Health and Fitness September, 2013

Share healthy living habits.
User avatar
Ivy
Member
Posts: 3306
Joined: Thu Sep 06, 2012 9:46 pm
Location: United States

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Ivy » Wed Sep 18, 2013 6:45 pm

Nancy, :D I was thinking about waiting to do Zumba on 1/1/14, but at the rate I'm going now, at building strength, I might start giving it a try sometime in October. :idea: The man who invented it wrote a book and he said actually there is no right or wrong way to do Zumba. He said just get up and move your arms, leg, and body and have a ton of fun doing it! He invented it when he went to exercise to teach, he didn't have the right tapes or they'd been forgotten, but he had some really wild music you use with Zumba. He put the tape in, just started directing the class and everybody loved it so much, it became a regular class! Now they have Zumba Dance Days everywhere, etc..! Isn't it exciting how something accidentally got invented for health and the good of the exercising world? :D

I walked an extra 2/3 miles to get the mail, but a neighbor took off his ear protection, while he was mowing, stopped his mower to tell me the mail came 2 hours ago. He said he thought he'd tell me. I had such a nice visit with him. He's elderly.

If I do Zumba sooner than October, I'll let you know, first thing because I'm going to be certain to log it here. I'm feeling stronger everyday, my muscles aren't hurting, they're getting stronger and for osteoarthritis in the hips, lumbar and sacrum and the Fibromyalgia, this is super good news. My doctor prescribed exercise to help combat the health problems and exercise is healing me. Also, it makes me feel good and good about myself! :!:
Touch the earth, love the earth, her plains, her valleys, her seas. Rest your soul in her solitary places. ~Henry Beston

User avatar
Nancy
Member
Posts: 23444
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:52 pm
Location: Washington state in the Pacific Northwestern part of the USA.
Contact:

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Nancy » Wed Sep 18, 2013 7:12 pm

I rode the ex. Bike today hoping dgson will walk w me.

User avatar
Harriet
Moderator
Posts: 16506
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:48 am
Location: The Carolinas

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Harriet » Wed Sep 18, 2013 9:22 pm

Love the discussion about exercise variety!

A very low sugar day, but I have some confusion about Jorge Cruise's phrase, "sugar calories". Come to think of it, how would you know how many "sugar calories" are in an item, except for eating the exact items he charts in his book? You can find sugar grams information, but that can't be so simple as to be the same thing, can it? Anyway, today I ate mostly things with zero or very little sugar.

2-egg omelet with spinach, bell pepper, onion, bacon
beef burger wrapped in lettuce for a "bun", tomato slices
big tossed salad, avocado, cucumber, shreded cheese
plain oatmeal, 5 raspberries, stevia packet, coconut oil

So what had the tidbits of sugar - tomato, raspberries and maybe the mayo for the salad. And I'm alive. I didn't just fall apart without sugar. :lol:


Oops, well I found my answer about the sugar calorie computations. It's in the fine print of the book on one page only - I hadn't caught on until now. Gee, you would think it would be a headline. But anyway, if you know sugar grams of an item, you can find the sugar calories by multiplying by 4. Yipes. That means it was obviously the oatmeal I had yesterday that contained the most sugar calories - 57 of them. Whoa. So I came closer to that 100 calorie limit than I thought! Oh well, live and learn.

Still, he maintains that sugar calories from non-starchy vegetables are not worth counting. In fact, he takes the example of a meal in which a person adds cooked brussels sprouts to a meal. 1/2 cup actually contains 148 sugar calories, but he considers them a "freebie" to eat and forget calculating. The reason is all the fiber that would be coming along with the sugar, keeping it from having effect. Those who understand insulin probably know this well.

User avatar
Harriet
Moderator
Posts: 16506
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:48 am
Location: The Carolinas

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Harriet » Thu Sep 19, 2013 10:11 pm

Basic workout today.

Wish I'd had another vegetable. Otherwise, the healthy habits looked good.

I took dd out this morning - unusual. She wanted a McDonald's breakfast, and although I didn't, I ordered an Egg McMuffin for later, since I'd read in another of Cruise's books that he recommends it as a choice for a fast food meal. We also had time to duck through the grocery and I picked up little cooked shrimp, because of a recipe I saw in Cruise's book.

breakfast was the Skinny Muffin from the book, butter, coffee with half-and-half
lunch was the "shrimp salad" recipe from the book
supper was a big tossed salad and the warmed Egg McMuffin

Sugar calories were
zero for breakfast
zero for lunch
87 for supper

The Skinny Muffin recipe can be found on the net - I think Cowinkie mentioned it. Easy, fast and filling for one, microwaved in a mug, easily slides out to a plate if you use the oil to grease the mug sides first. To me, it is a nice piece of brown bread - a brown bread roll. I wouldn't call it a "muffin" because I think of muffins as being sweeter, but then I suppose there's no reason I couldn't use twice the stevia. The "shrimp salad" is 8 small shrimp and then you make more or less just a tasty sauce for it from mayo, dill, lemon and some chopped celery. Sure enough, even though there doesn't seem to be much to it, you don't crave anything more.

