Day 74

Too tired last night to workout. I did next Friday's jumps instead and will get back on track today. Adjusting to diet changes has been hard and even painful. My weight in the morning is 66 kilos and goes up as far as 68 before I go to bed. I know all this is normal and expected, and the reasons and explanations behind it are well understood. New photo up. This time the lighting and quality is worse than ever. You may believe me or not but when I see myself in the mirror, I can definitely see more muscle tone and definition. I was toying around with a photo editting app that has some cool effects and a lot of not-at-all cool ones. But, the one to your left is certainly more accurate than the "real" one on the right. Back to work.

Day 70: Shawshank Redemption

PCP, the experiment is about to yield it's final results. Proof of it is that even Patrick refers to the next 20 days kind of in the past tense.

Today's question time video was most illuminating as many of my fears were dissipated: we do get to keep our new selves! The coming weeks are also about "returning" to normalcy before we "reintegrate" to life so that we are able to accept dinner invitations without freaking everybody else as we open a lunch box containing a chopped apple, a boiled egg mysteriously devoid of it's yolk, on top of which we dare ask the host if they happen to have fat-reduced milk in the fridge. I think I'll miss being a bit of an outcast but certainly appreciate that our stomachs cannot stay fist-sized forever.

All these feelings are like watching the Shawshank Redemption; inmates so accustomed to life behind bars that the outside world no longer seems appealing. Except for Tim Robins and Morgan Freeman, whose plan all along was to do great inside while strategising their redemption. To be honest, right now I sympathyse more with the guy whose crow dies, goes out to work packing groceries and hangs himself.

I think readjusting to life after PCP will be traumatic to some extent because even though we will be able to have confidence in our new physiques, so many things about the world will look bleak, grotesque, degraded. If I'm allowed a dose of humour here, I think for example that I will tend to agree with initiatives to update airline policies so that obese passengers are charged extra. Of course, we can all mostly say that we are tolerant, non-discriminatory people. But honestly, who buys that! After PCP it will be inevitable to not only use our new bodies but also our new minds to relate to the world.

OK, I doubt it will be a depressing experience. Getting back to making real sense, I think life will be of better quality from here on. It will just be a bit sad to see that however our own transformation, the outside world remains in big trouble! In Colombia, where I live, a study was recently published with some alarming results: 58% of the population is overweight, almost everybody dislikes vegetables, women eat more fruit than men, but the ones who eat more fruit only do it three times a week and, get this, 78% of the sample affirmed to do some kind of exercise on a regular basis. Yeah right! The study could skip all results and jump directly to concluding that at least 78% of the population is hypocritical.

What I can say for sure is that micro-geographically speaking, things around me have changed. At home, my wife started to dislike too salty falvours. My brother in law is currently doing the PCP. The three people who sit next to me in the office eat bananas like monkeys. People who at some point mocked me for what I was doing now see the results: some keeping their mouths shut but their faces full, others praising how good I look.

I hope sometime in the future civilization will look back to our days and wonder why people were fat much in the same way we look back 150 years ago and wonder why people's heads were cut off with a guillotine in a public square. I guess it will take a revolution for things to change. I'm leading my own private one quietly, just trying to lead by example. I'll follow Patrick's advice and continue to be Zen about PCP.

Here's to Day 70!

Day 69

Tough days. Last night I was drained and couldn't bring myself to jumping. Did the rest though, successfully.I have been doing the elevated push ups since some time now and I really think chest exercises are my strongest point. Legs, v-seats, abs in general except for planks, and arms come next (seeing your veins and so much definition of biceps and triceps is so cool), and back and shoulder exercises remain very challenging but I'm keeping up.

I won't lie to myself: I could say that all the cycling yesterday made up for skipping the jump rope. If I thought this was true, either I would stop riding the bicycle home-work-home(lunch)-work-home, or I would stop the jumping. Not a chance!

The new diet is messing with my mind. I feel very hungry just half an hour after lunch. The afternoon tea (yogurt and egg white) hardly satiate or ameliorate the starving sensation. So by the time I start the workout (7pm) I feel I have no energy. Then dinner fills me up more than I'd like, partly because of the carbs and partly because I'm having to add the post workout egg white and yogurt to my dinner; otherwise I'd simply never go to bed. And finally, my favourite meal of the day apart from breakfast, the evening snack. So I end up going to bed at around 11, which is not bad, but since the carbs were re-introduced the quality of my sleep has been affected. Last night was perhaps the first exception of the week.

