Fighting Father Time

2010-02-24T12:17:00.001-05:00

SERENITY NOW!

2010-02-21T07:50:00.001-05:00

OK, time to get moving. Have a great Sunday.

2010-02-20T09:09:00.001-05:00

Good morning at PF. good time to do legs. OUCH! worked up a good sweat. home, coffee and todadump.

2010-02-14T12:08:00.001-05:00

Happy Valentines day to all! Had a great Dinner out last night with Heidi. Got to the gym this morning. Back and Bi's today. Time to relax now.

2010-02-13T11:19:00.001-05:00

Had a great workout this morning. Heading to see the Lightning Thief with Adam & Brian. It's a good day.

Shoulders

2010-02-07T07:19:00.002-05:00

Well, another week has blown by where I've had no time for exercise. My lower back has been really tightening up due to my sitting in my office, or sitting at home. Yesterday I got up, fed the animals and headed for the gym. I sort of lie to myself. I say, well, I'll just do the elliptical for 25 minutes and then we'll call it a day. I know, typically, after 25 minutes of moving I feel better. So I jumped back into my routine. Shoulders and traps were on the the schedule so I picked up where I left off. Now I will say I do have an injury that i need to baby a bit, but my back isn't it. I did a few sets of overhead presses on the smith machine, followed by overhead presses with dumbbells. That's when I felt it. I had injured my wrist last weekend while moving a loaded bar from a lower position to a higher position on the smith machine. While I was pulling up with my right wrist and pushing up with my left, something popped on the pinkie side of my right wrist. What ever connects the base of the hand to the bone on my wrist popped and started to swell. So, I went easy on it the rest of last weekend and it's fell pretty good. Well yesterday, while not too bad, I felt it again. It hurts any time I need to pivot a weight on that wrist. So for straight bar pushing it's fine, but for dumbbells it's not so good. So, I went light but worked the reps. I definitely feel the burn in my shoulders this morning so I feel good about that and my wrist isn't bothering me so I don't think I set the healing process back too far on that end.
Today will be Back, Lower Back, Hamstrings and then Biceps. I will see how the wrist does on the pulling motion. If I can keep the hand position right I think I'll be ok. Well, the animals are fed and back inside now. I guess it's time to get my ass to the gym. Wish me luck.

Good weekend

2010-01-31T14:41:00.002-05:00

After a week on the road working I got back to the gym on Saturday. I've been fighting a cold but it felt good to get in and work up a sweat. While the years have flown by I still go back to the basics for my workouts. Saturday was Chest and Triceps, preceded by 25 minutes on the elliptical. I try to keep my pace fast so that while I might not be lifting as much as I used to I am working hard. I only allow about 30 seconds between sets. Just enough time to change the weights, take a drink and then I'm into the next set.
Today I did the elliptical for 28 minutes and then squats and leg extensions. I found it funny that while I'm at a "judgment free" gym I got some dirty looks when I kept adding weight to my squats. From my point of view I was going light, but the dirty looks, wow, you would have thought I was screaming and grunting. I won't judge you, you don't judge me. Ok? ok.
Tomorrow I have to bring my son to swim practice so I probably will need to just tread, abs and calves at home. I've got some off site meetings this week so I'll hopefully get back to the gym Thursday. Feeling good.

2010-01-23T09:12:00.001-05:00

3rd day back at gym. Cardio, back, hamis and biceps today. Feeling the burn right now.

Happy Thanksgiving

2009-11-27T16:43:00.009-05:00

We had a great Thanksgiving at the Stevens household. This was our third year of deep frying the turkeys and everyone seems to enjoy them. Besides the fact that they taste great. They are also really fast and easy to prepare. This year I went back to a very basic Brine. Last year I tried adding sugar to the brine and the results were black turkey's . This year it was just a cup of salt per gallon of water. I put the turkey in the brine the night before at 10:30ish. let it sit in a cooler outside and the next morning around 10ish I took the birds out, washed them off. Let them sit in the cooler for an hour or so while I got the oil ready and then about 45 minutes a piece and we're ready for the feast. Delicious! Another nice thing about doing the turkey outside is that I get to be outside enjoying the fresh air and peanut oil and Heidi gets the entire kitchen to herself for the side dishes. Now if I can just get a tv outside. My sister and brother-in-law showed up a little past noon and Dan brought me some beer, good man. Becks, I haven't had Becks in years. It tasted really good. My mother, mother-in-law and father-in-law were also in attendance. Kevin was home from college and Brian and Adam of course. Sadly Courtney wasn't able to make it back from Tempe this year but we talked with her and she and Tim were going to friends house for a meal. All in all I think things went very well.

