To Forge an Ironmaiden...

Froud

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Warrior Monk from Brussels
Posts: 905
Sometimes, the body is trying to communicate the hard way. I understand it might be, it is actually, frustrating to not be able to make our own body obey.
Hopefully you should be all right tomorrow :D I crossed my fingers!
 

Nevetharine

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So, I've actually been thinking of trying to do Ironheart alongside Bootcamp - Any opinions on that? Or do you guys think that would be too much? There's one weight-day in Darebee Bootcamp, followed by two rest days (Actually one seems to focus on tendon strength...) and a cardio day. I don't know for some reason I feel like I should be training my muscles more...?
 

TopNotch

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Ranger from Australia
Posts: 1,610
"Motivation is temporary. Discipline is forever."
Ages ago, on the Old Hive, @Redline wrote a great piece on why doing more than one programme at a time might not be the best idea. It could be nice to have something like that in an obvious place here on the New Hive. Anyway, essentially, you could end up screwing with the benefits of each programme. I'd suggest you don't do it. Do an Add-On programme, by all means, or as @Fremen suggests, a challenge, but do Ironheart by itself. It's a great programme and deserves full concentration. :)
 

Nevetharine

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Day 6 of Darebee Bootcamp ✔️
Day 2 of Push-ups & Squats challenge ✔️

I added side-to-side lunges to the weight training today.

And reduced the rest time from 2 minutes to 1.5 minutes to make it more challenging with 5kg dumbbells.

Now I'm starving. Like, I'm about to keel over. (I trained on empty this morning) I made bread with chickpea flour yesterday. Think I'll have some of that...with a thick slathering of Peanutbutter and slices of banana 😋

Today temperatures are set to rise to 38°C. So glad I got the training over and done with.

I'll spend the rest of the day reading. I'm currently reading Jo Nesbo's Harry Hole novels... They're crime novels, and I'm really enjoying the character of Harry Hole. Bit of an oddball police officer...and he's an alcoholic as well. Which adds a kind of depth to his character. He likes to, shall we say, bend the rules to solve the crime. 😁
 

Nevetharine

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Noting your Nesbo recommendation, I was seeing him on Goodread.
Highly recommend! There are, I think seven books in the Harry Hole series.

Jo Nesbo also rewrote the story of Macbeth. It's used in our educational curriculum here. I've never been one for school literary books but well, I might give that one a go. But first I'll finish Harry's books.
 

Nevetharine

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Completed Bootcamp Day 9.

After a lot of bitching and moaning and at the end, lying to myself. Telling myself I'll just do the one set.

Then one turned to three.

Hell, my legs are dead after that. How is it that I can complete some days of this program, or any other Level 4 program for that matter, on Level 3 and then others only on level 1?

And then I said I was done. DONE! I'd even turned off the timer for rest.

And then I did another set. And I was done again. No timer.

Maybe three minutes goes by. Then I do the final set.

And in the end I complete this day on Level 3 after all.

Legs dead. Lungs burning.

And only slightly high on endorphins, no really, just a little... ---

HELL! Do that again!! **pumps fist in the air and whoops**
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Nevetharine

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Also - if someone could shed some light on WHY this happens, I'd be grateful.

So the heat is really unbearable here at the moment. And sleeping well is an issue.

In fact I'm awake for most of the night.

What's the most natural sleeping aid in the world (for me)?

That's right!

A PBJ sandwich. 🤨🤨🤨🤨

How is it that a peanutbutter and jam sandwich acts like a sedative on me? It's not ideal to eat something like that at 00:20 at night, but hell, it let's me sleep like a baby.

HOW? WHY? MAKE IT MAKE SENSE! :shake:
 

Laura Rainbow Dragon

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Bard from Canada
Posts: 1,724
"Striving to be the change."
Jam causes a spike in blood sugar levels, followed by a drop, which can cause sleepiness. (I would think the protein in the peanut butter would help to counteract this, however.)
Peanut butter contains tryptophan. Carbs supposedly help with the absorption of amino acids. So possibly it's the PB & bread combo.
Some food intolerances/allergies can also cause sleepiness. (I had a roommate at uni with this issue. She did not have any other symptoms you might associate with food allergies. No gastric upset or the like. But if she ate the wrong foods, she would fall asleep.)

