Weigh-in day: I did it!! 10% gone!
Start weight: 154.6
Weigh in: 138.6
Goal: 128
I am very happy.
(In fact, I actually weighed in at 138.1 today. But since I went to a sauna last night, I am assuming that some portion of that is water weight. Since I was at 138.6 for most of the week, I decided I'd count that as the "real" weight for today. But it sure was nice to see the lower number! I look forward to seeing it again.)
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Tuesday, August 23, 2011
New goal: practicing every day
Over the last several weeks, my once- or twice-weekly yoga classes have been a complete joy and a surprise. I was initially very hesitant and intimidated to start yoga again, because it had been *so* long, I was afraid to face how much less I could do, I feared I was too old, I was sure I was too fat. I was essentially mortified in anticipation, because I once had a pretty serious yoga practice, doing Ashtanga Vinyasa 3x a week, and while I was never the most advanced student in the class, I was an avid and competent student. But that was 10 years and more than a few pounds ago. Even then, I was aware how much harder it was in my early 30s than it had been in my early 20s, but I was delighted to see how much I *was* able to do, and how my practice grew and grew over the months. Truth is, while I'd always been on and off with yoga, there was a lot of "on," and so I had a deep well of body memory to draw on. Little by little, I made my way, and was soon doing poses that seemed amazing to me: crane, wheel, fancy inversions, you name it. But in 2004, in a new town and a new relationship, things shifted. I could never find a studio I liked (I really tried), and then I got so busy with my job, new lifestyle habits took over, and I let it drift.
By the time we moved here in 2009, I was missing it quite a bit, but I was so horribly out of shape, and busy with yet another new job and new move, and so I can't say I pursued it hard. I tried a few classes at a local Satyananda studio, which I chose only for proximity, but it bored me to death. I felt overwhelmed by trying to find the right place, and a little hopeless about my ability anyway.
But this summer, since I started turning my life around, I decided to rededicate myself to trying again. I didn't expect much, and I knew I'd have to be humble about my limits, and I knew I'd have to face how much harder it was to do these things 20 pounds heavier, almost a decade older. But you know, I thought, I could just keep waiting and doing nothing, and then I'll be 40 pounds heavier and two decades older, and what's to be gained by that? I should just start now, where I am, and see where it takes me. That's what yoga is about anyway, isn't it?
Well, I have to say, now that I've been at it for a few months, I am indeed humbled, but not in the way I expected. Not by shame, but rather by gratitude. Because as it turns out, yoga was waiting for me all this time. And I do not suck, and I am getting better, but most importantly I am finding myself able to bring my whole heart to it, and I feel like it keeps bringing its whole heart to me. It's slow, but every week I find myself able to do things I haven't done in a decade. Stepping one foot up between my hands from down dog: did it, and I could barely do that in the old days! Head stand: my first unassisted headstand (hell, headstand of any kind) in a decade! Triangle, as gorgeous and open for me as I remembered. Chataranga, which has led to developing such arm strength that I can now do two sets of 15 "men's" pushups (I couldn't do a single push up in May!!). It's like relearning an old friend, which is also me, and it is creating a wonderful time of introversion and care in weeks that are often very hectic.
In fact, I've now come to the point where I'm disappointed that I can't go to classes more (I can't afford an unlimited pass, and once a week is all I can reasonably budget). But then I thought: why not practice on my own? I've always been a bit shy about doing a private practice--unconfident. But that's how all the best students really advance: not from a once-a-week class, but from daily practice. And so I thought: why not try it?
And so, well, I am. I've decided to set the alarm 45 minutes earlier every day, and simply do a half hour of yoga (the extra time for changing, rolling out my mat, setting up a tape, etc.), unless it's on a day I'm going to an actual yoga class. I'm going to do it regardless of what other exercise I have planned that day; for one thing, that way I know I'll at least meet my 30 minute physical activity minimum. And more important, or equally important, will be starting my day with my practice, instead of with my email or my chores. I can set an intention for the day, and begin it from a centered place, a place of self-care, and dedication to this important higher purpose. Then I can proceed with my work, my house care, my dog care, my exercise all the wonderful and busy stuff of life. But I can start it after 30 minutes--just 30 minutes--for me.
By the time we moved here in 2009, I was missing it quite a bit, but I was so horribly out of shape, and busy with yet another new job and new move, and so I can't say I pursued it hard. I tried a few classes at a local Satyananda studio, which I chose only for proximity, but it bored me to death. I felt overwhelmed by trying to find the right place, and a little hopeless about my ability anyway.
But this summer, since I started turning my life around, I decided to rededicate myself to trying again. I didn't expect much, and I knew I'd have to be humble about my limits, and I knew I'd have to face how much harder it was to do these things 20 pounds heavier, almost a decade older. But you know, I thought, I could just keep waiting and doing nothing, and then I'll be 40 pounds heavier and two decades older, and what's to be gained by that? I should just start now, where I am, and see where it takes me. That's what yoga is about anyway, isn't it?
Well, I have to say, now that I've been at it for a few months, I am indeed humbled, but not in the way I expected. Not by shame, but rather by gratitude. Because as it turns out, yoga was waiting for me all this time. And I do not suck, and I am getting better, but most importantly I am finding myself able to bring my whole heart to it, and I feel like it keeps bringing its whole heart to me. It's slow, but every week I find myself able to do things I haven't done in a decade. Stepping one foot up between my hands from down dog: did it, and I could barely do that in the old days! Head stand: my first unassisted headstand (hell, headstand of any kind) in a decade! Triangle, as gorgeous and open for me as I remembered. Chataranga, which has led to developing such arm strength that I can now do two sets of 15 "men's" pushups (I couldn't do a single push up in May!!). It's like relearning an old friend, which is also me, and it is creating a wonderful time of introversion and care in weeks that are often very hectic.
In fact, I've now come to the point where I'm disappointed that I can't go to classes more (I can't afford an unlimited pass, and once a week is all I can reasonably budget). But then I thought: why not practice on my own? I've always been a bit shy about doing a private practice--unconfident. But that's how all the best students really advance: not from a once-a-week class, but from daily practice. And so I thought: why not try it?
And so, well, I am. I've decided to set the alarm 45 minutes earlier every day, and simply do a half hour of yoga (the extra time for changing, rolling out my mat, setting up a tape, etc.), unless it's on a day I'm going to an actual yoga class. I'm going to do it regardless of what other exercise I have planned that day; for one thing, that way I know I'll at least meet my 30 minute physical activity minimum. And more important, or equally important, will be starting my day with my practice, instead of with my email or my chores. I can set an intention for the day, and begin it from a centered place, a place of self-care, and dedication to this important higher purpose. Then I can proceed with my work, my house care, my dog care, my exercise all the wonderful and busy stuff of life. But I can start it after 30 minutes--just 30 minutes--for me.
Saturday, August 20, 2011
Simply continuing
Over the last week and a half I've been traveling, hence the absence from the blog (most sorry!). We visited both my parents and my partner's parents, and that presented some unique challenges to staying on track. I did some things really right (I treated my mother to a yoga class, packed healthy food for the drive, tracked on my iphone), some things were harder to finesse (my in-laws are extremely unhealthy eaters, and it was very hard to make good choices at the kinds of restaurants they took us to). Ultimately, I came home very frustrated at the bad meals eaten, the exercise not taken, the lost time. I did my best, but there were real limits on what I could do, which is so frustrating. It's my body, my food, my time, but when you are at someone else's house, especially in-laws with whom you have a somewhat fraught relationship, sometimes you have to demur on doing things as you would really wish. I consoled myself that it was for a short time, did leg lifts in the bathroom, maintained portion control, and hoped for the best!
The good news is that I actually maintained while I was away--came back weighing exactly the same thing, to the tenth of a pound, when I was of course afraid I definitely would have gained. But the even better news is that I got back on the horse immediately after returning (SO important!). That is, rather than let the shame or frustration take over, I just picked off exactly where I left off. I figured that, well, no one gets fat from eating somewhat crappily and not exercising for a week, right? You get fat from doing that week after week, month after month, year after year... so all I had to do was not succumb to the (FALSE, MISLEADING, SABOTAGING) feeling of futility, and get back to doing what I know I need to do!!! And so: I did.
For several days I continued to... maintain. Same damn number, which by the way was 139.5: thankfully still in the 130's, but .4 most frustrating pounds away from my 10%! I feel like I've been at 139.5 for almost a month, which, essentially, I have (I had plateaud even before our road trip). But I just decided to rededicate myself wholeheartedly again, and trust that the scale would follow. I was almost immediately rewarded for this: today I saw 138.6!! I don't know what it will say tomorrow, but it was like a little hug from the universe reminding me that even if I'm stuck for a little while, I am by no means stuck forever. All I have to do is go back to making excellent choices, and the rest will follow.
This makes me realize, yet again, how often it is bad thinking that has thrown me off course. A sense that a few bad days undermines everything, and that it is hopeless. Why?? It seems to me now that the opposite must be true. The idea of this being a marathon rather than a race is really sinking in, the awareness that I just want to BE a person who eats healthily, exercises (almost) every day, takes good care of myself. It's really starting to happen, my being that person. And so a bad day or week doesn't stop me from being that person--it's just a little bit of behavior. What makes the change permanent is the quotidian, the way you live, not a bad day or a vacation. Don't waste time feeling ashamed or hopeless. Just watch those feelings with curiosity, but don't attach to them. They are, as I've said before, only feelings. The feelings don't get a vote on how you behave or how you eat. Notice them, and then make yourself a gorgeous salad with organic vegetables. Notice them, and then go have a great spinning class. It's the behavior, not the feeling, that will determine who you become (or at least, what you look like!). And keep taking those healthy actions, and the feeling, the story, will also change.
The good news is that I actually maintained while I was away--came back weighing exactly the same thing, to the tenth of a pound, when I was of course afraid I definitely would have gained. But the even better news is that I got back on the horse immediately after returning (SO important!). That is, rather than let the shame or frustration take over, I just picked off exactly where I left off. I figured that, well, no one gets fat from eating somewhat crappily and not exercising for a week, right? You get fat from doing that week after week, month after month, year after year... so all I had to do was not succumb to the (FALSE, MISLEADING, SABOTAGING) feeling of futility, and get back to doing what I know I need to do!!! And so: I did.