Live TV : Ustream

Fosters.com - Dover NH, Rochester NH, Portsmouth NH, Laconia NH, Sanford ME

2009-11-14T19:09:00.000-05:00

Great job this season for ORYA's First Football season.
Fosters.com - Dover NH, Rochester NH, Portsmouth NH, Laconia NH, Sanford ME

2009-11-14T16:29:00.001-05:00

I think this is the first week in a long time that I haven't worked out. Shame on me.

2009-09-10T21:49:00.001-04:00

Down to 205lbs. Night off from from EA Active. Nice night to relax and enjoy some football. Go Steelers.

2009-09-05T11:41:00.001-04:00

42 hours drive door to door. Courtney deliverd safely back to Tempe. Sampled all of the beers at 4 peaks. Good Mexican food. In and out Burgers. Relaxed. Done.

2009-09-01T12:37:00.001-04:00

Driving through Oklahoma, now I'm craving steak.

Wii Fit and Wii Active

2009-08-29T19:11:00.004-04:00

So its been a while since my last post. I got Wii fit and Wii active from EA sports for fathers day and I've been doing well with my workouts. I'm down 7 lbs and feel great. I like the Wii Fit because it allows me to track my weight and progress, but I don't care too much for the exercises. Conversly I like Wii Active for the exercices but I wish it had the scale functionality of Wii Fit. It would be great if EA Sports came out with a new version that included the scale functionality.
I'm on my second go round of the 30 day challenge. I started off as a beginner and I'm currently on Intermediate. I figure I'll get through the advanced level before I start altering the workouts. My routine has been, work, come home, eat, wait an hour and then workout. Now that school is about to start and Brian has football practice I will need to alter my workout time. I have been trying to come home, change, workout, change, go pick up Brian and then eat. It might get tough once the kids homework level picks up but I'm hoping I can keep this up. I don't want to have to switch to mornings because I prefer not to have to get up any earlier than I already do. We'll see what happens. I've got another 7 lbs to go for my first goal. Then we'll see if I can keep trimming down. I've already augmented the workouts with regards to the resistance band that came with the Wii Active. I use bodylastics that I got at my wifes request a few years ago. I like the fact that I can change bands to alter the resistance. I do find it a bit difficult to hold the Wii controls and the handles but add a pair of workout gloves and I make it work.
The only other thing I might change about the Wii would be if there was a way to not have to connect the Wii Remote with the Wii Nunchuck, Wireless. It would be easier to move. Oh well, I'll live. Ok time for Dinner.

2009-08-29T19:11:00.001-04:00

I can now blog from my phone. Love my G1. So its been a while since my last post. I got Wii fit and Wii active from EA sports for fathers day and I've be

A night on the slopes

2009-02-14T12:45:00.004-05:00

Last night I attended ski night with my youngest son and the middle school ski club. I'm so proud of him and how well he's doing. When I was at ORMS this is the same way I learned how to ski and when the opportunity came up for him this year he decided that he'd like to try it out. Now I haven't pushed skiing on my kids in the past as I was leery of getting them involved in an activity that I really didn't have a way to fund. With the ability to have him go up with the middle school he is able to go up, learn and if he decides to continue with it we'll work to make that happen. Anyhow, the school has buses that go up every Friday afternoon, yesterday I took the day off so that I could go with him.
Now as I said I learned in Middle school too and honestly I haven't skied much over the years. The last time I skied with January 1990 when a girl friend of mine and a few friends went up to Gunstock. Well 19 years and a few back surgeries later I was more than a bit nervous about getting back on the slopes. Now King Pine is a nice little mountain. Great for kids and families. After getting my gear on Brian and I headed for the chair lift. Brian offered to go up the bunny slope with me so I could get my ski legs back but I said, "Hell, No!" If I'm going to fall I want it to be up top. So we headed for the chair lift and away we went. Long story short. I didn't fall once. We got about 3 hours of skiing in and it was GREAT! I had forgotten the thrill of flying down the mountain. The fear of almost pushing yourself a little too far. Oh it was fun. I know that my body will hurt in another day or so but it was well worth it. Especially since Brian and I were able to spend some nice time together, just father and son and share a good time on the slopes. I look forward to the next trip and hopefully we can get my other boys up there too. Heidi???

