A long awaited update to Fatherhood & exercising

Evening all

Well, this has been a bit overdue and needless to say it looks like the hectic schedule caught up with me I couldn’t even dedicate time to post 🙂 

Oscar is the best thing ever and he’s full of joy! Seeing him grow and develop every day is such magical moments I’ll remember for the rest of my life. Any dad or mum will tell you the same thing. 

So how has my diet and training been since my last post? I guess I’d like to start on the not so good part, the diet! I’d honestly say I have been working on a 70:30 ratio. 70% of the week I am well prepared, cooking meals at home, planning ahead and it sure works. However, that 30% is bad, really bad. This usually consists of sweets, cookies, fast food or take aways. I now weigh around 75kg. That’s 4kg lighter before I became a dad, but I feel healthy and look ok. With a hectic work schedule and balancing things at home, it’s not easy even though I thought it would have been. The stress does build up and with my natural traits of wanting to be a perfectionist all the time, some times I just need to compromise and adapt. Something I’m still learning to do! 

As for the training, well that’s actually going well. I’m still training 3-5 times a week, but no I’m not strolling through the gym front door at 6pm when mostly everyone else does! Instead, I am waking up anywhere between 4:45am and 5:15am to have my ass in the gym by 6am for a solid hour of a weights & cardio with all the other hardcore gym goers. I tend to have a hard stop at 7:10am where I’m on the road and driving 1 hour 30 mins to get to work to kick start my day. 

So if you’re wondering what this photo is about, it’s from my pull up mate which I purchased a few months back and have used it a handful of times in the garden when I’ve 15-20 mins. This is great for pull ups, dips, push ups and core work. Beauty of this device is it takes 5 minutes to put up and down and you can take it anywhere, within reason. It’s great quality and a fantastic build. 

 Today’s routine looked a bit like this:
10 dips 3 sets 

3 sets hanging leg raises to failure 

3 sets inverted pull ups 

3 sets push ups to failure 

3 sets under hand pull ups 

You’d be surprised how hard body weight exercises can be when done properly! If there’s one thing I’ve improved over the last two months, it would have to be my gut! Flatter, stronger and far more toned. 

Right, it’s getting late now and I need my beauty sleep. I promise I’ll make more of an effort to post a few times a week! Even it’s to talk about my not so great wannabe chef style meals I conjure up 😂

Food pre workout or not…& an update on fatherhood

Afternoon fellow bloggers!
Hope you have all had fantastic weekends. 

The little man is amazing, he is so well behaved and I’m not sleep deprived…yet! Today he was more active and at 3 weeks old he didn’t sleep that much today. He took his first trip out with mum and dad yesterday and got some lunch. Getting ready I definitely under estimated how much time we need to account for when getting ready with a baby. I do find my days are super busy 7 days a week but well structured. I’m not over committing to doing heaps of things and it gives me valuable time in the evenings with baby whilst my wife relaxes when I’m at work in the week.

One week back into work and it wasn’t so bad, however, the first day back boxing yesterday Saturday morning and it’s wiped me out. Loved every minute of it, combination of fitness drills and pad work for 35 minutes. I noticed I started to flag though in stamina after 15 minutes on the pads. Coach keeps telling me…Ed, have you been out on the road running? A simple response to that was no coach. I think this session made me realise that if I am to have an amateur fight later this year I will need to get my butt into gear and get out doing no less than 10-12 miles road work a week or get some HIIT sessions in 2-3 times a week.

Over the past few years, cardio just seems to be such effort and boring but it’s so important to help my overall condition. I notice the difference when I do find the motivation to go running or get on a stair master. I managed 4 training gym workouts plus one boxing session this week.

Onto diet now…My diet has been about 80% ok this week with the other 20% requiring me needing to grab food here there and everywhere. My aim is to try get body fat percentage down to about 7% by June & I must be sitting right now between 12-13%. 