I suppose this is all part of readjusting to what our diets from here on should be like. But somehow I miss the days when dinner was just an apple, an egg white and a glass of milk.

Aside from all the above, I wanted to say that I'm past the point of feeling good about being able to tell how much weight I've lost or how much I've trimmed my body by the size of my clothes. None of my pants fit right anymore since the past three weeks. My shirts look as if they were passed on from an older brother (which is impossible considering I'm the older one), my boxers are good for dressing up like a clown in haloween and my belts are ornamental at most. My wife likes this baggy appearance and I have said to myself that new clothes should be a kind of troffe I shouldn't get my hands on until the game is over. I guess this is part of the grim enthusiasm, so I'll wait.

Day 67

There's no correlation between the frequency of my latest posts and PCP performance. If anything, the opposite is true. Not that I'm working out so much I don't find time to drop a few lines in here -in fact I'm managing to do my workout sessions in under an hour. But office work, running again to the hospital with our son who had a high fever last week (he's all better now), and just trying to fully unplug and get a good rest over the weekend, altogether delayed this entry.

Last night the pull ups and the KF abs were all done right for the first time. I felt a very satisfying tension in my back as the muscles contracted that I had never experienced before in my life. Changes are starting to surface in my back and lower abs. Perhaps it's more the feel and the awareness of inner strength and muscle than the looks, but it feels fantastic.

I'm committed to the bicycle as my new means of transport. No more using the car or taking taxis. The distance between home and my office is 3 kilometres, roughly. And while I used to walk several times a week, I'm discouraged by the constant raining and the fact that it takes up more time than I care to spend. The bicycle ride is 10 minutes, sometimes less, and I now have this cool raincoat that folds into a pocket size bag and a cycling backpack that comes with a dry sac you can put over it if it's raining. So, no matter the weather, I'm keeping this good habit. It makes sense on so many other levels like being the most eco-friendly way to move around town, etc. I usually go home at noon, have lunch and come back to work, so it's 4 x 3 kilometres a day, which is not bad!

Carbs, I'm sure if the dose was upped there is good reason for it. However, I notice I was sleeping better before and I'm wondering if instead of having the 50g of carbs at dinner, I could add those to the evening snack or add them to my lunch (that perhaps is too much at once). But having carbs at dinner somehow is not making me happier.

I have yet to have this week's photo taken and uploaded. Will do this tonight and upload it tomorrow.

On to read your posts, go have some lunch and try to stay focus on a couple of reports that must go out by COB today. Oh dear! Office work, can there be a more degrading way to spend a day? My wife came up with a thought the other day that was as liberating as it was frustrating: there should be a machine that transcribes what you are thinking directly into the final draft. Not to sound lazy, but I do think the brain is mightier than the pen (and therefore mightier than the sword).

Day 63

There's this sense of nervousness growing inside my head as we approach the last days of the PCP. What will life be like afterwards? OK, perhaps that sounded overly existentialist, but since by now I'm sure things won't, cannot and must not go back to be what they used to, and since I'm now habituated to PCP days, diet, routines and a big pay off of wellness, I seem to be taking an interest in the future and not just on focusing on each day as it comes.

Some parameters I'm trying to coin in my left brain:

- Once something ends, don't return, move on
- Treasure changes, mental and physical
- Moving on denotes a continuum, not an ending
- 90 days is the time it takes to see results, from then onwards, focus on habits

Enjoy de weekend,

J

Day 60

Busy week, but doing well.
I'm trying to focus on total workout times. Since day 50 I noticed I wasn't hitting the one-hour target, often spending as much as an hour and a half. But since Saturday this is starting to change. Last night it took me 58 minutes, including the rope jumps. Things are getting tough but results speak for themselves: relatives, friends and colleagues are thrown by how lean and healthy I'm looking. Today, despite the ever changing weather of Bogota, I decided to start using my bicycle again. It was so full of dust and rust and the tires were low on air. Still I kind of cleaned it and rode to a bicycle shop near my office for maintenance. New and lighter tires for city streets are excellent, rims straightened, breaks and transmission working as good as new. I was amazed at how strong my legs felt. It's been years since I last rode but I do remember feeling some soreness after just a little pedalling. Today it was a different story, I mostly rode using the hardest gear for speed and it felt fantastic, as if suddenly I had superpowers. I guess I'm gonna start experimenting more because the basis for tracking progress has so far been the PCP workouts. Putting to test this new body will be quite an adventure. I had been thinking so much about getting a motorcycle. I won't deny I still want one and find riding incredibly fun, but the bicycle makes so much more sense!

