1/19/16

Ab day.


lying leg raise: 15x2, 18x1
side crunch: 22x2, 30x1
ab rolls: 12x2, 15x1
knee hugs: 16x2, 23x1

Food
3236 cals
196.5 fat
176.5 protein
200 carb

Ate lots of salmon and trout, and a pint of Talenti choc chip cookie dough ice cream. Crushed it.

I got Pavel Tsatsouline's video The Naked Warrior. He has a system of progression for 1-leg squats and 1-arm pushups. I'll try to incorporate some of his stuff into my brogram.

1/20/16

Didn't sleep well, woke up anxious and trembling despite taking xanax and melatonin last night. I think maybe my last ab session at 9:30 pm was too late last night.

Today I did a 5 minute cardio session, 5 chinups, 10 pushups.

Good news is I weighed in at 134 lbs.

Food:
3035 cals
179.5 fat
154 protein
213 carb

Another day of relentless eating, including a pint of Talenti mint chocolate chip.

How has the pistol training been going?

1/21/16

5 minute cardio in the morning, and 3 good upper body sessions.

chinup 6x3
bentover row 28x15x3
press 28x10x3
curl 28x7x3
tricep extension 28x8x3
lateral raise 13x12x3
pushup 20x3
pullup 6x3

Food
3215 cals
198 fat
144 protein
205 carb

3rd straight day over 3k cals. I just found out parmesan cheese is 36% protein, I've been dumping it on my veggies the last couple days. Pint Of The Day: Haagen Dazs rum raisin.

I'll start doing some pistol-specific stuff tomorrow.

1/22/16

Slept about 3 hours last night. I've had 2 normal sleeps since going up to 30mg of Lexapro 16 days ago. I'll have to call my psychiatrist and tell her I'm going back down to 20mg cuz this **** is unbearable. My anxiety isn't any different from 20mg to 30mg anyway. The melatonin just makes me drowsy and delerious but I still don't actually sleep.

No lifting today.

Food
2139 cals
118 fat
88 protein
155 carb

The past week has been a blur of severe depression, sleep deprivation, and watching tennis all night.

Haven't had the energy to lift at all. I'm sleeping slightly better than I was before tho. This confirms that part of my sleep troubles were caused by the lifting. I don't know how to fix that other than to lift less. But the low volume of lifting that I do certainly indicates that there's something abnormal. It probably has to do with cortisol or heart rate variability or something. But I don't know how to fix it. I don't even know who to ask or what type of doctor would know anything about this.

Have you tried mirtazapine for improving your sleep yet?

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26742677

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/23857869

I'm kind of a poor sleeper occasionally and a low dose of that **** (3.75 - 7.5 mg) knocks me right out.

Never heard of mirtazapine, will check it out, thx.

If you decide you want to give it a go, obviously consult your doctor about it, to be clear of drug interactions and stuff.

But it sure sounds like you could be a perfect cndidate for it, as not only should it help with sleep (at low dosages) but also lower cortisol and potentially be appetite-inducing (at higher dosages).

yeah I'd def talk to my psychiatrist first. I might ask my gp for a cortisol test too.

Felt ok yesterday and today. Didn't lift much, just did more of a GTG thing with pushups/pullups/squats/ab rolls. Slept about 4 hours the last 2 nights.

weighed in at 135 lbs tonight, although I just ate 1lb of pulled pork and a box of cookies that was about 1000 cals.

http://www.beastskills.com/one-legged-squat-the-pistol/
http://www.beastskills.com/one-arm-pushup/

Here are some excellent guides on pistol and one-arm pushup training that should be useful for you

I went down to 20mg lexapro for almost 2 weeks. Didn't sleep any better, and anxiety went up a little, especially when laying down. The weirdest thing about my anxiety is it's always been the worst when I lay down. So I went back up to 30mg yesterday. I'll see my psychiatrist next tuesday and I'll inquire about the mirtazapine.

I've been averaging 2600 cals since my last post. I've started doing longer (10-12 min) and lower intensity cardio sessions, which seems more effective at "building an aerobic base" as they say. I'm starting to think my lack of aerobic fitness is a contributing factor to the anxiety, at least when I lift. I've noticed feeling less anxious during/after lifting.

Still can't sleep more than 4 hours per night tho.