For several days I continued to... maintain. Same damn number, which by the way was 139.5: thankfully still in the 130's, but .4 most frustrating pounds away from my 10%! I feel like I've been at 139.5 for almost a month, which, essentially, I have (I had plateaud even before our road trip). But I just decided to rededicate myself wholeheartedly again, and trust that the scale would follow. I was almost immediately rewarded for this: today I saw 138.6!! I don't know what it will say tomorrow, but it was like a little hug from the universe reminding me that even if I'm stuck for a little while, I am by no means stuck forever. All I have to do is go back to making excellent choices, and the rest will follow.
This makes me realize, yet again, how often it is bad thinking that has thrown me off course. A sense that a few bad days undermines everything, and that it is hopeless. Why?? It seems to me now that the opposite must be true. The idea of this being a marathon rather than a race is really sinking in, the awareness that I just want to BE a person who eats healthily, exercises (almost) every day, takes good care of myself. It's really starting to happen, my being that person. And so a bad day or week doesn't stop me from being that person--it's just a little bit of behavior. What makes the change permanent is the quotidian, the way you live, not a bad day or a vacation. Don't waste time feeling ashamed or hopeless. Just watch those feelings with curiosity, but don't attach to them. They are, as I've said before, only feelings. The feelings don't get a vote on how you behave or how you eat. Notice them, and then make yourself a gorgeous salad with organic vegetables. Notice them, and then go have a great spinning class. It's the behavior, not the feeling, that will determine who you become (or at least, what you look like!). And keep taking those healthy actions, and the feeling, the story, will also change.
Wednesday, August 3, 2011
15 pounds!
Weigh in day today: down 15 pounds exactly! Another half-pound, and I hit my 10%. Happy!
Start May 11: 154.6
Today Aug 3: 139.6
Goal (Oct ?): 128
Start May 11: 154.6
Today Aug 3: 139.6
Goal (Oct ?): 128
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Goals looking ahead
Tomorrow will be my first weigh-in after moving from a WW meetings membership to an online only membership. I'm certainly not regretting the decision to cancel the meetings portion. I'm feeling like staying on plan is about the decisions I make hour after hour every day, and the one hour meeting is such a tiny part of that. But it does mean I won't have anyone in real life to keep an eye on me and cheer me on (beyond my partner and the few friends that I've mentioned this journey to). So I wanted to look ahead and inspire myself by thinking about my upcoming goals!
So far I've lost 14.4 pounds since I joined WW. I might have shaved off one or two on my own before then, but we're not counting the unknown. This means I am super close to my next very major goal. When I hit 139.1, either tomorrow or the following week or whenever it is, then I will have lost 15 pounds--a total of 10% of my body weight, since joining WW at 154.6 pounds on May 11th. This will be a thrilling success for me, because I know that losing that 10% is something of a magic number in terms of disease risk reduction (those who are new readers: my mother's diagnosis with diabetes was a major motivator in my starting this process). It also means I will be at least halfway towards my ultimate goal! At 139.1, I start making my way into more of my size 6 clothes. And people have begun to really notice.
The next major goal, only 5 pounds more after that, is 134. This is an important number because it was actually my original goal when I joined WW. At 5'2", the upper number listed as "healthy" on the BMI chart is 137, and I knew I wanted to be a few pounds below that. But as I've lost weight and found myself succeeding at this process, I knew that I no longer wanted my goal to only be 134. That's for large-boned women, really, and I'm pretty sure I'm medium boned. But nonetheless, it will put me officially in the healthy range, with a BMI of 24.5. It will put me out of a size 8 except for a few slacks and into a size 6 just about completely. And it will put me at the 28th percentile for my age and height! I haven't weighed this since about 2005 or 2006. It's a genuine goal, a weight at which I look healthy and good.
After that, I have my heart set on 128. This is currently my official goal weight. When I hit 128, I will almost certainly be a size 4 in tops and skirts (I work out hard, and I'm pretty compact!) and a size 6 in pants. I may, just may, sneak down from a D cup to a C cup (this is GOOD NEWS!! I started as a overflowing 34DD, and I'm already down to a light 32D--a much happier size for me). My BMI will be 23.4, and I will be in the 21st percentile for my age and height! But above all I know I will feel so much lighter. Activities I adore will be so much easier (they already are). Joints will feel better, back will feel better, I will look and feel better. This is a weight I haven't been probably since 1997 or 1998. But I now believe it is achievable!
My new maybe just maybe dream weight is 125. I'm not setting it as a goal weight (yet), because I believe that at 128 I will look great and be healthy, and I can reassess then if more is desirable. But if I could maintain 125 without agony, then that would mean a total of 30 pounds lost, a weight I have not been in 15 years, a BMI of 22.9 (18th percentile), and a damn hot derriere. Also: SO much less likely to get diabetes, cancer, etc.! Also, yoga will be so wonderful, without parts of my body actually getting in the way! Also, true C cup, true size 4, truly awesome!
One step at a time. But these huge goals are not actually huge numbers away for me. They are all achievable a few pounds at a time. And I will achieve them!
So far I've lost 14.4 pounds since I joined WW. I might have shaved off one or two on my own before then, but we're not counting the unknown. This means I am super close to my next very major goal. When I hit 139.1, either tomorrow or the following week or whenever it is, then I will have lost 15 pounds--a total of 10% of my body weight, since joining WW at 154.6 pounds on May 11th. This will be a thrilling success for me, because I know that losing that 10% is something of a magic number in terms of disease risk reduction (those who are new readers: my mother's diagnosis with diabetes was a major motivator in my starting this process). It also means I will be at least halfway towards my ultimate goal! At 139.1, I start making my way into more of my size 6 clothes. And people have begun to really notice.
The next major goal, only 5 pounds more after that, is 134. This is an important number because it was actually my original goal when I joined WW. At 5'2", the upper number listed as "healthy" on the BMI chart is 137, and I knew I wanted to be a few pounds below that. But as I've lost weight and found myself succeeding at this process, I knew that I no longer wanted my goal to only be 134. That's for large-boned women, really, and I'm pretty sure I'm medium boned. But nonetheless, it will put me officially in the healthy range, with a BMI of 24.5. It will put me out of a size 8 except for a few slacks and into a size 6 just about completely. And it will put me at the 28th percentile for my age and height! I haven't weighed this since about 2005 or 2006. It's a genuine goal, a weight at which I look healthy and good.
After that, I have my heart set on 128. This is currently my official goal weight. When I hit 128, I will almost certainly be a size 4 in tops and skirts (I work out hard, and I'm pretty compact!) and a size 6 in pants. I may, just may, sneak down from a D cup to a C cup (this is GOOD NEWS!! I started as a overflowing 34DD, and I'm already down to a light 32D--a much happier size for me). My BMI will be 23.4, and I will be in the 21st percentile for my age and height! But above all I know I will feel so much lighter. Activities I adore will be so much easier (they already are). Joints will feel better, back will feel better, I will look and feel better. This is a weight I haven't been probably since 1997 or 1998. But I now believe it is achievable!
My new maybe just maybe dream weight is 125. I'm not setting it as a goal weight (yet), because I believe that at 128 I will look great and be healthy, and I can reassess then if more is desirable. But if I could maintain 125 without agony, then that would mean a total of 30 pounds lost, a weight I have not been in 15 years, a BMI of 22.9 (18th percentile), and a damn hot derriere. Also: SO much less likely to get diabetes, cancer, etc.! Also, yoga will be so wonderful, without parts of my body actually getting in the way! Also, true C cup, true size 4, truly awesome!
One step at a time. But these huge goals are not actually huge numbers away for me. They are all achievable a few pounds at a time. And I will achieve them!
Friday, July 29, 2011
Online only
After much thought and thanks to so much constructive feedback on the WW boards, I'm now an online only member, effective this morning. It's going to cost me $30 for 3 months, instead of $40 for one month, and all I have to give up are the meetings that are obviously frustrating me so much. I already do all my tracking online, and really my support community is online, so I can't see that I'm giving up much of anything except a 45-minute drive and 45 minutes of boredom! But I hereby make a promise to myself that if I find my resolve/accountability slipping, if I find that I'm underestimating the value of having to show up every week, that I will again become a meetings member.
The only thing I'm sad about is not getting to celebrate my upcoming 10% milestone in a meeting. But since I never found one that felt like a community for me, that's not much of a price to pay--it's more of a notional than an actual loss. I'm so happy with my progress and feeling so dedicated that I think the success itself will be plenty of its own reward.
Thanks to those readers who I know from the WW boards and who offered their advice.
The only thing I'm sad about is not getting to celebrate my upcoming 10% milestone in a meeting. But since I never found one that felt like a community for me, that's not much of a price to pay--it's more of a notional than an actual loss. I'm so happy with my progress and feeling so dedicated that I think the success itself will be plenty of its own reward.
Thanks to those readers who I know from the WW boards and who offered their advice.
Thursday, July 28, 2011
Closing in on 10%!
Another terrible meeting, but a great weigh-in day. Down to 140.4 pounds (my 10% is at 139.1). Almost there!
May 11 (start date): 154.6
July 28 (today, duh): 140.4 (1.3 pounds until 10%)
Goal (mid October?): 128... or maybe even 125
May 11 (start date): 154.6
July 28 (today, duh): 140.4 (1.3 pounds until 10%)
Goal (mid October?): 128... or maybe even 125
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Increments
A couple of weeks ago I was feeling frustrated that the scale wasn't showing much change: a couple of weeks of just losing .4 and .2 and such. There was a lot going on for me at that time (the root canal, and my partner also had a medical emergency) so it made sense that it wasn't the most glowingly successful time (it is hard to eat OP when you're sitting in a hospital waiting room, or driving around from doctor to doctor!). When things get like that, it's easy to hide from the scale for fear of disappointing news. I decided to try the opposite strategy: I decided it was time to weigh myself every day. Now I know that doesn't work for everyone--I know it freaks some people out, or can trigger eating disorder issues if you have them, so caveat emptor! You also have to be philosophical about the daily fluctuations. But what it has somehow allowed me to do is just that: get an objective, geekier bird's eye view, and take the punch out of the weekly "yay" or "boo" of WID.
