New journal use...
I bought a new toy today. It's a fancy scale that measures body fat, water percentage, muscle mass, bone density, and it estimates necessary caloric intake. I bought the tool in order to familiarize myself with these numbers which will give me some baseline knowledge which I can than research and expand upon and will ultimately lead to my increased ability to help other people live healthy and happy lives. It's also a tool to help me monitor the changes in my own body as I experiment with different techniques and routines for training martial arts (ie, if I spend a week focusing more on forms, what happens to the numbers? what if I spend a week working on building using the medicine ball versus building using Fu Hu Gong (traditional exercises developed by monks to work the core) versus simply push-ups and sit-ups, etc etc).
This journal is where I'll record the weekly results... To try to reduce variables I'll use the scale some time (approximately an hour) after eating dinner on Sunday night and immediately after showering and toweling myself dry. The instructions said for best results my feet should be slightly damp...
So today is the first entry. The scale says:
%Fat is 5.2
%Water is 65.4
%Muscle Mass is 48.3
%Bone Density is 5.8
Weight is 138.6 lbs
Recommended Caloric Intake is 3646 KCal
Thoughts:
Part of the inspiration for buying the scale came from the fact that my leg is finally healed enough that I can exercise fairly regularly without suffering too much. This means I can participate completely in our Wednesday night class (which is limited in what we can do because we're meeting at the park, so we can't do all the really crazy exercises (like Fu Hu Gong) that we used to do regularly), or I can practice on my own (forms, white crane, tian gong, etc), or I can do building exercises (push-ups, sit-ups, fu hu gong, medicine ball drills, etc) or physical therapy (mostly just one legged squats and heel raises) and I only suffer minimally for perhaps a day or two at most. Since realizing my leg was getting stronger I've begun exercising almost daily, doing at least standing meditation (which works the legs and all the stabilizers of the pelvis and spine), a little Fu Hu Gong (limited by my leg), Tian Gong (heavenly stem Ba Gua exercises) vigorously with as many as 30 repetitions each, White Crane exercises (not as often as I should), push-ups and sit-ups (the push-ups aren't as many reps or as many sets as I used to do, but I'm trying to focus more on achieving a form that maximizes the potential of the exercise without having to do as many reps... ie I've been doing 1 rep of 100 knuckle push-ups, and then usually a rep of 30 tiger push-ups, focusing on form... or something like that). I've only done the medicine ball exercises once since I bought the ball about a month a go, but I'd like to start doing them at least weekly again (the only thing that's stopping me is finding a partner to do them with, since they can't be done alone). I tried incorporating the medicine ball into my v-ups (might as well use it, since it's lying around); now when I do a v-up I hold the ball above my head and attempt to touch it to my rising legs each rep, and I think it's helped to work my abs quite a bit (again, less reps, better form is the key... It gets tedious doing 350+ crunches). I plan on attending private lessons every other week as long as I can afford it.
Also, my leg is still pretty atrophied (about half the size of my right leg) and still very broken (the crack still feels at least an 1/8" wide and runs the entire circumference of the bone) and I'm about 9 pounds less than I was when I was at what I consider to be my physical peak, before I moved to LA and started working 70+ hours a week... I have a theory that if I continue to try to build the flesh (ie muscle) and invigorate the blood (via exercising, especially PT) it will help the bone regenerate more quickly. Regeneration of the tibia is limited because of it's distance from the heart and especially because it's engorged by very little flesh and blood, especially in the area where I broke mine (just a couple inches above the malleolus'). Bone needs nourishment from blood to regenerate and there isn't much in that particular area... I was also thinking that using the technique of "rolling the shins" using a rolling pin (very very gently, and very slowly building up intensity and repetitions) may help to stimulate bone growth (basically Wolfe's Law dictates that bone becomes more dense directly in relation to physical stress put on it. Osteoblasts that are stimulated create osteoclasts, which are the fundamental building blocks of bone tissue...). I'm going to ask Alex and possibly Shr Fu what their advice is on the matter, but I anticipate they'll tell me to wait, just to be safe (and to save themselves from any liability), so I'll probably take the initiative and just try it, carefully. After looking at my x-rays I think the way the bone is formed it could only help... but what do I know.
I thought it was noteworthy that the scale says I should be eating about 3600 calories a day... I had always guessed I needed around 3000 a day to maintain and I know that I have trouble eating enough and have, especially during crunch times at school, gone to bed feeling hungry even after eating 3 meals in a day... I think now that I live in a normal house again with a real kitchen I'll have less trouble getting enough calories. If that number is correct it means I need to be eating about 3800 calories a day to have any chance of gaining weight, and even then, so long as my caloric need stayed the same, I would gain approximately 1 pound every 23 days or so. I suppose I should invest in a high calorie supplement...