Went to see psychiatrist today. She said she usually doesn't like to prescribe mirtazapine just for sleep since the sedentary effect is only a side effect. She also said the sedentary effect only happens at very low doses.

She prescribed Seroquel 12.5mg, to see if that will help my sleep. If that doesn't work then mirtazapine is another option but I might have to get off the lexapro first.

She wanted me to start taking klonopin instead of xanax since klonopin works longer and I'd be taking it every day. But I was like nah I only want to take benzos if I'm having a really bad day and I need something to calm me down, which is only about 1-2x a week now.

Knowing what a lightweight I am with medication, my psychiatrist prescribed the smallest possible dose of Seroquel, which is 25mg, and told me to break them in half.

I took half a tablet at 3am last night. I felt weird for about an hour, some numbness in my hands and feet, and irregular heartbeat. But then I slept solidly until about 10:30am when I got up to get an amazon package and brush my teeth. Then I went back back to bed and slept until 4pm. I still feel really tired, like I want to go back to bed.

I tried to do some pushups, got to 6 and collapsed.

This Seroquel is good stuff. I feel groggy for a couple hours after waking up, but if I'm sleeping I can't complain.

Back on the wagon today.

134.8 lbs

chinups 5x4
pushups 15x4
tricep extension 28x8x4
bentover db row 28x12x4
shrugs 28x15x4

15 minutes cardio

drug-induced sleep > no sleep

Ran a mile in 12:28 today. When I say "ran" that means 1/3 running and 2/3 walking cuz I can't run for more than about 1 minute straight.

Got surprisingly fatigued from that herculean effort, and didn't have as much energy for lifting.

One day I will run a mile in under 10 minutes MARK MY WORDS!!!

I've been slacking on counting macros, but it's not because I haven't been eating enough.

goblet squats 28x20x3
calf raise 28x20x2
1-leg bw bridge 20x2
I don't know what it's called but I did the thing where you crouch on the floor and hold a db in the inside of your knee and kick your leg back. I did 18x15x2 of those.

I have a very good experience with mitrazapin. it was doing miracles for my depression and sleeping problems at a dose a lot lower that is considered therapeutic. Usually lowest dose as antidepressant is 15 mg. 5 mg had changed things for me radically. The only bad thing for me was weight gain. But it seems that you definitely don't have that as a problem.

GL

I think lexapro/seroquel/xanax is a good trifecta for me right now. If it stops working I'll go for the mirtazapine.

Did ab stuff today.

lying leg raise 15x4
ab roll 12x4
side crunch 12x16x4
knee hugs 15x4

I am a psychiatrist, but not your psychiatrist, obviously. So the below are my thoughts based solely on what you're writing here. If you think any of it may be true, you should talk to your real psychiatrist about it as she's actually evaluated you and knows you. That said...

This is just stupid. The sedation is a 'side effect' of both Seroquel and mirtazapine, so why should her argument work on only one of these meds? And is it even significant that the sedation is listed as a side effect and not the main effect? Both drugs work on multiple receptors/systems, so you just have to be mindful of it all.

Both of these make me curious if the anxiety is being triggered by some cardiac issue.

I guess you're right. But the seroquel is working, so whatevs.

Yeah I know. When I first started having the panic attacks I thought it was my heart. I went to the ER 3 times, every time they did an EKG, they took chest x-rays, they did a bazillion blood tests. They did an ultrasound thing on my heart. I had 3 different cardiologists tell me there was nothing wrong with my heart. Whenever I told them it got worse when I was lying down they'd look at me like I was making it up or talking out of my ass or something.

For me, the only real evidence that it's not my heart is that xanax and lexapro have helped the physical anxiety symptoms, including when I'm lying down.

The anxiety still gets worse with exercise, but it's manageable now.

2/24/16

Back day.

db bentover rows 36x15x4
1-leg db deadlift 28x10x4
standard db deadlift 36x10x4
seated row with resistance bands 15x4

Yeah, I thought her reasoning was fairly illogical as well but didn't want to say anything because Seroquel seems to be working for hero.

2/26/16

135 lbs

Upper body day.



pushups 18x4
chinups 5x4
1-arm tricep extension 13x10x4
lateral raise 13x12x4
shrug 33x25x4