Day 56

Another week down as we approach 60% of the PCP.

I'm flipping through the news on the earthquake and tsunami in Japan and came across a chronicle of families who went out to public parks and squares with their survival bags all neat, no panic or histeria, and just sat on the benches to wait. Amazing! This is the most outstanding demonstration that discipline, individual and social, pay off in the face of catastrophe. Strict building rules minimised damages, people's awareness minimised the massive loss of lives (300 or so is the death toll, sad indeed, very sad, but nothing compared to Haiti or Pakistan). Trains in Tokio are starting to work again and the ice skating world cup will take place on 20th March (not the slightest crack on the stadium building). So, bad news but great example. I'm not a fan of generalization myself and therefore tend to disregard expressions starting with "Society must understand..." or "Throughout history, mankind...", which epitomise the rhetoric of politicians that make the crowds believe crowds are intelligent and rational. But I do acknowledge there are exemplary social behaviours and social results that are inevitably linked to individuals not each doing only what's best for themselves, but also sticking to rules and norms, which is the best course of action to being effectively compassionate.

Millions of things combined in specific ways are needed to achieve such advanced societies. But if I may extrapolate to my own personal experience, I have realised by way of doing the PCP, which requires great discipline and commitment, that changing eating habits and exercising triggered a myriad of positive changes in almost all other aspects of my life. So maybe it isn't necessary to tackle all problems or pursue all goals at once, but simply to do one thing right to trigger a cascade of changes, behavioural and spiritual, that might just do the trick of making life all better. I have also learned over the past 56 days that adherence to the programme is only possible if you understand why and what you're doing.

So, back to those Japanese families: they didn't rush out yelling histerically and propagating panic, but knew what and why they had to do. In fact, the people most scared in the streets were almost all expats, awed by the apparent lack of expression among the faces of the Japanese crowd.

It's also amazing to observe how chain reactions or "macro-behaviours" sudenly roll out. It takes just one person, not necessarily characterised by being a leader, to do something sensible and visible for others to follow. People seating around me in the office now give me money almost every day at 11am when I'm about to go downstairs to the organic market to buy my morning snack. I come back with fruit which they seem/pretend to prefer over croissants. I don't blame them for not wanting to eat their fruit with an egg on the side (I like it quite a lot). One of my colleagues even said she found eggs disgusting and dangerous (allergens, cholesterol, etc).

OK, perhaps I went too far. There is no real connection between an earthquake in Japan and our PCP individual experiences. I just made these connections inevitably, hoping Patrick and his loved ones are all safe and well. But, somehow I think I'm not that far off the path to a round thought. I didn't go to the shrink or get a gastric bypass to be happier and lean, and therefore stronger, younger and capable of taking care of myself throughot life. All I did was jumping rope every day and eating food.

Have a good weekend!

Day 55: indulgence 2

I looked up the word "indulgence" in wikipeadia only to conrfirm I did indeed fell prey of a faith-related trap. Wanna a know what wikipedia says? "Indulgence: In Catholic theology, an indulgence is the full or partial remission of temporal punishment due to sins which have already been forgiven."

I had pizza margherita (left one slice out of 8 on the plate) and a glass of white wine. Half way through savouring the mozarella, tomato and basil blend melt softly in my mouth, I was attacked by the image of a chopped apple, two egg whites and a glass of milk. Suddenly the pizza started to taste bleak. My indulgence, the satiation of my long desire for pizza, became a punishment. I felt like an idiot, not sure if my inability to enjoy a perfectly delicious pizza was worse than deliberately straying off the path just to see what happens. Like I didn't know already! #"!%$#"&(%)(/=/(&()&%/&!

