Who’s Feeling the Bulge?

After 4 days off and lots of eating, I’m definitely in the group that feels the Thanksgiving bulge right above my belt-line this Monday morning. Actually, I’ve been feeling it for a couple of weeks now since I’ve been dealing with chest muscle pains.

It all started at the beginning of the month when days after the Mt. Sac race I started feeling chest pains. I went to visit the doctor right away and was diagnosed with some sort of chest muscle inflammation. Thankfully, it didn’t have anything to do with the heart!

Since that diagnoses, I’ve only ridden twice. TWICE in 3+ weeks and the weather has been absolutely great for riding: mid 40’s at night up to the mid 70’s during the days. The lack of riding plus lots of eating has me up about 8 lbs in 3 weeks, YIKES! I’m the heaviest I’ve been in over a year. Ugh.

Now I have a plan, since I’m still not able to ride yet (the pains have lessened and I don’t want to risk aggravating it again) I’ve enlisted the help of my wife to help me limit my dinner intake. Dinner is by far my worst meal of the day. During the weekdays I normally have healthy meals while at work. Dinner, though, has been the meal I’ve let myself loose on. Bad idea.

So here’s the plan: Normally we eat family style but since I can’t control myself doing that I’ve decided to enlist the help of my wife to decide pre-dinner how much I can eat. Then she’ll pile that onto my plate and thats dinner for me. I know that I might get frustrated but I’ll have to remind myself that I put myself in this predicament by letting myself go.

My wife, who has given birth to two boys in the last 3 years, is back to within 2 lbs of her pre-pregnancy weight. Since she is not much of an exercise buff I know that she keeps her weight down by eating smart, something I can learn from her.

So what’s your plan for dealing with the bulge? I know it’s a little early with Christmas around the corner but I’m dying to get back on the bike and hit the trails again. I miss mountain biking.