I had picked up a dark chocolate bar with as little sugar as Cruise recommends, but I forgot I had it. Since the Egg McMuffin got me so close to that limit of 100 sugar calories today, I guess it's just as well - wasn't hungry.

User avatar
Harmony
Member
Posts: 11417
Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2008 3:56 pm
Location: Florida

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Harmony » Thu Sep 19, 2013 10:44 pm

Harriet, do you really think you can keep up that strict no-sugar thing? That seems so hard to me.

I'm being pretty strict with myself, still I have to realize if I get too crazy I'll never be able to keep it up and then where will I be? Like today, I was out and feeling a crash from not enough food, and I had other shopping to do. So I did the fast food thing, the healthiest thing on the menu that would "stick" and child size! Looked it up when I got home and it was only 340 calories. Very small sandwich and no drink with it. Better than coming home and devouring everything in site.

I'm convinced it's all about the balance.

User avatar
Harriet
Moderator
Posts: 16506
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:48 am
Location: The Carolinas

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Harriet » Fri Sep 20, 2013 8:41 am

Gets long winded and skippable. I can see why Cowinkie wrote such a long post about this book in June (8th post down).

Harmony, oh "strict" is a double-edged sword, isn't it? I have become very philosophical about strictness. I accept it while it can keep my interest and keep me feeling wholesome about it, but try to recognize when I'm burning out before it happens. My best hope is to at least keep from rebelling to the point I ruin all my progress. :? I'm as selfish as anyone else, so I recognize that a plan will usually keep my interest if I see results. Then, as often happens to us, we either hit a plateau when something's not so impressive any more, OR, in my recent case, life hits us upside the head with more urgent things and we forget where we were.

As lucylee has expressed here before, the times I've tried to do well and stick with some plan have certainly kept me from being a lot worse off than I might have been. That doesn't mean I haven't dropped the ball, though, and I will again. I'd count on it, LOL. Cruise defends his ideas by saying at least his plan does allow some sugar, possibly more than Paleo or Atkins - don't want to misquote, not sure. He has a few built-in ideas for handling the future times when you don't want to be so strict. He suggests taking weekends off, for instance. Would that be enough? Don't know.

I'm hoping that HRH's restrictions on himself as he watches his blood sugar will keep me at least in tune with lowering my sugar intake, too.

About going back to this particular book - it has a lot of similarities with others I've read lately. The 17-Day Diet author Dr. Moreno has a lot of the same ideas but offers a different time frame of 17 days sugar/starch restrictive and then 17 days alternate-day of adding in half less-restrictive days (which brings me back to the Alternate Day author Dr. Johnson, who published a lot of these bright ideas first). Also part of this book is an ongoing interview with another weight-loss author, Gary Taubes. So there are lots of voices saying "lay off the sugar". LOL

Btw, I like straight alternate-day and my dd33 has done very well on it, but I would have sugar cravings on low-calorie days because of something too sweet I'd eaten on the alternate days. I think I do need more strictness than that.

When HRH suddenly announced he was headed for the hospital NOW :shock: (kidney stone) I grabbed the first couple books that interested me, popped them in a bag and ran. One was this book, which had been "haunting" me for a while, since I'd stopped reading it when life got crazy. Also, I had foolishly gotten interested in the author more than studying this one recent overview book, and too sidetracked by previous books of his (there are many at libraries) that had different ways of looking at cutting back sugar and were full of color photos. I think I had some guilt over this one, which I knew was the serious no-nonsense one. Anyway, it was handy. At the hospital, I finally had time to start rereading and "hear" what the practical points were.

The fact is, sugar is my problem, and it's HRH's, and one way or another no matter which parent she takes after, it will be dd15's. It's also our most likely problem for the future, when we look at the diseases our two families have displayed in older years. For me, the white flour has always been such a culprit, I've thought of it as separate, but Cruise explains well that white flour products are (the bad) carbs and carbs must be recognized as sugar, too. I can see what he's trying to do - he's trying to make cutting back simple by offering a simple-to-remember number, 100. He's criticized for making it a "one-size-fits-all" when everyone is literally a different size, but again, I can see (finally, after a re-read) that he's trying to simplify, simplify, hoping someone will listen.

User avatar
Harmony
Member
Posts: 11417
Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2008 3:56 pm
Location: Florida

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Harmony » Fri Sep 20, 2013 10:24 pm

I'm sticking to my plan so far. Adding anything more would make it impossible - for me - to follow. However, the fast food yesterday did a number on me. I do have some residual fluid retention most days, and most days it goes away overnight and I start over the next morning. Since I began with the not-so-much caffeine, of course my fluid levels themselves dropped, and I think I was under hydrated a couple days. So I'm trying to up my water intake. That's hard for me.

