“Bitter Chocolate”

from the “Endomorph:”

It has been exactly one month since I dragged myself out of my lazy bearish hibernation and off to the gym.
I went hoping to change my body and alter my badly overweight condition.
So today I took some new photo’s wearing exactly the same shirt in the same gym.
Thank God there has been a little shape change otherwise I would through myself from a building.
I still struggle looking at the images of myself as they seem so alien so distant from what I thought I looked like.
I still can’t help thinking , “how did that happen”, and “is that really me?”
Yet the pictures don’t lie – it really is me! (and I don’t mean it in the “wow, what a spectacular specimen kind of way more like the “blegh,
I stepped barefoot on a slug” kind of way !)

When your body is drastically bloated out of proportion change seems to happen in the most torturously slow kind of way.
This is a danger-zone for any Endomorph, and a very big danger zone for someone like me who has very limited patience for just about anything other than my dog. I am a control freak, insecure and mostly demand instant gratification.
These are not the characteristics one really needs to accomplish success in the gym. (or really in the broader spectrum of life)
The lesson here is that training and reshaping will probably teach you a couple of things about yourself.
For me (on a personal level) it is that any change comes at the price of giving up one action for another.
You cannot always have your cake and eat it.
“Literally this isn’t working for me – I had a piece of cake today because I didn’t want to offend anyone – and my body is rejecting it like
mind rejects the colour combination yellow and green.”
I feel shaky , nauseous and have incredible heart burn –
Could it be that my body prefers the splendour of salmon and salad???
Death by chocolate mouse is exactly how I am feeling right now!
If you told me this 3 months ago I would have told you that your on crack.
Even going to gym has become a simpler task and I dare to say I am almost looking forward to it now.
Looking at these pictures I also cannot deny that no man should be sporting “moobs” the size of mine.
It just isn’t right to have bigger boobs than the girls down at hooters!
And if a “drag queen” tells you she wish she had your breasts, you know you have hit an all time body fat low.
This happened to me, and I am struggling to see the positive side of a compliment like that, even when it wasn’t really meant from a place of ill intent.
I sorta have to admit that I would rather one day have some random dude tell me I have a great chest.
I don’t know if it is possible to reduce the size of my “moobs” through training,
but I have promised myself that if I achieve a certain weight again and they are still bouncing around, I’d go under the knife.
It is the one thing that has always bothered me about my body and if I have the chance to do something about it with the assistance of surgery, I wouldn’t hesitate.
“Moobs” are a horror to straight men and gay men alike.
Research has shown that a lot of the time it is genetic and sometimes it’s just fat.
I believe my “moobs” are genetic since a had them even when I was virtually “manorexic!”
It suck’s to have “moobs”, there is nothing hot about a guy with breasts and it can lead to hurtful comments even when made in jest,
I have heard them all!
So not only am I on a mission to change the incredibly bloated shape of my body,
but I am on a mission to fight a life long embarrassing condition that I am now really just fed up with.
I guess that means today a wished farewell to baked goods.
For now chocolate flavoured protein bars will have to be the sweet treat to my week !

“Swim Style”

“What’s in your shorts”

“Whats in your shorts”

“Whats in your shorts”

If I had to pic a sim-style for the coming summer, I will definitely put “2Eros” new “Icon Swim-shorts” at the top of my list.
I love the bold colours  , the almost retro style and the attention to detail. The colour pops in the rope ties and edging is awesome.
It is also a more discreet way to draw attention to a body under construction. In swimwear “less is definitely not always more” (unless you are sporting the physique of the model in the pics)
It is great that fashion companies are giving us some great options in casual comfortable swimwear.
Check out “2Eros” website for more styles, and great undies @ www.2eros.com  

“Battle of the Bulge”

“from the Endomorph”

Thousands upon thousands of articles and posts have been written on the subject of loosing weight,
that leaves a nutritional novice with very little to say about the subject.