Since I have one of those schmancy Weight Watcher's scales, which I highly recommend, I am able to keep track of other things too, like body fat and BMI, all electronically calculated for me. I haven't been gathering those figures every day, but usually several times a week. And somehow watching the numbers jostle up and down, but ultimately, zipper-like, in a definite downward trend, has been incredibly encouraging. I won't make it to a meeting for an official weigh in until tomorrow, but here's what its been looking like first thing in the AM, before eating, drinking, or getting dressed:
July 11: 142.3; 30.7% body fat; BMI 26.2
July 12: 141.2; 30.6% body fat; BMI 25.9
July 18: 140.9; 30.4% body fat; BMI 25.9
July 22: 139.9; 30.2% body fat; BMI 25.7
July 23: 138.8; 29.9% body fat; BMI 25.5
July 24: 138.0; 29.8% body fat; BMI 25.4
July 26: 139.3; 29.9% body fat; BMI 25.5
Jul1 27: 138.2; 30.0% body fat; BMI 25.4
I am very pleased with the trend I'm seeing here! And however many glasses of water I've had, or whatever other random factors influence my weigh-in tomorrow, I can obviously see the progress here. Home scale wise, in 16 days I've lost 4.1 pounds: just ideal!
Since I have one of those schmancy Weight Watcher's scales, which I highly recommend, I am able to keep track of other things too, like body fat and BMI, all electronically calculated for me. I haven't been gathering those figures every day, but usually several times a week. And somehow watching the numbers jostle up and down, but ultimately, zipper-like, in a definite downward trend, has been incredibly encouraging. I won't make it to a meeting for an official weigh in until tomorrow, but here's what its been looking like first thing in the AM, before eating, drinking, or getting dressed:
July 11: 142.3; 30.7% body fat; BMI 26.2
July 12: 141.2; 30.6% body fat; BMI 25.9
July 18: 140.9; 30.4% body fat; BMI 25.9
July 22: 139.9; 30.2% body fat; BMI 25.7
July 23: 138.8; 29.9% body fat; BMI 25.5
July 24: 138.0; 29.8% body fat; BMI 25.4
July 26: 139.3; 29.9% body fat; BMI 25.5
Jul1 27: 138.2; 30.0% body fat; BMI 25.4
I am very pleased with the trend I'm seeing here! And however many glasses of water I've had, or whatever other random factors influence my weigh-in tomorrow, I can obviously see the progress here. Home scale wise, in 16 days I've lost 4.1 pounds: just ideal!
Sunday, July 24, 2011
Get healthy in the gym; get thin in the kitchen??
I want to talk today about a piece of "conventional" wisdom I see floating around the weight loss boards, one that I find deeply troubling. It is the mantra that one may get healthy in the gym, but that weight loss is about eating alone. I don't understand why this pernicious idea circulates unchecked, but it is frequently intoned as if fact. But it is neither true nor helpful, and doesn't even make any sense.
I have a lot I'd love to say on this topic, but for today: the science. If you want to lose weight AND KEEP IT OFF PERMANENTLY, then you should at least seriously consider looking at what those who have lost weight AND KEPT IT OFF PERMANENTLY have done. The best place for this information that I know is the National Weight Control Registry (http://www.nwcr.ws/). This is an ongoing study of those who have lost 30 pounds or more and maintained their loss for one year. These are the people who are getting it right. I encourage you to read through their site, but I want to point out two essential statistics:
* 98% of Registry participants report that they modified their food intake in some way to lose weight.
* 94% increased their physical activity, with the most frequently reported form of activity being walking.
This is pretty self-explanatory, but let me put it another way. Only 6% of those who maintained weight loss did so without increasing physical activity! Think about that the next time you think about skipping your workout.
The NWCR posts abstracts from dozens of research studies on their site. Here's the abstract of the results of one chronological study: "Obesity is now recognized as a serious chronic disease, but there is pessimism about how successful treatment can be. A general perception is that almost no one succeeds in long-term maintenance of weight loss. To define long-term weight loss success, we need an accepted definition. We propose defining successful long-term weight loss maintenance as intentionally losing at least 10% of initial body weight and keeping it off for at least 1 year. According to this definition, the picture is much more optimistic, with perhaps greater than 20% of overweight/obese persons able to achieve success. We found that in the National Weight Control Registry, successful long-term weight loss maintainers (average weight loss of 30 kg for an average of 5.5 years) share common behavioral strategies, including eating a diet low in fat, frequent self-monitoring of body weight and food intake, and high levels of regular physical activity. Weight loss maintenance may get easier over time. Once these successful maintainers have maintained a weight loss for 2-5 years, the chances of longer-term success greatly increase."
Here is the abstract from another study: "There is a general perception that almost no one succeeds in long-term maintenance of weight loss. However, research has shown that approximately 20% of overweight individuals are successful at long-term weight loss when defined as losing at least 10% of initial body weight and maintaining the loss for at least 1 y. The National Weight Control Registry provides information about the strategies used by successful weight loss maintainers to achieve and maintain long-term weight loss. National Weight Control Registry members have lost an average of 33 kg and maintained the loss for more than 5 y. To maintain their weight loss, members report engaging in high levels of physical activity ( approximately 1 h/d), eating a low-calorie, low-fat diet, eating breakfast regularly, self-monitoring weight, and maintaining a consistent eating pattern across weekdays and weekends. Moreover, weight loss maintenance may get easier over time; after individuals have successfully maintained their weight loss for 2-5 y, the chance of longer-term success greatly increases. Continued adherence to diet and exercise strategies, low levels of depression and disinhibition, and medical triggers for weight loss are also associated with long-term success. National Weight Control Registry members provide evidence that long-term weight loss maintenance is possible and help identify the specific approaches associated with long-term success."
On weight loss boards, people often bemoan the fact that their physical activity in any given week does not necessarily show up on the scale. But if you are trying to lose weight not for one week but forever, then please think longer term!
I have a lot I'd love to say on this topic, but for today: the science. If you want to lose weight AND KEEP IT OFF PERMANENTLY, then you should at least seriously consider looking at what those who have lost weight AND KEPT IT OFF PERMANENTLY have done. The best place for this information that I know is the National Weight Control Registry (http://www.nwcr.ws/). This is an ongoing study of those who have lost 30 pounds or more and maintained their loss for one year. These are the people who are getting it right. I encourage you to read through their site, but I want to point out two essential statistics:
* 98% of Registry participants report that they modified their food intake in some way to lose weight.
* 94% increased their physical activity, with the most frequently reported form of activity being walking.
This is pretty self-explanatory, but let me put it another way. Only 6% of those who maintained weight loss did so without increasing physical activity! Think about that the next time you think about skipping your workout.
The NWCR posts abstracts from dozens of research studies on their site. Here's the abstract of the results of one chronological study: "Obesity is now recognized as a serious chronic disease, but there is pessimism about how successful treatment can be. A general perception is that almost no one succeeds in long-term maintenance of weight loss. To define long-term weight loss success, we need an accepted definition. We propose defining successful long-term weight loss maintenance as intentionally losing at least 10% of initial body weight and keeping it off for at least 1 year. According to this definition, the picture is much more optimistic, with perhaps greater than 20% of overweight/obese persons able to achieve success. We found that in the National Weight Control Registry, successful long-term weight loss maintainers (average weight loss of 30 kg for an average of 5.5 years) share common behavioral strategies, including eating a diet low in fat, frequent self-monitoring of body weight and food intake, and high levels of regular physical activity. Weight loss maintenance may get easier over time. Once these successful maintainers have maintained a weight loss for 2-5 years, the chances of longer-term success greatly increase."
Here is the abstract from another study: "There is a general perception that almost no one succeeds in long-term maintenance of weight loss. However, research has shown that approximately 20% of overweight individuals are successful at long-term weight loss when defined as losing at least 10% of initial body weight and maintaining the loss for at least 1 y. The National Weight Control Registry provides information about the strategies used by successful weight loss maintainers to achieve and maintain long-term weight loss. National Weight Control Registry members have lost an average of 33 kg and maintained the loss for more than 5 y. To maintain their weight loss, members report engaging in high levels of physical activity ( approximately 1 h/d), eating a low-calorie, low-fat diet, eating breakfast regularly, self-monitoring weight, and maintaining a consistent eating pattern across weekdays and weekends. Moreover, weight loss maintenance may get easier over time; after individuals have successfully maintained their weight loss for 2-5 y, the chance of longer-term success greatly increases. Continued adherence to diet and exercise strategies, low levels of depression and disinhibition, and medical triggers for weight loss are also associated with long-term success. National Weight Control Registry members provide evidence that long-term weight loss maintenance is possible and help identify the specific approaches associated with long-term success."
On weight loss boards, people often bemoan the fact that their physical activity in any given week does not necessarily show up on the scale. But if you are trying to lose weight not for one week but forever, then please think longer term!
Saturday, July 23, 2011
Intervals!
There is a woman at my gym who looks pretty extraordinary, and her workout strategy caught my eye. I noticed her alternating between intense runs on the treadmill and sets on the nautilus machines. It took me a little while to work up my nerve to ask her about it, but yesterday I did, and I'm so glad! This woman is in killer shape, and I thought: hell, I definitely want what she has.
Anyway, she told me that her sister-in-law is a trainer, and recommended this interval strategy to her. First, she runs for a mile on the treadmill to warm up. Then does three sets at a machine. Then two super intense minutes on the treadmill (she said she is "comfortable at 8"--all I could think was, YIKES!). Then three sets on a second machine. Then two super intense minutes on the treadmill. Repeat. I forget how much she does altogether: I think it was just three miles total, but enough for 4 or 5 intervals. I was totally impressed, and a little intimidated, but decided I would try some version of this today. I knew I'd have to modify it some since I'm not nearly in that kind of shape (I usually jog along at a 4.5 at most--I'm just thrilled I can actually jog for a half hour now). But I was delighted that I didn't have to modify it nearly as much as I expected!
First, I ran for a half mile. I decided to do it at a 5.0. Then three sets on a machine. Then hopped back on the treadmill, and said, well, what the hell, since it's only a two minute interval, why not bump it up to 5.7? Did two minutes like that, then another three sets on a machine. Then back on the treadmill and thought, well, what the hell. It's only two minutes. Why not bump it up to 6.0? Which I did, and after a minute, said, well, how much harder can 6.5 be?
Four intervals later, I was zooming along at a 7.0 and feeling like a rock star! It was hard work, but not nearly as impossible as I feared, in part because I've started doing something like this in my spinning class (also totally new to me), in part because it really is possible to work very hard if you only have to do it for two minutes. I was done with intervals after that, but added another 10 minute jog at the end (at 5.0: I feel like within one workout, I'm kind of done with the 4s forever), and then had a nice long stretch, which I don't usually leave enough time for. But this was such a quick and efficient workout, it was quite something.
