Body and Soul-less

194.6 lbs. Okay, so removing sugar from the diet doesn’t work overnight (if it does work to bust the plateau).

We are not a nation of simple dumbasses: if that was the case, “Jeopardy” would have been canceled years ago. While changing from street clothes to workout clothes today, the ladies’ locker room TV (set always to E! Network) was showing an ad for some crap called “Quick Trim” starring Kim Whoredashian. This snake oil guarantees you will lose 20 lbs. in one week. Okay, America: The Whoredashian family is to American pop culture what derivatives are to Wall Street investment bankers: selling you nothing for something.  They offer no talents to entertain us and have laid traps to part total strangers from their money:  First, it was the Fun Kard, a prepaid debit card that ate up the user’s money in excessive fees and now this. As they are behaving like whores in all but name, I think it is their duty to administer blow jobs to everyone whose money they’ve taken.

Although the weight is on a plateau right now, I will say the recovery time and intensity from all the exercise I’m doing has shortened. So, something good is going on under the skin. And the bra is not quite as full (Do I hear groans of disappointment from my male readers? Thanks, Fellas!)

I have researched plateaus and the Mayo Clinic’s website offered the following “wisdom”: “If you're at a plateau, you may have lost all of the weight you will given the number of calories you're eating each day and the time you spend exercising.”

Oh, HELL no.

Burning 1100-1200 calories per day exercising (yes, you heard me) and consuming about 1200 calories per day isn’t good enough? According to all the charts and experts, 1800 calories per day will maintain your weight if you’re just sitting on your ass. I have witnesses to attest that I am not.

The Great White Belly continues to deflate, but it has taken my abdominal muscles hostage (excuse me, core muscles. The Pilates terminology has spread throughout all forms of exercise). Those puppies get worked through yoga, weight training and Pilates and they’re not responding as quickly as the legs (Yes, my feet and legs are my favorite parts. They do as they’re told, they respond very quickly to exercise and they don’t give me any trouble). Even the butt is shaping up. And everybody knows how independent butts are. Ever tried to get one into a pair of Spanx? They don’t go without a fight.

I can stand taller for longer and sit tall for longer. You need abdominals for that. Today’s game of Tantric Twister with Lila had us doing the Boat pose (balance on your “sitz” bones, legs up and extended, hands extended towards legs. Big “vee” shape, actually). My Boat capsized. Repeatedly.

I’m getting better with the Chair pose (aka The Torpedo Tube of Methane) and that uses legs, abs and glutes. The vinyasa from Plank (top of a pushup. Absolutely brutal on my wrists) through a Chadaranda Pushup to Cobra to Up Dog? No. Lila tells me to just go for Downward Dog and hang there. (It’s a lot easier on the wrists than Plank. If there is such a thing as a porno flick based on yoga, there’s a lot of Downward Doggie Style going on). And I broke a fingernail.

There are moves that require one folding in half lengthwise. The Great White Belly prevents complete execution of this instruction. If it was one of those stress-reducing toys, it would just kind of squish around to the back. Scare the hell out of everybody around me, but I’d be able to complete the move.

The chest (aka the White Mountains) is also an obstacle, in the above-mentioned forward fold and also poses on the side such as Triangle and Pyramid. It kind of drags the torso along with it and I get that sweetly-voiced, quiet instruction to modify. Dammit. I don’t want to remain on the yoga equivalent of the bunny slope. Of course, when I got off the bunny slope in skiing, I went off a mogul, my left ski came off in mid-air and I landed on that nice, pointy tip right into the left boob. The hematoma was spectacular and the scar tissue has been giving mammogram technicians fits for over 30 years. Maybe I’ll stick with the modified poses for a while.

My arms are also a source of irritation (and there are so, so many). I work them hard in weight training, there are biceps emerging, the flaps are lessening under the triceps, but holding them straight out or up for an extended period is tiring (any of the Warrior series).  It’s why I don’t hitchhike. Well, that and it’s pretty damned dangerous. There was one pose called Eagle where you kind of make a caduceus of your arms and squat (Yes, you do). The stretch to the back muscles (rhomboids, lats and dlets, om my. See what I did there? It’s a little yoga joke) was almost orgasmic. One more series and I would have needed a cigarette.

Do you see why the legs are the favorites?

Patience is a virtue, but it’s not one of mine.