I have been dieting for years, I have yo-yoed up and down in body weight from extreme to extreme,
causing a superhighway of stretch marks reaching metropolis like lengths from my stomach down over my ass to my thighs.
Stretch marks are gross and they don’t go away, and 20 gallons of vitamin e-oil won’t make them lighter.
You also can’t tattoo over a stretch mark as it is technically dermis that has been deprived of blood flow and has died.
This really sucks and on of the only treatments I know that is semi-sucsessfull on stretch marks is “carboxy” treatment.
I know – cause I’ve tried every potion and lotion out there.
I could have saved myself the effort and the expense had I taken the time to educate myself and kept a regular, steady and balanced diet.
This brings me back to the point I was actually trying to make….
The one thing every fitness guru, supplement pusher and miracle body transformation will tell you is that there are no miracle diets (amen) that you will almost always gain all the weight back that you have lost ( and then some) , and that death induced by the ” Mexican Fire Ant” is more sensible choice.

I never believed any of the “jibber jabber” and thought that the best way to loose weight was to starve yourself and block out the starvation with appetite blockers of the most dangerous chemical composition.
And it worked …. and then it didn’t !
I also ended up going mental, destroying my libido, inducing halitosis, and feeling over all quite miserable , but hey I was a size 28 – big woop !
My take on all the BS out there is that for the poor, sluggish overweight “Endomorph” like myself the only way to knock of the pounds
is to admit to yourself that there is no quick fix to battling the bulge, that it is a constant battle between the right amount of exercise and eating right .
None of this above is very complicated , but it is hard work , and difficult to do if your a little on the homely side.(preferring to stay indoors watching endless amounts of series with the curtains closed – my idea of a perfect afternoon in hiding from the big bad world)
I want to say out loud that it is so much easier just living with the pot belly, fat thighs and flabby arms that develops so easily for the “Endomorph”.

I want to say out loud stop wasting money on a lot of crazy shit products and use it to go on holiday.
I want to say out loud that it is better to be a little fat and happy than starving all the time because it sucks to be hungry.
I HAVE to say that if you still want to change your body after that, it probably means you have something inside you that is reaching desperately to become more than you have even given yourself the recognition for wanting.
The “Endomorph” who possesses this kind of fighting spirit, who has tried everything and suffered for it and is still willing to try one more thing, is a “Superhero” in his own right and one that I will wage money on is able to keep fighting the battle of the bulge.
I would like to think of myself as the latter, but that is still to be proven.

The one enemy the fighting “Endomorph” has to be weary of is the “scale”.
Looking at it too much, is like watching too much porn, you start loosing interest when the action never changes.
I jokingly took a few pictures of myself when I started training, and then again a couple of weeks later and even though
there wasn’t much change when I got on my scale, in the second set of pics a couple of weeks later my stomach seemed a little smaller, and whats even more telling is that a few people have mentioned that I look “flatter”!!

The other thing most fitness guru’s and supplement pushers will tell you is to eat 5-6 small high protein meals at 2-3 hour intervals per day.
Sounds great right ?
It’s not.
You gotta cook like a lot of stuff and prepare like crazy – it’s a mission and something that I really struggle with.
One tends to think because someone is fat that the are constantly eating ! This is not true , I am overweight according to my BMI but never ate more than 2-3 meals per day. It was what I ate and the amounts I ate that was the problem. It also didn’t help that I washed every mouth full down with a litre of Coke Zero.
I haven’t been able to manage 5-6 small, high protein meals per day yet, and this (I dare say) is where a supplement like a protein shake comes in real hand. It’s quick and some taste like chocolate milk so it’s not as much torture as a piece of chicken every other hour.
“Hero’s” are people that decide to do something about something that bothers them and changes the world around them.
“Super-hero’s” are ordinary men who decide to change the things that bothers them about themselves, and then changes the world around them.
(Thats just how I think about it anyway, cause it’s so hard to change ourself before we try to change other stuff)

Before I try to be a “Superhero” , I will just try being a little bit more disciplined and a lot more determined.

Do it the “Old Khaki” way !!

“Postcards from Oxford”

 

Get your “Goat” on !