Obviously I can't judge the results after doing it once, but I'm glad I pushed myself to try something new, and given the way people sing the praises of intervals, I'm pretty optimistic. Also, it emboldened me to politely ask others about elements of their workout--in fact, asked two women about particular exercises they were doing with the balance balls, and no one seemed to think it was weird. Very exciting to learn more, to try harder, to discover I can do more than I thought!
Also: saw *138.8 this morning!!
The more I lose, the more I gain confidence that I can meet and exceed prior goals. Not long ago, my goal was just 134 (?). Was that it? I don't even remember. Now I'm definitely set on 128... and beginning to consider 125. Feeling really empowered and hopeful.
Smooches, Bibliogrrl
5'2"; 155/*143/128? (*I weigh daily at home earlier in the day than my weekly weigh-in at WW, and it's been a great week. Can't wait to see how much if any of this shows up at my official weigh in...)
Anyway, she told me that her sister-in-law is a trainer, and recommended this interval strategy to her. First, she runs for a mile on the treadmill to warm up. Then does three sets at a machine. Then two super intense minutes on the treadmill (she said she is "comfortable at 8"--all I could think was, YIKES!). Then three sets on a second machine. Then two super intense minutes on the treadmill. Repeat. I forget how much she does altogether: I think it was just three miles total, but enough for 4 or 5 intervals. I was totally impressed, and a little intimidated, but decided I would try some version of this today. I knew I'd have to modify it some since I'm not nearly in that kind of shape (I usually jog along at a 4.5 at most--I'm just thrilled I can actually jog for a half hour now). But I was delighted that I didn't have to modify it nearly as much as I expected!
First, I ran for a half mile. I decided to do it at a 5.0. Then three sets on a machine. Then hopped back on the treadmill, and said, well, what the hell, since it's only a two minute interval, why not bump it up to 5.7? Did two minutes like that, then another three sets on a machine. Then back on the treadmill and thought, well, what the hell. It's only two minutes. Why not bump it up to 6.0? Which I did, and after a minute, said, well, how much harder can 6.5 be?
Four intervals later, I was zooming along at a 7.0 and feeling like a rock star! It was hard work, but not nearly as impossible as I feared, in part because I've started doing something like this in my spinning class (also totally new to me), in part because it really is possible to work very hard if you only have to do it for two minutes. I was done with intervals after that, but added another 10 minute jog at the end (at 5.0: I feel like within one workout, I'm kind of done with the 4s forever), and then had a nice long stretch, which I don't usually leave enough time for. But this was such a quick and efficient workout, it was quite something.
Obviously I can't judge the results after doing it once, but I'm glad I pushed myself to try something new, and given the way people sing the praises of intervals, I'm pretty optimistic. Also, it emboldened me to politely ask others about elements of their workout--in fact, asked two women about particular exercises they were doing with the balance balls, and no one seemed to think it was weird. Very exciting to learn more, to try harder, to discover I can do more than I thought!
Also: saw *138.8 this morning!!
The more I lose, the more I gain confidence that I can meet and exceed prior goals. Not long ago, my goal was just 134 (?). Was that it? I don't even remember. Now I'm definitely set on 128... and beginning to consider 125. Feeling really empowered and hopeful.
Smooches, Bibliogrrl
5'2"; 155/*143/128? (*I weigh daily at home earlier in the day than my weekly weigh-in at WW, and it's been a great week. Can't wait to see how much if any of this shows up at my official weigh in...)
Friday, July 22, 2011
Frustrated with meetings
Lately I've been getting very frustrated with WW meetings. I wonder if others are experiencing this. I've shopped around quite a bit--I've actually sat in on 5 different leaders' meetings now--and while some are better than others, clearly all the meetings have certain formulaic components and approaches that are part of the corporate plan. I'm not loving it, and thinking about becoming just an "on-line" member. On the other hand, I worry I might fall away from the plan if I'm not checking in every week (?). Trying to mull it over.
What annoys me about meetings is twofold, I think. The first is that the level of information seems very basic, even insulting. I suppose it's being pitched at people who are really learning how to eat healthy for the first time, but that ain't me. I've been eating healthy for decades. The portion control is helpful, but that doesn't take a rocket scientist. In general, it's all pitched at the lowest common denominator, and I find it pretty uninspiring. All the focus on packaged food, crap from McDonald's, hoarding all your points for some big blowout at Chili's or Applebee's--I've never even BEEN to any of those places. I cannot relate.
The second problem, related to the first but even more serious than the first, is the obsessive focus on eating management at the meetings. Yes, I realize this is a diet program (uh, a "lifestyle" program). But it's not as if everyone gained weight only because they didn't know how many ounces of fish to have with their rice. Besides the fact that half of what people are encouraged to eat I would never touch--either as a vegetarian or because I don't eat packaged crap bars--I am bored and frustrated by the constant focus on regulating food consumption: as if everyone who is in Weight Watchers is there because they are a glutton who simply has to learn to control themselves. While obviously overeating is, technically speaking, a component of all weight gain, it is so much more complicated than that. People gain weight because of fear, an unhealthy (even if low calorie) diet, self-sabotage, because they are abuse survivors, because of low self-esteem, all sorts of reasons that go beyond just putting too many forkfuls in the mouth. And it's clear that meeting leaders avoid discussing those emotionally-charged topics like the plague... so instead we spend all our time counting forkfuls. That seems to me to be bailing out the basement while the hole is in the roof.
While I understand that meeting leaders are not therapists, I do think that WW meetings are like support groups. But as it stands, they seem to be groups of women (mostly) supporting each other to put down the fork. But not groups of women supporting each other to understand or privately explore whatever it was that led them to pick up the fork too many times in the first place. Again, that physical retraining is essential if you're going to cut down on calories and actually lose the weight. But I wish there were at least some acknowledgement that if you're going to keep the weight off, you're going to have to figure out your stuff. In the meantime, I'm not sure how much I'm getting out of hearing people talk about how many ounces of chicken they are eating, or how much they love the 2 point whatever bars. It just feels like a waste of time.
I dunno. Must be in a grumpy mood today, which I shouldn't be--I am continuing to lose quite consistently, despite a very challenging couple of weeks! In fact, I saw 139.9 on the scale at home this AM: first time in years I've grazed the 130s. Very encouraging!!
Smooches,
Biblio (5'2"; 155/*143/128) *139.9 at home this AM!
What annoys me about meetings is twofold, I think. The first is that the level of information seems very basic, even insulting. I suppose it's being pitched at people who are really learning how to eat healthy for the first time, but that ain't me. I've been eating healthy for decades. The portion control is helpful, but that doesn't take a rocket scientist. In general, it's all pitched at the lowest common denominator, and I find it pretty uninspiring. All the focus on packaged food, crap from McDonald's, hoarding all your points for some big blowout at Chili's or Applebee's--I've never even BEEN to any of those places. I cannot relate.
The second problem, related to the first but even more serious than the first, is the obsessive focus on eating management at the meetings. Yes, I realize this is a diet program (uh, a "lifestyle" program). But it's not as if everyone gained weight only because they didn't know how many ounces of fish to have with their rice. Besides the fact that half of what people are encouraged to eat I would never touch--either as a vegetarian or because I don't eat packaged crap bars--I am bored and frustrated by the constant focus on regulating food consumption: as if everyone who is in Weight Watchers is there because they are a glutton who simply has to learn to control themselves. While obviously overeating is, technically speaking, a component of all weight gain, it is so much more complicated than that. People gain weight because of fear, an unhealthy (even if low calorie) diet, self-sabotage, because they are abuse survivors, because of low self-esteem, all sorts of reasons that go beyond just putting too many forkfuls in the mouth. And it's clear that meeting leaders avoid discussing those emotionally-charged topics like the plague... so instead we spend all our time counting forkfuls. That seems to me to be bailing out the basement while the hole is in the roof.
While I understand that meeting leaders are not therapists, I do think that WW meetings are like support groups. But as it stands, they seem to be groups of women (mostly) supporting each other to put down the fork. But not groups of women supporting each other to understand or privately explore whatever it was that led them to pick up the fork too many times in the first place. Again, that physical retraining is essential if you're going to cut down on calories and actually lose the weight. But I wish there were at least some acknowledgement that if you're going to keep the weight off, you're going to have to figure out your stuff. In the meantime, I'm not sure how much I'm getting out of hearing people talk about how many ounces of chicken they are eating, or how much they love the 2 point whatever bars. It just feels like a waste of time.
I dunno. Must be in a grumpy mood today, which I shouldn't be--I am continuing to lose quite consistently, despite a very challenging couple of weeks! In fact, I saw 139.9 on the scale at home this AM: first time in years I've grazed the 130s. Very encouraging!!
Smooches,
Biblio (5'2"; 155/*143/128) *139.9 at home this AM!
Saturday, July 16, 2011
It's just a feeling
It's been a somewhat difficult week. On Monday I had a root canal, and it went pretty badly awry: got infected, I developed a hemotoma (on my face--I look like I've been punched!) from a misplaced novocaine shot, and I have had to stay on very strong antibiotics. I've stayed on the program diligently, in that I've tracked every day and eaten within range (except for the day I was so miserable I only ate half my points), if not quite as impeccably as usual. But it's hard to feel connected to the project of getting healthy when you're feeling sick. I actually took a nap three days in a row, whereas usually, a nap is about a semi-annual event. And instead of working out my usual 6 days a week, I think I managed to exercise three times.
I should have shrugged this all off. Instead, the negative talk and negative thinking started creeping in right away. It was surprising and alarming how quickly I started to started to disconnect from my identity as a healthy, active weight watcher--how soon I started telling myself, "well, guess that's slipping away." Even though I was tracking, the lack of exercise and lack of energy and just physical pain made a healthy lifestyle feel really remote. I even noticed I was eating fewer greens, whereas previously I've not had any problem meeting my fruit and veggie servings.
When I weighed in at the meeting, I still managed to lose .2 pounds--no great progress on the scale, but at least a tiny loss. Still, the negative talk continued. "Oh well, guess I'm done really losing weight."
What the hell??
Yesterday, still a bit worn out but game to try pushing myself, I made it back to the gym and did 45 minutes on the stair stepper. Today I had a great 90 minute yoga class, after stocking up on greens from the farmer's market. It's 3:30PM and I already have met my good health guidelines for produce. And... the scale showed another pound less than it did just 3 days ago. And guess what? I feel back "in" again. Already?? Does everything change so fast? Is it really so much about my mental attitude.
