10302009

Looks like I’m back up to 220 lbs. (100 kg). Hopefully that’s just water retention from the Epistane and/or increased carbs I’ve been playing around with.

10172009

1) Turns out Dad has, in addition to having a misshapen valve in his heart, an ENLARGED heart. He’s off to see a cardiologist later this week to decide the course of action.

2) On a less-important note, my Unemployment monetary assistance hasn’t yet been paid, so I get to go to the Department of Labour Monday to see what’s gone wrong. I’m hoping that, were my claim refused, I would have been notified directly, right?

3) Also Monday, starting the Westside. My joints request your prayers and well-wishes.

10092009

1) I’ll start keeping an actual log again the week after next; taking next week off to recouperate and try to decide on a fucking program. I’m thinking either Westside or 5/3/1 (it’s new, so of course I wanna jump on this bandwagon).

2) Even though it’s probably ultimately for the best and I should probably block it from my mind and move on, I can’t help but dwell on the firing situation and GET MORE AND MORE FUCKING PISSED OFF THE MORE I THINK ABOUT IT. GODDAMN IT, et cetera.

3) Totally lost my train of thought. That’ll teach me to switch tabs in the middle of updating.

09292009

ONE GODDAMN HOUR ON THE ELLIPTICAL AT 70+ RPM. FUCK YEAH.

09272009

Originally posted a couple of years ago:

I second guess myself/overanalyse far too much. I need to stop that and put some trust in this creativity/intelligence that I’m supposed to have. I’ve done some reading and thinking today, and I’m juggling some potential business ventures (to be unveiled… sometime) around in my head. Thus, I can’t let this “oh no, what if I fail” bullshit keep me from taking some risks.

I’ve really got nothing to lose as it is, anyway!

Most of that still rings true, but what the hell happened to those plans? I don’t even remember what all of them were, to be honest. Anyway, the Hot Topic job (or ANY job; Hot Topic just happened to be what came along) was intended to be used to FINANCE these plans, not become a substitute for them.

I’m gonna need to do some more brainstorming… and maybe soul-searching (it’s been a while since I’ve used that thing). I’ve gained a little business experience and a new way of looking at things, no matter how slight a change, so if anything I think I’m better equipped now (aside from forgetting what my ideas were) to do this than I was then.

THINKING for now. When I get back from my trip – whenever/wherever that may be – it will be time to IMPLEMENT somehow whatever ideas come about. Or attempt the original plan-within-a-plan of biding my time as an hourly wage slave until opportunity knocks… or at least passes by so I can jump through the window and tackle it.

I’m gonna try to chase some form of the goddamned American Dream, no matter how much bullshit it might be.

09252009

Holy shit. 212 mg/dL before lifting because I’d eaten some stuff I shouldn’t've (those damned SANDWICHES are apparently fucking dangerous. I hate the ‘beetus.), but after the lifting (erstwhile sipping on a protein shake) and 15 minutes steady-state ellipticalling, it was down to 82. No wonder I was feeling faint, with it dropping that quickly. Goddamn.

Still at 210 lbs. (95 kg) bodyweight, but I’m up to 6 chinups WITH strict form!

09212009

During lifting, I sipped on a “recovery drink” that included (among its 2 scoops) 28 g of sugar. I thought it would kill me, and to be fair, I did feel like embracing the sweet release of death during the workout because I hadn’t had an insulin spike like that in a looong time. BUT the results of the SCIENCE! were as follows (mg/dL; too lazy to convert to foreign measurements):

147 before leaving for the gym
196 after lifting (and finishing the shake), before cardio
136 after cardio
106 after the drive home

For reference (fasting levels), 80 – 120 is “normal,” the lower 70s is where people start feeling faint, and upper 120s and above is in official beetus territory.

Yeah, it got really high, but it went down pretty quickly (might be into the 90s or even 80s right now, but I don’t want to use any more expensive test strips tonight), so I think I might be able to properly conduct another Operation Adonis program and drop a lot more fat!

Wednesday or Friday I’m gonna try it with ONE scoop of the recovery thing and one scoop of straight whey and see where that leads me.

09192009

1) Rack pull with 350 lbs. (159 kg).
2) Blood sugar after lifting and cardio (only 10 minutes HIIT, 5 minutes steady-state because I simply couldn’t continue) was 91 mg/dL, even after having a handful of chips AND a damn hot dog (WITH bun and some ketchup) beforehand. Nice.
3) Hamstrings are REEEALLY sore and I may not be able to complete a squat or even walk correctly tomorrow. (That’s not what I initially meant to say here, but I already had the 3) typed out so I had to put something there)

09162009

(Not an official log, so it doesn’t get the proper date notation. )

Still not actually recording weights/reps, but I found out tonight that I can still bench 250 lbs. (113 kg) without much of a problem and can now do 6 chinups (on a related note, bodyweight was 210 lbs./95 kg when I checked earlier). Feeling pretty badass in spite of losing the job.

09142009

Why did I only now find this?! I’ve read about gastric bypass surgery IMMEDIATELY correcting diabetes 2, but this goes into possible mechanisms/reasons for that correction.

I can’t help but wonder if the gut infection I had right before I was diagnosed had anything to do with the development of MY ‘beetus. Yeah, I was fat and there’s a family history of it, but I was/am active and didn’t/don’t eat like shit, so I think it’s at least plausible.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080305113659.htm

ScienceDaily (Mar. 6, 2008) — Growing evidence shows that surgery may effectively cure Type 2 diabetes — an approach that not only may change the way the disease is treated, but that introduces a new way of thinking about diabetes.

