i havne't wanked in 10 days and its real, mane. ive noticed i can look people in the face now(i used to not hold eye contact and always look down). and the the social anxiety somewhat is reduced. i went to buy coffee and actually felt normal.

p.s. i might asplode tonight.

Job is good. It gets me out of the house and gives me something to do. It gives me a routine. Aspies need a routine. It forces me to interact with humans on the regular. And I get paid.

Cute server chick at the restaurant said her fav thing is croissants. I said that's cool cuz it's my fav thing to make. My plan is to make croissants for staff meal soon and then I'll be like "good croissants eh?" She'll be like "omg yes these are amazing" then I'll be like "um... wanna be my gf?"

Not sure if N1H-themed parody or not.

Doesn't matter, do it anyway!

Ascribing improvement in non-sexual social relations to not jerking off seems somewhat dubious. Why would you look down because you jerk off?

pummi,

Not a parody, we just have similar psychological issues. My log is like N1H's, but without the gains.

soulbro,

I think N1H has some shame issues about sex that he hasn't explored yet. A therapist would help with that obv, but I won't hold my breath waiting for that to happen.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BOh7Nc9A...fit_lolamontez

god****ingdayum look how dat ass moves

Well, getting a job and out of the house regularily sure sounds a lot like gains to me.

Got really sick last week. Had some cray **** coming out of my nose. Haven't lifted for a while still.

Makin all kinds of anxiety and depression gains tho. All kinds.

I feel like I don't need the lexapro anymore. I was taking 20mg for a long time. For the last 2 weeks I've been cutting them in half and taking 10mg. Tonight I won't take any, we'll see how that goes.

I'm reading a great book called Cure: A Journey into the Science of Mind Over Body. It's about scientific research on how one's mental state or thoughts can have a direct impact on one's physical body. Especialy illnesses which are defined by symptoms, like chronic pain, IBS, depression, etc. There's an Italian scientist who identified the chemical changes in the brain when a person believes they've just taken a pill that will relieve pain or digestive issues. People with such illnesses can knowingly take placebos and train themselves to associate taking the pill with relief from the symptoms. And it works.

The chapter I'm reading now is about social interaction and how studies have shown people that have more (and more positive) social interaction on the regular live longer, have less psychological issues, and even recover from illnesses like autoimmune diseases faster than those who don't. OTOH, people who have more negative/hostile social interactions have even worse health than those who have no social life at all.

I definitely feel like going to work and being around people I generally like for 5 days a week has had a significant effect on my overall mental health. I spent so many years either completely alone or alone living with my parents and having no one to talk to.

This is a really interesting blog. I can relate to it so much. That last post about social interaction is so bang on. I often find that when I'm nervous about hanging out with people I don't know very well that it usually goes a lot better than what I was expecting.

Yes I've been working full time for almost 3 years after a period of not working/studying/volunteering/part time work and my mental health is way better as well.

Been off Lexapro for 2 weeks now and I feel fine. It just seemed to have stopped working for me and/or my other anxiety management strategies made it unnecessary.

Sleep is my main issue right now. Seroquel works, but the problem is it builds up in my system. When I take it 2-3 days in a row I start feeling drowsy and tired all day.

I tried zzzquil (it's Nyquil but with only the ingredient that makes you sleepy) a couple times this week and it helps a little.

I got a lifting bench on amazon, and it's pretty sweet. Now I just need some energy to use it for lifting.

Prescription med recap

This is only the meds I've taken on a long term basis, not the ones I've tried and didn't work at all for me (which is buspar, zoloft, lamictal, and 1 or 2 others I don't remember).

Xanax: 6/25/14 to 2/17/17. A lot of people seem to freak out about benzos, but xanax worked like a charm for my panic attacks with no (short term) side effects at all and I never felt like I needed to constantly increase the dose to get the same effect. I started out needing 2 or 3 .25mg doses per day to stop the panic attacks. I gradually needed less as I got on Lexapro and learned how to manage anxiety better. I don't think I've had to take more than half of a .25mg pill in a day since I went on Lexapro. I haven't taken any for 4 days right now. For the last few months I've only been taking it for sleep. I might feel like I need it again for sleep at some point but hopefully I can manage that with otc stuff like valerian root and zquil.