I realize--and, I think for the first time, I *realized*--that there was no way that a bad week or a bad few days had to derail me. That things just couldn't be lost all that fast! I know how many people fall away from their healthy choices because of one bad choice, one bad day, one extra dessert. Why do we let ourselves do this?? Today in yoga when the teacher suggested that I "set an intention" for the practice, I asked myself to remember that the negative talk was just talk, just a feeling, not the truth. That, as I've learned to do so many other ways through yoga, I can just "watch" the feeling without identifying with it. This was a major breakthrough for me! It's just a thought. It's not the Truth. Maybe at this moment some sabotaging or insecure or tired voice inside me is telling me that I can't do this. But that voice has absolutely no direct line to the facts or to the future. I can do this, and I am doing this, every time I make a healthy decision. There is no light switch that shuts it off and it's over. OK: I didn't exercise Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday because I was miserable and in pain. But I DID go to my spinning class Monday before my root canal (!!), and I did go back to the gym yesterday, and I did go to yoga today!
Epiphany: every day is a brand new day to make good new decisions in.
As of today, according to the home scale: BMI 25.7
Weight: 155/140.3/128 (so close to the 130s! Hooray!!)
Body fat: 30.5%
Getting there!!
I should have shrugged this all off. Instead, the negative talk and negative thinking started creeping in right away. It was surprising and alarming how quickly I started to started to disconnect from my identity as a healthy, active weight watcher--how soon I started telling myself, "well, guess that's slipping away." Even though I was tracking, the lack of exercise and lack of energy and just physical pain made a healthy lifestyle feel really remote. I even noticed I was eating fewer greens, whereas previously I've not had any problem meeting my fruit and veggie servings.
When I weighed in at the meeting, I still managed to lose .2 pounds--no great progress on the scale, but at least a tiny loss. Still, the negative talk continued. "Oh well, guess I'm done really losing weight."
What the hell??
Yesterday, still a bit worn out but game to try pushing myself, I made it back to the gym and did 45 minutes on the stair stepper. Today I had a great 90 minute yoga class, after stocking up on greens from the farmer's market. It's 3:30PM and I already have met my good health guidelines for produce. And... the scale showed another pound less than it did just 3 days ago. And guess what? I feel back "in" again. Already?? Does everything change so fast? Is it really so much about my mental attitude.
I realize--and, I think for the first time, I *realized*--that there was no way that a bad week or a bad few days had to derail me. That things just couldn't be lost all that fast! I know how many people fall away from their healthy choices because of one bad choice, one bad day, one extra dessert. Why do we let ourselves do this?? Today in yoga when the teacher suggested that I "set an intention" for the practice, I asked myself to remember that the negative talk was just talk, just a feeling, not the truth. That, as I've learned to do so many other ways through yoga, I can just "watch" the feeling without identifying with it. This was a major breakthrough for me! It's just a thought. It's not the Truth. Maybe at this moment some sabotaging or insecure or tired voice inside me is telling me that I can't do this. But that voice has absolutely no direct line to the facts or to the future. I can do this, and I am doing this, every time I make a healthy decision. There is no light switch that shuts it off and it's over. OK: I didn't exercise Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday because I was miserable and in pain. But I DID go to my spinning class Monday before my root canal (!!), and I did go back to the gym yesterday, and I did go to yoga today!
Epiphany: every day is a brand new day to make good new decisions in.
As of today, according to the home scale: BMI 25.7
Weight: 155/140.3/128 (so close to the 130s! Hooray!!)
Body fat: 30.5%
Getting there!!
Monday, July 11, 2011
Sneaking one in
Had to have a root canal this morning. UGH!
Feeling thrilled that I managed to make it to my Spynga class (spinning + yoga = bliss) early this morning before the endodontist. I was honest with myself and knew I wouldn't want to go after, so, even though I was a bit tired and grumpy (I'm not a big AM exerciser), I did it and it was great!
Also: last weigh-in day, I was down another pound. Very exciting. The progress is going well enough that I've felt brave enough to adjust my goal weight downward. As it is, my BMI is down to 26.2: so close to the healthy weight range (upper end 25). I'm now only "marginally overweight," which is hugely exciting and inspiring!
I owe a longer post, and will be back soon. Just wanted to make sure that no one doubts I'm sticking with it.
xo, Biblio
155/143/128
Feeling thrilled that I managed to make it to my Spynga class (spinning + yoga = bliss) early this morning before the endodontist. I was honest with myself and knew I wouldn't want to go after, so, even though I was a bit tired and grumpy (I'm not a big AM exerciser), I did it and it was great!
Also: last weigh-in day, I was down another pound. Very exciting. The progress is going well enough that I've felt brave enough to adjust my goal weight downward. As it is, my BMI is down to 26.2: so close to the healthy weight range (upper end 25). I'm now only "marginally overweight," which is hugely exciting and inspiring!
I owe a longer post, and will be back soon. Just wanted to make sure that no one doubts I'm sticking with it.
xo, Biblio
155/143/128
Monday, July 4, 2011
Avoiding diabetes; avoiding sabotage
My mother has diabetes. I can't recall if I've mentioned that here before or not, but that diagnosis has definitely been a big part of my motivation to lose weight. It sounds silly, but losing weight "just" to look/feel better struck me as too selfish, too superficial (thank goodness, I am learning to change my mind about that: I realize now that that is no "just"!). But losing weight to be healthy and avoid disease seems very reasonable. Although my mother is actually pretty healthy and not insulin-dependent, the idea of the disease itself nonetheless terrifies me, and I absolutely DO NOT WANT TO GET IT. I am aware that my severe hypoglycemia might well be a precursor, that several relatives besides my mother have diabetes, that biology is not on my side, and so I am extremely motivated to do everything in my power to not let it happen.
So far, I have been somewhat private about my weight loss with my family for several personal reasons: above all, there has been a lot of weird competition and jealousy there, and it makes me very uncomfortable. I've always been thinner/healthier/more health-focused than my mom or sister, and when I am thin, I definitely feel the tension with them. At the same time, my parents do believe in taking care of oneself, and are big proponents of the gym, etc. So I made a calculated decision to tell them I was working out a lot, trying to take care of myself, but NOT mentioning Weight Watchers. I simply didn't want my progress losing weight to be so squarely on their radar, to be commented on and called attention to. I want more privacy in the process. It feels safer, easier; for now, at least, I am only telling people whom it is not complicated and fraught to tell (makes sense, no?). When I visited a few weeks ago, they both commented that I was losing weight, and I just smiled and said thanks. I didn't mention Weight Watchers, I didn't even mention dieting. I just said I was exercising a lot and trying to take care of myself. That I didn't want to get diabetes.
That seemed like a really great choice, and I'm sticking with it. But something else funny happened; I noticed that every time I said I wanted to avoid getting diabetes, my mother said "or forestall it." It really got under my skin. And she has starting changing her own narrative about diabetes, saying that she knew, with our bad family history and health issues, that it was "inevitable" that she would get it. And that likewise, all I could do is try to delay it as long as possible.
And I say: bullshit to that.
I tried and tried to figure out how to deal with this, because I find such messages incredibly undermining and sabotaging. Obviously, I do not have total control over the universe. Genetics will play the hand that it is going to play. But I am not going to roll over and assume that the best I can do is forestall the inevitable. Instead, I am determined to NOT get this disease, and to take every human step I can take to not get it. But I also wanted to address the negative message, in a loving way, to get her on my side. So I wrote this email:
"I also want to thank you for rooting me on with all the healthy changes I'm making. I've been doing some research, specifically into 'how not to get diabetes,' and want to tell you the wonderful news that it is by no means certain that I will get this disease. According to diabetes.org, 'In general, if you have type 2 diabetes, the risk of your child getting diabetes is 1 in 7 if you were diagnosed before age 50 and 1 in 13 if you were diagnosed after age 50.' I think I can beat those odds, and am absolutely determined to make all the lifestyle changes I need to make to make that happen. So let's not talk about merely forestalling, but preventing! That's my wholehearted aim. (Obviously, I can't control the universe, but heck almighty if I'm not going to do my part)."
It felt extremely good to send it. And how could she not respond positively? And indeed, she sent an incredibly encouraging email back, saying she was delighted to hear those statistics and glad I was doing all I can to prevent diabetes.
So delighted--a big non-scale victory: how to turn a place of potential sabotage (however unconscious or even however well-intended) into a place of support!
Friday, July 1, 2011
Five Things
From the WW website: "List five things you’re doing now that you weren’t doing a month ago. Perhaps you’re walking 15 minutes longer, taking the stairs or drinking water. It’s all good. Recognize the positive things you’re doing instead of focusing on what you don’t feel are going so well."
Things happen to be going great. But it is wonderful to remind oneself of everything that is already changing along the way.
1) I ate very well before I joined WW. But now I am eating WONDERFULLY. I can't believe how radiant and alive I am feeling on a whole foods diet (not quite 100%, but very, very close: increasingly infrequent protein powder and increasingly infrequent vegan meat products are almost the only exception). Really and truly, I feel newly focused on all the incredible food I am putting *in* my body, not the food I am "denying" my body. What an epiphany.
2) I am exercising 5-6 days a week, and generally walking more and being more active even on my "rest" days. It is joyful to feel so alive in my body again! I can run for a half-hour nonstop now! (That may not sound like much to you, but to me, it is huge). I rode my bike for 20 miles! I am very excited to think about all my body is doing and will be able to do as I continue down this path. I'm starting to think big thoughts.
3) I am fitting into some of my size 6 clothes again! Just a few more pounds and I will fit into most of them.
4) I have cut way, way back on caffeine. I had been drinking 3 cups a day. I'm now down to 3/4 cup. This is perhaps the single best thing I can do to stop overstimulating my adrenal glands, and ceasing to overstimulate my adrenal glands means less stress/anxiety and better blood sugar management, which also means less overeating to compensate for blood sugar crashes. Hooray!
5) I'm taking my vitamins. I still don't take them every day. There are so many of them I feel like I *should* take for general health and for blood sugar management that sometimes I get overwhelmed by it. But I am taking them pretty consistently 4 or 5 days a week, and it is much more on my radar as a thing I really need to do. And guess how often I took them before WW? Zero times a week!
6) I need to add this. It's not a separate thing I'm doing, but it is a result of 1-5: I am getting close to being in my healthy weight range, and I have made myself less likely, maybe even much less likely, to get diabetes and a whole panoply of other diseases. This one is HUGELY motivating for me!