Have you tried isolating any of the ingredients from one another to see if any have the effect alone?
 

Nevetharine

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Jam causes a spike in blood sugar levels, followed by a drop, which can cause sleepiness. (I would think the protein in the peanut butter would help to counteract this, however.)
Peanut butter contains tryptophan. Carbs supposedly help with the absorption of amino acids. So possibly it's the PB & bread combo.
Some food intolerances/allergies can also cause sleepiness. (I had a roommate at uni with this issue. She did not have any other symptoms you might associate with food allergies. No gastric upset or the like. But if she ate the wrong foods, she would fall asleep.)

Have you tried isolating any of the ingredients from one another to see if any have the effect alone?
I haven't, actually.

It's a strange thing. It doesn't really make me sleepy if I eat it during the daytime. Just at night. Might just be a mental thing even, who knows. Or maybe it's the carbs.

Maybe I'm just too engaged to notice the effects during the day? It's interesting though. Lol
 

Nevetharine

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Completed Bootcamp Day 12.
And Push-ups and Squats challenge day 8.

It's really hot here... Heat wave. Oh, also, there have been zero results so far with the recomp. For the first month anyway. So I guess I'm going to have to eat a bit less. Weight and meassurements is exactly the same.

I'm writing again. :)
 

Nevetharine

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Should I be eating a bit less than maintenance though?

I think I may have lost a centimeter around the lower belly, but I can't be sure it's not just a meassuring error.

Apart from that, everything is exactly the same?

(Except I can do more push ups now 😉)

Edit to add - I'm currently eating around 50-60g of mostly plant-based protein a day.
 

Nevetharine

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Completed Bootcamp Day 16

I took a few days off the program because I was ... On monthly sick leave. 🙄

I've lost 0.5kg, which kind of sucks for recomp but it's not surprising.

Because my diet has gone down the gutter. I'm just not into eating, and when I am, I'm not into eating complicated food.

For me, uncomplicated means PBJ sandwiches, bananas with peanutbutter, and (at least) roasted cocoa chickpeas with milk. (Which is like healthy cocoa pops)

I'm taking a 50mg B-Co tablet now and I think that's part of the reason. That and the heat...

My body feels hunger but my head isn't interested in food.
 

Nevetharine

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Who'se feeling a bit creative?

I'd love some ideas because I'm stuck with my novel.

So... Short version. Human soldiers on another planet (in a living universe with thousands of intelligent species mingling). Can't go back to Earth - corruption, human experimentation etc. Also, Earth cannot know about the "Civilized Universe".

They're Commander was a human test subject on Earth. Plucked back from the edge of madness to train them to function in the Civilized Universe.

They see some security tapes of him where he was still insane, and get the wrong idea. Half the group of human recruits revolt. They won't be led around the nose by a madman , who is also, a cyborg.

And humans don't trust other species in this book. but he has a few loyal followers. He's selfless and brave.

But what do I do with the group that revolts? Where do they go? Some of them side with an enemy... The wicked ones.

But what about the others that are just ignorant? (They're not many, 60 and all. ARound 20 stay loyal. The rest have to go)
 

TopNotch

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Ranger from Australia
Posts: 1,610
"Motivation is temporary. Discipline is forever."
The ones who revolt can just fade away. Perhaps some go to other planets. Perhaps some try to get back to Earth and are, to protect the CU, killed by other species. So the "ignorant" ones - they hadn't seen the tapes? Or they just don't believe them? The Commander sinks - opportunity for major low point here, well of despair. Ah, how about, when Commander is wallowing in self-pity, those revolting people (and here I use the word with both meanings!), try to head off back to Earth and the Commander is the only one who can bring everyone, humans and other species, together to prevent this. The Commander, of course, leads from the front, saves the day, and everyone sees what a wonderful bloke he really is, not at all mad actually, and so re-instate him as Boss. Story continues...
 

Nevetharine

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The ones who revolt can just fade away. Perhaps some go to other planets. Perhaps some try to get back to Earth and are, to protect the CU, killed by other species. So the "ignorant" ones - they hadn't seen the tapes? Or they just don't believe them? The Commander sinks - opportunity for major low point here, well of despair. Ah, how about, when Commander is wallowing in self-pity, those revolting people (and here I use the word with both meanings!), try to head off back to Earth and the Commander is the only one who can bring everyone, humans and other species, together to prevent this. The Commander, of course, leads from the front, saves the day, and everyone sees what a wonderful bloke he really is, not at all mad actually, and so re-instate him as Boss. Story continues...
Alright more background.

