Week 37 runs from Monday 7th September — Sunday 13th September, 2020.
For more information on what, why and how I’m tracking everything, including my health & fitness goals, please click here. To skip to the end of week summary, please click here.
The Week in Fitness & Food
9/7 – Monday. Rest (ish).
Today was Labour Day in the US so Jacky had the day off. Because he had the day off we just lazed around and had a leisurely breakfast this morning instead of exercising. I was also feeling a little tired and sluggish, probably because it’s been so hot lately, but also because I slept late last night.
In the afternoon we decided to go to a nearby mall to walk around, be outside but not actually outside, and — more importantly — get me Cinnabon. Haha. There were loads of sales going on but I was just interested in the Cinnabon buy-one-plus-a-drink-and-get-one deal. I ate half of one and am saving the rest for another day.
I didn’t exercise today, so I took a random photo just now. The top I’m wearing looks a little large for me and the bat wings under my arms look to have shrunk significantly, both of which are perfectly fine by me haha.
To be honest, I’m very not used to not exercising two days in a row anymore, especially if one of those days is on Monday. Or maybe it’s just I’m really not used to not exercising on a Monday (I did walk a lot more than usual but it was only 6,000 steps). I feel a bit bleurgh and want to work out. It’s too late now because it’s bedtime, but I cannot wait to get back to challenging my body again tomorrow.
I’m taking that as a good sign because I’ve learned that exercise is a reward and it is a joy and pleasure to take care of my body by pushing it to grow stronger. I love working out now; I love working hard during a workout, I love the feeling of accomplishment when I’m able to do one more rep than last time, I love the challenge of keeping good form, I love how energised I feel afterwards.
I did do my weekly pushup test today though!! I did 10 elbows-out knee pushups with actual good form (Jacky was very impressed) plus 3 more where my form was getting increasingly poorer. I then did 1 elbows-in knee pushup with good form (I think?) before I collapsed. I rested for a few minutes and was able to do 5 more elbows-out knee pushups. Result!
There was no change in my weight, but that’ll probably go up tomorrow given my Cinnabon and lack of exercise heh heh.
| Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 01:25 | 09:25 | 8hrs | 4hr 45min | None | Somewhat rested | 122.4lbs |
9/8 – Tuesday. Completed 16:36.
Videos completed: MadFit 5min Warm Up, MadFit Arm Toning Workout, MadFit 30min Low Impact Full Body HIIT, MadFit 5min Cool Down.
I started the set with some pushup training after my warm up. I did have decent form!! There is room for improvement but I think I did 11 elbows out knee pushups with acceptable form before my form began to suffer more. I did 14 in total before starting the Arm Toning Workout.
I mis-remembered it being 15min long so when it ended I was a bit surprised. It wasn’t as difficult as I was expecting and I think that’s because I was stronger! Or maybe I just didn’t have the best mind-muscle connection, I don’t know.
I would like to try it again but without the pushup practice beforehand, and I’ll try to go slower to really make sure I’m engaging the correct muscles next time. Pushup training before doing an arm workout was, um, possibly not the smartest idea I’ve ever had, so I won’t do that next time in case the fatigue caused me to cheat on moves.
The other thing to note was that my right wrist was hurting today, so I have to be careful not to cause additional injury to my body.
The second video was fun and more challenging; I worked hard on my lunges because I think I don’t always have the best form for my lunge. I could feel that I’d become stronger though because there were moves that I was struggling to do last week that I was able to do with less difficulty today (the one where you bring up one leg behind you so your body is parallel with the floor, then bring that same forward to crunch – I was wobbling everywhere last week but today was able to do the move without falling and was even able to feel the burn on my glutes).
However, it looks like my plank form suffered so I’ll need to be more careful for those in future. There’s another 30min low impact ‘HIIT’ workout of Maddie’s that I want to try so I probably won’t re-do this one again for a little while.
Jacky exercised with me today but he hadn’t been properly fuelled with food and felt faint half way through so had to stop. After the workout I was also feeling a little low on blood sugar so cut up some mango for Jacky (I had a couple of slices too) and a golden kiwi for myself.
I’m doing a what I eat in a day post for today so won’t go into too much detail about my diet today.
Sleep-wise, we have another mosquito in our room, GRARGH. Its buzzing woke me up in the middle of the night and made me paranoid. My sleep was pretty disrupted because of it. I hid myself under the sheets but I think it still managed to bite me. Ugh.
