full from breakfast”. Like “Who cares if you’re hungry or not: it’s LUNCH time.” We’re so chained to these conventions. It’s something you see in the carnivore sphere: people want to use it as a weight loss diet, they report that they’re gaining weight, show their food log and it’s MASSIVE, people ask “are you REALLY that hungry?” and it turns out they’re just eating 3 meals a day because that’s what they’re used to.
Really? I didn’t know that, thought he was still pretty well liked. Can’t say I’m terribly well read in the community though.
Well I feel pretty personally called out with this one. Hit me to a tee. On the plus side, half my logging does come from the can. (Yes, to include this one lol)
I’m not going to lie, I really have considered it, especially after seeing some of your conversations with @TrainForPain. For me, it would definitely be a transitory thing, have some hard believes about the benefits of a well rounded diet, but I do think the elimination approach could help massively to figure out what exactly my stomachs not jiving with. That being said, it’s not something I want to do while attached to a ship. starting next week I’ll be at sea for over a month, and really probably only have a few weeks on land for the rest of 2024. I absolutely do not want to try carnivore using the mystery meet options available on a ship lol, especially when half of them are always smothered in some type of sauce. Feels like it defeats the whole point, while still robbing me of any potentially nutritious non-meat options they serve that meal. A healthy diet underway is definitely an uphill battle. I may hit you up after this tour!
Weighing in on the elimination stuff - My recs would be to start with gluten, like @jdm135 and @TrainForPain said. If still no dice, order further eliminations as follows: dairy, raw veggies, eggs, caffeine, nuts/seeds. Or if you really want to dig in, a FODMAP elimination and reintroduction would be the way to go. And, as always, I’m here to help in any way I can! I know you have my email and contact info, shoot me a note or text anytime!
first day back after maybe a little too much debauchery. Weight belt feeling pretty tight, 9 days definitely had their effect. Still, I don’t regret a moment of it, because it was honestly glorious.
back to ship life, won’t be back on land for a bit, and realistically I’m spending most of the rest of the year at sea. @taylortooswift we are sharing the same pain lol.
stopped the Josh Bryant program. Not because I didn’t love it, I actually thought it was fantastic, and this has really solidified to me that I’d love to hire him for personal coaching once I get a land based job. But, the program doesn’t really jive with ship life, and I don’t have all the equipment/ access to really run the program as written.
I did learn a lot from the program though. Made me rethink the priority on accessory work, AKA I should care about it. I really feel my backoff sets on the main lifts and my accessory work do a lot more to build strength than the top set, top set seems to be more important for practicing the top end exertion. Building the base vs raising the peak if you will.
hopping back to 531. Always respond well to it, and as long as I can grab a rack, I’ll be able to knock out the main portion of the workout, then fitting in what accessory work is available given the gym. Started today, and felt a little off just from the time away from the gym, but the weights still moved fine. I do have to unrack the bar and walk about 5 paces back to press, which I am very much not a fan of, but it’s not terrible.
sleeps about to just go completely to hell. Diets going to be rough, but I’ll do what I can to pick healthy choices. Really going to focus on consistency in the gym and making sure I get in my cardio, do what I can to limit the damage.
also, going to put a lot of effort into my mental state while at sea. Tbh, I struggle with this. Not necessarily struggling with mental health, but struggling to prioritize it. I let the job take priority a bit more than I should, shoulder loads that really aren’t my responsibility, but I feel like I should step in when others slack. Makes for great performance reviews, but combined with the command climate, honestly got me into some pretty dark spots this last year. The time away from the ship was amazing, but it also acted to really enlighten me as to how bad I had actually let my mental state go. Been consistently unhappy and angry for so long that I somewhat forgot what it felt like to actually enjoy life, and it wasn’t until I felt some joy that I realized how much I’d be missing. Really going to focus on not letting myself get to that point again.
@TrainForPain@QuadQueen thanks for the recommendations! I’ve looked into FODMAP before, and think that would definitely be the first start before I tried anything more drastic. Thing is for me (this last week very much not withstanding), I don’t really eat a lot of the “trigger” foods. Hardly ever have bread, don’t remember the last time I had an uncooked vegetable, next to no dairy. I suppose I have 8 or so eggs a week and a few almonds every day, so I could experiment with that…. The one thing on the list, which I very much never considered, is caffeine. I use a frankly obscene amount of caffeine, probably averaging around 600-800mg a day when I’m at sea. Definitely not good, but I didn’t think it could cause stomach problems. I’m also legitimately concerned if I’d be able to stay awake the hours I have to without that much caffeine so…. I may just have to deal with the rumble guts for a while. I’ll try cutting back, which I say every few months lol. Always lasts until the next 24+ hours awake, and then I just cave. My new position is theoretically less demanding, so let’s see if I can make it stick this time!
Buckle up dude.
Damn. I feel bad for you but worse for the guys that don’t have a stateroom.
These guys WORK. And their climate is bad, toxic, brutal, stressful in every way…
(I know that applies to you too but its different)
I’d love to do it again lol. With all this education and perspective i would probably enjoy it more haha.
But wouldn’t love the separation from family.
Hey man i talked to Derek Thistlethwaite about ship gyms and which of his programs works with our equipment (assuming you have the same equipment we do on carriers). He said Get Build Different 2.0 should work with what we have. I plan on trying it out if i ever get decent enough internet to download it and Deep Water.
Stay safe out there man! Enjoy it as much as possible.