Lexapro: 8/26/15 to 1/27/17, started with 5mg/day and slowly increased the dose in 5mg increments. I was at 30mg/day for about 2 months in early 2016 but I felt like it didn't work any better than 20mg, so I was on 20mg/day for the vast majority of the time I was on it. It helped with anxiety and a little with depression. I don't get panic attacks or really bad anxiety anymore. I think it's a combination of working on myself with my therapist, exploring the reasons why I was having those reactions to everyday occurences, and learning how to manage them when they do happen.

Seroquel: 12.5 mg 1x/day from 2/18/16 to 2/13/17. It helped with sleep for a while but made me drowsy af for the whole next day. The side effect got worse the more times I took it. 25mg is the lowest dose they make. I cut them in half, and it still knocks me the **** out for 24 hours. This is some serious **** I do not want to **** with anymore. I've thrown out all the pills I had and don't plan to take it ever again.

This is what happens to me when I don't lift, don't sleep ,and eat mostly pizza and sugar for 7ish months. I've had some back and shoulder pain lately, obv. Dat spine curve doe lol.

http://imgbox.com/FjaHI7H6
http://imgbox.com/ctP8n8lo
http://imgbox.com/B72xmIpv

Yeah dood, how do your organs even fit in there?

Still like job?

Meditating at all?

My organs can easily fit into my distended belly.

Job is good. Everyone thinks I'm a hater tho cuz I hate a lot. Today chef and I were talking about his workout routine, he's trying to lose some weight. I've been telling him he just needs to be more of a hater. Hating burns calories imo. He asked me if I ever tried something called hate minute abs. It's like 8 minute abs but its only 1 minute and you just focus on hatin' **** to increase the intensity. I said no but maybe I should try that one. Then I suggested he should try HIIT: Hate Intensity Interval Training. It's something I invented. What you do is hate on some **** for 20 seconds then rest for 10.

Last week I did some HIIT when this little asian hostess bish came in wearing what I can only describe as MC Hammer pajamas. I was hatin on those fugly pants so hard. It was quite a workout.

Been off of all prescriptions for 3 weeks. I took xanax a couple times early this month but I felt a lot of brain fog the next day, and I just don't need it anymore. I've been taking zquil + valerian root at night.

One thing that's been a huge help for my sleep is changing the timing of my carb consumption. I've been eating almost no carbs before about 3pm, and I've been eating a low protein high carb meal like oatmeal/pasta/bread 1-2 hours before bed. This is a great way to induce sleepytime. I heard on a podcast that taurine can help with sleep so I ordered some and will report results.

Job is going fine. Other areas of life not great. I haven't talked to anyone in a social setting for a long time, maybe 2 months. I spend a ton of time watching tv/movies/reading. My room is full of **** I don't need and I hardly have any space to lift. It's strange how my life looks very simple on the outside. I don't really "do anything", but I constantly feel overstimulated and overwhelmed with unnecessary objects and thoughts.

That's fantastic, congrats! (aside from the last paragraph obv)

zquil has stopped working, it was nice while it lasted. Taurine doesn't do much. I've slept 4-5 hours per night the last 3 nights.

It didn't help that a wave of depression came on 3 days ago.

The only thing I can do is continue the sleep research and try to find something. I started reading The Sleep Solution. Dude seems like he knows a lot about sleep.

Also started reading Manly Health and Training: To Teach the Science of a Sound and Beautiful Body by Walt Whitman. It was a long lost series of magazine articles published in 1858 and recently rediscovered and compiled into a book. The introduction sounds promising:

Sounds like what H&F would be if it existed 160 years ago.

This Sleep Solution book is pretty solid so far. The author talks about how all his insomniac patients way underestimate the amount of sleep they get. This is because you can't tell exactly when you fall asleep obv, and because people still feel unrested when they wake up, so they assume they must not have slept as much as they did. Sleep research that relies on surveys where people try to recall how much sleep they get is totally unreliable. And it's hard to do good sleep research because whenever you have sleep deprived people trying to do various tasks they constantly fall into "microsleep" which is when you fall asleep for like 20-30 seconds at a time. Apparently the Guiness Book of world records stopped keeping track of records for sleeplessness because of microsleep making it impossible to really know if someone hasn't slept.