Of course, there's no noticeable damage done to my body on the outside. But yesterday I walked 6 kilometers on top of the rope jumping and the workout, not because I wanted to consciously compensate or because I thought I deserved extra self-inflicted punishment, but simply because my body asked for it. It's been raining non-stop the past two days, but still I opted to walk to work and back home.

On PCP-related matters, I'm thrilled to finally starting to master the V-seats.

Day 53: new photo up and time for indulgence 2

So I finally put up the photo. I'm happy to see results starting to show. Who was that chubby guy in the Day 1 picture?

Tonight I shall make use of the right to indulgence number 2. My wife and I will be going to one of our favorite restaurants in Bogota, a traditional Italian called Di Lucca. Not sure yet what I'll have. It will be hard making a choice from the menu now that it is impossible for me to suppress the cumulus of PCP knowledge and ignore definitive changes of which I seem to be hyper aware. I will come back tomorrow for a full brief on operation "dinner out"! (I just remembered this from Spy Games, cool movie).

Days 50-52: list of definitive changes and list of changes underway

I keep thinking about how profound an experiment PCP really is. When writing about the changes I'm experiencing, I've always been a bit hesitant, doubting that perhaps the PCP effect will fade sometime after day 90. This thought, far from pessimistic, is a way to tricking myself into reflecting on what I'm doing and therefore be able to put a pin on changes that I think are more definitive while keeping track of others that are possibly still not as well rooted. So here's a list of A) things that have changed for good and a list of B) things that are still changing:

A) DEFINITIVE CHANGES:

- No more salt. If I'm invited to have dinner by friends or family, I won't be a pain in the ass. But at home, I'll make it rule to cook salt-free food.

- Eat food. Perhaps this should be in the first place, but I'm making the list as it comes to mind. I'm enjoying so much eating food that I just don't want to ever eat anything else. Again, life puts us in all sorts of situations but as much as it is possible, I choose to say no to processed foods.

- Vegetables (a lot), protein (enough) and carbs (a little). That's how I want my plate to look like from now on.

- Fruit. I can't say I won't indulge on occasion with a small piece of fine chocolate or a delicious dessert, but only if they're worth it and only every once in a while. Otherwise, I will always prefer fruit for snack and I'll eat fruit every day.

- Whole and complex carbs. As much as I can. Specially when it comes to bread. This is a habit I have since before PCP (whole grain bread) and I intend to keep it.

- Fat-free cooking. I don't miss butter at all. A bit of olive oil is enough. I'll try to avoid excesses of fat in all their forms.

- I want to eat cheese again. But I want to know how to approach this more thoughtfully.

- Milk, yogurt and egg whites. I just love these.

- Eating 5-6 times a day. My body is asking for this like clockwork now. I won't starve it.

- The rope! Excellent habit. I never thought I could be able to exercise 10 days in the row, much less 52. Now 90 doesn't seem difficult. I'm not going to do strength training workouts every day like we are doing right now, but I don't mind jumping every day. I know Patrick has this covered for us.

- Teaching our son how to take care of himself. He is only one years old. For now, my wife and I are making his choices. But we will make sure he eats food and cultivate in him (and his brother/sister whenever that happens) healthy habits. We'll make sure he understands the reasons behind leading a healthy life.

- Exercise and active lifestyle. No need to say more. Except perhaps that I feel confident about this being a definitive change because I've learned how to do it. Exercising without knowing how is not only hazardous but also boring and autistic. Boredom leads to desertion and deserting leads to a myriad of frustrations. So I will exercise but I will mostly also lead an active lifestyle.

- In line with the above, I'm determined to keep a juvenile attitude towards life. I'm kind of an old person in the body of a young man. Always too serious, wearing a tie and growing a belly at fancy restaurants. PCP made me change this. I want to stay young forever and nobody can tell me otherwise. I've seen those pictures of elderly people in Osaka climbing trees and showing off their 100-year old muscles and find no reason why that can't be me. Being too 'serious', too 'adult' and too 'corporate'-looking, will only drive me away from the type of life I want to lead and the type of person I like being most. PCP has shown me that I can do my work even better, not just because I'm eating well and taking care of my body through exercise, but also because training shoes and outdoors clothing are far more comfortable than a suit, a tie and wooden-sole shoes. Those are for very special occasions. Otherwise, I will take advantage of the fact that I can afford dressing comfortably where I work, and that what matters is what I say, write and do, an not so much that the knot of my tie is perfect. Just standing straight and being lean is doing so much more for my image than looking fat, tired and wearing a grey suit. It projects strength, energy and confidence, kindness and well-being,and people seem to react better to this than to the usual burocrats they must deal with.