A Letter to Sheri about back pain

2008-11-22T06:34:00.009-05:00

First I'm not a doctor and I don't play one on TV. This is simply my opinion based on my own experience.
First a little background so that I don't come off as preachy.
I've had 2 back surgeries, the first was a discectomy. The second was a spinal fusion.
For the first I had a herniated disc at L4, L5. This occurred due to a fall I took. Immediately after the fall I pushed myself to get up and try to work as normal. The fall took place on a Saturday, by the following Friday I was in so much pain that I had to crawl to the toilet. When I could no longer crawl I had to have the EMT's come to carry me out of the house to the hospital where I spent a few days on Morphine. After recovering from the pain to the point where I could have physical therapy I was able to get myself to the point where I was pretty much pain free. When the pain returned I opted for surgery. The discectomy surgery wasn't that bad. Recovery was pretty easy and the pain was almost immediately gone. A year later it returned. Apparently I re-herniated the same disc. I didn't know you could do that but apparently you can. Again after a long physical therapy rehab I was able to resume normal life. I had some loss of motion in my left leg but that returned with continued exercise, mainly walking. It was about 9 months after this rehab stint that I stepped out of my car after my long daily commute that I felt that twinge, and yes a day later I could barely stand. Bring on the second surgery. The doctors told me that since I've re-herniated the same location on multiple occasions the chances of another discectomy fixing the problem were slim. They suggested that I needed to sure up the weak area by fusing the area with a double surgery including a discectomy and a Spinal Fusion. Seeing as each time I had hurt my back I ended up losing many days from work I elected to have the surgery even though it would cost me 10 weeks on my back.
The surgery went well. The recovery was HELL! The pain immediately upon waking from the surgery was the worst pain I've ever had. Weeks went by and the back pain, as I knew it, was gone. Physical therapy was great and after a few short months I was back in the gym and working out. Hell in less than a year I was doing 600 lbs. leg presses without even a twinge. (I probably still can if I could get my ass in gear)
Anyhow, the back pain that put me on my knees, crawling to the toilet, was gone after each surgery, but it was replaced with a new pain. First, I have had recurrences of the pain that puts me on my knees since my last surgery, but now I know how to deal with it and I know what it isn't. Second, since my last surgery, I've been in pain every day. My last surgery was in October 2001, you do the math. Now the pain I have every day IS different from the pain that takes your legs away, but I would caution you not to have surgery due to this new pain. This new pain is from the fact that when you have back surgery they have to peel away the muscle from your spine to get to the spine and that muscle never really attaches itself quite the same way it was before. Also, for spinal fusion, they need to take bone from your pelvic bone that they then use to help fuse your vertebrae together. This bone is chiseled out of you from a second incision. This location probably is more troublesome to me than the actual spine incision. And finally to top it all off I still have time when the good old pain comes back and I can barely stand. Now don't give up hope! Had I known then what I know now I would not have had my surgeries. Sadly when you're in so much pain that you can't tie your own shoes or wipe your own ass you don't really care what will stop the pain. Please, please take your time and relax. You need to understand what is causing the pain in order to learn how to cope with it. Now I can't tell you that you will never be in pain again. But I can tell you that you can manage the pain and for much of your life you won't even know you have it. Don't worry; I'm not going to tell you the pain is all in your head. It's not, it's real and it hurts. However, the cure for your pain starts in your head and by using your head, or your mind, along with exercise and/or physical therapy you can beat this pain. I'm going to stop typing now and recommend you read some books that helped me. Read and walk. Learn how your body reacts to stresses and how you can work to teach your body not to cause you as much pain. If you are currently in so much pain that you can't walk please know that I have been there and I know what it's like. But also know that from the other side of surgery you won't be in any better position to deal with the pain that will probably return. You will just have some nice scars. Read the books, get physical therapy, walk, walk, walk, exercise, relax, stretch, relax some more. It's a job but it's worth it.

