Getting Kathy fit again. Take II

Hi people.

I want to start a blog to hear a bit more from your opinion and some comments.
My goal is be back to as good fitness as possible and gaining some weight in a healthy weight

Short background
1. I am a former athlete (basketball and running from mid school to mid 20's).
2. I was always extremely underweight, even when I was fit. As a matter of fact, now is my best weight (except right after I quit the pill). I'm 164cm and weight 42kg.
3. I had a knee injury from a car accident (torn ACL and meniscus, didn't have the surgery on the ACL, only the meniscus). Have been using a knee brace since.
4. A few months ago I had some sort of unexplained vertigo, still not explained but suspected heart issues. Still doctors are not sure. Yet, I passed every test, so the conclusion is that it is nothing to worry about, but to go back if something reoccurs.

Anyway. My plan is to go back to gym and working on my fitness slowly.

Goal 1 : Gain weight
Goal 2 : Regain fitness
Goal 3 : Leg recovery

Day 1

5AM : 1.5KM walk*2 15min break for stratches again, just for fun because the weather was good.
Around 3PM short home-gym session. Working on hands mostly:
Push-ups 5sessions of 15 (1min break between sessions)
Weights (3kg) 5 sessions of 20 *3 different exercises on different muscles. (30 seconds break between sessions, 1 min. break between exercises types).
Around 7PM cycling for about an hour. I don't usually cycle at night but it was very hot during the day.

Breakfast : A cup of coffee and chocolate candy + Toast with gem.
Snack : Tahini and nuts snack-bar
Lunch : Vegan Pizza slice and vegie soup
Snck : Ginger sweets
Supper : Shuba Salad (I rearly eat fish and eggs, and this meal had both, and mayo, but I had to eat it because it was a roomates birthday and his mom prepared it and I really don't like upsetting people, and honestly I did enjoy it).

Tomorrow will try to run a bit.
:smile:

Reply 1

Smack

In.

What are your dietary preferences, and do you have any restrictions?

Reply 2

Kathy89

Original post by Smack

In.
What are your dietary preferences, and do you have any restrictions?

I don't really have any restrictions, prefer mostly vegan diet.
When I was a strict vegan it was the best time for me health-wise.
I'm allergic to black pigment food dye (one of them at least) and had some food allergies in my childhood that I don't know the source of...
I was very picky eater when I was younger. Now I eat a lot of different things and like trying new things.

Reply 3

Kathy89

Day 2
5AM woke up and had some tea
6AM : 0.5KM walk, 0.5KM run, 0.5KM walk, 0.5KM run, 0.5KM walk. Well, I walked more because I had to get to the starting point ect, but that I don't count.
around 6PM when I got home, I worked out on pull ups, crunches (both bicycle and regular) 5 takes of 15 each. Did some Yoga too.

Food
Breakfast : Oatmeal with gem
Snack : some nuts
Lunch ; Large baked vegies and beans salad, and some fresh salad + fresh orange juice.
Supper : Mint tea and a orange and carrot cake (took two slices, I loved it)
Also I ate some fresh and cut fruits during the day at work.

Reply 4

Kathy89

Day 3
A pretty weak day. Was too busy to do the things I planned for the fitness routine.

5AM, woke up, drank some green tea and went for a walk 30 min. fast walk, 10 min. run, 50 mins fast walk back home.
Took a shower and went to work (driving). Had some coffee and croissant for breakfast.
~10AM had a Twix bar.
During the day drank 4 cups of coffee (total of 5) and ate some cookies = meetings with customers.
~4:30PM had a vegan buritto
Got home at 9PM.
Now too tired to do anything fitness related.

Reply 5

Kathy89

Day 4

Woke up at 5AM, drank some tea and drove to the pool.
Swam 25m *4 takes. I'm scared to get tired in the pool so I took long breaks between takes.
It was all I did fitness related because later I had a mild migraine. Maybe I will go out for a walk soon.

