BP Journal BrainSquirt

[BrainSquirt]

Profile, background, bio info, etc - will edit later...

[BrainSquirt]

Breakfast 1 PM omelet 1 egg, mostly veggies ( a protein going away party)
Lunch: apple before workout
Dinner after workout large romaine salad, caesar dressing w/ xtra olive oil, sprinkle of parm. cheese
Bedtime snack handful of raw walnuts and craisins

Supplements:
AMPM Cleanse (VitaminShoppe brand)
Broken cell wall chlorella
New Chapter Coenzyme B Food Complex

Liquids:
+ 3 qts water.
2 cups white grape / cherry juice
1 qt. gatorade (diluted to .25 strength) mix during workout.

Workout:
Plan: was light weight, high reps, mid speed 3 sets of 3-5 reps 3 minutes in between sets
Actual: was using 60% of wt from last week so increased the reps like pushed the reps for tri cables to near failure on last sets, etc. Also ended up not resting even close to 3 minutes btwn sets … basically it felt like not enough weight.

Chest: incline smith bottom half of press only, flyes, bench
Shoulders: front raise plate, side raise
Trics: cables, bench.

Notes: ordered test strips, 2 and 10 test

[RobRegish]

Nice start Brainsquirt. Please keep us posted as the Famine Phase progresses. It usually hits me hard on day 3. You should start feeling uncomfortable pretty soon...

I do try and lift as heavy as possible on day 1, because as the rest periods decrease over the course of Famine, so does your ability to move the big weights..

[askmass]

That's the truth, re day three... which is tomorrow for me!

I'll try to get a log up for my current run, soon.

Hang tough, Brain!

I try to plan day three to be as busy as possible, jam packed so it goes "fast" (kind of literally in a different way) and then a late'ish workout around 8p. After I hit a hot bath with Epsom salt and then the hay promptly.

I also visit and eat with Vegan friends (of which my daughter is one) during this week more than usual, lol...

"Eating in the Raw" by hottie Carol Alt is a great resource for the famine phase, and beyond.

[RobRegish]

I mention this in The Blueprint but those Multistix are VERY revealing in the Famine Phase. The amount of protein being excreted is massive.

[BrainSquirt]

Breakfast 1 PM Handful of almonds
Snack: Apple
Lunch: 5 PM banana before workout
Dinner: after workout 1 lb Sugar Pea stir fry vegetable mix, ½ cup brown rice, teriyaki sauce, fresh ginger, powdered tumeric (which yucked up the whole meal, btw), imitation wasabi, rice bran oil

Supplements:
Enzymes pre dawn
AMPM Cleanse (VitaminShoppe brand) 5555
New Chapter Coenzyme B Food Complex AM

Liquids:
4 qts water flavored with one cup green tea and 4 tbs zylitol crystals
2 qt. gatorade (diluted to .5 strength) mix during workouts.

Workout:
Plan: was light weight, high reps, mid speed Legs, Back and Bi's 4 sets of 6-8 reps 2.5 minutes between sets
Actual: played hard fast tennis 45 minutes right before hitting the weights. Used 70% + of wt from last week Deliberately timed the rests between sets better but still didn’t wait 2.5 minutes every time. Legs going to be sore from tennis tomorrow? ( especially with no Adaptagen- N) Going to be exhausted from starvation ??

Legs: various machines including squat machine, standing barbell calf raises.
Back: rows, bent over 1 arm dumbell rows (higher weight), underhanded standing barbell rows to belly for lats
Bics: sitting rows, nautilus assisted one arm pull-ups to failure

Notes: Lost umph near the end of workout. CNS still in pretty good shape – at least subjectively…

[RobRegish]

"Notes: Lost umph near the end of workout."

It's starting

[BrainSquirt]

"Notes: Lost umph near the end of workout."

It's starting

…some first time questions…
So for the last 3 days of Phase1, I’m going to mostly juices (and alkalyzing) right?
And re diet and workouts - Just how close to totally depleted, exhausted, dead am I supposed to get? If I don’t get there this first time (or any cycle actually), should I expand the phase by 1 or more days?
Thanks.

[RobRegish]

The most important factor is caloric intake, staying within or under the recommendations provided.

Objectively,waking heart rate should reach the point where it's elevated 8 beats per minute or more above baseline.

No worries though, if you haven't done this. The general feeling you should have is 1.) Disinclination to train 2.) Tired 3.) Weak 4.) Cursing my name and wanting to end this thing as quickly as possible.