He makes a great point about how sleep is the only thing you need to give your body that you can't deprive yourself of to really hurt yourself. You can starve or dehydrate yourself to death if you're determined enough. You can't kill yourself with sleep deprivation. When you need sleep bad enough, your brain takes over and makes you sleep and there's nothing you can do about it.

This was a huge revelation and very reassuring for me. I have a ton of anxiety about not sleeping. I think about how I'm going to make myself fall asleep and I assume I'll need to put a lot of effort into it. What I should be doing more of is trusting that my brain knows how to make me sleep if I really need it. There's no need to worry too much about it, I can let my brain handle it.

Oh also I'm about 100 pages into the Walt Whitman Manly Training book and there's def a few gems in there that I'll collect and quote later.

EFFECTS OF A SOUND BODY.

Among the signs of manly health and perfect physique, internal and external, are a clear eye, a transparent and perhaps embrowned complexion (this latter not necessarily), an upright attitude, a springy step, a sweet breath, a ringing voice and little or nothing of irritability in the temper. With your choleric man, there is apt to be something wrong in the stomach, joints or blood. In nine cases out of ten, when this is obviated the disposition comes round.
We shall speak by and by of health as being the foundation of all real manly beauty. Perhaps, too, it has more to do than is generally supposed, with the capacity of being agreeable as a companion, a social visitor, always welcome—and with the divine joys of friendship. In these particulars (and they surely include a good part of the best blessings of existence), there is that subtle virtue in a sound body, with all its functions perfect, which nothing else can make up for, and which will itself make up for many other deficiencies, as of education, refinement, and the like.

We say to the young man not only that mental development may well go on at the same time with physical development, but that indeed is the only way in which they should go on—both together, which is much to the advantage of each. If you are a student, be also a student of the body, a practiser [sic] of manly exercises, realizing that a broad chest, a muscular pair of arms, and two sinewy legs, will be just as much credit to you, and stand you in hand through your future life, equally with your geometry, your history, your classics, your law, medicine, or divinity. Let nothing divert you from your duty to your body. Up in the morning early! Habituate yourself to the brisk walk in the fresh air—to the exercise of pulling the oar—and to the loud declamation upon the hills, or along the shore. Such are the means by which you can seize with treble gripe upon all the puzzles and difficulties of your student life—whatever problems are presented to you in your books, or by your professors. Guard your manly power, your health and strength, from all hurts and violations—this is the most sacred charge you will ever have in your keeping.

To you, clerk, literary man, sedentary person, man of fortune, idler, the same advice. Up! The world (perhaps you now look upon it with pallid and disgusted eyes) is full of zest and beauty for you, if you approach it in the right spirit! Out in the morning! If in the city, even there you will find ample sources of amusement and interest in its myriad varieties of character and occupation—in the scenes of its awakening and adjusting itself to its daily labors—in the crowds around its ferries, and all through its main thoroughfares, and at its great depots and markets. Do not be discouraged soon. Give our advice a thorough trial—not for a few days or weeks, but for months. Early rising, early to bed, exercise, plain food, thorough and persevering continuance in gently-commenced training, the cultivation with resolute will of a cheerful temper, the society of friends and a certain number of hours spent every day in regular employment—these, we say, simple as they are, are enough to revolutionize life, and change it from a scene of gloom, feebleness, and irresolution, into life indeed, as becomes such a universe as this, full of all the essential means of happiness, full of well-intentioned and affectionate men and women, with the beneficent processes of nature always at work, the sun shining, the flowers blooming, the crops growing, the waters running, with all else that is wanted, only that man should be rightly toned to partake of the universal strength and joy. This he must do through reason, knowledge and exercise—in short, through training; for that is the sum of all.

Let it be known that a certain degree of abandon is necessary to the processes of perfect health and a muscular tone of the system. The fault of intellectual persons is, doubtless, not only that far too much of their general, natural fund of stimulation is diverted, year after year, from all the great organs in the trunk of the body, and concentrated in the brain, but that they think too much of health, and, perhaps, that they know too much of its laws. Of this last, it might be explained that if they only knew a little more, namely, to put their technical knowledge aside at times, and not be forever dwelling upon it, things would go on much better with them.

