Health and Fitness, June, 2015

[Nancy]

I did 10 mi. On the ex bike today for my exercise.

[lucylee]

After a long period of doing nothing -- 10 days to be honest -- I finally did 15 min walk away the pounds tonight. No outdoor walking with a "feels like" temp of 100 degrees around here.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Ramblin Rose my sleep effectiveness last night was 83%!!! I haven't had anything that high in a long time. I also took over 12K steps yesterday so could have expected a restless night from discomfort. It is possible the extra protein before bed is working (dh was very sore before bed last night so I gave him a back massage and he took ibuprofen, so perhaps it is just that he slept better so I slept better.)

I'm still tired, despite sleeping in late. And I was still up in the night but that doesn't matter if I fall back into a restoring sleep after (which I did.) I'm going to have to cut back on my calorie intake during the day in order to leave room for the calories at night (last night I had them because of all the walking I'd done through the day but my hip is sore today so I'm not sure I'll get anywhere near that many steps.)

[Harmony]

Catching up here. Nice to read everyone's progress... and good test results from LadyM. Thank you RRose for migraine information. I get one so rarely. It would take years of tracking to ever figure out a pattern, if I even have one... but I did wonder if my recent changing of my diet had anything to do with it.

I am down 5 lbs. in a month. And I am doing what everyone says doesn't work. I'm not writing anything down except current weight on my white board. I'm not following any specific diet, except cutting down on those things I know are high calorie or high fat and cutting out things that are very bad like ice cream and cookies. While the DGKs were here I did have a little birthday cake. But if I eat something I know I shouldn't, I take very very small portion.

I always suspected that each of us knows what are our triggers, what are those bad things we do. It's not rocket science to figure out how to lose weight. There's so much conflicting information from so many sources anyway, how does one decide on this program over that one? Yeah, someone mentioned skim milk being higher carb... well I am watching cholesterol and fat so I'm sure not going to do whole or even 2%. I just keep portions small.

I'm surely not the poster child for weight loss... but my goal is to live my life and have mental and physical energy for what I need to do...rather than getting mired down (and then failing) with charts and systems and diets. None of the record keeping etc. has served me well over the years. But I do think I've gained enough information that automatic and recurring decisions come more easily now.

I applaud each of you with your efforts and wish us all great success!

[RunKitty]

WTG, Harmony!! Very sensible approach to weight loss and your motive to have physical and mental energy to do what is yours to do sounds perfect. I agree that we (mostly) know what our own triggers are. I will give that more thought. Thanks for the post.

[Sunny]

Tracking my food and exercise helps keep me straight. I ran out of time yesterday and missed entering my food on MFP so I'm back to day one today. I did fill in foods for yesterday just so I have a record. I don't know if I've lost any weight since we've been here in VA; I suspect I'm about the same because of the way my clothes fit. Missing a day every once in a while doesn't hurt, but if I'm not consistent with it I become complacent and start eating what I shouldn't (more snack foods) or eating bigger portions.

On the days that I know we won't be going out I have been taking a walk outside down the street and back to the house. This is a slight hill so a fair workout back to the house. Yesterday we walked in two large stores, M ichael's and T arget. I do realize that walking a store is not the same as treadmill walking for exercise as the walking is usually more casual and on a treadmill can be faster, more vigorous.

My diet has been fairly healthy and consistent for a few years now and tracking it on MFP has shown me what I can eat and the portions I need to keep my weight steady. I appear to be in maintenance mode and since I want to lose a few more pounds I now realize I must up my exercise to achieve this. I really don't want to go below 1100 calories per day!

I am happy to see everyone's ideas and progress here!

[lucylee]

WTG, Harmony!!!

[Ramblinrose]

Ditto Harmony what RunKitty said.

I agree as I think we all know our bodies fairly well and how it responds to foods and exercise. I know carbs can really set me off on an eating binge especially if it comes in the form of BREAD. Gosh I think given the chance at times I could eat an entire loaf in one sitting.

Sunny, I wouldn't go below 1100 calories a day either. My daily calorie range is between 1200-1500. I do try to vary it a bit and I think it helps with my weight, especially when I am in a maintaining mode. One thing I do stick with is drinking 1/2 my weight in water ounces. I get terrible leg cramps if I don't.

Speaking of leg cramps did y'all know a spoonful of plain old yellow mustard will stop your body from cramping. I learned that from people who do all those Spartan and Tough Mudder races. Many of them carry the pre-packaged mustard you find at a fast food store when they race...Kathryn, you should ask your son about that. Also I am told drinking dill pickle juice will do the same thing. I've been keeping some of those mustard packages by my bedside because I get cramps all the time...the ones that attack the outsides of my ankles really hurt...and yes I take extra potassium and magnesium.