Juicing is fine and fantastic time to introduce alkalizing into the program. My sense is that your body will be giving some or all of these signals to you very shortly. If not, you can extend it a day or two until they are observed.

[BrainSquirt]

Breakfast: 2 PM ~10 raw almonds
Snack: Apple
Lunch: 5:30 Banana before workout
Dinner: Post workout Tiny bowl of old fashioned oatmeal with ¼ scoop MassPro, ¼ scoop stabilized rice bran, sprinkle of wheat germ, 1 tbs flax seed oil (budwig style in about 2 tbs cottage cheese). Was going to eat a salad later but near bedtime just decided to go hungry…

Supplements:
Chlorella 6 tablets
AMPM Cleanse (VitaminShoppe brand)
Senna
Liver support herb tablets
New Chapter Coenzyme B Food Complex AM

Liquids:
4 + qts water flavored with one cup green tea and 1 tbs Really Raw honey
1 qt. gatorade (diluted to .25 strength) mix during workouts.

Workout:
Plan: Chest, shoulders, trics 5 sets 8-10 reps 2 min rests
Actual: Not much fun. Legs not as sore from the sprints in tennis as I thought they would be.
Trics: Incline overhead pulley. Nautilus Assisted Dips All on plan (ie 5 sets 8-10 reps 2 min rests)
Chest: Decline flies, on plan but no presses tonight
Shoulders: : front raise plate (increased weight last set). Side raises (progressively decreased weights). All on plan … plus Leaning over reverse dumbbell flies (1 set at ‘learning’ weight).

Notes: re “My sense is that your body will be giving some or all of these signals to you very shortly”
Thanks Rob. Heartrate is definitely up. Weaker in weight room. Certainly depleted after workouts and going up stairs one at a time instead of usual three, etc. And yes, I hate you – are we there yet?
re Dinner. ‘should’ have eaten a salad but after the workout it was chosen (ie it was not a craving)
and hey it’s a famine fast not a suicide pact…
so I stalked the oatmeat, killed it and ate it
re calories have probably sneaked in a few extra calories in with the fats in nuts and salad dressings, etc but am generally running on under 50% of the calories eaten previous week and protein intake at about 10-15%

Questions: BP book mentions sodium intake.
General ?’s Is there an optimal cycle of sodium intake for the BP phases? And what about sodium phosphate?
More specific ?’s – have been drinking a lot and mouth doesn’t feel very thirsty but body and insides kinda feel ‘thirsty’. Is that related to sodium intake?

[BrainSquirt]

Breakfast: 10:30 A few almonds and 4 strawberries
Lunch: Large salad, romaine and spring mix, Caesar with addtl olive oil and apple vinegar (went to workout at noon so having ‘big’ meal at lunch)
Snack: Apple
Dinner: None, just juicing, may make fresh carrot parsley juice…

Supplements:

Liquids:
2 qts water
2 qts low sodium V8 (some with Worch and Tabasco)
1 qt. gatorade (diluted to .25 strength) mix during workout.

Workout:
Plan: Legs, back, bics. 6 sets 10 – 12 reps, 1 minute rest
Actual: 5 sets 10 reps ~ 1 min. rest. Once I got there figured that’s the only way was going to make it through all of them. Still got cold sweats and almost light headed
Legs: All machines… incline squat machine, leg curls, leg extensions, abductions, adductions
Back: leaning over reverse flies, underhanded bent over barbell rows to belly in rack (with way too much weight - didn’t have the energy to change the plates ), Universal back machine
Bics: dumbbell curls, Nautilus assisted one hand pull-ups, a few heavy pulley rows (just to sense the contrast from where I was last week…)

Notes: At an hour after workout and half hour after meal, heartrate is still 20 over base ??

Questions: see separate post to follow.

[BrainSquirt]

Rob,
In journal for yesterday I joked “are we there yet?” and also asked about possibility of need to extend Phase 1 sometimes. Same basic questions today, but more serious this time.
In terms of the criteria you mentioned in your post – heart rate, weak, fatigued, etc

Heart rate: stays elevated. At an hour after workout and half hour after meal, heart rate is still 20 over base. Gradually coming down instead of jumping to base within minutes or seconds.
Blood state: No ammonia smell yet (but do have smelly feet for the first time in years - don't know if that's related). Don’t have test strips yet. During workout never got truly warmed up and got cold sweats and almost light headed near the end.
Weakness: Not feeling weak moment to moment but in the gym, certainly can’t do weights I was doing last week …
Fatigue: body feels low energy and fatigued. Mentally feel ok but can feel something ‘ain’t quite right’ … so

Once there, how long do we stay in the ‘torn down’ state?
Once there, how long is too long to stay in the ‘torn down’ state?

