[Ceci82]

Hello Timarie ! . I Love how you target your waistline in a smart way. I´m doing something similar.
BTW Your Thread is one of my favourite and i´ve learnt alot.

My question : what are the best exercises to increase hips muscles ? I´ve got a bigger butt that took me alot of work and sweat (went from 34.5 to 37in) but I look the same from the front. Thanks You ! and happy 2014

[timarie]

You've made such amazing progress! I'd like to try to bulk up my bum as well, I mean it's bubble-ish shaped but flabby fat. I rather have it be a compound of fat and mostly muscle so I'm definitely going to try this and Let's see where I end up in a year and a half
One thing I'd really like to ask is if you knew anyway I could get rid of a lower belly pouch. It's slight but noticeable.

Hi!

I know the type you're talking about! That is a great butt to work with! If you typically gain fat in your butt first and lose it there last, you won't be losing all--or even most--of the fat on your toosh! Which is actually really GOOD news for you (if your goal is like mine, to get a big, perky butt-- just as you said, a compound of both fat and lots of muscle). If you keep the fat on your butt and build up muscle for more volume from underneath, your butt will get even bigger and perkier! For example, mine is a bunch of both So I am sure you can easily get these results!

As for your lower belly pouch: you wouldn't happen to be a natural hourglass shape, would you? Having a fatty bum and lower belly pouch are typical for natural hourglass shapes.
Since that is likely your trouble-spot, I would not try to cut on your caloric intake a whole lot, as you will lose fat all over before you lose it from that pouch! Now if you don't mind losing weight from all over for the sake of losing the pouch then sure, but I wouldn't focus on that method if I were you.

For your particular situation, I would recommend you try the stomach vacuum exercise. The key is to be consistent with it and to do it as often as you can throughout the day. This will help pull in your body's natural corset and tighten your core. Also, keep a high intake of fiber if you aren't already. Regular bowels are one of the best ways to help keep a trim tummy. You can also take a supplement called "CLA" that is proven to help lose fat around the waist. It is naturally found in all cow products such as beef and milk, and you can buy it at any vitamin store in gel capsules. Finally, you can try spot reduction for that little bit of stubborn fat that just won't go away. Keep in mind that it is tricky, though and will take some time to see results. See post #90 of this thread (where I answer another woman with a similar question as yours) wherein other references are made to the all other posts with the above listed recommendations discussed in more detail! Let me know if you have any other questions Good luck!

[timarie]

Very interesting take on the reason for your fatigue! I doubt I ever would have thought lowering T levels to be the culprit. I hope you are correct and that it fixes itself as time goes on. Keep us updated!

This is funny looking back on this old post because my sleeping problem has improved and worsened, improved and worsened since then. I have been all over the map, as far as sleep goes (which I KNOW is terrible!). But, I think that is because I have been VERY irregular with taking my pills for my past two cycles. In fact, I have noticed that during the times when I completely skip the pills for whole days at a time, I almost cannot go to sleep. So yeah, I think the antiandrogens are the culprit! Now I have two reasons to actually make the effort to take my herbs regularly!

I really believe that if I were to take my herbs very regularly, that I would get sleepy again, and then gradually adjust. For a short time (before getting lax on my pill popping regimen) I actually did start to see improvement. Well, here goes nothing again!

[timarie]

Hello Timarie ! . I Love how you target your waistline in a smart way. I´m doing something similar.
BTW Your Thread is one of my favourite and i´ve learnt alot.

My question : what are the best exercises to increase hips muscles ? I´ve got a bigger butt that took me alot of work and sweat (went from 34.5 to 37in) but I look the same from the front. Thanks You ! and happy 2014

Hey Ceci!

It's been a while! Good to hear from you

All I have to say is WOW GIRL you went from 34.5" to 37"? That is so amazing!!! Great work!!! I am so proud of you!!! I bet you feel so sexy now, too! It feels great, right? I'm a total booty addict Get it, girl!!

Anyway, to your question about building those small hip muscles: they are not as easy to build as the gluteus maximus, and usually building the gluteus maximus helps make the appearance of the hips wider... but, it all depends on how you work out your gluteus muscles. Before you do your booty workout, you should try to get some mind-muscle awareness with your "hip muscles." For example, before I run my hill sprints, I do fire hydrant stretches. Before I do my walking lunges, I do either cable abduction exercises or the abduction machine. Whatever your choice, just choose an exercise to work the abductor muscles. This will allow you to work more of your outer gluteus muscles while you continue to work out your butt! That is the best way to get the most bang for your buck.

