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So you were feeling pretty good heading into the holiday weekend with regard to appearance: Abs showing some or a lot of delineation, muscles feeling full and hard - in effect, you were looking 'tight' and proud of it. Now, after a long weekend of eating and (probably) drinking, you feel like a bloated cow and are scared to step on the scale or look at your midsection in the mirror.
Well, then don't step on the scale, and don't look in the mirror. Just by getting back on track this week with regularly scheduled workouts and eating habits, all of that 'damage' you think you did this weekend will be reversed. It's been discussed before both in this blog and within the Back2Health newsletter, but bears repeating: the body is very dynamic. It can swing seemingly in the wrong direction for a few hours or days, and then all of a sudden you'll feel and look great again. And, conversely, you can eat a huge 'junk' meal and then a few hours later look better than earlier in the day...but 2-3 of those meals either during the same day or over several leave you in bloat-world again.
So while I try not to give specific advice to anyone that I'm not directly working with, generally speaking the following steps will help bring you right back to where you were - if not improve on appearance due to the metabolic shock of a few days of excess calories:
- Drink as much water as you can for a few days; this will flush out the system of excess sodium as a result of increased food/drink, which also means that excess water will be released. Hence, no more 'bloated' feeling.
- Get right back onto your 'regular' eating; no need to diet super hard and deprave yourself of needed calories.
- Get right back into your 'regular' workout schedule. If you train with us, that's 1-3 intense resistance training sessions per week.
By week's end, if you follow the above steps, I'll pretty much guarantee that you'll be back to where you stood before the holiday weekend took it's toll.
*The title to this particular blog posting is the title of the email from the client discussed below, received this week.We had a client return for our services today, after approximately 3 mos. without MedX exposure. He stopped, simply enough, because the sciatica that he had been suffering from due to disc herniation was no longer present.Since the reduction in pain was the primary reason for starting MedX treatment, I'm not surprised he stopped once feeling well. But, as we've discovered, often times it's not wise to terminate MedX sessions completely after the initial 12-16 weeks. This is because there is, like any other muscle/muscle group, a 'use it or lose it' effect. Train your biceps hard, and they will become larger and stronger to whatever genetically mediated degree possible. The same thing happens with the muscles of the lumbar back - BUT, and this is a big but - these particular muscles tend to hold strength longer once gained. In other words, one may find that taking two weeks off from biceps training leads to a slight loss of muscular size and hardness. With regard to the lumbar muscles, this 'loss' is less noticeable when following a period of intense strengthening. In this particular client's case, it lasted about 3 months before he noticed a return of discomfort. Our goal at Back2Health: Spinal Fitness is to reduce lower back/neck pain as quickly as possible for every client. What this means for most clients is about a 12-16 week commitment to regular, once-weekly sessions using the MedX equipment. After this, however, we recommend a less frequent maintenance program for each individual to keep the pain at bay. Whether this means every other week or once per month is to be determined based on how the client feels. But that would certainly be better than pushing hard for 12 weeks to get rid of pain, taking 2 months off and having pain return, and then needing to go through another intensive 12 weeks of MedX treatment. The goal should be to do as little as necessary to elicit the ideal response.
I've just about had it with trying to get the word out regarding the efficacy of MedX spinal exercise to the media. A few publications have allowed me to mention MedX in particular (one regarding police officer back pain, and the other dealing with back pain in nurses), but mostly I'm asked to remove any/all vendor names. It's a bit difficult to explain why MedX is the best at what it does without actually mentioning the name. That would be like discussing the merits of an excavation company that has the only backhoe in the region - with everyone else limited to shovels - by saying the company uses 'tools'. Could mean shovels, bare hands, or a backhoe - the reader/listener will never know.
WCVB-5's Chronicle television show was approached via a connection within, but they would only consider doing a story on reducing back/neck pain if other options besides MedX were considered as well. In other words, the story would have to present multiple approaches, and all purportedly of equal value.
No thanks. You can keep your shovel - I've got my backhoe...
After last week's 'off' chest workout, yesterday's session for that body part was ideal. Great mind-muscle connection, crisp contractions, and (perhaps resulting from the lackluster previous workout) excellent arousal during the session led to a fantastic pump and deep fatigue. 24 hours later and my pecs are sore and full. Unless future chest workouts are a struggle, and not simply the odd session here and there, there is no concern (i.e., overtraining, injury, etc.).
It's also interesting to note, although no surprise to this author, that one bad workout didn't ruin the appearance of the muscle in question. Often times trainees treat their sessions in a do-or-die fashion, which is good for arousal and motivation, but if things don't work as planned, that doesn't mean one's physique will fall apart. Most people that train hard, and have at least a few months of such training behind them could stop completely and notice little loss of 'appearance' over at least a few weeks.
Surprisingly, I had a bad chest workout today. This is usually the easiest body part to pump and fatigue, and rarely do I suffer from the muscular 'disconnect' that occurred this afternoon.
As strange as it may sound, I almost felt non-recovered from a full body session last Thursday. Only two exercises were attempted on that day, performed in modified Monster Zone fashion (i.e., not as strenuous due to longer rests between mini-sets, and less regard for completely even fatigue throughout exercise range of motion). Decent pump that day, but nothing fantastic.
Today, three exercises were chosen that usually lead to what I like to call a 'crisp' connection, where its easy to really groove each repetition and dig deep into the target area. In other words, everything usually seems to click. But today, everything felt off; coordination, connection, and then frustration when the first two were noted to be off.
About a minute after each set, a decent pump was noted, but not the usually full and round pectorals that I've noted since implementing the Zone Training method first 3 years ago. About 7 hours later at the time of this writing, some of the usual post-workout fullness is still there, but again not as much as typical. Following chest, shoulders were a little better, but things didn't really click until triceps at the end of session. Appearance immediately after was of somewhat deflated pecs and shoulders, and nicely pumped and hard triceps.
Curious to see what happens with next two days' workouts (different body parts). Will those also suffer as chest (and to a lesser degree delts) did today? Also, due to unusual split, these body parts won't be trained again for 9 days (vs. usual every 7th day). Finally, I haven't been super hungry last 2 days after eating a lot Saturday afternoon/evening (social event). Doubtful that lack of calories in last few days had much to do with things, but interesting to note nonetheless.
Something I've noticed in years past, and already noticing this year is that by paying close attention to hunger I can manipulate appearance for the better. By that, I mean that in cases such as currently where I'm eating clean and with moderate caloric intake - but then note being ravenously hungry on certain days - it is actually beneficial to eat a bit more food on those days. In the past, and so far this year, this has occurred on workout days, particularly where 2-3 consecutive days' workouts have occurred - or the day after my 3rd workout. In every case where I have noticed this pattern emerging, I've looked better (fuller, harder, and leaner) in the days following such an increase in caloric intake.
Strange how dynamic the body is. Last night after dinner, I felt and looked as tight as I have since last summer. In fact, I almost felt beach ready, i.e., plenty of abdominal definition, not much to pinch around love handles, and a hardness of muscularity that I haven't noted yet this spring. This afternoon, immediately after workout, I felt less lean - and 'flat' even though pretty well pumped from workout.I suspect, that in the next 24-48 hours much of what I'm noticing in a negative light will reverse. But it is interesting that one can look and feel great one day and then like crap the next, particularly when diet and exercise remain pretty much constant.