Not trying to flake out at all. Subjectively feel pretty good… almost high from the fasting… certainly can go one more day. But at the same time don’t want to do damage that would take more than a couple of days to recover from… it takes ‘starving refugees’ years to recover fully, if ever, from them pencil arms and legs …

Thanks.

[RobRegish]

Rob,
In journal for yesterday I joked “are we there yet?” and also asked about possibility of need to extend Phase 1 sometimes. Same basic questions today, but more serious this time.
In terms of the criteria you mentioned in your post – heart rate, weak, fatigued, etc

Heart rate: stays elevated. At an hour after workout and half hour after meal, heart rate is still 20 over base. Gradually coming down instead of jumping to base within minutes or seconds.
Blood state: No ammonia smell yet (but do have smelly feet for the first time in years - don't know if that's related). Don’t have test strips yet. During workout never got truly warmed up and got cold sweats and almost light headed near the end.
Weakness: Not feeling weak moment to moment but in the gym, certainly can’t do weights I was doing last week …
Fatigue: body feels low energy and fatigued. Mentally feel ok but can feel something ‘ain’t quite right’ … so

Once there, how long do we stay in the ‘torn down’ state?
Once there, how long is too long to stay in the ‘torn down’ state?

Not trying to flake out at all. Subjectively feel pretty good… almost high from the fasting… certainly can go one more day. But at the same time don’t want to do damage that would take more than a couple of days to recover from… it takes ‘starving refugees’ years to recover fully, if ever, from them pencil arms and legs …

Thanks.

These are great questions and it sounds like you've certainly "hit it" in terms of what the famine phase is designed to accomplish: controlled catabolism.

Your resting heart rate being higher than normal is indicative of the extreme stress your body is under. This is a good thing as I point out in The Blueprint. If there is no stress to adapt to, adaptogens don't work optimally. More importantly, your body has entered a state where it has begun fighting the catabolism back and priming itself for anabolism, which you're going to take advantage of shortly!

The "torn down state" is ideally executed over a 5 - 7 day period. Why 5-7 days? Because REAL muscle loss starts happening during week 2. We don't want that happening, we just want the message sent to your brain that it needs to grind catabolism to a halt and up-regulate anabolism. Each and every time Blueprint trial participants went two (one guy went 3!) weeks or more in the Famine phase they lost too much muscle, had a HARDER time regaining it and generally got poorer results.

Your commentary around in the gym strength/stamina, something being not "quite right" and particularly your comment about almost being high from the fasting are everything I need to hear to know you're nailing it right on schedule. That almost high feeling is due to catecholmine release. The body's stress hormones have been activated and the adrenals are pumping them out for all their worth.

I must tell you how much I appreciate the effort you're putting into this. By the sounds of it, you're doing all the right things. The payoff is right around the corner, so hang in there...

[RobRegish]

Questions: BP book mentions sodium intake.
General ?’s Is there an optimal cycle of sodium intake for the BP phases? And what about sodium phosphate?
More specific ?’s – have been drinking a lot and mouth doesn’t feel very thirsty but body and insides kinda feel ‘thirsty’. Is that related to sodium intake?

Sodium should be kept lower during the Famine Phase. I'm not saying cut it out completely but don't purposely salt your meals, use any more than normal etc.

During the Feast phase, you increase it but nothing drastic. A few shakes on every solid food meal to increase nutrient intake of those that are sodium dependent (creatine is just one). Again, just a bit more than you usually use.

I haven't used sodium phosphate and don't recommend it, particularly in the depleted state the Famine Phase puts you into. It could potentially stress the kidneys too much. Just not worth the risk, IMO.

As for your thirst question: Again, this tells me all I need to know insofar as you're doing it right. Your "body and insides" feeling thirsty isn't really related to sodium intake. Rather, muscle is almost 70% water and the very specific training and dietary tweaks we're making are causing controlled catabolic reactions.... such as an efflux of water/nutrients out of the muscle. Let's call it cell-de-volumizing. Think of a sponge when its squeezed and then left baking in the hot sun for a week. Now imagine how receptive it will be to water/nutrients in that parched state. When they're finally made available again it'll soak them up like... well, a sponge. That's what we're doing...