Vegan Bodybuilding & Fitness

I have posted my background and health concerns in other forums on this site. Please refer to them in the Introduction Forum and the Bodybuilging & Strength Forum. But briefly I'll review them. Last February I began to experience pain and great difficulty urinating. I was sent to the ER by my GP. At that time they found a blocked kidney stone but more importantly a large mass in my lower colon/prostate area. Long story short, after a colonoscopy found no cancer in my colon, the Doctor did find a large mass protruding/pressing into the colon track that my blocking my ability to defecate also. My prostate was very enlarged. I went to a Urologist and had two operations (TURPS) to rotor-router out the insides of prostate. During the second operation a biopsy revealed I had Fourth State Prostate Cancer. On the Gleason Scale I had a 9 out of a possible 10. The higher the number the more aggressive the cancer. Also my PSA had jumped from a 2.0 to a 47.2 in little over a year's time. Anything over a 4.0 is indication of prostate cancer. I was diagnosed as a T2cN1MO which means the cancer has spread outside of my prostate into the nearby lymph nodes but thank God there was no indication it had also metastasized into pelvis bone area. During this initial diagnosis process I had to wear a Foley Catheter for over four months to enable me to urinate. I had several blot clots during that time that blocked the catheter and the catheter had to be replaced several times. An increasingly more painful process every time as the prostate was very swollen and inflamed from both the operations and the repeated removal and reintroduction of the catheters. During this period of time I struggled to remain as positive as I could but at times I was very depressed at the prospect of my own painful and radically shorted live span prospects.

I was immediately scheduled to have 8 1/2 weeks of radiation and to start injections every 6 months of Eligard which lowers the male testosterone hormone. The idea is that testosterone caused the prostate cancer to grow so reducing or eliminating it would help shrink the prostate and stop the cancer from spreading. The radiation was to pin point and kill the cancer.

In addition to the above I started to search the internet for anything else I could do to fight my cancer. I came across Dr. Cambell's China Study. I read the entire book from cover to cover and it changed my life. I also found Dr. Dean Ornish's The Spectrum. Both books strongly recommended from their own scientific research a whole plant based vegetarian and even more so a vegan diet to reduce the spread of prostate cancer and maybe even reverse it. So sometime in the middle of March of last year I became a vegan at the age of 65 years of age. After a life time of being one of the biggest meat and dairy eaters you may find anywhere! After beginning my new vegan diet, I immediately began to feel better. Maybe it was due to it was something I could do to try to help myself and not just given into the despair of a rapidly impending painful death. I could fight back!

Now several months later much has changed. My latest PSA blood test has my reduced from the high of a 47.2 down to a 0.2 well below the 4.0 cut off level that indicate the presents of cancer. Also my CT scan showed that my lymph nodes have reduced down to normal size and my prostate was also greatly reduced. I saw my Cancer Doctor last week and after examining me she said my prostate had completely reduced to normal size. She had another PSA blood test taken and I am still waiting the result of that test. If it remains relatively as low as the last one, she said she would consider me "disease free." That is quite a turn around from almost a year ago! Did the conventional medial approach accomplish this or was it my vegan diet, or combination of both? I can't prove it one way or another but I can say my Doctor is very surprise at the results. The conventional approach just doesn't results in such rapid change or to have my PSA dip so low so fast. I have also lost about 60 pounds down to about 300 pounds and I plan to lose about 80-100 more! I do believe that the vegan diet is the major reason for my turn around. I feel better now that I have in the past 20-30 years. I have hope and new dreams about my future.

And I can now keep my promise to my departed wife Linda that I will pass her love forward to our sons and grandsons at important occasions in their lives. Last year during my dark days, my worst fear was that I would not be able to keep that promise. I think that sacred promise to Linda was what keep me going and fighting for my life. I had that promise to keep that meant more to me that anything else in my life! I also meet a wonderful woman about a year after Linda's passing. Her name is Rita and she has been a real blessing in my life to both help my healing process dealing with the grief of the loss of my wife of 35 years and getting through my cancer scare and recovery. If my vegan diet feed my body, it was Rita's love that feed my soul!

This brief review has become rather lengthy. LOL Enough for now. I plan on posting my diet and training logs here on an ongoing basis. Later!

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Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

Had to go out of town for a few days and it threw off my exercise plan. But back at it. Time to reboot!
I got up this morning and weighted in. 315. Not good as I gained about 10 pounds over the past few weeks. I have been sticking to my vegan diet but without much exercise, so I gained. My metabolism is so low now with the hormone depletion therapy (No Testosterone!), that if I don't exercise, even on a low calorie diet, I still gain. I'm losing an incredible amount of muscle mass and am so much weaker than just one year ago that it could be very discouraging if I let it get to me. I have to do the entire program to keep on track!