This morning I was up 2 lbs. Trying to take this philosophically, knowing that I yo-yo up and down quite a bit with the fluid thing. My typical weight loss is like this: Go down half a pound, go up half a pound, go down half a pound, go down another half a pound, go back up a half a pound, go down half a pound, kinda like stepping down with a small bump back in between. I don't know if that's fluid or what. But I see the pattern. I guess that's why they say not to weigh every day, but I've found when I do not, I lose focus and go off track.

I've added in some fruit to my diet, so am getting more sugar that way, but I have taken out snacks that add sugar and I think I'm on the healthier side of all that right now.

Your glucose numbers have always been good, haven't they, Harriet?
My last couple were fine.

User avatar
OKay
Member
Posts: 4678
Joined: Sun Dec 06, 2009 2:14 pm

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby OKay » Sat Sep 21, 2013 7:59 am

I guess that's why they say not to weigh every day, but I've found when I do not, I lose focus and go off track.


This is the same for me too! My weight is all over the place from day-to-day. A few weeks ago I made a page for everyday (Sunday, Monday, Tues, etc) to record my weight. I still weigh everyday but because it is recorded on the day-of-the-week page I am comparing my weight to last week on the same day. It is very inspiring to see a big weight loss each day.
Wednesday - I lost 2 lbs!! Yes!
Thursday - I lost 2 lbs!! YEAH!!
Friday - I lost 2 lbs!! YIPPEE!! a part of me knows this is the same 2 lbs I lost the days before, but because I'm comparing week-to-week numbers I have the same feeling of success each day

Of course it could go the other way too....I gained today....and yesterday... oh no.....

User avatar
Harriet
Moderator
Posts: 16506
Joined: Wed Jul 09, 2008 6:48 am
Location: The Carolinas

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Harriet » Sat Sep 21, 2013 1:08 pm

Great job, OKay and Harmony, staying on plan and seeing encouragement!

Harmony, I know the frustration of having a sodium-rich meal and feeling the effects later. So unfair. But if you only made a choice with 300-some calories, you would think it wouldn't have been so bad. No telling.

Dd15 got a lesson in sodium and fluid retention the other morning. She and her big brother had pigged out on Doritos the previous afternoon, and I'd warned them to slow down. She put a ring on her finger that evening for some reason - not a new one, she was aware of many times she'd worn it and she later said it had slipped right on. In the morning she awakened and tried to take it off before going to school and it wouldn't budge. So now I think she understands the concept. I've always told her I can gauge my fluid retention by clasping my hands with interlaced fingers - if I have fluid retention, there's a completely different feeling in the fingers and they don't clasp the same. Now she gets it.

The forward/back of weight loss is so familiar to me, OKay and Harmony. I'm another one who weighs every day. I make it part of my bleary-morning routine, lol, and seldom forget. I figure if I'm content, it's a good thing to know, and if I'm discontented, I needed to face it now, not later.

Yes, my glucose numbers are boring, Harmony, and dr never mentions. Both parents and my mother's identical twin were like that, too, though, so I may just have some inherited help for which my diet can't take much credit.

Yesterday, I did the next 15 min. of Total workout. Food was:

Green drink but really cut back on fruit. 50 sugar cals from small amounts blueberries, kiwi, apple
then brunch veggie omelet zero sugar cals
shrimp salad zero sugar cals
burger wrapped in lettuce, tomato, onion, zero sugar cals

Found myself looking forward to the Skinny Muffin breakfast this a.m.


Noticing, as I hit the link above and went back to Cowinkie's own link, that it doesn't work. I believe she had linked to a member page you can't get to unless you signed in. Here is the homepage for The 100 site. From there, the bottom of the page has a FAQ Frequenly Asked Questions link. When they talk about "Belly Fat Cure", that is the older series of books that I think I was really sidetracking into, because they are full of such colorful photos.

User avatar
Harmony
Member
Posts: 11417
Joined: Mon Jul 14, 2008 3:56 pm
Location: Florida

Re: Health and Fitness September, 2013

Postby Harmony » Sat Sep 21, 2013 8:55 pm

Thank you for the link, Harriet. I did read it through and I guess it's not as complicated as I thought. I'm sorta interested to read how it works for you.

I'm doing a lot along those lines. Much lower carbs. and no junk food, just fruits and veggies with some protein, and whatever protein I get I make sure it's low fat. I was interested to read his theory of what causes triglycerides. And the fact that cheese and nuts are free. I've not had very much cheese at all for weeks now.

So, that leaves the luncheon today to admit to... I was grateful for the cucumber and squash she had out, and I limited myself when it came to the little toothpick things with sausage...and completely bypassed the fried chicken plate...but then I did have 1 butter cookie, 1 cupcake, and about 10 oz. of cranberry fruit punch. That was basically all I ate today except for 1 piece of baked white meat chicken when I got home. I even gave DH the 2 dinner mints I brought home! Oh, she did have a huge cheese/fruit platter out and I had a small wedge of a mild cheese and a raspberry and a strawberry! She sure knows how to put out a nice spread!

I know in the past I'd have had a lot more on my plate. I couldn't even look at the table after that even though she was saying "go back for more food". It was CALLING to me.


Return to “Healthy Habits”

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 24 guests