Health and Fitness September, 2023

[Harriet]

It's the month of "Back to School" and the children are busy learning out there!

We all benefit when we keep right on learning, and health and fitness subjects are especially worthwhile, to care for ourselves, our families, communities. This thread has always been a great example of that, bringing info about new plans, ways of exercise, etc.

What have you been learning lately?

I've been fascinated by "Live to 100 - Secret of The Blue Zones" that started showing two days ago on Net flix if anyone happens to have that. There's a very short video preview here if you scroll down, although I don't find it to show how extremely informative the series is - does include some funny jokes with people while filming, happy attitudes, and the beauty of the places. Buettner's just-released book's first couple chapters can be read by clicking on the Look Inside feature in the upper left corner here (book image). He already has other books, previously published about his 20 years of work on this with Nat'l Geographic.

[Nancy]

Walked have half of my steps in by two-ish today.
Got my steps in yesterday. 9-2

[LadyMaverick]

Nancy - BWTG!

Harriet - Thank you for this thread and sharing about the "Live to 100 - Secret of The Blue Zones" shows. I am enjoying watching them. However, the data analysist side of me would like to see how they came up with these figures. I might dig a little to find the answer if I can.
** Knowing your sense of purpose is worth up to seven years of extra life expectancy.
** attending faith-based services four times per month will add 4-14 years of life expectancy.
** commit to a life partner (which can add up to 3 years of life expectancy)
** They grow gardens - Of course I happy to see this made their list and I am all in on this one. LOL

I just finished reviewing my data for August. Overall, I am pleased with the outcome. However, it was a challenging time getting through it. I went through 15 days of gaining weight daily after I started going to the gym. I found that downright discouraging!! Some of the weight gain might have been muscle gain but I know a big part of it was increased hunger and overeating. There were two days that I lost control of my hunger and ate 1800 calories! One day I was emotionally overwhelmed and ate junk food (aka chips!!) I wasn't happy with how much I was eating but I did log each one of those foods into Cronometer because I wanted the data. It wasn't pleasing but it was real life. On those days I was eating almost twice the amount of food that I should. Thankfully my body has settled down and my hunger level adapted to the gym exercise minutes. I am back to rarely being hungry. I ended the month weighing 3.6lbs less.

[Nancy]

I walked the last two days.

[Harriet]

One check-in for me to report is that I got a mammogram yesterday, and "look, ma, no suspicions". (smile - is that a fair way to say it?) Dr. surprised me by coming around the corner to talk, and being very encouraging and taking time to say how he won't schedule me for anything in the future except ordinary annual mammograms. But then he had extra time left in the appt, since for all he knew, he'd have been recommending an ultrasound, just didn't see the need. He talked with me about my sleeplessness, which is very possibly caused by the new med. Something to discuss with other doctors.

My dgs13 told me he'd seen a program suggested on Netflix that seemed just perfect for me and described the one we've been chatting about here. I am gratified that he "saw" me in that program and remembered my nutrition courses and chats with him and with his brothers.

LadyM, i definitely saw myself in your experiences with eating in response to activity. Yesterday was kinda difficult on me - by the time we walked out of the grocery (our large grocery shopping trip for the whole week) I didn't even feel like helping HRH get the groceries in the car. That is out of character for me - we always share all the work. The heat was oppressive, and I have a tendency to leave him with the cart and list in the store and dash all over the place getting items, the concrete floors bothering me. It really caught up with me because I had had only a simple fruit breakfast. At home, I needed food NOW (not a good situation to get myself into) and had yogurt because it was cooling (not so bad) but then broke open a bag of chips - what was I thinking?

Of course, that was probably not your experience, exactly. Are you eating before going to gym? Maybe taking something along? I just realize that part of my problem on days "out" in any way is that I need to be smart about not getting hungry. We are odd in that HRH finds it best to avoid eating before going out.

[Nancy]

I have been walking and gardening aka logging in the back yard, for my exercise this week.
That continue with stump removal next up.

[Nancy]

Great news my yoga pants fit again now! Yea!
Got my steps in again today as well.

[Harmony]

I've been researching too. I think our diets recently have slipped off the cliff here. If I was buying groceries strictly for myself I wouldn't have nearly the amount of sugary things here that I do. DH seems addicted. I think I know what's up with him...he is struggling just to walk and do anything and his energy is very low. After a lifetime of heavy physical work, he is bored and unhappy to be this unable... and that little sugar rush helps for the moment. He doesn't consider what happens after that, the slide back down.

I began talking with him about it all again this afternoon. He tries to tell me there's less sugar in the tonic water he drinks than the cans of cola. It tastes more sour to him. Yes, but that's the quinine in it I think. So, the labels are misleading, they might be truthful, but neither of us has a visual idea of what a gram of sugar looks like. So I looked it all up tonight. Judging by what comes up in the search engine, a bazillion other people are struggling to figure it out also. I think it's misleading of the companies to put info in such a way that it makes no sense... but I guess that's a marketing ploy. So here it is:

Sams Cola, 12 oz can has 10 teaspoons of sugar, 160 calories.

Great Value Tonic Water has 3 servings in it. 1/3 of the bottle, 11.2 1/2 oz is almost the same as a can of soda. That 1/3 of a bottle has 8 1/2 teaspoons of sugar in it, 130 calories.

So I told him if he drinks 1 bottle of tonic water a day and 1 can of cola, he gets 35 1/2 teaspoons of sugar each day. And I know he drinks more soda than that and he puts a spoonful of sugar in his morning coffee...plus an apple and a small orange each day plus carbs plus cake or doughnuts.

Soda in the refrigerator calls to me. Once in a while I'll have a juice glass (very small) of tonic water. I just want something cold and I was having problems with my ice for a while and this stuff is there easy to get and cold. sigh...

We don't do all the chemicals of artificial sweeteners. I left him a note about all this because he'd looked at the labels too and was unable to figure it out. On the internet are lots of calculators to convert grams of sugar into teaspoons. ARRRRGH!

[Nancy]

Got my steps in yesterday and today & Wed.

[Harmony]

We've made a step in the right direction. DH put a big pitcher of water in the refrigerator and I put a small one in the door compartment for me. We think our RO water we get at our sink is better water than from the refrigerator which just goes through a little charcoal filter. I need to think about my caffeine addition....