Went down to my basement gym this morning and rode my recumbent bike for 30 minutes at a level 7. Drank a glass of green tea with lemon as I rode the bike to help up my metabolism. Then went up stairs to have breakfast. Made a chocolate protein shack with fresh strawberries, chocolate protein power and soy milk. And took my daily supplements. I will try to do some more walking today to keep the calorie burning going. Tomorrow I start my weight training again. Will do my legs and lower back.

A few days ago I received the results of my lab tests from my GP Doctor's appointment. My cholesterol was down to 163 from 178 last year. All of my other tests were within normal limits but my blood sugar was a little too high. Maybe because the blood draw was taken mid afternoon and I had eaten two meals before the office visit. So it was not a fasting measurement. Over all I was pleased with the results.

On the down side my latest PSA testing had risen from a 0.2 to a 8.12. It needs to stay well below a 4.0. I discussed this with my Cancer Doctor and it was a possibility that my bad fall the first week of December when I received my head concussion, may be the cause in the big raise in my PSA. It jarred my entire body and I passed blood in my urine for a few days afterwords. Any trauma to the prostrate, no matter how small can cause a temporary increase of the PSA. Even having sex the night before a PSA test can cause a raise. I'm hoping that the fall was the cause of the increase and the further out I get from the fall, that the PSA will go back down. I have my next PSA testing towards the end of April and I'm hoping for a more positive results.

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

I have been reading a lot about Phil Cambell's high intensity cardo approach (Sprint Eight) to increase endurance, raise HGH levels, and increase strength, while increasing weight loss. His approach is backed up by both his and others research.
See:
http://fitness.mercola.com/sites/fitnes ... _SNL_TFA_1

That is the approach I am going to incorporate into my exercise program. Basically I will do cardio on my recumbent bike three times a week. First I will do a 3-5 minute warm-up then eight cycles of 30 seconds of high intensity pealing with 90 seconds of low intensity pealing recovery between the high intensity intervals. then do a cool down of 3-6 minutes to return my heart pulse slowly back to normal.

I will also do my strength training, basically powerlifting training but not as heavy as I used to do four days a week. This will follow the Westside System as developed by Louie Simmons. I have been using his approach for close to 25 years with great results. I will have to scale down the amount of weight I use on my heavy days due to my lack of testosterone, but otherwise I'm going to keep dancing with the girl I have always brought to the dance!

Mondays: Heavy box squats and lower back exercises.
Wednesdays: Heavy Bench Presses/upper body exercises.
Fridays: Speed Squats and lower back exercises.
Sundays: Speed Bench/upper body exercises.
Ab work four times a week alternating crunch and leg raise type exercises.

Train smarter, not longer!

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

Question...what do your credentials stand for? I am a LSW (Licensed Social Worker) in NJ...working towards my LCSW (License Clinical Social Worker). Youre in the mid west right?

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Darth Vader from Sandlot once said, "Heroes get remembered, but legends never die." Then he later died.
https://www.facebook.com/BigMeeeeech

LISW-S in Ohio stands for Licensed Independent Social Worker licensed to be an independent supervising Social Worker. That is an independent clinical mental health/social worker professional who is recognized to be qualified to supervise other mental health/social worker professionals.

The ACSW is of course the National Association of Social Workers certification for Academy of Certified Social Workers.

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

OOO ok so sounds like the LCSW...

_________________
Darth Vader from Sandlot once said, "Heroes get remembered, but legends never die." Then he later died.
https://www.facebook.com/BigMeeeeech

Rode my Recumbent bike for 10 minutes for a warm-up on level 9.

High Box Squats (Box height at 20 inches) with the Buffalo Bar made by Ironman (relieves stress on shoulders and bicep tendons). I breaking in with a High Box to keep stress off my knees. I will slowly decrease the height of the box over the next several weeks until I'm breaking parallel at the bottom of my squat which would be a legal squat in competition.
Bar weight of the Bullalo Bar is 71 pounds.
First set.
Empty Bar plus 56 pounds of chains hanging off bar to the floor equals 127 pounds at top of squat and deloads to the 71 pounds at bottom of the movement when breaking parallel. Since I'm currently only doing about a quarter squat as I break in and save my knees, the bar weight will only deload to about 100 pounds when sitting on the box. I did eight reps.
Second set
I added two twenty five plates so the bar weight was 121 plus 56 pounds of chains. I did five reps.
Third set
I added two more twenty five pound plates so the bar weight was 171 plus the 56 pounds of chains.

From now on I will notate this in short hand as follows:
71 + 56 = 127 X 8 reps.
121 + 56 = 177 X 5 reps.
171 + 56 = 227 X 3 reps.