Recommended reading:
To Be or Not To Be... Pain-Free: The Mindbody Syndrome by Marc D. Sopher
Healing Back Pain: The Mind-Body Connection (Paperback) by John E. Sarno
any other book by Dr. Sarno.

So long to summer.

2008-08-30T21:24:00.005-04:00

Well another summer has flown by. This summer was actully very busy for me and my family. My kid sister finally got married. What a great wedding. I took my boys camping up in the woods of Maine. We went white water rafting, fishing and saw some Moose. We spent a couple of days with my father. The boys got to ride horses and learn how to care for them as well. I think it was one of our best vacations. Work has been nice and busy which helped to speed the time along. I got a promotion a few weeks ago and I look forward to getting things up and running in the new position just as soon as I can clear a few things from my current plate load. My kids are all doing well. The Olympics were a great inspiration for my boys, who are now both looking forward to the fall/winter swim season. Way to go Michael Phelps! Football has started again and both of my younger boys are both back into the full swing of practices. Autum is pretty much here. The nights are cool and dry and the days are sunny and breezy. I love Autum. I finally finished stacking all of my wood for the season. I do have 2 more cord on order but I have what I need for this seasons heating. I hope it arrives before the snow flies as I'd like to get it stacked and ready for next year. Man the cost for cord wood really shot up as did the demand. I'm trying to get a head start on next year. Thankfully we've done a great job this summer with oil. We'll see what the winter holds.
Well, enjoy the last weekend of summer and enjoy the wonderful weather. Unless of course you're on the gulf coast and evacuating from Gustav.

All Wet

2008-03-08T08:41:00.003-05:00

As a kid I was on the swim team. I love the water. My kids love the water. And all of them, at one time or another, have been on the swim team too. Currently my youngest is the only Stevens still on the team. Each season the team has a fund raiser. This season we swam to raise money for Heifer International. We had a family swim and encouraged all of the swimmers and their families to swim laps for money. So this past Sunday I joined my son and the rest of the swimmers in the pool. It's been a while since I did any laps. It felt good. I swam fairly constant for an hour. I even raced a friend of mine who had also been on the team when we were kids. I think I edged him out but who knows. My butterfly isn't what it used to be but everything else felt pretty darn good. Yes, I've been a bit sore since Sunday but it's a good muscle sore. While I don't see myself joining the masters anytime soon. It's not out of the realm of possibilities. Besides the swim I've also been trying to get on the treadmill more often. Since my bad BP grade I've only been to the dungeon once. I've been busy ok!? geeze I'll get back soon but I am trying to shed my musclehead mentality and get back to a whole body workout. Well ,back to work.

166/98

2008-02-21T18:41:00.003-05:00

So I was doing my forth set of inclined dumbbell presses. The weight wasn't too much, nice concentration and contraction. I felt good. I was adjusting my shoulder blades on the bench when I got a sudden wave of pain and heat washing over me from the base of my skull to the front of my head. I calmly put my weights down and took some long deep breaths. I wasn't in a lot of pain but the suddeness of the headache that set is was amazing. I could feel my heart beating in my temples. Needless to say I brought my workout to an early end. I went up stairs and layed down with an icepack on the back of my head. After a few hours the pain was down to a mild headache. My wife asked if I thought my blood pressure was up. I hadn't really concidered it. My son needed a couple of folders for school so I went up to the local Rite-Aid with him to get them and while I was there I decided to sit at one of those BP machines. 144/95. hmm. The next day I awoke with a bad headache again. Now, I have been fighting off whatever cold/flu has been going around the house so whether this was a normal Migraine or Sinus headache I wasn't sure, but I knew I needed to travel later in the week so I took a day to sleep. I called the doctor to pacify my wife and they couldn't see me until the next day at 4:15pm. So I woke now on Tuesday, went to work, left early, feeling relatively crappy and went to vistit the Nurse. I think I scared her with my story as she took my BP and recorded me at 142/94. She got my doctor who took my BP and clocked me in at a lovely 166/98. Man!!! So, I'm now on a low dosage of BP medication , which she says she'll probably increase before she decreases, and I've been instructed to stop all supliments and lose 20 lbs. I told my Doctor that I've been exercising and was very suprised by this. I told her about my blog and she said to keep working out and to keep fighting father time. "It's a losing battle" I'll use these last words of hers as motivation. I'll lose the weight. I'll lower my BP and I'll increase the lean muscle mass. (some how) So here's to the newest challenge.