Weight-wise, it looks like despite the Cinnabon I still managed to eat in a calorie deficit (dinner was a gigantic veggie wrap) so ended up lighter than yesterday. Now I kinda wish I tracked my calories the day before so I have a better idea of what my maintenance calories are heh heh.
| Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 01:30 | 09:35 | 7hr 35min | 5hr 5min | 2-3x | Not at all rested | 121.6lbs |
9/9 – Wednesday. Completed 18:57.
Videos completed: Natacha Oceane 10min Warm Up, MadFit 15min Dancer Leg Sculpt Workout, MadFit 10min Beginner Lower Abs, MadFit 5min Cool Down.
Today I almost didn’t exercise but again I was so happy I did in the end. I didn’t do the full set that I originally intended because it was dinner time, but I feel that perhaps it was because I didn’t do the additional leg/butt/thigh video that I was able to focus a lot more on engaging my core for the lower abs video.
I noticed today that my form had improved again for the dancer leg sculpt video, though there is still room for improvement! But I made a conscious effort to not lean forward during the lunges, and try to keep my body straight (rather than turning to the side) during the aeroplane moves.
I also noticed improvement on my form for the ab workout – I’ve been making a conscious effort to suck my tummy in to engage my abs and for at least 1 of the movements, I was really able to keep my tummy sucked in the entire time. This may not seem like a lot, but it really was a great improvement for me!
My entire body aches now haha. I didn’t expect my arms to ache as much as they did from yesterday’s workout but there you go. And now I’ve done lower body and lower abs. Perhaps I need a rest day tomorrow?
I slept later than I wanted to last night but I still woke up somewhat rested with only one disruption in the middle of the night to adjust blankets again, so I’m very happy with that. We haven’t caught or killed the mosquito yet, but… ah well. Thankfully I am no longer as paranoid.
Weight-wise, it fluctuated a tiny bit higher. You guys can see what I ate yesterday and it really wasn’t that much! My body naturally fluctuates up a little during the week – this is actually one of the lowest it’s ever risen on a day it’s increased. Let’s see what happens tomorrow.
| Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 01:30 | 08:35 | 7hrs | 3hr 25min | 1x | Somewhat rested | 122lbs |
9/10 – Thursday. Rest.
I slept late and woke up late with some mild cold symptoms (mild headache, stuffy nose, light cough), probably because the temperature dropped overnight and I went to sleep with wet hair from my shower last night.
I love that the weather has cooled down. It’s cloudy today and it reminds me of home. Yesterday we woke up to a dark, orange sky due to the smoke from nearby fires, but today a lot of that smoke has dissipated and the clouds remained.
I am really praying for rain, as well as safety of all those firefighters and everyone who has been displaced from their homes. What a year 2020 has been so far. Jacky and I are very, very blessed to still have shelter and financial security through Jacky’s job, and we do not take this for granted.
I’m resting today because I don’t feel well, but I’ll also be reflecting today and remembering to be extra thankful for Christ, one another, and the comforts that we continue to enjoy.
Jacky made slow cooked lamb shank last night so the apt has been filled with the smell of delicious lamb and veggies. We had that for breakfast and we’ll probably have it for lunch and dinner too heh heh heh.
Weight-wise, I’m up a tiny bit more but, again, I think that’s due to natural fluctuations. It’s the highest weight I’ve had on a Thursday since I’ve started tracking this way, but Tuesday’s weight was the lowest I’ve had on a Tuesday. I’m cautiously optimistic right now because in previous weeks, my weight has always hit 123-124lbs by Thursday but it hasn’t yet this week.
We ordered some Korean food last night and I ate a bunch of seafood pancake (sooo good!!!) plus had a glass of wine before bed last night. I’m probably retaining a bunch of water from the salt and carbs. We’ll see what happens the rest of this week. I think I’ll do a separate post tracking just my weight alone because it’s actually really interesting to see the week-on-week comparison.
| Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 01:30 | 09:50 | 8hr 20min | 5hr 10min | None | Somewhat rested | 122.6lbs |
9/11 – Friday. Completed 11:03.
Videos completed: Natacha Oceane 10min Warm Up, MadFit 15min Dancer Leg Sculpt Workout, MadFit 15min Leg/Butt/Thigh Workout, MadFit 10min Beginner Lower Abs, Pamela Reif 15min Daily Stretch.