I came across this article on the BBC site where a university study was undertaken about the effects of male and females consuming carbohydrates pre training and how the body reacts to fat loss. I’ve always heard mix reviews and have tried both methods, but just not for long enough. After reading this earlier on I am going to keep my carb consumption post workout and see the next 12 week effects it has on body composition. I’ll just stick to BCAAs and a coffee pre workout. Note that all my workouts are at 6am.  

http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/articles/4glyLcrhgqQtPGQYM11l1YJ/the-big-experiment-how-can-i-get-my-body-to-burn-more-fat-without-doing-more-exercise

I’m keen to know anyone else out there who has a view to share in this subject. 

Catch up with you all later this week and how fatherhood is going and am I managing my days well enough to keep train at a high intensity! 

If only I was a machine never burning out!

Two days now back at work and I’ve had moments of tiredness, however, nothing that a good coffee couldn’t fix. I have also managed to hit the gym this morning at 6am; all in all 2 gym sessions so far in this week. Yesterday was pretty full on, playing catch up at work, Cooking two dishes, tidying up the kitchen and then around 7:45pm started winding down watching some football, before going to bed at 10:30pm. 
I was dreading the alarm going off at 4:50am, just not knowing how I would sleep throughout the night. Trying to not overthink it all. That said, our little one only wakes up once in the night which is such a result! 

Yesterday I decided to cook up some salmon with a dash of teriyaki sauce and separately a diced beef dish with some sugar snap beans. I had some broccoli already steamed to accompany dinner and my wife had noodles with her Salmom, whilst I just had salmon and veg. 

If only we were machines and tiredness never kicked in, we could run full steam ahead 100% of the times. I do tend to wake up around 4:50am – 5:15am. Why? So I can get my weekly gym workouts in before work and this then gives me back my evening so I can help out around the house and look after the baby. 

I’ve attached a photo so you can see the dishes cooked, quick snap of me in the gym and my new trainers which I am so happy with! Pretty trainer mad here! 

 Also a look in the workout program for today! Back and Biceps session.

Two weeks in & time to work out

Today marks two weeks since Oscar was born and seeing my wife making a great recovery. I’ve been adjusting nicely to taking on more responsibilities and I’m back to work tomorrow with new challenges ahead. These next few days will lay the foundations to new routines including my work life.

I took the first week off from all training and put all my focus and efforts at home. The second week onwards saw me back in  the gym and I’ve been feeling great after every session. I feel refreshed, the intensity has been there and I’ve put maximal effort into every rep and set. If I was to use two words to describe how this new approach has been, I’d say “Training Smarter”.

I’ve included an image of today’s workout. I am heavily focusing on building a well balanced Physique and these next 12 weeks focus more so on building a better chest and shoulder width. 

An eventful Sunday

Good Afternoon people,

Wishing you all a great Sunday 😁

After watching the David Haye and Tony Bellew fight, last night was a bit up and down with broken sleep. I ended up changing two nappies, so got about 4-5 hours sleep and our little one wouldn’t stop crying in the morning for no apparent reason. Sent us into worry not knowing why he cried but it was a sense of relief when he calmed down, fed and had a nap. 

Tired and feeling lethargic, I managed to get myself to the gym and train with my brother. That’s 4 gym sessions this week logged.  It’s always fun and competitive training together; Spurring each other on and pushing boundaries is a heap of fun. I’m very glad I decided to go! Keep those gains coming & one step closer to my goals.  

I did attempt to go buy some more protein after my workout until the card machine decided to take my card. As frustrating as that can be, I just need to wait for a new one to be issued and go stock up later in the week. 

With one day left until I go back to work, tomorrow will see a heap of preparation for Tuesday and Wednesday. 

This Pele quote is one of my favourites and keeps me going both at work and in my personal life. 

Tasty Food

Here is a snap shot of what’s been served in our household yesterday and today.
Preparation ahead of time has been crucial and we sure have enjoyed tucking into these lovely foods. Post workout I just had to have a bowl of Rice Krispies along with my whey isolate protein shake & 5g of creatine monohydrate.

The fish (Espada Preta) was simply pan fried; it is very commonly eaten on the island of Madeira. The sweet potatoes in the same tray were placed in the oven and cooked for 50 minutes. 

I try to get fish into my diet 3 days at least a week. It is filled with protein and vitamin D. Most fish is also one of the best source for omega 3 fatty acids which are fantastic for your body and brain. 