For more information on exercises to specifically target these muscles, see post #82 of this thread. I hope that helps!

By the way, did the veins on your hands ever improve? Also, I know this is random but, I really like your signature

[timarie]

Quick Life Up-Date

So, my apologies to everyone for having been gone for almost two months. The sleep problem got to me pretty badly, and my job was only getting worse and worse. So I quit just before Christmas. Without having anything lined up. That is when you KNOW someone really hates their job! Anyway, God answered my prayers and I was accepted just a week ago into the grad program of my dreams that I have always wanted to study! This is my dream career and I couldn't be happier. Also, I will be going to Australia for my program! I am terribly excited, as it has been 2.5 years since I have been abroad. That is just too long!

So, as I am looking at the transition period that I am going through now, I realize that I will need to use this time to actually ground those things into a permanent routine for myself before things get crazy again. I took a whole month break off from my lower body routine starting at the beginning of December because of all the snow storms I got out my way. I was finally able to start back up again last week, which was a little difficult to actually get myself to the gym and just do it. Getting out of routines is so costly for me... it throws me off so terribly! As for my waist routine: I have not done that at all past the first week I did it, so I was never able to make it successfully part of my weekly routine. SHAME ON ME. I hope to resume it and make it a successful part of my weekly routine sometime in the next month. And my upper body routine? Forget it. I was not ever able to pick them up again because of my sleeping problems. And I have noticed the decrease in tone and that "taut" look in my upper body, as well as my cleavage illusion. I do miss it, but my priorities at the moment are to get my lower body back into full swing and to trim down my waistline as I have been wanting to do for a while now. It would be great to have everything back into full swing, but I am not going to place any money on it because of this sleep problem that still persists.

Therefore, these are my goals for this month, in chronological order:
1) Lower body routine back into swing
2) Regulate my doses of my herbs
3) Waist Tucking Routine solidify into weekly routine
4) Resume Upper Body Routine

I will be trying to tackle those goals as I tackle all the paperwork that needs to be finalized in the next month before I make the big move!

[Jenniferlove]

Very interesting take on the reason for your fatigue! I doubt I ever would have thought lowering T levels to be the culprit. I hope you are correct and that it fixes itself as time goes on. Keep us updated!

This is funny looking back on this old post because my sleeping problem has improved and worsened, improved and worsened since then. I have been all over the map, as far as sleep goes (which I KNOW is terrible!). But, I think that is because I have been VERY irregular with taking my pills for my past two cycles. In fact, I have noticed that during the times when I completely skip the pills for whole days at a time, I almost cannot go to sleep. So yeah, I think the antiandrogens are the culprit! Now I have two reasons to actually make the effort to take my herbs regularly!

I really believe that if I were to take my herbs very regularly, that I would get sleepy again, and then gradually adjust. For a short time (before getting lax on my pill popping regimen) I actually did start to see improvement. Well, here goes nothing again!

You know, I had been a crazy insomniac for as long as I can remember. At night my brain would just not shut off! There were many all-nighters just from anxiety alone. It didn't matter if I physically exhausted myself because all I could do was think, think, think. As corny as this sounds, I now sleep like a baby and it's because of my bf. I am finally MENTALLY satisfied. We will talk and talk and talk and then go to bed and be asleep in like 5-10 minutes every night.

What I'm saying is if you don't have a significant other to chat about all that is on your mind, either write in a journal or read. Could help. No stimulants though. If you study feng shui, you should not have anything stimulating in the bedroom. No electronics. This too helped me a ton, just be removing all such things. The bedroom is for rest and intimacy and nothing else according to their rules.

[timarie]

You know, I had been a crazy insomniac for as long as I can remember. At night my brain would just not shut off! There were many all-nighters just from anxiety alone. It didn't matter if I physically exhausted myself because all I could do was think, think, think. As corny as this sounds, I now sleep like a baby and it's because of my bf. I am finally MENTALLY satisfied. We will talk and talk and talk and then go to bed and be asleep in like 5-10 minutes every night.