Aw man, I totally forgot that it was the 15min leg/butt/thigh workout that was killer because it has no breaks, rather than the 15min dancer leg sculpt. Both were challenging, but goodness me – I still need to take a few breaks in the second video because it’s so exhausting.
That said, I loved today’s workout too. I think the rest day yesterday was super helpful in allowing my body to recover. Today I was able to get through all the videos and keep good form throughout, which is more than I have been able to do in the past. My form for donkey kicks etc. was finally a decent table top (previously I was more of a wonky table).
I also did some pushups in between the first two videos – I was able to do 4 elbows-in knee pushups with good form! As in, I actually brought my entire upper body and chest down to the ground with my core engaged, rather whereas previously I was just pushing my head forward so that my forehead got close to the floor whilst my chest was still in midair and my gut was hanging out.
I did a 5th where my form was weaker on the way up and then collapsed on the 6th. Yay!! I’m sooo happy with this. I guess it’s because I didn’t try these after an initial set of 10-15 of elbows-out knee pushups that I was able to do more than 1. I was barely able to do any of the elbows-out pushups after this since I was already tired from the first video, plus I realised I didn’t want to go all out on training arms today as it may wear me out for tomorrow.
I’m extra happy that I was able to complete the workout because I didn’t sleep enough last night, plus I ended up sleeping really late. I discovered some really disheartening news about Netflix releasing the film “Cuties” and it just upset me so much I couldn’t sleep.
I understand the film is supposed to be a critique of over-sexualising children, but the extended crotch shots and gratuitous bum shots of scantily clad 11yr olds twerking and partaking in other adult behaviour is just… sickening. In fact, I can’t even believe I just wrote those string of words in a sentence about a film that’s widely available to the public.
The “critique” then comes off as incredibly disingenuous, and honestly I cannot even stomach the contents of the released clips, there’s no way I can get through the entire film to hit that conclusion at the end. Plus, by then, all the pedophiles will have had plenty of footage to jerk off to. It made my blood boil. I was so upset I was close to tears.
I asked Jacky for permission to cancel our Netflix subscription because it’s the only way I know how to protest against them in a way that they might take this seriously. I’m against cancel culture, plus we enjoy watching Netflix a lot, but this was just too much.
The film may have won an award – but the co-founder of the organisation giving out the award was then arrested for sexually assaulting a 9yr old. I mean… at that point, I’d consider the award to be more of a detriment given the contents of the film and what people are criticising.
Anyways, I was still so upset I couldn’t sleep because I wanted to see if there’d been enough of an impact for Netflix to remove the film from their streaming service. So I slept late. It’s late afternoon/early evening now and I am pretty tired due to loss of sleep. Sigh, I can’t talk about this anymore because it still upsets me so much. I’ll go back to talking about fitness:
Weight-wise, I did drop back down as I thought I would, yey. For the past 3-4 weeks it looks like on any given week, my weight will increase on 2 days, decrease on 3 days and stay the same on 1 day. That seems to be my pattern of fluctuation. We’ll see if this trend continues tomorrow.
| Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 02:20 | 09:05 | 6hr 45mins | 3hr 45min | None | Somewhat rested | 121.6lbs |
9/12 – Saturday. Rest.
I’m feeling a little nauseous and under the weather today. I woke up with a mild headache again despite sleeping earlier and long enough, so am going to take it easy today. Yesterday I exercised hard anyway.
I think I might have caught a bit of a chill last night because autumn is now here and the temperatures have been falling during the night. I also was very tired by 8pm but pushed myself to stay awake through fellowship and a post-fellowship catch up with a friend.
My weight did decrease again today! So now I my median weight for the week: 121.6lbs.
| Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 23:35 | 09:50 | 10hr 15min | 6hr 30min | None | Somewhat rested | 121.0lbs |
9/13 – Sunday. Rest.
Man, I’m disappointed I wasn’t able to exercise today either. Even the walk around Costco didn’t rack up that many steps for me since we didn’t buy half as much as we usually do.
I didn’t sleep enough last night and woke up pretty tired so I didn’t have the energy to workout today. I need to make sure I sleep well next week so I can have ample energy to workout. I miss exercising!!
Weight-wise, I didn’t gain too much either – it looks like normal fluctuations to me, and it also seems to be lower than last Sunday’s weight, which is great. I ate quite a bit (esp carbs) and didn’t exercise today though, so I’m expecting to be heavier tomorrow.
| Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 00:50 | 08:40 | 7hr 40min | 4hr 25min | 1x | Somewhat rested but still tired | 121.2lbs |
End of Week Summary
Days Exercised: 3
Pushup Count: 13 elbows-out knee pushups (8 with very good form, 5 more with acceptable form), 4 elbows-in knee pushups.