Fashion is about much the same, and I believe that looking good contributes to feeling good.

My advice, find a clothing brand that works with your body.
I have been struggling with this for years.
I am a short square, most manufacturers cater to persons of lengthy statuesque proportions, which makes the search
for appropriate apparel a little more challenging.
For instance there is a big movement currently toward “skinny jeans” and “skinny  …” just about everything else.
For an Endomorph with short legs and a rugby players shoulders working his way back to fitness, this is the most ridiculous look ever.
It makes you look like a bowling pin and even larger and more out of proportion than you feel.
This is great if you have the retro body of the “Ectomorph”, and get your style tips from John and Yoko !
It took me months to find a brand that didn’t cut off the circulation in my legs and sat so low that my crack was visible to the whole world . I have almost no bum and a (currently) rounder middle , which means every time you bend in a pair of hip hugging skinny jeans, the whole lot pulls down to your knees.

I also had to find a budget friendly brand without it being typically cheap !
Its financially straining for anyone that is working towards fitness and having to buy supplements, to have to splurge large amounts on clothing as well ! I.O.W I just can’t afford “Diesel, Gucci and Prada” lol !!

I was given an “Old Khaki” gym bag for my birthday and immediately connected with the masculine, almost vintagy, postcards from Oxford kind of feel.
So I decided to check out their clothing as well and “Bam!” , what a cool brand !!
Even though the pants were a size “36” they didn’t look like my dads or like I belonged on a park bench.
They fit perfectly, a mix between cargo and smart casual. (still a little too long but nothing my tailor can’t chop)
Nice comfortable loose cut around the leg but not baggy ! (also makes an Endomorph look shorter !!)
Since winter has hit in the Southern Hemisphere, I opted for to great jumpers with the same vintage feel, slightly faded v-necks,
and slim body but not constrictive.
There is something about “Old Khaki” that wants to make you buy a “Moleskin” journal and a real set of “Travel Chests” so that you could head towards “Victoria Falls’ on a journey to finding the lost treasures of Sheba !
I’m loving it.
I am not saying that this brand is the sensible choice for every “Endomorph” out there !! (We are not all short squares)
I am saying that I made a personal connection with a certain style that suites my current shape and made me feel good about myself
and more importantly about shopping for clothes which I have found an almost traumatic experience in the past !

Again there is a small relation to fitness …. NEVER GIVE UP !

from the Endomorph:

Dwayne Johnson

We are allowed to listen to the things some “Superhero’s have to say” ….
That’s why they are “Superhero’s !!”
I “think” Dwayne is genetically gifted, but I am willing to bet he is a hard worker !!

Being Human … and Fitness

from the Endomorph :

Being human means that some days will be filled with buckets full of motivation, and eagerness to
achieve the perfect body, and some days probably won’t.
If you are anything like me ( slightly less confident about personal success ) you may actually have
those kind of days pop their dark, negative, little heads up from the fitness trenches more often than not.
I read over the past week about a guy so obsessed with muscle that he went from one extreme to the next during the past 10 years
to achieve physical perfection. I call guys like this “superhero’s” !

Personally that hasn’t happened to me yet , here’s to hoping.
What has happened to me though, is that over the past 3 weeks I have been doing just about everything right.
I have worked out regularly and eaten portions equating to such small amounts that my Yorkie has taken it upon herself
to drop tiny dog pellets at my feet, or so it seems.
Then I go and look for a pair of pants, and nothing … same fat ass sized waist as before, and I cry in a chain store fitting room.
Yes thats right, I cried.
Point, laugh, pull a face, I don’t care.
I felt completely defeated, I felt alone, and frustrated with a waistline that felt as if it were cast in cement.
I know that an Endomorphs change is a slow an gruelling process, but how did I end up in this place of suspended animation, where it felt like no matter what I had done to better myself, it was useless and I was still …. fat.
I have bigger boobs than Kate Moss.
And I was still a size 36.