What I'm saying is if you don't have a significant other to chat about all that is on your mind, either write in a journal or read. Could help. No stimulants though. If you study feng shui, you should not have anything stimulating in the bedroom. No electronics. This too helped me a ton, just be removing all such things. The bedroom is for rest and intimacy and nothing else according to their rules.

??? So if I read and write and talk to a friend when I am sleepy, it would help? Haha, I have often tried this but I fall asleep in the middle of all of them. Yes, including talking to people!

But seriously, thanks for trying to help! But insomnia isn't my problem. My problem, as you can see above, is that I am always sleepy. And I said that I am almost positive I know what the source of the problem is, and how to fix it. I guess I will need to better explain.

I have been on the regular sleeping about 10-12 hours everyday (sometimes even more), and I'm not even kidding. And I have never dealt with anything like this before I began taking the antiandrogens. I am pretty good with curbing bad habits, as I used to have insomnia issues due to my high energy levels before the antiandrogens and I knew how to deal with it pretty well, so it is not a matter of just forcing myself to get/stay up. I have excellent will power, but that does not help this. This is a bigger beast that cannot be curbed by forcing an external regimen to fix it. This is a dramatic energy level change that only caffeine has been able to fix (but I don't like the jitters I get from caffeine, so no to that), and I honestly believe the only way to fix it is to go to the source.

The source is antiandrogens I take to help increase my breast growth chances and, since I do not want to give up on them, I will just need to focus my energy on being consistent with taking them so that my body can have the chance to adjust to regular controlled doses and I do not continue to always throw it out of whack. As you see I briefly mentioned above that it "improved then worsened, then improved and then worsened":
-1) I started off taking my pills regularly but at a decently high moderate dose. Going from nothing to this threw me immediately into an energy drainage, and my body was not used to the low T levels so I continued to stay drained.
-2) As I continued to be regular with my doses, maybe about after a month, began to gradually improve (in other words, I began to be less sleepy).
-3) Then more than a cycle-and-a-half ago, I began to miss some dosages and I was taking them at all different times. This irregular timing of herbs would send my body through moments with extreme high energy levels (say, after having only 1/3 of my doses two days straight), and then back to heavy sleeping. Kind of like a roller coaster. But only not as fun.

So, I really think that if I am ever going to get back to normal AND possibly grow boobs by dropping my T levels, I am going to need to be very careful about taking them strictly without missing any dosages.

*******************Now that it has been clarified, I really don't want to spend anymore time on this thread discussing theories about my sleeping problems for now. I am going to give my theory an honest go, and update.***************************

Adding to what Jennlove wrote above about electronics in the room (this is for others to read as this is an important topic):
Often people cannot do this because of their living situations (such as mine, in which I rent a room out of a house). In these cases, turning off all electronics at night will suffice. This concept is not belonging specifically to feng shui, as it has been stated by many health sources, so it should not be a point to dismiss. You also may find that this point has been brought up in other threads on this forum. This is important for, not only a sound sleep as Jennlove mentioned, but also more production of melatonin and HGH. If you're not already turning off (or putting away) your electronics in your bedrooms, and if you care about the quality of your sleep, you might want to seriously consider this!

[Jenniferlove]

Boy, I would quit all anti-androgen supplements for at least a month and see what happens. In my early 20's I had what you had and it was terrifying. That was back when I was working 2 jobs and going to school full-time. I quite possibly was just stressed out. But I was tired as often as I was awake and would sleep for 10-12 hours too. This went on for over a year and finally I went vegetarian and did an overhaul on my life/diet. Things really changed for the better.

I remember I was tested for everything under the sun, but my physician concluded I was a poster child for health. He told me I might have what they call "chronic sleep disorder". Western doctors are just not well-equipped for these types of things I now realize.

Good luck to you! Please remember that you can grow your breasts without the herbs. Don't harm your health. It's not worth it.

[Ceci82]

Hello Timarie ! . I Love how you target your waistline in a smart way. I´m doing something similar.
BTW Your Thread is one of my favourite and i´ve learnt alot.

My question : what are the best exercises to increase hips muscles ? I´ve got a bigger butt that took me alot of work and sweat (went from 34.5 to 37in) but I look the same from the front. Thanks You ! and happy 2014

Hey Ceci!