Kathryn I thought of you last night...I was really hungry before I went to bed and was cruising my pantry for something to eat. I keep a small neon colored index card propped up on one of my shelves that reads... Protein Instead... to remind me to eat that instead of carbs. Ate a small piece of cheese and I am happy to report i slept well and my weight is down 1.6lbs this morning.

Course I still think this drop in weight is due to cutting back on my meds, but am happy to see the scale has shifted down.

Tomorrow I'll be hiking my hill at 5 in the morning. Believe it or not by 5:15 there will be at least another 15-20 cars with all sorts of people doing the same thing. Some walk it, some run it...and some carry all different size backpacks and use the hill to condition themselves for up coming events. Even at that early time the temps should be hitting somewhere around 90*. I use a "cooling cloth" to keep me cool.

Yesterday when I went by the hill at 8:00 to take Willis to the vet, there was a paramedic truck in the parking area. Not a good sign, but during this time of the year it happens daily all over the valley. Still I hate to see it.

[Harriet]

Harmony, that's wonderful - both the loss and the bravery of writing it in!

Tracked down my dsecondbil today and got the skinny on his newfound skinny. He's dropped to his lowest weight of adulthood by scrupulously avoiding wheat and sugar, period. That's his whole plan, although he does consider even berries to be additional sugar (I argued that one, but he says he just doesn't crave them so doesn't want to let them in to his plan). I said he must be eating a lot of veggies, and he says yes, but with a big dependence on peppers and onions, since he is still not very adventurous in trying unusual ones.

He also brags quite a bit on Sunny's mention (My Fitness Pal) as well. He is a completely open person and happily showed me his MFP pages. The drop in weight is a pretty impressive slope. I had guessed 40 pounds and he said that although I was right about the recent drop, that from his absolute highest weight (which he showed me on MFP) it is more like 50. Cholesterol lowering has also been documented, but I'm not sure of those numbers.

He says that he has not tried to add in exercise, although he feels so much better now and can do a lot of things he couldn't before. (Like my dstepson, he has always been an avid disc-golf player, so that's been his activity at all weights.)

Oh, and one more thing - he works for a large healthy-foods company and belongs to their program for perks for documented health improvements. He says that's fun for him, trying to "beat" his previous numbers and prove he deserves some recognition at work.

[Kathryn-in-Canada]

Today is day 50/126 for me and I've managed to check in every day at MyFitnessPal. My calorie intake is nowhere near 1200 even though it should be but I'm losing weight slowly and steadily. At least my 'bad' days now are usually only 1800 calories instead of 2500 - 3000.

I've given up soda except for once a week (sometimes twice - like on Tuesday when I was recovering from the test and really wanted a coke to settle me.) I keep a case of Dr. Pepper in my laundry room, hidden under stuff and on Sunday (or Saturday if I know that will work better for me), I have one.

I've switched to popcorn almost every day instead of Baked Cheetos although I still have those on hand. I'm adding in nuts (although every serving is weighed.)

I'm using my food scale a lot more (for instance, weighed my burger tonight after cooking so I could accurately track it.) I've also built meals in MFP so tracking those are easier.

There's some padding (I recently reweighed and discovered I'm only using 1/2 cup of berries in the morning not a cup but I've left those in since I underestimate at times as well.)

We are still eating out a fair bit (dh loves to) but I'm getting more forceful about where and when. The lunch at the bagel shop is higher in calories than most lunches at home but I don't mind if I can see a way to have a lighter dinner.

Dh is getting used to cooking only potatoes for himself but choosing larger ones than he might normally pick and then I'll have a few bites of them.

After tracking garlic bread over several meals, I've realized that it is just too many calories for the benefit. So my dinners most of the time have a salad, the meat and one or two cooked veggies (and aside from avoiding potatoes, I don't avoid any other veggie.)

MFP counts the fiber and protein for me and gives me goals to shoot for, although I always go over the fiber goal, I'm still under the fat and protein goals after years of being trained to eat low-fat. I make sure I have 2 glasses of milk, minimum a day (which accounts for 1/6 of my calorie intake) and make up the other two servings of calcium/magnesium with supplements.) I also make sure I have a minimum of 5, preferably 10, servings of fruit/veggies a day.

Of course, I'm eating either too much of things, or things I shouldn't since my calorie count is still too high, but I'm making progress subbing high calorie, not filling food for less calorie, more filling foods like popcorn or extra salad.