The commander is in the process of training these recruits to join the Intergalactic Defense Confederation. A band of different alien species from all over Civilized Space, who form a collective military.

The ignorant ones have seen the tapes... Where he (the commander) was brutally manhandled, raped, experimented on, his limbs cut off (he's a cyborg now, half biological half machine, which adds to their level of distrust). Obviously no man can keep a sane head in those circumstances.

But he is fighting a war inside his own head with his own PTSD. he's actually afraid of humans - for obvious reasons. He has fits. Like seizures when he has flashbacks. So he could go down mid-battle and be useless. But he doesn't let that stop him. Add to that the fact that most humans in my world have never seen a person have a fit before, and then come out of it with his nose and ears bleeding.

As I was saying. The ignorant ones have seen the tapes, but instead of feeling pity for him (like the loyal ones), they now see him as psychologically unfit to lead them. Especially after the prank...

There's actually a prank that was played on him by some of the traitors... A prank that went very....very wrong. They were going to scare him....


And he got into a violent, defensive, strangling mood mid-scare and one recruit may end up dead...or very close to dead. I'm still deciding.

So that adds.

He could, technically, choose to wave the orders he'd been given, and not train them. But again, I have trouble figuring where I'll put them.

They can't go back to Earth since the colonization project is secret. Or their memories will have to be wiped somehow.

They can't, or won't want to end up in civilizated space. Because of culture shock I suppose. The kids don't dig aliens.
 

Nevetharine

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The interesting thing is that most humans came on this expedition to get away from a distopian Earth... 🤔

Maybe some of them just crack under the pressure of leaving their homeworld and never going back.

They know most of humanity is corrupt, but they can't bring themselves to be ordered about by something "less than human" ... Like the Commander.

That's kind of the internal struggle.

For the Commander, he doesn't trust them. He's a broken man. But, he's forced into dealing with them when he's ordered to by his superior. He has to find some way to heal, and introduce humanity into the overall intergalactic society - in this case, into the Intergalactic Defense Confederation.
 

Nevetharine

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I'm just doing the workout of the day right now. Did 3 sets and I'm doing tons of walking. Like maybe 1-2hrs a day. I've gotten some new shoes.

There's a view into my head below, pertaining to the diet issues I'm having right now. I'm not eating properly. And I also don't feel like working out super hard.

I'm just writing it here because I might be heard. And I suppose writing it at all helps.

TRIGGER WARNING for the piece below for those who have...ah... Mental health issues when it comes to food and self-worth. Feel free to skip it.


My mood is sort of down the drain. I guess along with my diet. Because of my diet/mood.

Because I've discovered the root of my unorganized eating ATM is -

"Why do I have to eat? I don't do anything worthwhile in life. There's no need to consume food/resources."

"I hate how my body looks. So I don't want to keep feeding it and get fatter." (I'm just skinny fat, even if I'm actually at a 'normal' weight) very ironic because when I think of denying food my brain just goes into zombie-mode and eats anyway. And I feel guilty afterwards.

"I'm not worth the money I have to spend on good food. Or I don't deserve to eat good tasting food. It's a luxury. Not needed. I can eat the same thing 3 times a day, everyday."

"No one gives a shit anyway. I'm just another faceless number. Why do I have to care?"

This kind of feeds into itself. Bad food leads to bad mood, bad mood leads to bad food.

Not necessarily bad food, just, unbalanced eating patterns.
 

Fremen

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Shaman from Italy
Posts: 3,181
"“Keep an eye on the staircases. They like to change.” Percy Weasley, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone."

Nevetharine

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A post about strange things. Skip to the end, or don't. Choice is yours.

You know what's funny? It's that I get to a point of hating my body so much that I decide "if you don't like it, change it."

Now if only it could happen overnight like I so passionately wish for in that moment.

Going from soft to hard, like I could just cut off the fat and there would be a layer of 6-pack abs underneath it.

Wouldn't that be nice?

I totally have the dream to be a bulky woman. Hell knows if I'd ever get there with the tug of war going on between passion and patience. And throw in a distaste for strength training and you've got a lovely cocktail of going around in circles and not getting anywhere.