A few years ago this would have still been warm-up weight and I would have been squatting down to a parallel box instead of a High Box. Oh, well. I just need to keep this all in perspective. I how have prostate cancer and my treatment has weaken me considerably. So with that all in mind, for a first workout in over a year, I guess that's not so bad. I think I could have pushed myself to do more but I must lift with my head and not my ego and break in slowly!

I also did one set of TKEs (Terminal Knee Extensions) with a Blue Band for each knee. 20 reps. each.

As I slowly break in and tease my conditioning upward without over loading my very weak recovery ability, I will add more exercises to my Monday workouts. I will add powerlifting Good Mornings, Reverse Hyper Leg lifts, Glute/Ham/Calf Raises, and ad work plus more knee rehab work besides the TKEs. Slow goes it for awhile!

My body weight was 312 this morning. Down three pounds from yesterday.

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

Off to Columbus this morning for my weekly Chelation & Vitamin I.V. Therapy. This evening I plan on doing the "Sprint Eight" cardio training on my recumbent bike. Feeling very good this morning. So far I'm not suffering any undue fatigue from my workouts. If this remains my status at the end of the week, I'll add a little bit more intensity and exercises to my routine next week. Slow goes it!

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

Last evening I tried to do the Sprint Eight on my Schwinn Recumbent bike and I couldn't do it. The programs on my bike couldn't switch so I could follow the 30 second intense phase then the 90 second phase, etc. for eight cycles. So I had to be satisfied with the Interval program. When the regular increase of resistance phase comes on, I just petaled as hard as I could and then backed off when the lower resistance phase came on. Boy was that hard! I only made it about 2/3 through of a 20 minute program when I had to quit because I was gassed! Newer models of the Schwinn Recumbent bikes may be more flexible/programmable but not my older model!

Because of my current lower recovery ability, I was afraid that I may have over trained last evening but I woke up this morning very refreshed so no bad. But I still must watch this real close so as not to over due it. No more set backs. I rather build up slower than over due it and set my self back several weeks. I take my blood pressure and pulse every morning and if there is an increase, that gives me an idea that I may have over done it the day before.

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

I think you are inspirational. I am having my friend who is 27 and has R.A. read your journal.

Thanks for sharing,

-Dylan

Dylan,
Thank you for your kind words! I always want how I live my life, personally or professionally, to mean something. I know that for my word to mean anything, I must walk the walk. It's easy to tell people to empower themselves and take control of their own destiny as best they can, but if I'm not following my own advice, then I would be less than genuine. The final results of my journey is unknown. But if hard work, doing everything possible that I'm aware of to do to fight my prostate cancer, is going to make a positive difference, I'm going to do it. My love and true heart felt obligation to be the best Father, Grandfather, husband to both my late wife and current wife, and as strong and true friend as I can to my many friends, is what drives me and motivates me to keep moving forward. Whatever happens, I have promised all my loved ones that I plan on celebrating every day. I refuse to dwelt on my possible early demise. I think that would only cripple me and bring on a poorer results.

So onward and upward my friend. That's the only reality I choose to believe in!

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

One of my favorite links and the base resource I use to build my diet plan and rationals to exercise!

<a href="http://www.cancerproject.org"><img src="http://www.cancerproject.org/media/images/cp_banner.gif" alt="Cancer Project: advancing cancer prevention and survival through nutrition education and research" width="468" height="60"></a>Cancer Project Banner 1

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Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

Bench Press:
Warm-up 45 x 10 X 2 sets
90 X 5
125 X 2 (Boy oh boy! Used to part of my warm-up! Long way to go to get back to normal.)
65 X 12

Triceps push downs on Lat Machine:
50 X 12
70 X 10
90 X 8
100 X 6

Dumbbell curls:
20's x 12
25's x 10
30's x 8

Dumbbell Lateral Raises;
10's x 12
12's x 10
15's x 8

Ab Bench Crunches:
10 x 20
15 x 18
20 x 15
25 x 12

Just need to keep my head straight and not get disappointed. I'm starting my come back journey. Not doing anything is death. Keep moving is life. I choose life!

_________________
Lawrence M. Smith ACSW, LISW-S
Mental Health Clinician & Administrator
AKA as IronSmith (Pen name when I wrote articles in old PowerMag magazine)
Held Drug Free Powerlifting State, National, & World Records in the Federations NASA, AAPF, ADFPA, & Amateur IPA.

i like your outlook and journal. You are an inspiration. I wish you all the best. keep it up.

You should check out my stand up comedian friend Carmen Trineece. She is very funny and she happens to have cancer and talks about it in her act. She is really amazing on stage and off.

-Dylan