The Dungeon

2008-02-17T15:26:00.000-05:00

It's not much but it's mine. The only thing I'm missing now is a chin up bar. I've got my eyes open for one that I can attach to the overhead beams.
It's a tight squeeze but if I'm careful I don't bump my head too often.

Rebuilding

2008-02-07T21:14:00.000-05:00

I got my first set of weights from my parents for Christmas when I was 10 or 11. I got a straight bar with about 20 lbs of weights on it. I also got a chin up bar that went in the door frame of my bedroom. I think I stubbed my toe on the weights and hit my head on the bar in my door frame more than I used them, but as with many young boys my desire grow up big and strong was there. Jump ahead to freshman year in high school before I did anything closer to serious lifting. A few friends and I started working out with some of the seniors behind the school with a mishmash of barbells and old benches. We eventually got permission to clean out a storage closet in the gym and set up 'The Weight Room' . I remember after one workout being afraid that my arms would never fully straighten out again. The next day I had what we called the 'Coco-crispy cripples', where your arms were so sore that you couldn't hold the spoon to eat your coco-crispies. Today the same High School has a state of the art weight room with real equipment. Boy kids today are spoiled. (lol) Anyhohw, on again off again with the lifting through high school and college and I was struggling my senior year in college to get above 200 lbs. So now 20 years later I'm squatting what I used to curl and I'm pushing to get down to 200 lbs. Now I'm rebuilding. My schedule doesn't allow for much gym time so I've been building my own gym. A few years ago I got a bench and some dumbbells, followed shortly there after by a BowFlex treadmill. A year later I bought a basic Smith Machine, a heavy bag and a stand. My wife is very supportive as I take to the basement in the evenings to workout. For my 40th bday she suprised me with a set of BowFlex SelectTech dumbbells. These things are great! They give me a decent amount of weight without taking up a lot of space and since I'm sharing my home gym with my oil tank, furnace, and the rest of the junk in my basement I don't have a lot of space to spare. So while it might not be Golds, a few nights a week I sneak off to my dungeon weight room and rebuild. I like the results so far. Let's hope I can keep it up.

Competing

2008-02-04T21:22:00.001-05:00

So in my waking moments yesterday my brain was wrestling with why I continue to want to lift weights. Why lift? Why push for more? Shouldn't I start to become content with simply becoming healthy, eating well, losing weight? For some reason I still have my college days Muscle head mentality. While I am trying to eat more healthily I'm still pushing for a more muscled look rather than thinning down. I'm forty with 4 kids and a wife I love and I still feel like a 20 something, well at least in my head. My body feels much older. I've had 2 back surgeries, the last one leaving me with 4 screws and 2 rods in my lower spine. So my goal is to feel, physically, as young as my mind says I am. I’m in a competition with myself and with time. I know that the statistics of age say that at 40 things start to change more quickly. Testosterone levels are supposed to drop more rapidly. Depression is more likely. Well I’m going to do my best to fight these changes. So I’m going to continue to workout and continue to try to make gains and since I no longer have my friends to compete with I guess I'll have to compete with myself. Heres to a good fight.

Awakening

2008-02-03T10:49:00.001-05:00

Here's an email I sent to a friend of mine, slightly edited.
So 10 weeks ago of so I started working out again with the goal of being in better shape by the time I turned 40. I turned 40 last Monday and for the most part it's worked. I feel pretty good. The muscle memory is still pretty good though it's taking me 2 days or so to recover between work outs. I'm assuming that if I keep it up the recovery time will improve. Anyhow I woke up this morning with an idea for a website http://www.fightingfathertime.com/. Sort of a site for newly middle aged men with articles about how to get or stay in good health. In my pre-waking moments I envisioned a community site, local, personal, growing as users join... So I woke up walked the dogs, fed the dogs, fed the cats, answered some work emails and looked at website building sites. Almost immediately I started to lose interest. You've got free site builders, pay small fee for sites, Wiki's... Easily overwhelmed I looked at simply doing a blog, but blogging scares me. I feel exposed and don't know that I really want to pour my thoughts out to just anyone. So, I'm mulling over a site but just needed to air my thoughts. I'm going to let my chickens out now and get my day going. I'm nervously waiting for the Superbowl tonight. Go Patriots!