This was a helpful exercise. I'm not at goal (yet), I'm not a size 4 (yet), I have more positive changes to make. But I truly have transformed my life in only two months. And I am never going back.
Things happen to be going great. But it is wonderful to remind oneself of everything that is already changing along the way.
1) I ate very well before I joined WW. But now I am eating WONDERFULLY. I can't believe how radiant and alive I am feeling on a whole foods diet (not quite 100%, but very, very close: increasingly infrequent protein powder and increasingly infrequent vegan meat products are almost the only exception). Really and truly, I feel newly focused on all the incredible food I am putting *in* my body, not the food I am "denying" my body. What an epiphany.
2) I am exercising 5-6 days a week, and generally walking more and being more active even on my "rest" days. It is joyful to feel so alive in my body again! I can run for a half-hour nonstop now! (That may not sound like much to you, but to me, it is huge). I rode my bike for 20 miles! I am very excited to think about all my body is doing and will be able to do as I continue down this path. I'm starting to think big thoughts.
3) I am fitting into some of my size 6 clothes again! Just a few more pounds and I will fit into most of them.
4) I have cut way, way back on caffeine. I had been drinking 3 cups a day. I'm now down to 3/4 cup. This is perhaps the single best thing I can do to stop overstimulating my adrenal glands, and ceasing to overstimulate my adrenal glands means less stress/anxiety and better blood sugar management, which also means less overeating to compensate for blood sugar crashes. Hooray!
5) I'm taking my vitamins. I still don't take them every day. There are so many of them I feel like I *should* take for general health and for blood sugar management that sometimes I get overwhelmed by it. But I am taking them pretty consistently 4 or 5 days a week, and it is much more on my radar as a thing I really need to do. And guess how often I took them before WW? Zero times a week!
6) I need to add this. It's not a separate thing I'm doing, but it is a result of 1-5: I am getting close to being in my healthy weight range, and I have made myself less likely, maybe even much less likely, to get diabetes and a whole panoply of other diseases. This one is HUGELY motivating for me!
This was a helpful exercise. I'm not at goal (yet), I'm not a size 4 (yet), I have more positive changes to make. But I truly have transformed my life in only two months. And I am never going back.
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
7 week weigh in
It's been 7 weeks since I started Weight Watchers, and today was a thrilling weigh-in day!
* I've lost 10 pounds
* Which means I've met my 5% goal
* And also puts me at the halfway point for my goal
May 11, 2011: 154.6
June 28, 2011: 144.6
Goal weight: 134*
I think this is my goal weight, but I might adjust it down to 130 later. I want to see how I feel as I go along.
* I've lost 10 pounds
* Which means I've met my 5% goal
* And also puts me at the halfway point for my goal
May 11, 2011: 154.6
June 28, 2011: 144.6
Goal weight: 134*
I think this is my goal weight, but I might adjust it down to 130 later. I want to see how I feel as I go along.
What TO eat: Breakfast edition
Breakfast: the most important meal of the day. This may be true for everyone, but it is the most especially and most urgently true for the hypoglycemic. The magic pill for most of us is to keep our blood sugar steady, which means eating frequently--as often as 6 times a day--and eating meals that contain the right balance of protein, fiber, fat, and carbohydrates. It also means eating as soon as possible after what is, after all, at least an 8 hour fast every night (many hypoglycemics find a benefit from having even a 100-calorie snack right before bed, to minimize the number of fasting hours). This advice--eat 5-6 meals a day, consider a small snack before bed, eat a generous breakfast very soon after waking, eat fat at every meal--all of this seems counter-intuitive to a weight watcher. But speaking only for myself, by eating every 2-3 hours, I essentially do for myself the work that my pancreas and adrenal glands (the major sugar regulatory system) can't seem to do for themselves: i.e. I keep my blood sugar nice and steady. And when my blood sugar is steady, it is 1000 times easier not to overeat, and not to set off the terrible chain link reaction that happens to your body and your metabolism when your blood sugar falls.
So one of the things I want to say to my fellow weight-watching hypoglycemics is: don't be afraid to eat! I have eaten 5-6 times a day every day I've been on Weight Watchers, and I have lost weight every week.
I think one problem that hypoglycemics can get into while dieting is the desire not to "waste" their calories/points on breakfast. Again, I urge you to try--do it as an experiment for a week if you're not sold--to eat a great, full breakfast. Weight Watchers, I mean a 7-8 point breakfast, not the measly 3 point nonsense a lot of people force themselves to live on!
So here are some sample hypoglycemic-friendly breakfast meals. I'm listing them in approximate order of how frequently I eat them. I eat some variation of the fage yogurt breakfast about 4-5 times/week:
1) One cup of 2% Fage or other Greek yogurt (hypoglycemics need a little fat!), 2 tablespoons wheat germ, 1 cup mixed berries, 1 Tbsp. chopped almonds or walnuts. Sometimes I also add a quarter cup of uncooked rolled oats--just sprinkle them on with the wheat germ.
Another, perhaps even healthier option, is to have 0% fat Greek yogurt (dairy fat is saturated fat, after all), but include closer to 2 Tbsp. of nuts. If fruit is hard for you to handle in the morning (as it used to be for me: I'm still amazed I can eat it--but again, only with enough protein and fat!), then skip it and have the rolled oats. You can have your fruit later in the day, when it's easier to process.
Add other nutritional supplements (spirulina, flax seeds, etc.) as you like.
2) Omelette. The options are endless. My base is usually (a) two whole eggs plus two egg whites [5 points] or (b) one whole egg and three egg whites [4 points]. There is more cholesterol, but also more protein, in the whole egg, so you have to decide what's best for you. I then add 1/2 to 1 oz. of a really tasty cheese (gruyere, blue, goat) for a maximum of flavor. Then load up on veggies: red onion, mushroom, arugula, peppers, whatever you love. You can add a piece of toast or 1/4 oatmeal or veggie sausage and some fruit and still keep the meal at 8 points.
3) Smoothie. Soy milk, protein powder, spirulina, fruit, a glob of fage, sometimes a dab of almond or peanut butter. The plus: quick and easy. The negative: protein powder is not a whole food. But making this is a hundred times better than skipping breakfast.
4) Tofu scramble. With onions, mushrooms, veggies, and add a couple of tablespoons of nutritional yeast. Serve with some fruit.
5) Cottage cheese. With all the stuff you put on your fage.
6) Optimum slim cereal. This is about as whole foods and high protein as a processed cereal can get. Add soy milk, wheat germ, fruit, and a dozen almonds.
7) English breakfast. Sometimes we like to do a variation on the traditional British breakfast. Beans, toast, pan fried tomatoes, vegetarian sausage, one fried egg. Fun and yummy. I even put marmite on the toast.
ONE LAST THOUGHT ON PROTEIN:
Keep track. If you are suffering from hypoglyemic symptoms, try experimenting with different quantities of protein in the morning, and journal how you feel. If you follow this diligently for a few weeks, you should be able to determine exactly (I mean, to the gram!) how much protein you genuinely need in the morning. Through a lot of trial and error, I have learned that 20-24 grams of protein = happy me, and less than 20, or lord help me less than 16 = miserable me. Your mileage may vary.
TWO THOUGHTS ON BEVERAGES:
*** Drink less coffee. As important as all the other breakfast advice, maybe more so, is to cut way down on your caffeine consumption. Coffee overstimulates your adrenal glands. Need I say more?
*** Skip the juice. Human bodies are made to eat, not drink, their calories. I realize that I break this rule with my smoothie. But fruit juice is particularly hard for a hypoglycemic to handle. I adore fresh squeezed orange juice and grapefruit juice, so I have it on rare occasion: but only 2 oz., and only after I've eaten my protein.
All these meals come in at about 6-9 points, depending on how I load them up. They all also contain a balance of protein, fiber, fat, and carb that really works for my body. It took a lot of trial and error to figure it out, but now I know how many grams of protein, and how much fat and fiber, I really need at each meal in order to be OK. If you are having trouble with your weight loss and/or your hypoglycemia, see if the bigger breakfast can work for you too!
So one of the things I want to say to my fellow weight-watching hypoglycemics is: don't be afraid to eat! I have eaten 5-6 times a day every day I've been on Weight Watchers, and I have lost weight every week.
I think one problem that hypoglycemics can get into while dieting is the desire not to "waste" their calories/points on breakfast. Again, I urge you to try--do it as an experiment for a week if you're not sold--to eat a great, full breakfast. Weight Watchers, I mean a 7-8 point breakfast, not the measly 3 point nonsense a lot of people force themselves to live on!
So here are some sample hypoglycemic-friendly breakfast meals. I'm listing them in approximate order of how frequently I eat them. I eat some variation of the fage yogurt breakfast about 4-5 times/week:
1) One cup of 2% Fage or other Greek yogurt (hypoglycemics need a little fat!), 2 tablespoons wheat germ, 1 cup mixed berries, 1 Tbsp. chopped almonds or walnuts. Sometimes I also add a quarter cup of uncooked rolled oats--just sprinkle them on with the wheat germ.
Another, perhaps even healthier option, is to have 0% fat Greek yogurt (dairy fat is saturated fat, after all), but include closer to 2 Tbsp. of nuts. If fruit is hard for you to handle in the morning (as it used to be for me: I'm still amazed I can eat it--but again, only with enough protein and fat!), then skip it and have the rolled oats. You can have your fruit later in the day, when it's easier to process.
Add other nutritional supplements (spirulina, flax seeds, etc.) as you like.
2) Omelette. The options are endless. My base is usually (a) two whole eggs plus two egg whites [5 points] or (b) one whole egg and three egg whites [4 points]. There is more cholesterol, but also more protein, in the whole egg, so you have to decide what's best for you. I then add 1/2 to 1 oz. of a really tasty cheese (gruyere, blue, goat) for a maximum of flavor. Then load up on veggies: red onion, mushroom, arugula, peppers, whatever you love. You can add a piece of toast or 1/4 oatmeal or veggie sausage and some fruit and still keep the meal at 8 points.
3) Smoothie. Soy milk, protein powder, spirulina, fruit, a glob of fage, sometimes a dab of almond or peanut butter. The plus: quick and easy. The negative: protein powder is not a whole food. But making this is a hundred times better than skipping breakfast.
4) Tofu scramble. With onions, mushrooms, veggies, and add a couple of tablespoons of nutritional yeast. Serve with some fruit.
