No pain no gain! Is it really true?

So it’s raining ice. And my cars broke down. Guess I’m working out at home.

I’m working on reworking my exercise routine. I wanted to make sure I was going to the gym at least 4 days a week but this week is kinda crazy cause of the above issue. So it looks like I am working out at home. I have a little exercise bike and a total gym thing that’s been handed down from some family members.

My roommate helped me reorganize the exercise space after the Christmas tree came down. So I have no excuses right?! Gonna go break a sweat.

I was listening to a guy talk about his desire to be a better person, to over come fear and pain. The last few months I have been dealing with hip pain. So not fun. I also been trying to figure out why I am having it. I thought it was due to over use on the elliptical glider at first but stopping using the elliptical has not made any difference. I went in for massage on a couple of occasions and they said my hamstrings, quads, and glutes were really tight and they massaged them to try and release it. It always feels better afterwards. It even effects my lower back sometimes so I actually gave body pump a bit of a rest, as well. Means a whole lot less squats.

One thing I learned from talking to one of my instructors at the gym is that she experienced it to as a result of her body alignment shifting. She had a pinched nerve. Sciatica maybe? She mentioned that she use to be a waitress and that she leaned to one side a lot carrying heavy trays of food to tables and that as a result the muscles on one side adapted to this. After she left that field and started working out, things started to shift and she began to develop nerve pain as she trained to get stronger. She saw a chiropractor and they told her that her job basically caused a shift in her spine and now that she was working out and things were realigning she had developed a pinched nerve.

I know I sit a lot cause of drawing and so forth. Could this pain be due to sitting and poor posture. 6 months after I left universal studios as a caricature artist I started doing small amount of exercise at home and I noticed suddenly I developed pain in my right shoulder. It went on for months. When I started lifting weights though and got regular massages the pain decreased and it has finally gone away. On occasion it flairs up if I over use my arm at gigs but it’s become much more rare to have an issue with it.

So I guess the key is going to be just working through the pain. Get more massages on that hip and leg area and strength train. As well as, yoga to improve my range of motion. I gotta just work through it.

The same with diet. I have been reading a lot about intermittent fasting to get your body to kick into weight loss mode. It’s hard though. It takes some mental fortitude to not eat for 18 hours eat day and have a small window of food time. I’m going to work towards it though. It’s necessary. I said I wanted to hit my goal by 40 yrs. old I’m not even half way there but this year I would like to push harder and make more effort. Thought I became a vegan I still have meat and cheese cravings. What keeps me from it is that I hate the feeling of being sick when I use to eat a lot of meat. I refuse to go back to it. So Thats just how it’s going to be I guess. Let’s get healed. Let’s get strong. Let’s over come pain!