Day 125 - Going Massive!

Okay, so after careful consideration of my goals (listed at top of page), upcoming events, schedule, and the comments of my fellow shredders, I have decided to go all-out with a full Metabolic Surge Shred starting tomorrow.
I feel that I have healed enough from my pinched sciatic (or whatever it is) to start full workouts again plus I just can't wait any longer, not working out makes me feel like such a slug. The final thing I am doing is getting a massage today to work out the last of the problem, but even if it isn't 100%, I am confident that I will be able to do what I need to do in my training. Thanks to everyone for their well wishes, I appreciate the comments and advice in the past week.
And so the decision has been made for MS. I was really on the fence for a while, because, as Debbie said, it is a challenge to do the all protein and all fruit days (the worst parts) and the program is pretty rigorous, not a lifestyle type of thing but for sure a short-term solution. However, after reading through the program again, I believe that everything recommended in it is necessary for the kind of transformation that I am looking for over the next 36 days. And, as several of you mentioned, the workouts are excellent. Actually I never stopped doing the workouts while I have been on BFFM, just was a little less organized about them, because they are great and you never have to worry about adaption with them since they are all so different. I think that I can do the short-term sacrifice of harder nutrition compliance over 5 weeks for the long term gain of less fat and more muscle. Yeah, not much of a contest when I think about it that way.
If I really want what I say I want, I have to be willing to go all-out for it and I have been kind of half-hearted about it lately, thus the slowing of results. What was good about the last month was that I found out how to make this a lifestyle once I am at the goal that I have set for myself. And that's really a challenge for a lot of people, so I don't have to worry about that now, it's just that I was doing it a little prematurely.
So I am going for 100% compliance to the MS program, along with some added steady-state cardio as recommended in BFFM, for the next 36 days. That is the three full rounds outlined in MS before a 10 day rest/recovery period that I will take after ECSS. I am actually really excited about this, I feel like I have learned so much in this journey so far and I can really apply it to this mini-mission to end Mission 3 on the best note possible. This will all coincide nicely with the (semi-secret) things that Adam has planned for us to do on our blogs and his for this last push leading up to his big Day 500 and our ECSS. More on that to come soon.
For now, I am going to finish up my planning today and start with Day 1 tomorrow. What I have done is convert the MS pdf workouts to an Excel spreadsheet so I can make a few tweaks here and there that I have learned from my previous rounds, add in my SS cardio, and log the amount of weight that I am using for each type of exercise.
If you are unfamiliar with MS, you do different types of exercises, numbers of sets, reps, and times between sets each day, so you have several different amounts of weight that you can do depending on these factors. It's not like you just up the amount of weight you do for a particular exercise each time, it's all over the place, thus the need for more careful documentation. You only repeat a certain type of exercise every 12 days, when the next round begins, so there's a lot of flipping back and forth between pages to find your last weight, too if you don't organize yourself well enough. So that's why I made the spreadsheet for this time.
Also, the last time I did MS I did not plan my meals, I just knew what I my limits were for each day and kept it in my head. I know that I did well enough with that, because I had good results, but for this time, to both up the results and ensure compliance, I am planning my meals for a period of 12 days and repeating that for each round. That way there's no surprises and I won't get caught without the food I need for a particular day. This is where I have had trouble in the past, as far as sticking to the plan goes, but I know if I just commit to it and have it planned in advance I will do much better than spending time each day planning which is what I have done in the past. That takes too much time. So I will be planning up to my reward meal and then starting over again. With 12 days of meals, I know I won't get bored, plus the macronutrient rotation helps with that as well. I just have to remember that it's all short term and I can get through the hard parts.
The other issue that I have been dealing with is the fact that my husband is on BFFM with me and one of the big reasons I switched off of MS in the first place was so that both of us would be on the same eating schedule, but, again, this is only short term, and he is not willing to do MS with me (also afraid of the nutrient isolation days plus he's not good with low carb) so I will just make it work for the time that I will be on it. It's not long and it's not like I have to do something totally different, I just won't eat certain things I fix for him or add something to what I am having to satisfy the requirements of the day I am on.
Another reason I am going with MS is, as Adam said, the 12 day cycle really helps me from "taking off" on the weekends. Both nutrition and training-wise, I tend to give myself too much leeway on the weekends and it keeps me from getting the results I want. So the 12 day cycle really makes each part of the phase important, not related to which day of the week it is. With BFFM, we have been having our reward meal every Friday afternoon, and from then on it seems like things slide until Monday rolls around. This way, my reward meal will be every 12th day, whenever that may be, and when I go out to lunch with Jeff on Fridays it will force me to make smart decisions that are still on plan since it will not be my reward meal (most likely - haven't looked at all that dates yet). Also, having my reward meal in the middle of the day kind of gives me that mindset I was talking about avoiding in my earlier post about the "airplane principle" - that is, I tend to feel like the whole day is shot because I had my reward meal and just give up on it for the rest of the meals that day. Not a good thing to do, but sometimes I just can't help it. So putting my reward meal back on the evening of the 12th day like it was before will help with that since it will be almost the last thing I eat that day (planning on having a protein shake for an evening snack most days) and it won't be the flood gate opening for a weekend binge session. Amen to that.
The other little things (that aren't so little) that I am changing, or at least tracking better from the last time around are:
1) my protein intake - before I was not very strict with making sure I loaded protein during phase 3, so I will be watching that closely this time to have my 150g/day
2) pre- and post-workout nutrition - before I was doing my weight training fasted in the morning because that's just how I have been able to fit it in. I now realize that I will be more likely to burn muscle by working out without the proper building blocks in my body before and after, which will hurt my results. I will either do cardio in the morning if I am doing something fasted, or I will change my schedule around to allow myself to get in the proper nutrition before I train.
3) trying glutamine - I want to see if this does anything for me, I am not going to do the creatine because that is more of a weight-gain supplement, and I am not looking for that, but the glutamine is supposed to promote fat loss, so I want to give it a try.
4) tracking calories - this is something that I really loved about MS the first time, not having to track, and it is not really necessary if you are eating the right foods because it is tough to go over the calorie levels, but, like I said before, I am going all-out this time, so I want to keep my calorie count in mind when I am doing my meal planning to be sure that I don't accidentally go over. And, again, it won't be the drag that I have perceived it to be in the past because I will only be doing it once during planning and then just sticking to the plan (hmm, think I've heard this from Tom V?).
5) more intense HIIT - that sounds weird, I know, but I think I was really giving myself kind of a break on HIIT since I don't have any cardio equipment to gauge how hard I was working. On days when I didn't feel as well, I am sure that I was not where you are supposed to be whether it's maximal, sub-max, or near-max. So I recalculated my MHR and found the values where I think I should be depending on which type of cardio I am doing, and I will wear a heart rate monitor to make sure that I am not cheating on this. That's the only way I can think of to ensure a hard enough workout when I am just running in place, doing jumping jacks, using the punching bag, etc (the kinds of cardio I do at home since I have no equipment and I only have to sustain them for 1 min or less). Then for SS cardio I will be doing the Tae-Bo DVDs I have which are less intense so they can be done for longer amounts of time (30-45 min).
Okay, well I think that's everything. It's a detailed and optimistic plan, I know, but I feel very confident that I can do it given what is at stake here and the excellent accountability that you all in the ShredderSphere offer. Thank you all for giving me the confidence to feel that I can attain such a massive goal and giving me a reason and deadline to achieve it in (shout out to the NY4!). Keep on me guys, I am committing to posting every day so give me hell if you don't see me. Especially on the weekends, that's a tough time for me, so don't give me any slack! Talk to you all soon!
P.S. Here are yesterday's pics...