5) Cottage cheese. With all the stuff you put on your fage.
6) Optimum slim cereal. This is about as whole foods and high protein as a processed cereal can get. Add soy milk, wheat germ, fruit, and a dozen almonds.
7) English breakfast. Sometimes we like to do a variation on the traditional British breakfast. Beans, toast, pan fried tomatoes, vegetarian sausage, one fried egg. Fun and yummy. I even put marmite on the toast.
ONE LAST THOUGHT ON PROTEIN:
Keep track. If you are suffering from hypoglyemic symptoms, try experimenting with different quantities of protein in the morning, and journal how you feel. If you follow this diligently for a few weeks, you should be able to determine exactly (I mean, to the gram!) how much protein you genuinely need in the morning. Through a lot of trial and error, I have learned that 20-24 grams of protein = happy me, and less than 20, or lord help me less than 16 = miserable me. Your mileage may vary.
TWO THOUGHTS ON BEVERAGES:
*** Drink less coffee. As important as all the other breakfast advice, maybe more so, is to cut way down on your caffeine consumption. Coffee overstimulates your adrenal glands. Need I say more?
*** Skip the juice. Human bodies are made to eat, not drink, their calories. I realize that I break this rule with my smoothie. But fruit juice is particularly hard for a hypoglycemic to handle. I adore fresh squeezed orange juice and grapefruit juice, so I have it on rare occasion: but only 2 oz., and only after I've eaten my protein.
All these meals come in at about 6-9 points, depending on how I load them up. They all also contain a balance of protein, fiber, fat, and carb that really works for my body. It took a lot of trial and error to figure it out, but now I know how many grams of protein, and how much fat and fiber, I really need at each meal in order to be OK. If you are having trouble with your weight loss and/or your hypoglycemia, see if the bigger breakfast can work for you too!
Friday, June 24, 2011
Page a day, pound a week
You know, this incremental weight loss, which I feared so impossible just weeks ago, really feels manageable now. I feel that it is now just a matter of consistency, commitment, and gradualism. I'm not trying to lose 10 pounds in a week. But I am trying to lose 10 pounds in 10 weeks. One week at a time. One pound at a time. This feels so much less scary and overwhelming than looking in the mirror and discovering: no! I'm 20 pounds overweight! How will I ever lose 20 pounds? I forget where I read this, but it really makes sense now: I will just lose one pound. But I will do it 20 times.
Since this seems to be working and making so much sense, I'm going to apply this to another area of my life, too. I'm an academic, so the main thing I have to do in the summer, besides prep the next year's courses, is research and WRITE. And I can sometimes feel overwhelmed by how much I need to write. Among other things (several articles, reviews, encyclopedia entries, etc.) I have to write a book. How will I ever write a book??
Now I know! I will write one page. I will just do it many (many) times.
So, starting today, instead of binge writing in fits and starts, I'm going to try writing a page a day. If it blossoms into more writing, wonderful. But every day I only have to write one page (good cop)!
And every day I HAVE to write one page (bad cop)!
Since this seems to be working and making so much sense, I'm going to apply this to another area of my life, too. I'm an academic, so the main thing I have to do in the summer, besides prep the next year's courses, is research and WRITE. And I can sometimes feel overwhelmed by how much I need to write. Among other things (several articles, reviews, encyclopedia entries, etc.) I have to write a book. How will I ever write a book??
Now I know! I will write one page. I will just do it many (many) times.
So, starting today, instead of binge writing in fits and starts, I'm going to try writing a page a day. If it blossoms into more writing, wonderful. But every day I only have to write one page (good cop)!
And every day I HAVE to write one page (bad cop)!
Thursday, June 23, 2011
A calorie is indeed not a calorie
What was I saying just yesterday? Although the title of this piece would seem incredibly self-evident ("To avoid middle-age weight gain, drop the chips and hot dogs"), their findings are fascinatingly specific about the ways in which a calorie is not a calorie:
Some specifics:
**"Those with a taste for certain unhealthy foods packed on pounds faster, however. Eating one serving of potato chips per day was associated with an extra 1.7 pounds every four years, while a daily serving of french fries was associated with an extra 3.4 pounds. And each daily serving of soda, processed meat, and red meat was associated with about 1 extra pound."
** "On the other hand, some foods appeared to fight weight gain. For each daily serving of yogurt they ate, the study participants gained about 0.8 fewer pounds than expected, and for each daily serving of fruit and nuts, they gained about half a pound less over each four-year period."
And speaking of yogurt, fruit, and nuts, I'll be back soon to tell you about great breakfast foods for hypoglycemics.
Some specifics:
**"Those with a taste for certain unhealthy foods packed on pounds faster, however. Eating one serving of potato chips per day was associated with an extra 1.7 pounds every four years, while a daily serving of french fries was associated with an extra 3.4 pounds. And each daily serving of soda, processed meat, and red meat was associated with about 1 extra pound."
** "On the other hand, some foods appeared to fight weight gain. For each daily serving of yogurt they ate, the study participants gained about 0.8 fewer pounds than expected, and for each daily serving of fruit and nuts, they gained about half a pound less over each four-year period."
And speaking of yogurt, fruit, and nuts, I'll be back soon to tell you about great breakfast foods for hypoglycemics.
Wednesday, June 22, 2011
What (not) to eat
I am delighted with my membership at Weight Watchers. I am slowly and steadily losing weight (average 1.1 pounds/week); having a weekly place to weigh in and chat with people is helpful and motivating; the website and iphone app are terrific; and the points system is easy to learn and to use. But since Weight Watchers is essentially just a portion control plan, people use a very wide variety of paths to get to their daily allotment of points. If you follow their good health guidelines (which, though proprietary, accord with USDA recommendations: e.g. make sure to have at least 5 servings of fruit/veggies), then you will at least get some whole foods in your diets. But I've also heard all sorts of cockamamie suggestions for what to eat. I mostly bite my tongue because I'm not the leader, I'm not there to proselytize, and I know that not everyone is ready to lose weight and eat whole food. Still, some of bad advice I hear bandied about in meetings amazes me.
For example, at WW meetings you may well hear suggestions about eating (low points foods) at McDonald's. You might well be encouraged to eat (low point quantities) of highly processed, packaged foods--indeed, quite a few of them are sold by the WW corporation itself! I've even attended a meeting with a leader who told us that she eats ice cream (in a low point quantity) every night.
So I need to say it here because I can't really say it in the meeting: "a point is a point" is just as much of a lie as "a calorie is a calorie"! Yes, from the weight loss perspective, it's very simple: create a calorie deficit, and you will lose weight. But if what you are trying to do is not just lose weight, but make positive lifestyle changes, prevent disease, and create for yourself a glowing state of health, then you need to do more than just eat less. You also need... and I'm going to tell you the big secret, so hold on tight...
You also need to EAT *FOOD*. Not--to borrow Michael Pollan's parlance--"edible food-like substances." But actual food. Eating a 2 point diet bar/protein bar/snack package/pick your laboratory-concocted food-like substance is not the same thing as eating a 2 point serving of actual food. And if you are diabetic or hypoglycemic, or if you want to avoid being one of these things, then for goulash's sake you need to eat meals made with whole foods in a reasonably balanced proportion of macro-nutrients. No one on earth is going to tell me that an avocado isn't healthier than some lower-point laboratory-concocted chemical cocktail that contains fat-simulating flavors. NO NO NO NO!
Now, in WW's defense, the point system does to a large extent take care of all this. If a food is higher in fiber or protein, it is lower in points (e.g. caloric impact) than a food high in fat or poor carbs (another food that is badly misunderstood: all carbs are not created equal, but more on that another time). So you are rewarded with lower points for a meal of garbanzo beans and green peppers than a meal of pork and tortilla chips. But the WW folks are not thinking about your blood sugar. The folks at WW also want to sell more 2-point snack bars of food-like substances. And so those of us who are hypoglycemic or diabetic must essentially follow two plans at once: mobilizing all the good health guidelines for blood sugar stability through the points system. This isn't nearly as hard as it sounds, but it does require tweaking the system in a few common-sense ways. For example: eating a filling, high-protein and high-fiber nutritious breakfast, rather than squeaking by on an English muffin and an egg-white and saving your points for that late-night ice cream. And: following the glycemic index carefully--e.g. don't munch down on high-glycemic foods that have low WW points (e.g. carrots), or only do so if you pair those foods with enough fat and protein to mitigate the high-glycemic impact. That stack of carrots might be a "diet" food for someone else, but it's only going to trigger a blood sugar crash in me.
In future posts I'm going to speak a little more extensively about what I am eating, and how I've modified my whole foods diet to work on the WW program, as well as how I'm tweaking the WW program when necessary to prioritize whole foods, low-glycemic eating. First up: breakfast.
For example, at WW meetings you may well hear suggestions about eating (low points foods) at McDonald's. You might well be encouraged to eat (low point quantities) of highly processed, packaged foods--indeed, quite a few of them are sold by the WW corporation itself! I've even attended a meeting with a leader who told us that she eats ice cream (in a low point quantity) every night.
So I need to say it here because I can't really say it in the meeting: "a point is a point" is just as much of a lie as "a calorie is a calorie"! Yes, from the weight loss perspective, it's very simple: create a calorie deficit, and you will lose weight. But if what you are trying to do is not just lose weight, but make positive lifestyle changes, prevent disease, and create for yourself a glowing state of health, then you need to do more than just eat less. You also need... and I'm going to tell you the big secret, so hold on tight...
You also need to EAT *FOOD*. Not--to borrow Michael Pollan's parlance--"edible food-like substances." But actual food. Eating a 2 point diet bar/protein bar/snack package/pick your laboratory-concocted food-like substance is not the same thing as eating a 2 point serving of actual food. And if you are diabetic or hypoglycemic, or if you want to avoid being one of these things, then for goulash's sake you need to eat meals made with whole foods in a reasonably balanced proportion of macro-nutrients. No one on earth is going to tell me that an avocado isn't healthier than some lower-point laboratory-concocted chemical cocktail that contains fat-simulating flavors. NO NO NO NO!