Median Weight (Tues – Sat): 121.6lbs
Weight Change (if any): -0.4lbs
Days Slept 7.5hrs+: 5
Days Slept Before Midnight: 1
Workout Summary
I didn’t exercise as many days as I wanted to this week, but I guess my body needed time to rest and recover. It’s possible that I worked too hard so I wasn’t able to recover as quickly as last week, but I think it’s probably due to me not getting enough sleep.
This week I could feel, on the days that I did workout, that I was much stronger. I also was able to do more pushups with good form — actual good form — this week! That’s a big win in my books.
I’m excited to workout more next week. This week was mostly focused on strength and endurance and I could see that I’d gotten stronger because not only had my form improved, I just didn’t feel as exhausted doing the video. I was able to get through more videos than I was last week as a result.
Though I wasn’t able to exercise on as many days as last week, I am happy that I went harder than last week on all the days I did workout. 3 days in a week isn’t too bad either. I just like working out so wish I did more.
Weight Summary
My median weight was 0.4lbs lighter than the previous week, which is perfect for my goals! I didn’t really struggle with my diet this week at all either – I was able to eat intuitively and switched between eating to full and eating until I was no longer hungry.
I’m a lot more familiar with my weight fluctuations now and it really is interesting to see how my weight changes on a daily basis. I can see a bit of a pattern so even on the days my weight increases I’m not super concerned, nor does it cause me to change my diet.
It looks like what I’m currently doing/eating is fine and that I’m now just naturally eating in a deficit. If that changes in the next week or so, I’ll change up my diet or increase my exercise accordingly.
Diet Summary
This week I was eating more intuitively again. I didn’t eat as many low calorie-dense meals as last week though, but I made sure that for the majority of my meals, I ate until I was no longer hungry (or just a little bit full). That said, I did make sure I balanced my food intake with healthy fruit and veg whenever I snacked on chocolate or friend chicken.
I learned to be satisfied on the smaller portions that I understood my body needed, rather than continuing to eat because I emotionally wanted it. As a result, I was able to essentially eat whatever I wanted and still lose weight.
Sleep Summary
I felt a lot more tired this week and woke up less rested compared to last week, despite sleeping over 7.5hrs on most nights. As such, it looks like sleeping before midnight (or at least before 1am) probably makes a difference to how rested I wake up feeling.
It’s also possible that I slept worse this week because of the changes in temperatures overnight that caused me to wake up a few times to adjust my blankets in the middle of the night. In addition, there were a few social issues this week that caught my attention and caused me stress.
My sleeping pattern doesn’t seem to have majorly affected my weight loss since I am still on track with my -0.5lbs/week goal. However, I do think it has affected my workouts because I haven’t had enough energy to exercise as much as I did last week, nor has my body recovered as quickly.
I needed a lot more rest days, and that probably indirectly affected my weight loss too. I’ve started tracking my median weight for the week on a new weight loss tracker post, and I’m actually really happy with my rate of weight loss so that’s not as much of a problem, but I’m just disappointed I haven’t been able to exercise as much as last week.
Next week, I will make more of an effort to sleep before midnight to see how that affects my sleep quality.
Date | Sleep Time | Wake Time | Hrs Slept | Restful Sleep | Disruptions | Awoke Feeling | Weight |
| 9/7 | 01:25 | 09:25 | 8hrs | 4hr 45min | None | Somewhat rested | 122.4lbs |
| 9/8 | 01:30 | 09:35 | 7hr 35min | 5hr 5min | 2-3x | Not at all rested | 121.6lbs |
| 9/9 | 01:30 | 08:35 | 7hrs | 3hr 25min | 1x | Somewhat rested | 122lbs |
| 9/10 | 01:30 | 09:50 | 8hr 20min | 5hr 10min | None | Somewhat rested | 122.6lbs |
| 9/11 | 02:20 | 09:05 | 6hr 45mins | 3hr 45min | None | Somewhat rested | 121.6lbs |
| 9/12 | 23:35 | 09:50 | 10hr 15min | 6hr 30min | None | Somewhat rested | 121.0lbs |
| 9/13 | 00:50 | 08:40 | 7hr 40min | 4hr 25min | 1x | Somewhat rested but still tired | 121.2lbs |
Muchos love,