Breakfast (after pool) - coffee with a loaf of bread and cheese, a loaf of bread with orange spread.
Snack - peanut bar
Lunch - Pizza 2 slices (was at the office and people there wanted pizza so I joined)
later a migraine hit me so I took a pill and rested a bit before going back to work. After work on my way back home I had a snack of some salty and spicy nuts.
Supper - potato dumplings and vegie salad.

I actually think I should eat more, but I'm not hungry and don't want to push more food into me. I don't count calories, but it looks like I should eat more...

Reply 6

Kathy89

Day 5

~6AM - Running 1km on the beach. Slow run.
~3PM - Working in some weights
~7PM - Cycling for 30 min.

Breakfast (after running) - 2 bananas, a cup of tea and a vegan yogurt with fruits.
Snack - some sweets
Lunch - Soup, rice with fried vegies and beans + large salad.
Supper (now) - Baked potatoes and some vegan cheese.
Later will drink some tea, maybe with some sweet,

Reply 7

Kathy89

Day 8
After 2 days off because of a mix of migraine and asthma. The second time I had an asthma attack, the previous time was 5 years ago. But this time I knew what it was and stopped it early. It's more of a seasonal allergy that acts like an asthma with coughing and feeling like my trachea is very narrow and air barely coming through. So I took Ventolin and rested for the two days, today was great so I tried to do more exercises.

6AM went for a walk until 8AM. I didn't even measured how much did I walk, but 1 hour walk each way is great.
2PM did some exercises for leg recovery for my left leg and weights for my right leg.
6PM 5*5 pull ups, some weight exercises for the arms and some exercises for the ankles.
9PM went for a relaxation swim and sauna.

As for nutrition, I ate much better this time
5AM - a toasted bread slice with chocolate and Banana
8AM - a protein bar
10AM - some nuts
2:30PM - Mushroom soup, potato pure, seiten stake and a large salad and fresh orange juice
7PM - fruit salad, tea
10PM - tea and sweets
I also drank 3 cups of coffee during the day.

I don't know how to reduce caffeine intake while I work, also I am not sure it is bad for me to drink that amount of coffee. Like I heard it might trigger migraine, but I think that mine is weather related (and hormonal).

Reply 8

Kathy89

It's been a good 5 last days nutrition-wise and fitness-wise.
Despite being in a low mood overall I managed to do a lot of healthy stuff.

One day we were celebrating a friend's birthday in a park. There was a playground and I joined a bunch of kids playing basketball (kids 12-15 y/o). It was nice they allow me to join and I managed to play well. I miss jumping more and playing more aggressively, but it was just enough for my leg and it was the most pleasant thing there... I don't like socializing much but I like playing basketball. The guys called me when the food was ready so I had to leave the players but it was just the amount of fun I needed.

The other day I went to the gym. I increased the intensity of the training. Despite feeling a bit lightheaded afterwards (mostly migraine thing) I felt good overall. The next day I reduced the intensity and worked more on rehabilitation.

Today I walked a lot and cycled. Tomorrow and the day after I have a lot of meetings so I'm not sure I'd be able to do much but I prepared food so I could take it with me in the mobile fridge case. Hope it will last till 6PM.

I increased the amount of protein and fruits I eat during the day and hope it will work better for me.

(edited 9 months ago)

Reply 9

Kathy89

So this week was good too. Although it was too hot to do anything outdoors I did go to gym and pool.
Apparently I overworked on my arms. I have a twitching and aching biceps and brachialis... probably too much swimming and some basketball practice so it was really too much, although it didn't felt too much but anyways, I'm resting the arms for a few days to see the process.

Nutritionwise it was good too, but I'm not hungry... I have to force myself to eat which I don't like to do. I guess it's the weather.

Reply 10

Kathy89

Today I am sick.

I think I'm cursed... The moment I'm doing good something has to f*ck up everything, either car accident, unexplained vertigo, now a combination between asthma and a flu. My nose is stuffed and I can't talk without coughing my lungs out, my head hurts and I'm dizzy. I took 4 meds now, hopefully it will help and I could start eating something.
Season changing is the worst.

Reply 11

Kathy89

After a week without training at all. I was gradually back to normal routine.