- Eating in. Restaurants, good or bad, are an enjoyable experience if it happens every once in a while and for a reason. My first indulgence was having lunch out with my wife as if on a date. This was so cool. Making restaurants a first choice or a predominant habit is unhealthy, expensive as hell and takes all the magic away from eating out (I know this because this was the trail I was following before PCP). Plus, for some antiquated reason I'm still convinced that one of the things that makes a family a family, is that father, mother and children seat together at the dinner table together.

B) CHANGES UNDERWAY

- Alcohol. I don't know what will happen after 90 days of no alcohol. I've never been a drunk, but before PCP there always were cold beers in the fridge and wine and spirits in the bar cabinet. Good wine with food, a glass of whisky in a cold night and good talk, a cold beer in the afternoon... What's not to love about that? But I also have to say that as pleasant as that is, I haven't missed it once. In fact, I feel so good to not have a hangover the next day and to be naturally satisfied, without crutches. So I guess I won't drink alcoholic beverages as I used to (without thinking twice about it), but as much as I find it rational not to drink, a beer or a glass of wine or fine whisky do lubricate social events much better than water. And that is also important.

- I'm considering applying for the Fung Fu Body later this year. But I'm still not totally sure. From an individual point of view, PCP has been great. But like all if you, I don't live by myself. There are some good side-effects at the family level of following a strict training programme such as this one. My wife, for instance, has become sensitive to too much salt and likes eating egg whites perhaps more than I do. But working out every day takes a lot of time and dedication. Sometimes there's a conflict of schedules (not really an excuse), sometimes it would be great just to eat the same food without restrictions. I could think of many more examples, but ultimately what I want to say is that maybe it is easier family-wise if we are all relaxed and spontaneous instead of rigorous and stuck to some regimen. So, if I choose to do the KFB and if I am really to commit to a life of activity, exercise and healthy food, I need to make some sacrifices like waking up early and finding a time and a method that I still haven't established (even after 52 days of doing it) which does not conflict with family life. Living better shouldn't make people around you miserable.

- Perhaps getting up earlier in the morning... Mmm? This is tough for me. Not that I'm lazy or that I wake up late. I just find it difficult to get up at a fixed time. Our son is still not sleeping through the night (not really an excuse), and waking up and getting up earlier for me means getting out of bed at 6am instead of 7am. I'll try.

- Finally, changing without obsessing. I must admit I'm of the obsessive kind. PCP is one of the most rewarding things I have done with and in my life. Results are so encouraging that they feed my obsession to keep things right. But it is also important to be able to lead a healthy life without having to obsess about it. Obsessions are not as sustainable as reasons. Reasons are not as sharp as obsessions. Being obsessed is in a way easier because you are hyper aware of what you're doing all the time. Obsessions are, if you wish, more visible and loud inside your head. Yet, obsessions tend to be ephemeral (I'm still talking about myself). It happens to me when playing the piano. I work hard until I'm finally able to play a given piece. Then I tend to over relax and sadly, I end up often forgetting how to play it. So, all that hard work for what? Reasons are quieter in my mind, I'm not always seeing my reasons as much as I see my obsessions. But whenever I'm needing to clear my head and put my ideas in order and set out to do something new or differently, I resort to finding my reasons and revisiting them. So let me recap. PCP has made me also reflect about my behavior and about how my mind works. This is something I knew but hadn't really wanted to address. I must invert the order: reasons first, obsessions later. It will take me farther and at a steadier and smoother pace.

- Ok. One more. I'll try flossing every day!