A new article — published in a special supplement to the February issue of Diabetes Care by a leading expert in the emerging field of diabetes surgery — points to the small bowel as the possible site of critical mechanisms for the development of diabetes.

The study’s author, Dr. Francesco Rubino of NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center, presents scientific evidence on the mechanisms of diabetes control after surgery. Clinical studies have shown that procedures that simply restrict the stomach’s size (i.e., gastric banding) improve diabetes only by inducing massive weight loss. By studying diabetes in animals, Dr. Rubino was the first to provide scientific evidence that gastrointestinal bypass operations involving rerouting the gastrointestinal tract (i.e., gastric bypass) can cause diabetes remission independently of any weight loss, and even in subjects that are not obese.

“By answering the question of how diabetes surgery works, we may be answering the question of how diabetes itself works,” says Dr. Rubino, who is a professor in the Department of Surgery at Weill Cornell Medical College and chief of gastrointestinal metabolic surgery at NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell.

Dr. Rubino’s prior research has shown that the primary mechanisms by which gastrointestinal bypass procedures control diabetes specifically rely on the bypass of the upper small intestine — the duodenum and jejunum. This is a key finding that may point to the origins of diabetes.

“When we bypass the duodenum and jejunum, we are bypassing what may be the source of the problem,” says Dr. Rubino, who is heading up NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell’s Diabetes Surgery Center.

In fact, it has become increasingly evident that the gastrointestinal tract plays an important role in energy regulation, and that many gut hormones are involved in the regulation of sugar metabolism. “It should not surprise anyone that surgically altering the bowel’s anatomy affects the mechanisms that regulate blood sugar levels, eventually influencing diabetes,” Dr. Rubino says.

While other gastrointestinal operations may cure diabetes as an effect of changes that improve blood sugar levels, Dr. Rubino’s research findings in animals show that procedures based on a bypass of the upper intestine may work instead by reversing abnormalities of blood glucose regulation.

In fact, bypass of the upper small intestine does not improve the ability of the body to regulate blood sugar levels. “When performed in subjects who are not diabetic, the bypass of the upper intestine may even impair the mechanisms that regulate blood levels of glucose,” says Dr. Rubino. In striking contrast, when nutrients’ passage is diverted from the upper intestine of diabetic patients, diabetes resolves.

This, he explains, implies that the upper intestine of diabetic patients may be the site where an abnormal signal is produced, causing, or at least favoring, the development of the disease.

How exactly the upper intestine is dysfunctional remains to be seen. Dr. Rubino proposes an original explanation known in the scientific community as the “anti-incretin theory.”

Incretins are gastrointestinal hormones, produced in response to the transit of nutrients, that boost insulin production. Because an excess of insulin can determine hypoglycemia (extremely low levels of blood sugar) — a life-threatening condition — Dr. Rubino speculates that the body has a counter-regulatory mechanism (or “anti-incretin” mechanism), activated by the same passage of nutrients through the upper intestine. The latter mechanism would act to decrease both the secretion and the action of insulin.

“In healthy patients, a correct balance between incretin and anti-incretin factors maintains normal excursions of sugar levels in the bloodstream,” he explains. “In some individuals, the duodenum and jejunum may be producing too much of this anti-incretin, thereby reducing insulin secretion and blocking the action of insulin, ultimately resulting in Type 2 diabetes.”

Indeed, in Type 2 diabetes, cells are resistant to the action of insulin (“insulin resistance”), while the pancreas is unable to produce enough insulin to overcome the resistance.

After gastrointestinal bypass procedures, the exclusion of the upper small intestine from the transit of nutrients may offset the abnormal production of anti-incretin, thereby resulting in remission of diabetes.

In order to better understand these mechanisms, and help make the potential benefits of diabetes surgery more widely available, Dr. Rubino calls for prioritizing research in diabetes surgery. “Further research on the exact molecular mechanisms of diabetes, surgical control of diabetes and the role played by the bowel in the disease may bring us closer to the cause of diabetes.”

Today, most patients with diabetes are not offered a surgical option, and bariatric surgery is recommended only for those with severe obesity (a body mass index, or BMI, of greater than 35kg).

“It has become clear, however, that BMI cut-offs can no longer be used to determine who is an ideal candidate for surgical treatment of diabetes,” says Dr. Rubino.

“There is, in fact, growing evidence that diabetes surgery can be effective even for patients who are only slightly obese or just overweight. Clinical trials in this field are therefore a priority as they allow us to compare diabetes surgery to other treatment options in the attempt to understand when the benefits of surgery outweigh its risks. Clinical guidelines for diabetes surgery will certainly be different from those for bariatric surgery, and should not be based only on BMI levels,” he notes.

“The lesson we have learned with diabetes surgery is that diabetes is not always a chronic and relentless disease, where the only possible treatment goal is just the control of hyperglycemia and minimization of the risk of complications. Gastrointestinal surgery offers the possibility of complete disease remission. This is a major shift in the way we consider treatment goals for diabetes. It is unprecedented in the history of the disease,” adds Dr. Rubino.

Type 2 diabetes, which accounts for 90 to 95 percent of all cases of diabetes, is a growing epidemic that afflicts more than 200 million people worldwide.

At a time when diabetes is growing epidemically worldwide, Dr. Rubino says that finding new treatment strategies is a race against time. “At this point, missing the opportunity that surgery offers is not an option.”

In addition to having performed landmark studies in the field of diabetes surgery, Dr. Rubino was the principal organizer of an influential Diabetes Surgery Summit, held in Rome in March 2007. This international consensus conference helped establish the field, making international recommendations for the use of surgery and creating an International Diabetes Surgery Task Force. Dr. Rubino serves as a founding member.