Tonight for dinner (eaten approximately 1 hour before showering and weighing myself) I consumed .56 lbs of salmon, 2/3rds a cup of rice, and a little over a pound of tomatoes (good for the prostate) and broccoli (good for building blood, I believe). The salmon was lightly seasoned with olive oil, lemon juice, and citrus pepper. The rice was seasoned with black sesame and furikake nori (seaweed and white sesame) and the veggies had a slab of butter.
This journal is where I'll record the weekly results... To try to reduce variables I'll use the scale some time (approximately an hour) after eating dinner on Sunday night and immediately after showering and toweling myself dry. The instructions said for best results my feet should be slightly damp...
So today is the first entry. The scale says:
%Fat is 5.2
%Water is 65.4
%Muscle Mass is 48.3
%Bone Density is 5.8
Weight is 138.6 lbs
Recommended Caloric Intake is 3646 KCal
Thoughts:
Part of the inspiration for buying the scale came from the fact that my leg is finally healed enough that I can exercise fairly regularly without suffering too much. This means I can participate completely in our Wednesday night class (which is limited in what we can do because we're meeting at the park, so we can't do all the really crazy exercises (like Fu Hu Gong) that we used to do regularly), or I can practice on my own (forms, white crane, tian gong, etc), or I can do building exercises (push-ups, sit-ups, fu hu gong, medicine ball drills, etc) or physical therapy (mostly just one legged squats and heel raises) and I only suffer minimally for perhaps a day or two at most. Since realizing my leg was getting stronger I've begun exercising almost daily, doing at least standing meditation (which works the legs and all the stabilizers of the pelvis and spine), a little Fu Hu Gong (limited by my leg), Tian Gong (heavenly stem Ba Gua exercises) vigorously with as many as 30 repetitions each, White Crane exercises (not as often as I should), push-ups and sit-ups (the push-ups aren't as many reps or as many sets as I used to do, but I'm trying to focus more on achieving a form that maximizes the potential of the exercise without having to do as many reps... ie I've been doing 1 rep of 100 knuckle push-ups, and then usually a rep of 30 tiger push-ups, focusing on form... or something like that). I've only done the medicine ball exercises once since I bought the ball about a month a go, but I'd like to start doing them at least weekly again (the only thing that's stopping me is finding a partner to do them with, since they can't be done alone). I tried incorporating the medicine ball into my v-ups (might as well use it, since it's lying around); now when I do a v-up I hold the ball above my head and attempt to touch it to my rising legs each rep, and I think it's helped to work my abs quite a bit (again, less reps, better form is the key... It gets tedious doing 350+ crunches). I plan on attending private lessons every other week as long as I can afford it.
Also, my leg is still pretty atrophied (about half the size of my right leg) and still very broken (the crack still feels at least an 1/8" wide and runs the entire circumference of the bone) and I'm about 9 pounds less than I was when I was at what I consider to be my physical peak, before I moved to LA and started working 70+ hours a week... I have a theory that if I continue to try to build the flesh (ie muscle) and invigorate the blood (via exercising, especially PT) it will help the bone regenerate more quickly. Regeneration of the tibia is limited because of it's distance from the heart and especially because it's engorged by very little flesh and blood, especially in the area where I broke mine (just a couple inches above the malleolus'). Bone needs nourishment from blood to regenerate and there isn't much in that particular area... I was also thinking that using the technique of "rolling the shins" using a rolling pin (very very gently, and very slowly building up intensity and repetitions) may help to stimulate bone growth (basically Wolfe's Law dictates that bone becomes more dense directly in relation to physical stress put on it. Osteoblasts that are stimulated create osteoclasts, which are the fundamental building blocks of bone tissue...). I'm going to ask Alex and possibly Shr Fu what their advice is on the matter, but I anticipate they'll tell me to wait, just to be safe (and to save themselves from any liability), so I'll probably take the initiative and just try it, carefully. After looking at my x-rays I think the way the bone is formed it could only help... but what do I know.
I thought it was noteworthy that the scale says I should be eating about 3600 calories a day... I had always guessed I needed around 3000 a day to maintain and I know that I have trouble eating enough and have, especially during crunch times at school, gone to bed feeling hungry even after eating 3 meals in a day... I think now that I live in a normal house again with a real kitchen I'll have less trouble getting enough calories. If that number is correct it means I need to be eating about 3800 calories a day to have any chance of gaining weight, and even then, so long as my caloric need stayed the same, I would gain approximately 1 pound every 23 days or so. I suppose I should invest in a high calorie supplement...
Tonight for dinner (eaten approximately 1 hour before showering and weighing myself) I consumed .56 lbs of salmon, 2/3rds a cup of rice, and a little over a pound of tomatoes (good for the prostate) and broccoli (good for building blood, I believe). The salmon was lightly seasoned with olive oil, lemon juice, and citrus pepper. The rice was seasoned with black sesame and furikake nori (seaweed and white sesame) and the veggies had a slab of butter.