It's been a while! Good to hear from you

All I have to say is WOW GIRL you went from 34.5" to 37"? That is so amazing!!! Great work!!! I am so proud of you!!! I bet you feel so sexy now, too! It feels great, right? I'm a total booty addict Get it, girl!!

Anyway, to your question about building those small hip muscles: they are not as easy to build as the gluteus maximus, and usually building the gluteus maximus helps make the appearance of the hips wider... but, it all depends on how you work out your gluteus muscles. Before you do your booty workout, you should try to get some mind-muscle awareness with your "hip muscles." For example, before I run my hill sprints, I do fire hydrant stretches. Before I do my walking lunges, I do either cable abduction exercises or the abduction machine. Whatever your choice, just choose an exercise to work the abductor muscles. This will allow you to work more of your outer gluteus muscles while you continue to work out your butt! That is the best way to get the most bang for your buck.

For more information on exercises to specifically target these muscles, see post #82 of this thread. I hope that helps!

By the way, did the veins on your hands ever improve? Also, I know this is random but, I really like your signature

Haha Timarie your memory is awesome ! I near to solve the mystery of "the veiny hands", I think is related with PM mostly. (more noticeable during follicular phase ) but it is not very bad (like madonna or angelina´s hands ).
Thanks one more time for your help ! Now my bum is 36.5 in because I have been eating healthy lately and the first place where I lose weight is my butt and thights.
Ps: Congratulations on being accepted to that graduate program. You are closer to your dreams now. Australia sounds great ! (btw I like your signatures too )

[timarie]

Boy, I would quit all anti-androgen supplements for at least a month and see what happens. In my early 20's I had what you had and it was terrifying. That was back when I was working 2 jobs and going to school full-time. I quite possibly was just stressed out. But I was tired as often as I was awake and would sleep for 10-12 hours too. This went on for over a year and finally I went vegetarian and did an overhaul on my life/diet. Things really changed for the better.

I remember I was tested for everything under the sun, but my physician concluded I was a poster child for health. He told me I might have what they call "chronic sleep disorder". Western doctors are just not well-equipped for these types of things I now realize.

Good luck to you! Please remember that you can grow your breasts without the herbs. Don't harm your health. It's not worth it.

First off, I want to start off by thanking you for caring so much You are always chiming in, with some kind of feedback. I feel loved! So thanks

Interesting. When I am stressed out, it is the other way around (it is impossible for me to sleep when I am stressed)... which is good, in a way, because I don't know how it was even at all remotely possible for you to work two jobs and go to school full time while sleeping 10-12 hours every day. Like, how does that even pan out? I'm doing the math and it isn't calculating out the way it should

And yeah! So glad for you that you fixed up your diet!! Isn't that an awesome feeling? It's amazing how much a diet can effect, pretty much everything, about a person's life, isn't it?! I know when I fixed up my diet, it made me feel like a new woman. Although most processed food is bad, it is important for people to know this is not the case for all processed. And certainly not meat, haha. You just have to be smart, that's all. Most people aren't smart about it, though. A clean diet is always best when there is variety. I'd say if your sleeping problem was fixed due to a change in diet, it was solely based on the fact that you started cutting out excessive processed foods. Too much of it is bad for sure, so yes that would have definitely helped you. I wish that more people were aware of this!!

As for western doctors, don't even get me started If you read somewhere up in my bust thread, I mention that my doctor dismissed me. I wasn't sad about that at all, because she only irritated me to no end... so, I am with you on that one!

Anyway, moving on, looking at this situation, I have been sleeping crazy hours. Yes, it is not healthy to be all irregular with one's hormone doses!!! And that is exactly what I knew I had to fix! And I have been VERY diligent with it since the last time I posted, and wow, what a difference already!! But anyway, taking herbs doesn't hurt a person. The herbs I am taking are not hurting me. It is HOW I was taking them. I hope that makes sense.

As for testing to quit the antiandrogens for one month, I don't think it will be so simple, because I was advised that when coming off such hormones, to do so slowly. It might cause even more complications just cold-turkey quitting like that!! Even if I wanted to.

There is more response to this in my other thread, with more specifically NBE talk