With all this, we have an idea, amounting to profound conviction, that the highest and palmiest state of health, ministering to a long life, and accompanied throughout by all that makes a man physically the superior animal of the earth, and crowned at last with a painless and easy death—we have an idea, we say, that all this is only attainable, (except in rare natural instances,) by a cultivated mentality, by the intellectual, by the reasoning man. What else, indeed, is the whole system of training for physique, but intellect applied to the bettering of the form, the blood, the strength, the life, of man?

In other and shorter terms, true intellectual development, not overstrained and morbid, is highly favorable to long life, and a noble physique; and what falls short of these latter aims, (if attributable to anything in the mentality of the subject,) is, that the mentality of that subject was in a vitiated condition, or, (as in these latter days is often the case,) that there was not enough brute animal in the man. We repeat it, strange as it may seem, this is generally the case in these extra-mental and extra-philanthropic days of ours.

That the half-way and unwholesomely developed mentality of modern times, as seen in large classes of people, literary persons, many in the professions, in sedentary employments, acts injuriously upon the health, and militates against the noble form, the springy gait, the ruddy cheek and lip, and the muscular leg and arm of man, we know, full well. But, without wishing to be severe, what, critically considered, is the amount of modern mentality, except a feverish, superficial and shallow dealing with words and shams? How many of these swarms of “intellectual people,” so-called, are anything but smatterers, needing yet to begin and educate themselves in nearly all real knowledge and wisdom?

Usually the breakfast, for a hearty man, might consist in a plate of fresh rare lean meat, without fat or gravy, a slice or chunk of bread, and, if desired, a cup of tea, which must be left till the last. If there be boiled potatoes, and one of them is desired, it may be permitted. Ham, gravy, fried potatoes, and a list too long and numerous to mention, of dishes often found on the breakfast table of boarding houses and restaurants, must be eschewed. Fortunately, there is hardly a table set but it affords something that will answer, at a pinch, for a meal.

The great art lies in what to avoid and what to deny one’s self.

After breakfast, in the case of a man who has work to do, (for we are writing for the general public, as well as the sporting man,) he will go about his employment. One who has not, and who is devoting his attention, at the time, to the establishment of health and a manly physique, will do well to spend an hour of the forenoon (say from 10 to 11 o’clock,) in some good exercise for the arms, hands, breast, spine, shoulders, and waist; the dumb-bells, sparring, or a vigorous attack on the sand-bags, (a large bag, filled with sand, and suspended in such a position that it can be conveniently struck with the fists.) This should be done systematically, and gradually increased upon making the exertion harder and harder.

From three quarters to half an hour before dinner, all violent exercise must cease.

Dinner should consist of a good plate of fresh meat, (rare lean beef, broiled or roast, is best) with as few outside condiments as possible. (If thirsty during the forenoon, drink, but never before eating.) Eat according to your appetite, of one dish—always, if possible, making four or five dinners out of the week, of rare lean beef, with nothing else than a small slice of stale bread. Or, if preferred, lean mutton, cooked rare, may be eaten instead of beef, at times, for variety. No scraggly, grisly fat, or hard cooked pieces, should be eaten. Nor need the appetite be stinted—eat enough, and when you eat that, stop!

(We cannot resist the impulse to condemn here, what we consider the frightfully injurious dinners and dinner habits of most people who, as they would call it, “live well.” Look over the bill of fare of any hotel or restaurant, or even the dinner-table of an ordinary boarding-house—see the incongruous dishes that, on the bills, stand in long lists, and that men devour, often three or four different kinds—soups, pastry, fat, fish, flesh, gravy, pickles, pie, pudding, coffee, water, ale, brandy—and heaven knows what else! Not one out of fifty eats a really wholesome, manly substantial dinner. All, more or less, distend the stomach, and bloat themselves with quantities of trash, to worry the digestion, thin the blood, and return, sooner or later, in lassitude, headache, constipation, or a fever, or some other attack of illness.)