If I even have the genes to achieve it. The women in my family have always been well overweight. Hell, I'm smaller than any of them ever were. I'm normal.

It's too bad my body composition falls seriously short of my expectations.

And this may not make sense to many people, but since I have a masculine side and a feminine side, I'm inclined to think that whenever the masculine is more dominant is when I start to hate the way I look. And I start thinking that yes, fitness can absolutely take my boobs away. Really, I don't mind.

Maybe that's why I'm in pain every month. It's a psychological thing. Since I've hated being a woman for at least half my life. The only way I can indulge my masculine side is when I write/read through the eyes of a male character, or when I do strength training with weights (not because it's a stereotype that men train with weights, but because they make my muscles feel strong/larger/more capable)

I don't tell these things to anyone. I can't. Not even my husband, because he is very, ah, conservative with that sort of stuff. And I still love him regardless, so. So props to you if you've made it this far into the weirdness of my deepest darkest secrets, Lol. I guess I'm just past caring right now and looking for an outlet.

Now for some normal-ness. I'm doing Day one of Push Pull Legs. And 3 sets of 10 second deadhangs.
 

TopNotch

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Ranger from Australia
Posts: 1,610
"Motivation is temporary. Discipline is forever."
It's great that you can use this forum as your outlet. Why do you have the dream of being bulky? Why a 6-pack? We've all got bits of weirdness somewhere. It's what makes us all so interesting! :LOL:
 

Fremen

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Shaman from Italy
Posts: 3,181
"“Keep an eye on the staircases. They like to change.” Percy Weasley, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone."
Some time ago I had a kind of shock when I realized, reading specialized books, articles and thinking about it that I could never be strong.
You can train all you want but you can't overcome genetics.
So I started thinking about what interested me about strength: discipline, choosing how to be, improving, always having something to aim for. All things that have little or nothing to do with being physically strong :)
Think of a construction game, with the same pieces you can make infinite things, maybe not all what you would like but more than what your current imagination can think ;)
 

Nevetharine

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'Cuz it's stereotypically manly. Lol. 🙈 And that's what my inner guy wants. Maybe my inner guy should learn some patience.

And since I can't have balls (sadly) it's the closest I could ever get. If it was at all possible.

It may be extreme to hear but at times like these I don't even want to look at myself in the mirror. I just want to stay in my head and imagine myself as I think I should look - which at least half the time is very far from womanly.

I know it's weird. But oh well. We're all wonderful freaks of nature. I've kind of been on this train since somewhere in high school when someone commented that I didn't look like a girl.

And I liked that comment. 🤨
It's great that you can use this forum as your outlet. Why do you have the dream of being bulky? Why a 6-pack? We've all got bits of weirdness somewhere. It's what makes us all so interesting!
 

Nevetharine

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Viking from The Depths
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Posts: 868
Some time ago I had a kind of shock when I realized, reading specialized books, articles and thinking about it that I could never be strong.
You can train all you want but you can't overcome genetics.
So I started thinking about what interested me about strength: discipline, choosing how to be, improving, always having something to aim for. All things that have little or nothing to do with being physically strong :)
Think of a construction game, with the same pieces you can make infinite things, maybe not all what you would like but more than what your current imagination can think ;)
That's an interesting viewpoint. When I think of my masculine side I often think in terms of personality differences.

Like disciplined, brave or courageous, anger and all those qualities that people associate with manliness. And sometimes my husband thinks I'm weird when I act that out.

And then the female comes back into play and I'm all soft and cuddly and weepy and want chocolate

And they're endlessly fighting with each other so I never get anywhere😂
 

Mianevem

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Valkyrie from Budapest, Hungary
Posts: 1,088
The organisers of the next LARP I'm going to pointed out that if you're, say, a small and fragile little thing, that shouldn't stop you from playing a mighty barbarian. You just need to focus on aspects of being a barbarian other than body type. I'm quite certain that with a little twist this can apply to real life, too. :p

This ties in with what @Fremen said, too. It might be worth a try attempting to focus on other areas and goals, instead of mere appearance. At least that's the attitude I'm trying on, since I'm starting to realise that if I base my confidence on what I see in the mirror, I will never be content at all either.
 
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