Still not 100% healthy. The asthma is still kinda there, I mean there is still discomfort while breathing deeply and sometimes I have mild coughing attacks, but I can train in the gym pretty easily and yesterday went swimming.

I work a lot more now, with much more travels introducing more of our new products to clients, so much less time to train but still I do find time to go to the gym.

Reply 12

Kathy89

I'm doing very well lately.
I gained some weight. I'm 44kg now (empty stomach before training, so even if I lost 1kg during training, which is not logical, I still gained some weight).
I'm very careful with cardio training now. Docs suspect my vertigo might be cardio-vascular after all. Still waiting for a scheduled visit to a cardiologist and starting stress testing and longer term monitoring. Meanwhile, lighter training and more recovery training. More working on diet and good habits which I already do anyways.
My housemate (the girl I share a floor with) suggested it could be post covid complication because cardiac problems are a common complication. I tend to agree if it turns out I do have some cardiac issues.... I would never suspected it actually because I was always an athlete and did the cardiac tests at least twice a year, even after quitting active sports. I did that when I registered to the gym all the previous times for recovery (from the knee injury) and for regaining fitness the last time.
This time I didn't do it yet because I am not fit yet. When I just started, before the vertigo, I just assumed I was fit enough to start from 0, so didn't pay for the full fitness test.

Anyways, working on some weights and abs makes me look less like a skeleton. I hope this summer I could gain enough to feel good in a swimsuit. My ideal weight goal is 48-50kg (I'm 164cm) I know it is still underweight but I'm realistic, gaining 10kg in a few months is not realistic.

Reply 13

Kathy89

Long time no see...

Update

Stress test was fine, long term monitoring without extreme physical activity showed nothing extraordinary, they consider to di a long-term monitoring with gradually increasing physical activity and getting to some sort of intense activity towards the end of the test (2-3 weeks of monitoring) to see if there is a sign of something.

I had no strange issues for over a few months so they think I recovered and the tests are just to see if it is cardio related. If not, they have no idea what it was and no need to test further because it seems like I recovered. Strange.

On the good side, I'm stable 43-44kg, eat well and except for weather related migraines and seasonal allergies I have no issues. I continue with swimming and gym at least 2 times a week. I wish the weather was better to take a walk. I tried a few times during the night but it is still very hot. This week will do a blood test to see if I have any insufficiencies or tendency to some and change my diet accordingly. So overall all good news.

Reply 14

Kathy89

Well, the last week was so productive I can't believe I made such a progress.

It's holidays here so I visited my parents and brother at my home town.
I asked a friend of mine from the basketball team to arrange a practice meeting with whoever left from the team and still in town, took a couple of days to arrange it and to arrange the court but we managed to make it. Initially we wanted to play outside but due to the war here it is not safe and we asked the team coach to practice on the school court and got the permission (somewhat because of me having the reputation of the good girl). So we met 5 people (out of the original team of 18-23 depending on the year). We mostly chatted about our lives but still played a bit. We are all too old and too injured to really play, what would you expect from 32-36 year olds. Later the boys from the school team started to arrive and joined us for a shooting game. I didn't expect I was still pretty good at shooting (passes and dribbling was not even close to what I was used to).
The next few days one girl from the team joined me for jogging/running (others where too afraid to go to the promenade far from shelters or buildings to hide at in case of alerts). I discovered that my stamina improved a lot and if I don't put too much pressure on the leg I can run 5k pretty good (not competitive) but still a good pace.

Cooking with mom and my brother's wife for a family dinner made me so happy to eat good home made food I didn't even counted how much did I eat but it was so good I'd like to eat like that everyday. It is something I really miss while working. Eating with people I like makes eating more of a fun than a necessity so unknowingly I eat more without feeling tired or sick. It doesn't happen usually.

I gained a bit of weight, I'm now 45kg, hope to gain more.

The weather is great so now when I'm back to the town I live I hope I manage to keep up with the running and maybe go to the gym again. I feel almost 100% back to normal. No signs of the vertigo or cardiac problems... so only the leg left...