TEN pounds of MUSCLE lost…???

Wow, I’m REALLY unhappy as I type this post. I actually don’t know the last time I was so unhappy.

Just returned from getting “re-assessed” on my “numbers.” As those of you who read this blog know (all 4 of you LOL), I was told about the middle of last year that I had to dramatically change what I was doing eating/exercise-wise, because it was wreaking havoc with my body chemistry.

I had “everything” tested last August – then the “chemistry part” was re-tested fairly recently (October). Per the way the chemistry was going, I was taken off doing “met cons” and endurance-type exercise, and told to concentrate on strength, and then non-“metabolic” training, like walking.

So today, I had my numbers re-assessed. As all 4 of you (smile) know, my coach at our Crossfit box has “un-metcon’d” the workouts for me, so I can still train basically “with” the class. As you also know, I’ve added other strength/conditioning training from Krissy Mae Cagney’s program, as blessed by my mobility guy.

I feel pretty good these days. I’ve noticed a lot better tone in both my arms and in my legs. But I’ve felt “heavy.” Now I know why . . .

My body composition came back that actually my body fat has gone from 29.9% (in August) to 33%. My actual body fat (in pounds) went from 53.6 pounds to 57.9 pounds. My lean muscle weight went from 125.8 pounds, to 116 pounds.

That’s just 0.2 pounds shy of a loss of TEN POUNDS of muscle.

(Imagine if I hadn’t picked up my strength training…??)

And before you ask – it’s not some half-assed test. It’s not only the same test as in August, but it’s also the “2nd best, only to a body fat dunk tank” test.

Beside. Myself.

So, I’ve been instructed to go back to logging on MyFitnessPal with a vengeance. Yeah, so, I hate logging. I have said before how great and semi-painless MyFitnessPal is, but I still hate it. I’ve been doing logging for two weeks, but in a desultory fashion – meaning, for example, that weekends (when I’m away from the computer and my phone), I haven’t kept track.

As my pal Claire (who I’m doing the Krissy Mae Cagney program with) said – it’s time to ix-nay the ine-way and eese-chay.

So there’s the thing. I HATE having to change what I eat. I love what we eat. I HATE feeling that my body has “betrayed” me by getting older.

The scary part is that if I’d put on body fat – if my body fat had just “gone up” – that would be one thing. But what up with the significant muscle loss?

He said that one possibility is that what I’m eating just isn’t getting in to “feed” my muscles. Instead, I’m “stuck” saving calories as fat because of something wonky with my chemistry. And, since I have now added strength, stopped met cons, and all the rest of that jazz from the exercise side – it’s time to hit it hard from the eating side.

I wish I wasn’t such a great cook (brag, brag, brag, but it’s actually true). I wish my husband didn’t think I was the best cook in the world, which makes me cook even more. I cook “primal” – veg, meats, some starch (but, like, sweet potatoes and squash now and again) . . . but the portions are large, very large. I also eat way too fast. Also my husband likes to eat pretty late at night (he’s European).

My husband has a habit of throwing little “spanners” in the “works” of course – like, “Hey honey, let’s go drink champagne and eat dark single-sourced Amazonian chocolate out on the deck.” But it irks me to no end that NO, we are not eating Twinkies. Or bread. Or croissants. Or McDonald’s. Or KFC. Or fruit, even. And also NO, I’m not starving myself – in fact, I’ve kicked up my caloric intake by a bit, as I’ve mentioned in previous posts.

9.8 pounds. Nearly TEN POUNDS of muscle lost. In five months?? That’s nearly two pounds a month!

I know that what I’ve been told has to be right – that what I’m eating is being stored as fat and not “feeding” the muscles, so they are breaking themselves down to “get at” what my body needs. I’ve read about this ad nauseum. I just never thought it would apply to me.

I hate being surprised. I guess the part I hate the most is that I very rarely “look forward” to things. It’s been a habit since I was a little kid. Folks would ask if I was “looking forward” to a vacation, my birthday, etc. The answer was always No. Because if you “look forward” to something, you build all sorts of great things around that event in the future – and if it doesn’t meet your imaginings, you’re bummed out. So instead, I always stay neutral when it comes to holidays, vacation, birthdays, etc. – so everything that happens is an awesome surprise.

Walking into that office today for the re-test, I was “looking forward to” the “delighted” look when my numbers would be “so much better.” It’s my own fault that I was “looking forward” – I know better. The fall from what you expected to happen to what “really” happens is so much farther if you have pumped yourself up from not expecting anything at all. In fact, it’s kinda a shock.

Well, we’ll see where I’m at in another six months. Until then, my new JournalMenu.com journal has a section for goals. I blithely put as my first goal to have an 18% body fat percentage by a date next year. I don’t care about weight – in fact, I actually “lost weight” between my last test and now – but we know what it was “made up of” (muscle)! So now, I have to add another goal, and it has to be to re-up my muscle percentage in a BIG way.

Bummed. Just bummed.

{…pause…}

I have just spent the better part of an hour figuring out what I can do S.M.A.R.T. Goal-wise to attack this problem. Not to beat up on myself but wow am I bad at Math. As a side story, remember “story problems” back in grade school? (You know the ones: “If a train leaves New York at 3:00 p.m. going to Chicago and another leaves Chicago at 4:30 p.m. for New York and they are going x miles an hour, when and where will they crash into each other if someone doesn’t throw the switch?” – oh oops that’s the Addams Family version…) Well, back in math class, I used to move the trains forward by an hour at a time, until I got “close” to where they were meeting, then move them forward in minute increments, until I got them to smash – um – I mean pass. Stop laughing.

So that’s what I’ve been doing, trying to figure out what’s “attainable” (the “A” in S.M.A.R.T. goals) and in what time (the “T” of S.M.A.R.T. goals).

After moving my muscle and fat “trains” forward and back by a pound at a time, I’ve decided that, by my husband’s birthday (when we’re likely to be in Hawaii, and I’m likely to be doing Crossfit Open Workout #1 at a box there) I would like to gain three pounds of muscle, and lose eight pounds of body fat. That would be a “total” weight loss (as in “scale weight”) of five pounds – or less than a pound a week. Now, mind you, I know that putting on that much muscle is not going to be easy. But I am going to crack open my nutrition books (I only have 10,000 of them), and figure out what has gone haywire, and how to signal my fat cells to release their stuffed little faces, and how to signal my muscle cells to fill up their starved little selves.

So there you have it.