For further information on the great benefits that fish has for you, take a visit to https://authoritynutrition.com/11-health-benefits-of-fish/

Today I decided to make a different kebab style dish using 2 packs (Total of 1kg) of 12% beef mince and it contains the following ingredients….

X 1 grated onion

X 2 Cinnamon teaspoons 

X 1 Salt teaspoon 

X 1 Tumeric teaspoon 

X 1 mild Curry powder teaspoon 

This dish was cooked in its own juices and no extra oil was added. It took a total of 40 minutes to cook.

Learning new dishes is proving to be fun and helping keep our diets tasty and varied. By adding these simple dishes to my arsenal, next week when I go back to work I can plan ahead and cook in batches. I’m aiming to cook every other day right now. If I’m honest, as creative as cooking can be I don’t fancy spending hours in the kitchen after a 12 hour day.  Giving my wife free time in the evening and spending time with my son is what the ultimate goal is. 

Day 9 : Tiredness kicks in..

Day 9 into fatherhood and those middle of the night wakes up hit me today, but it’s worth every moment. I woke up with a headache (which I hardly get, maybe one two a year) but that quickly passed and it didn’t stop me carrying on with what I had planned regardless how tired I was. Today indeed included my third visit of the week to the gym, a midwife appointment, a spot of DIY and awaiting for some family to pop round. I seem to keep going and going but usually after a while the candle burns at both ends and I end up falling sick which I’m trying to avoid. Where do I find the energy I have? who knows, it still baffles me. I’m tracking by diary how I feel and what I do to see if I can pin point where I over do things and see where I can ease up to be far more productive.

I spent yesterday night once I put the baby to sleep preparing / marinating our food ensuring it was ready to cook today. Cooking has never been a strong point of mine, however it’s an area I’m looking to improve and be more adventurous with dishes. Hopefully in the coming weeks I’ll be able to share some recipes.

For the training part I’ve dug up an old program I had and started this up again. By having a structured program it allows you to focus on just doing what you need to do and not waste time in the gym. If finances permit and you can get a coach / personal trainer then I’d highly recommend it. Use them to get you started, get you motivated and on your way to a new you. Sometimes this is all you need before being able to go solo. If you are UK based then feel free to message me; I’d be happy to recommend some I have used in the past which have been reliable and well worth every penny.

I’ll be posting what this workout looks like for anyone who wishes to give it a go or use it as a starting point.

An update on fatherhood…

A week into fatherhood and yes it has seen adjustments to how me and my wife spend our days, but it is more evident we have far more structure to our day. Yes I feel tired, but where ever possible I get a nap in. I am still on paternity leave, so next week when I return to work will be the true test to how I cope.

I’m already back in the gym thanks to a super supportive and wonderful wife. My day’s have consisted so far in getting up, preparing breakfast for both myself and wife before jumping in the shower whilst she breasts feed him. After he’s finished feeding, she gets some time to herself and do anything she wants whilst I change what is usually a dirty nappy before putting him to sleep. All the remaining chores, food shopping, cooking etc is worked around his sleeping patterns which typically last anywhere between 2-3 hours; Sometimes less.

I’ve added a quick image to this post of my recent food shop which I will prep for the next 2-3 weeks in freezer bags to save time when cooking up our meals.

4 kg of chicken breasts

2kg of 12% beef mince

800g of beef cubes

8 Aberdeen angus steak burgers

The Journey Begins

I decided to create this blog two nights after my wife gave birth to our first son on February  20, 2017. For the last 9 months I constantly heard that once you have a child your free time is gone. I won’t lie, that scared me at first, but now he has arrived, not only has he filled our lives with more joy, I am so excited to see him grow up. Sure i’m not sleeping 7-8 hours a night solid but all that means is I need be positive and adjust. For the last few years I got more and more into working out, I even took up boxing to learn something new and set myself new goals.  No doubt I am for life changing moments (for the better), however I am more eager than ever to still find ways of exercising, having a balanced life style and help at the same time through this blog motivate other dads out there who think it’s impossible to find time. For those Dads who already manage this well with a newborn and very young baby, a huge well done and keep going!