Days 47-49

I'll say these past three days were PPCPDs (perfect PCP days), as Patrick would put it.
There's some pain in my right pectoral, so it's good that yesterday the focus was on the arms and today is just the rope jumping. By the way, I'm doing better with the timed jumping (because I'm also counting), therefore not loosing my concentration. 8 2-minutes sets are about 1,850 jumps! Kung Fu abs were really tough because my bar is anchored to a very narrow door frame. Not sure I did those right. Yesterday, upon the news of now being time for indulgence 2, I realised I'm quite happy with my diet as it is. So, again, instead of thinking of something like a chocolate cake, I think I'll opt for dinner out with my wife to a nice restaurant. I know lunch would be best, but this is something we haven't done since our son was born (13 months ago). My weight is hovering around 69-70 kilos, but I'm starting to actually feel dense and heavy muscle-wise, so I'm looking forward to the remainig PCP days to consolidate results. Sorry I didn't put up the weekly photo. The one I took was accidentally deleted when transferring from the flash card to the computer. 60-seconds planks are exponentially harder, don't you think? Those 10 seconds increments are a torture technique. I must confess I'm not doing the 8-minutes abs. I just hate the music and find the guy annoying. The real reason, though, is that I feel I'm having enough with the daily PCP quota. I know I could be missing an opportunity to have better-looking muscles, but the truth is I end up very tired and worn out after the workouts, so maybe I'll consider doing those after PCP is over. I'll be happy to know if those of you who are doing these are seeing enhanced results that could incline me to reconsider. Wish all of you a happy weekend!

Days 43 - 46: catching up

Back from a long weekend away and unplugged from work. If I wanted I could have had access to my blog on the go but, to be honest, I just felt like taking a rest from fluorescent computer screens and enjoy the break. I will put up a couple of photos later this week, including the weekly photo.

I'm finding the new diet plan interesting. Having as much of the vegetables portion as I want at lunch feels like training for the post PCP life, when we will have to make choices and eyeball our rations without crutches like the food scale or the diet plan prescribed in advance.

I will make a few confessions:

- I couldn't have animal protein for breakfast, which I replaced with egg whites. Is this OK?
- On Monday we went for a long walk that involved some climbing and trekking. On the way back, I carried my son (he is all better, thank you Molly) on my back hanging from a backpack seat for babies (I will post a photo of this too). When we got back home to our friend's house where we were staying, I was too tired and didn't feel like working out on top of the long day's walk. Skipped the skipping and did half the workout. It felt like enough from a physical point of view, but I still feel like I betrayed myself a bit.
- I'm having mixed feelings about the timed version of the rope jumping. In my case, counting helped me concentrate and have an idea of how much was behind and ahead at any given point. I tried setting the stopwatch on my phone to two minutes but at some point I began to have doubts: how much more do I have to go? Did I press the start button? Will 2 minutes be equivalent to 200-250 jumps? And as I thought about this, I lost my concentration and started to trip systematically, which by now we all know is one of the most frustrating sensations. So, I went back to counting and I'm still doing 6 sets of 250 jumps. I'll try switching to the new method, but the transition won't be as easy.
- The friends we went with are former PCPeers, so it was great food-wise. On Monday, however, we had to buy some braised chicken which we ate by the river upon arrival to our spot (a fantastic hut in the middle of nowhere next to a clean river flowing through a warm, almost desert-like valley). It was too high on salt and a bit oily. I honestly didn't enjoy it very much and noticed right away how hard it was to actually know what it tasted like with so much salt in it. One of our friends became food poisoned and threw up many times after that meal. Not sure it was the chicken though, but I'm glad I didn't eat that much.
- There was a lot of alcohol available during the whole trip. I couldn't resist having a tiny sip of cold beer when we arrived in the hut. Otherwise, I had none and it was weird being around merrier people enjoying cold rum, beer and wine. But then again, it feels excellent to see them hungover and weak the next morning while you are all perky and ready to go.
- The morning egg snack was tricky. In the past four days there was a lot of moving around and driving involved, so in fact only once I did have it as prescribed. The other times, I replaced that egg at breakfast.
- Schedule-wise the trip was a scramble. Worked out twice in the mornings and the rest of the days very late at night. Not easy or smart, because I could feel my body feeling confused, wanting to move in the mornings and wanting to rest at night, but forced to do the opposite. So now I need to get back to a regular routine to feel less tired and more in control.
- I'm doing well except for the side crunches. But I'll keep trying.
- This morning I my weight was 69 kilos. Yes, I know numbers aren't important, but it is great knowing I've lost 8 kilos so far and also that despite the salty and oily chicken and the rather disorganised schedule of the past days, my weight was stable.

When is the next indulgence?