Eventually I ended up buying the 36, cause you gotta wear pants in public where I live.
And also didn’t buy the most horrible pair, just because I had to buy something. I forced myself to look for something nice.
The reason for this is …
I still had hope after recovering from my little breakdown.
And I believe that if nothing else, we must be kind to ourselves as much as we would to others.
I took a days break, from the scale and from the gym and from the supplements and shakes.
And for one day, I was human again I could always try for “superhero” status again tomorrow.

Tomorrow came,
and went to gym.

Endomorph’s front profile

Endomorphs side profile – right hand

Endomorphs side profile – left hand

Endomorphs back profile, full body

Metamorphosis – the missing fitness mag link … ?

metamorphosis – wikipedia:
Metamorphosis is a biological process by which an animal develops after birth or hatching,
involving a conspicuous and abrupt change in the animals body structure through cell growth and differentiation .
Some insects, cnidarians, amphibians, molluscs, and tunicates undergo metamorphosis,
which is usually accompanied by a change of habitat or behaviour.

from the Endomorph:

I bought my first fitness mag when I was still googly-eyed and at school.
I was picked on for being arty and different and thought that if I went to gym to gain some muscle,
I would be able to swing things in my favour a little.
The first magazine I ever purchased was a “Mens Workout” mag, and there it was, page after page of shiny genetically amplified muscle.
My first thoughts about the guy on the inside middle page was…
“ain’t no one gonna get up in your face !” and
“whoa, them are some short, shorts ya all wearing!”
Unfortunately for me I never quite understood that most of the guys in fitness mags where “metamorphosed” creatures belonging to a select group of only perhaps a few thousand on this great big turning ball of a planet inhabited by 5.99988887777666 billion other
people.
It was a pity that the particular magazine I had bought only sported images of super-humans and didn’t come with a content warning!

After reading about weight-lifting and supplements, I ran to gym, joined (for the first of a million times) and nearly pitched a tent the first week from not wanting to leave.
By week two my enthusiasm decreased, and by week three, I was ready to move back home.
And for f**k sake I still didn’t look anything like anyone in those mags – not possible !
(I did however look half anorexic as I ate barely anything and dropped weight like a good habit . FYI this don’t happen after 30 no more.)
I had the same routine throughout my 20’s.
Each time I would catch the fever – I would run to gym and want it to happen overnight.
I wanted to be a magazine boy !
I would have also probably achieved more if I started selling them on street corners.
My weight yo-yoed out of control – I added and lost muscle like Hue lost Bunnies and I became despondent and depressed.

There were a couple of things missing from my “routine”:
1) actually having a routine
2)doing my homework regarding fitness
3)figuring out what a proper diet consisted of = 80% of what working out is about.
4)learning not to waste my time if I thought it was a waste of time
5)what my body type was,
6)”magazine boys” didn’t rock the pages after working out for 12 weeks.

Fact is, “magazine guys” are great motivation for fitness and weight training. Fitness magazines also wouldn’t sell if say, you put me on the cover without a shirt on. Fact is that fitness is a huge business and all about the selling products, equipment and beauty.
Thats ok , it creates employment and gives us something to look at.
It would however just be really great for once just to add a dash of reality, and by looking at all the reality crap they kill television with, there must be a market.
I would have been a lot more grateful if somewhere along the line they included an average guy , who didn’t get the chance to spend his life in the gym, who had a lot of stress and a big old fat belly and said, “right lets see if any of this works”.
And then make him write an article about it, so that we could learn about the absolute hell it is to go through a metamorphosis of the body and more importantly the mind.
How to keep going at it when real things happen like,
your company is in trouble,
your boss is an asshole,
your business is not breaking even,
your drive by 2000 fast food holes on your way home
your partner doesn’t want to touch you with a broom in the basement
your cost of living spirals into orbit each day.

