It's been a while...

I had to take a break and really, through trial and error - sometimes a lot more error! - figure out what was going to work for me.

To lose weight, you have to do what works for you.  That is my mantra and has been for many years.  Putting it into practice is a lot harder than saying it.  That's what makes the authors of diet books rich.  So many choices.  The grapefruit diet will work for some people.  The Atkins diet will work for some people, too.  And every diet in between.  But a person who can do Atkins every day for the rest of their lives is a very different person from the one who can do grapefruit!  Some people love to exercise (at least I've heard these people exist...)  They can eat more as long as they exercise more, but look out if they are injured.  That weight sneaks up fast!

Figuring out what works for you is the tricky part.  You can lose weight on most diets.  But it has to be a way of eating that you can commit to and stick with for a really long time - as in forever.  That's how you gained the weight, right?  You committed to eating badly and stuck with it for a long time.

What I ran into was once I hit 50 and the dreaded menopause, I couldn't lose weight any more.  At least not the way I had been doing for the past 10 years.  I was slowly gaining and I didn't know how to stop it.  10 lbs in 18 months would turn into 20 lbs in 3 years, and just keep going from there.

What is working for me now is keeping my numbers a lot more steady.  In the old days, I could fluctuate wildly from day to day.  1000 calories today, 3000 calories tomorrow, 1200 the next day.  It all averages out, right?  Well, it did when I was younger.  Nowadays, I am finding it better to hover between 1400-2000 calories, and get a little exercise every day, too.  As you get older, you have to cut out a lot of the extremes.  I just hadn't applied that thought to dieting before.

So, I'm back on track with this and seeing where this takes me.

188.2/185/165

Eating less and exercising really does work!

I am happy to announce that even though it's been nearly three weeks since I last posted, I am still eating pretty well.  I am drinking a little bit of water.

I am doing 30-60 minutes of aerobics most days.  I went to my first Zumba class on Wednesday.  I have never been to an exercise class in my life.  And you know what?  It was a lot of fun!

I am eating more veggies, although I do still manage to eat a little chocolate every day.

And yes, my weight is going down.  Sometimes I think, "At this rate, it will take me years to reach my goal".  But my next thought is, "So what?  What if it really take me three years to reach my goal?"  Does it matter?  Nope.  It's a journey, and it always will be.  It's more about taking care of myself than getting to a certain number on the scale.

188.2/184.8/165

Setting goals - or not

An email from a friend got me thinking about goals.  Why are long term goals so much harder to meet than short term?  I don't pretend to know the whole answer, but part of it is procrastination.  If something is in the very distant future, we tell ourselves we have plenty of time to reach that goal.  Saving money for college...for retirement?  So far off, we will worry about it later.  


Losing weight seems to work the same way - for me anyway.  If there is an event a month away, I can stay pretty focused on it and force myself to behave - for a month.  But if I just set a goal of losing 20 lbs.  just because I want to and I need to.  Well, that's pretty ambiguous.  I have plenty of time to lose it.  Then an event happens along, and here I am.  Still with the same 20 lbs to lose.  Annoyed at myself because if I had known about the event, I could have lost the weight.  but we have the ability to go ahead and lose the weight at any time.  What is stopping us?  Hmmm.  That's the part I don't quite understand.  It's tied in with the first paragraph.  Plenty of time to reach that goal.  Worry about it later.  


My eating has been up and down lately, as you can see by my numbers.  I was complaining the other day that I have only lost 6/10 of a lb since last Christmas.  My daughter pointed out to me that I could have gained that much plus a whole lot more.  She's right.  I need to be happy I am maintaining and not gaining.  I have traded some (not all) of my cookies for low fat granola bars, and some (not all) of my Diet Coke for water.  I have also traded my 10 min of treadmill time for 30 min of aerobics most (not all) days.  So we will see where we go from here.


188.2/187.6/165

About exercise...

I was talking to my daughter today.  I said something like, "I exercise every day, I walk on the treadmill, I lift weights, I don't understand why I have no endurance.  I am wiped out after just a few minutes of anything." She paused for a moment and asked, "How long are you doing each activity?"

D'oh.  Hmmm.  Maybe 10 minutes...  10 min on a treadmill, 10 min lifting weights and 10 min on exercise bike still equals 30 min of exercise.  It still burns calories, but it is not going to build any kind of endurance.

You can scroll down to the post about how I hate to exercise.  But since I am '49 and holding', I'm going to have to get serious about the endurance part of it, or I will be on one of those scooter chairs before long!

188.2/184/165

Do ya think?

My husband is coming to the realization that his favorite way of eating is making him fat. Da ya think? For the past 27 years his favorite way of eating plumps him past 200 lbs. When he does eat his favorite way, the pounds magically melt off. When they melt off to a certain point 188 pounds, he goes back on his favorite way of eating to help him lose weight. Well, his "weight loss" pounds to come, goes in the wrong direction every time. I know he wants to believe his way works but it doesn't.

I don't remember once my father giving my mom the word about her cooking. My dad cooked on weekends. Of the two, he was the better cook. He was part Italian and believe in using spices to improve the taste of food. My mom on the hand loved bland food. The blander the better.

My husband looks at a salad and says he can't eat this everyday.. but yet he can eat TV dinners everyday. He eats turkey dinners morning, noon and night. Sometimes he will a different dinner but his main squeeze of TV dinners is Turkey.

I just don't get it.

My husband...

He had a thought yesterday.... That he might be the problem of me losing my weight because of the food he throws in the cart. He also came up with another brilliant idea.. No snack foods in the house we wouldn't be snacking at night?

Da ya think?

Observations on Exercise

I don't like to exercise.  I do it nearly every day in some form or fashion.  I walk on a treadmill, I go to the gym.  But I don't enjoy it, and many days, I have to talk myself into exercising at all.  I could reward myself with food, but that would defeat the purpose, now wouldn't it?  lol

It has occurred to me that exercise should burn calories in proportion to how much we enjoy it.  If you have a terrible cold, but you go to the gym anyway - the calories burned should be double the normal calories burned!  If you hate painting, but you paint a room anyway - double calories for you.  If it worked that way in real life, we would lose a lot more weight, because we would be a little more eager to do the exercise we really don't enjoy.

188.2/184.6/165