20/20 Introduction

I have officially joined the 20/20 Lifestyles program at my gym (www.proclub.com). The first step is to attend a two hour introductory seminar given by the program founder, a doctor. I went to the seminar a little over a week ago (I know, this is not really a timely post! ) The doctor went through the 20 reasons why people are overweight- he suggested that everyone in the room probably has 4-5 reasons among the 20. The seminar was really interesting- he talked about weight and health issues from a biological point of view..it wasn't just about "Put down the fork fattie"… He talked about enzymes and hormones that affect the way people eat, he talked about sleep, he talked about not eating enough at the right time of the day, he talked and talked for two hours. The interesting thing for me is that on an enzymatic or hormonal level, a lot of the processes were self-reinforcing… so by the time you have bad eating habits, your enzymes and hormones go through processes that keep you in that cycle, which also leads to High Blood Pressure, High Blood Sugar, Insulin resistance, high cholesterol and other issues…

The next step in the program is to get blood drawn for a initial reading of blood sugar and cholesterol… I had that done on Tuesday this week. The next step is that there are a number of initial things that need to be done: I will see a counselor next Friday, the following Monday I will get an initial fitness assessment done, Mid week I will have a meeting with a 20/20 program doctor who will probably scare the heck out of me with my initial health evaluation. Then the week of June 9^th I will start my fitness program- three times a week I will strength train with my trainer, and I'll do cardio I think about 5-6x/week. I also will meet with a dietician weekly starting June 11.

I have been sick for three weeks which has really put a damper on my pre-program training. In fact I haven't done any cardio since the beginning of the month- I've had a nasty cough that has completely drained all my energy. I finally went to the doctor on Tuesday and he put me on some anti-biotics which has started to help. We are going to Vancouver this weekend for a few days and we'll bring our bikes…hopefully I'll be able to enjoy a little bike riding. I'll be in Austin next week but I plan to start really watching what I eat and start exercising so that I don't wait until my dietician appointment on the 11^th.