I find it hard to train when bad things are happening, or when I am sad.
This is the most important time to train because of the whole endorphin thing blah, blah.
But you know what?…
It’s hard to drive to gym, when you can go home and loose yourself in another crap episode of “The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills” (those people need Jesus)
It’s easy to say, later, tomorrow and not now.
It’s hard to say ok, 45mins and burnout.
Ripping your muscles apart and drowning in sweat – sucks, it really does, and what sucks even more is squats and that you look like you
have pooped yourself the day after because you can’t climb the stairs to your office.
The biggest suck-fest is that it all happens quite slowly if you have the body type that was put together when God was not in character that particular day and your DNA spiral is a little bent.

We can only ever do our best.
Sometimes doing our best means doing something out of character.
Sometimes we have to change the habitat that we are comfortable in, displace ourselves to such and extent that we are uncomfortable and even in pain.
I cannot guarantee it, but I am almost certain that this will initiate a change of energy, and to be honest at this point in time I pray that I am right, because right now I am in that uncomfortable place.

Today I have poop-legs and an extremely stressful reality weighing down on my life, that makes lifting more weight look like such an insignificant part of the process.
I am uncomfortable in my personal life,
but I am going to go to gym anyway, because I would really LIKE to loose some inches off this 43 inch belly and because it’s uncomfortable and I can still choose to do it,
makes me a little more free today than I was a week ago.

Ready, Steady and Go

Endomorph’s side profile 02/04/13

Endomorphs frontal profile 02/04/13

Endomorph’s other side profile April 2/4/13

from the Endomorph :

The mirror might be one of mans cruelest inventions when you are not the worlds most pragmatic narcissist.
If you dare to venture a little beyond the sensible relationship with your reflection i.e combing your hair or straightening a tie , you could easily find yourself in a spot of trouble.
I have recently stood completely naked in front of my mirror, looking beyond the large white swollen shape that faced me to see if I could find a reason beyond the surface for my appearance.
It sounds very philosophical, but really it’s not.
Every single diet program and fad that I have spent small fortunes on, neglect to mention the bodies connection to the inner physical state and relation to the state of spirit.
I didn’t have to be a yogi to realise mine was out of whack and that the outer probably reflected some of the turmoil that I was feeling physically and spiritually on the inside.

Wiser men than I have claimed that the eyes are the passage to the soul.
In my naivety toward life’s greater mysteries, I beg to differ!
I believe that the body is a reflection of the soul. Almost as if we are a living sarcophagus to a very delicate energy. The better the shape of the energy, the better the shape of the box.
Anyone may disagree, but for me personally this was my “ready”.

After that things became a little bit more complicated and I had to deal with a minor panic attack that included acknowledging :
my weight – a staggering 95kg or 209.43 pounds ! and I measure 5’8
my diet – bad, processed, addicted to Coke Zero (not a diet drink – there is no such thing)
my age – oi vey not 21 and cute anymore
my relationship with myself – mostly angry
my relationship with others – mostly angry
my relationship with my body – none
my relationship with food – comfort
my relationship with stress – blinding
my relationship with inner will – weak
my relationship with change – good God freak out completely!
acknowledging that I have a problem – little slow on the uptake!
mental and nervous breakdown – almost there.

Yet somehow I managed to take a deep breath stand back and in a small “lightbulb” moment realised that for me there was very little to loose when it came down to choosing change as the “nightmarish” and most probable option to proceed.
This was my “steady” moment !

My “go” moment, was to pack a mental bag with little bits of tattered determinations, faded knowledge and unpolished ambition.
So I admitted my addiction to myself – Coke Zero – I have been clean for almost 3 months now and if I hold out I will dedicate and entire post to this.
I joined the gym – for the 1 millionth time in my life !
I introduced myself to my metabolism and found out what makes me such a square.
So here goes:
“Hello my name is …. and I am and Endomorph.”
I took some pictures of myself at the gym – that I will post here, small face blur, we don’t have to plaster ourselves all over the internet all at once!
I choose to post these body pics as a measure of inspiration, not for others, but for myself, hoping that that age old dignity thing will kick in to first gear at some point and keep me on the very narrow path of change.
I would like to write about my journey as an Endomorph.
Prove to myself that it is possible to change my physical appearance, that I do possess determination and can “will” the world around me.

So here goes …. everything!