Now, in WW's defense, the point system does to a large extent take care of all this. If a food is higher in fiber or protein, it is lower in points (e.g. caloric impact) than a food high in fat or poor carbs (another food that is badly misunderstood: all carbs are not created equal, but more on that another time). So you are rewarded with lower points for a meal of garbanzo beans and green peppers than a meal of pork and tortilla chips. But the WW folks are not thinking about your blood sugar. The folks at WW also want to sell more 2-point snack bars of food-like substances. And so those of us who are hypoglycemic or diabetic must essentially follow two plans at once: mobilizing all the good health guidelines for blood sugar stability through the points system. This isn't nearly as hard as it sounds, but it does require tweaking the system in a few common-sense ways. For example: eating a filling, high-protein and high-fiber nutritious breakfast, rather than squeaking by on an English muffin and an egg-white and saving your points for that late-night ice cream. And: following the glycemic index carefully--e.g. don't munch down on high-glycemic foods that have low WW points (e.g. carrots), or only do so if you pair those foods with enough fat and protein to mitigate the high-glycemic impact. That stack of carrots might be a "diet" food for someone else, but it's only going to trigger a blood sugar crash in me.
In future posts I'm going to speak a little more extensively about what I am eating, and how I've modified my whole foods diet to work on the WW program, as well as how I'm tweaking the WW program when necessary to prioritize whole foods, low-glycemic eating. First up: breakfast.
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
Benefits of a bad workout
I had a pretty crappy workout yesterday. We'd driven home after a long weekend out of town, and had stayed up too late, driven too long, and faced too many errands when we returned for me to put my all into it at the gym. I thought about not going at all, because what, I thought, was really the point. I had a half hour in me at most, and it seemed silly to bother.
But I got my butt over the gym, and did a half hour of lackluster exercise. I'd be shocked if I burned two points, though the bike machine recorded 150 calories. Whoop. I even drove to the gym--a 10 minute walk away (I don't usually count the activity points of that walk or other minor activity--I just do it because I should!). And unlike some other occasions on which I've not been in the mood, dragged myself to the gym anyway, and then found myself having a great workout, this was decidedly NOT, let me repeat, a great workout. I didn't wind up pushing myself harder than expected. I didn't wind up adding extra time. I didn't wind out doing a bit of lifting while I was there. I didn't even do any stretching. I just sat down on the bike machine with a magazine, pedaled for a half hour, and drove back home.
But I am so, so glad I went.
Why? Because I have learned that for me, if I stop, if I have reasons not to go, then there will always be reasons not to go. There will always be work to do, or tiredness, or some other reason. But if reasons never even enter into it, then it's just what I do. It's who I am. I don't negotiate with myself about whether today is a day I will brush my teeth or walk my dogs. These things are not optional; they are just what I do. I suppose this is a more loving way of thinking about what it means to "just do it," which has always sounded a bit hostile (stop being a whiner!) to me. I think what it means, for me, is that "it is just what I do."
I was thinking last night as I pedaled: this is not a love affair. This is a marriage. And therefore you show up every day, and bring the best you have to the table, even if what you have that day is not very much. You don't say: I'm not feeling it today, so I'm not coming home tonight. No, you bring yourself everyday, hopefully usually with a whole heart and lots of energy, but with whatever heart and energy you've got.
Best of all, doing so means that it's easier to keep doing so, to show up the next day with that heart and energy, because you didn't let yourself down the day before. If I hadn't gone yesterday, I would have felt frustrated and ashamed today, and that shame and frustration is NOT motivating: instead, it causes hiding behavior. Shirking behavior. But by showing up, I was true to myself and my goals, and that makes it easier to be true to them today--when I have some energy back, and am ready to put in a kick-ass workout!
But I got my butt over the gym, and did a half hour of lackluster exercise. I'd be shocked if I burned two points, though the bike machine recorded 150 calories. Whoop. I even drove to the gym--a 10 minute walk away (I don't usually count the activity points of that walk or other minor activity--I just do it because I should!). And unlike some other occasions on which I've not been in the mood, dragged myself to the gym anyway, and then found myself having a great workout, this was decidedly NOT, let me repeat, a great workout. I didn't wind up pushing myself harder than expected. I didn't wind up adding extra time. I didn't wind out doing a bit of lifting while I was there. I didn't even do any stretching. I just sat down on the bike machine with a magazine, pedaled for a half hour, and drove back home.
But I am so, so glad I went.
Why? Because I have learned that for me, if I stop, if I have reasons not to go, then there will always be reasons not to go. There will always be work to do, or tiredness, or some other reason. But if reasons never even enter into it, then it's just what I do. It's who I am. I don't negotiate with myself about whether today is a day I will brush my teeth or walk my dogs. These things are not optional; they are just what I do. I suppose this is a more loving way of thinking about what it means to "just do it," which has always sounded a bit hostile (stop being a whiner!) to me. I think what it means, for me, is that "it is just what I do."
I was thinking last night as I pedaled: this is not a love affair. This is a marriage. And therefore you show up every day, and bring the best you have to the table, even if what you have that day is not very much. You don't say: I'm not feeling it today, so I'm not coming home tonight. No, you bring yourself everyday, hopefully usually with a whole heart and lots of energy, but with whatever heart and energy you've got.
Best of all, doing so means that it's easier to keep doing so, to show up the next day with that heart and energy, because you didn't let yourself down the day before. If I hadn't gone yesterday, I would have felt frustrated and ashamed today, and that shame and frustration is NOT motivating: instead, it causes hiding behavior. Shirking behavior. But by showing up, I was true to myself and my goals, and that makes it easier to be true to them today--when I have some energy back, and am ready to put in a kick-ass workout!
Wednesday, June 15, 2011
On weight loss and identity (Or: how I quit smoking)
Yesterday I wrote a bit about the reframing that is required in becoming a thin (or not overweight) person. In the past, substantial weight loss has always required this for me: trying to get a new handle on who I am, who I am in the world, and how my relationship and even identity shift as a result of being "thin person." You wouldn't think such a thing would be existential. It's just more or fewer pounds. But in my experience, it really is: it changes your sense of your own being, and certainly the way others treat you, significantly enough that actual identity is caught up in the transition. I mentioned that in the past this has always been a bit of a stumbling block for me. I can lose the weight. But can I live being an existentially thin person? That seems to require a whole other set of skills, and I'm not sure I can get them from a commercial diet site. I have to learn how to occupy that version of my identity.
I've been thinking about this in terms of how I quit smoking, many years ago. My guess is that I may be the only person on earth who quit smoking this way, but perhaps you have parallels to draw on of your own. For me, it was a two part process. And the first really had to do with this: rethinking my identity. I identified as a smoker. This was over 20 years ago now, but basically it had to do with all those silly things I had been advertised into believing: that smoking was a counter-cultural gesture, that it made me a bad-ass, that it enabled me a certain kind of freedom (there is so much about life I can't control. But I can have a cigarette any time I want!). I really connected to those things. And I realized that to quit smoking, I would have to do more than break the habit, survive the withdrawal symptoms, and learn other coping mechanisms for stress. I realized I also had to stop identifying as a smoker.
And that's what I did. I began thinking about all the aspects of my identity that countered that smoker's identity. What was it about me that was, existentially, a non-smoking person? And so I identified all of the things that correlated with a non-smoker's identity, such as my vegetarianism, my love of hiking, my anti-corporate feelings (why give money to a rich corporation whose sole raison d'etre was to addict me to their poison?), etc. And I focused on this identity with a genuine intensity, told myself repeatedly this version of the story of who I was. And in becoming her, thinking as her, I found what I needed to make the transition psychologically. Three weeks of withdrawal symptoms? Shrug. You just tough it out. I had to BECOME a non-smoker. So that's what I did.
So what does it take to become a thin person? What aspects of my identity or self-perception are wrapped up in being an overweight person, and can I let some of them go? For example, I have often offered up this justification that I can't be bothered to spend time at the gym working on my body because, you know, as an intellectual person I'm above all that. I have more important ways to spend my time than perfecting X muscle or maintaining Y weight. And while this is true in some abstract sense, that Dostoevsky is more important than deltoids, this way of framing it is also a partial truth, indeed a deception. Because the time I spend to make my body healthy is not just decorative. It makes me radiant with life, energy, confidence, optimism--and these things most certainly are as important as Dostoevsky! So I have to tell myself the new, truer narratives about these things, and most of all, locate those parts of myself that identify as a person who seeks radiant health, life, etc. For me, I think I can likewise draw too on those strategies that worked for me when quitting smoking over two decades ago. For example: do I want to be one of those ordinary fat entitled Americans (not to pick on my countrymen--there are fat people everywhere--but with 2/3 of our population overweight, we certainly have an international reputation as a culture of fatness). Do I identify with that?? Good God no! So I have to root out those self-justifications and habits that cause me to be identified as this, when I am not actively choosing it.
Thin Bibliogrrl is not just an intellectual. She is also a radiantly alive person, an optimistic and confident person. Thin Bibliogrrl has enormous amounts of energy. Thin Bibliogrrl surprises people with her real age because she is so healthy. Thin Bibliogrrl does not make the lazy or easy choices, but eats whole foods, rides her bike instead of driving when possible, does not mindlessly gobble down food or alcohol. Thin Bibliogrrl has a balanced life that is not all work but leaves time for taking care of myself, because taking care of myself means I can be more fully present for all parts of my life. Thin Bibliogrrl is not going to get diabetes like her mother. Thin Bibliogrrl does not wait until tomorrow to do things: she seizes the day with all her heart. Thin Bibliogrrl looks goddamn good in a pencil skirt.
I've been thinking about this in terms of how I quit smoking, many years ago. My guess is that I may be the only person on earth who quit smoking this way, but perhaps you have parallels to draw on of your own. For me, it was a two part process. And the first really had to do with this: rethinking my identity. I identified as a smoker. This was over 20 years ago now, but basically it had to do with all those silly things I had been advertised into believing: that smoking was a counter-cultural gesture, that it made me a bad-ass, that it enabled me a certain kind of freedom (there is so much about life I can't control. But I can have a cigarette any time I want!). I really connected to those things. And I realized that to quit smoking, I would have to do more than break the habit, survive the withdrawal symptoms, and learn other coping mechanisms for stress. I realized I also had to stop identifying as a smoker.
And that's what I did. I began thinking about all the aspects of my identity that countered that smoker's identity. What was it about me that was, existentially, a non-smoking person? And so I identified all of the things that correlated with a non-smoker's identity, such as my vegetarianism, my love of hiking, my anti-corporate feelings (why give money to a rich corporation whose sole raison d'etre was to addict me to their poison?), etc. And I focused on this identity with a genuine intensity, told myself repeatedly this version of the story of who I was. And in becoming her, thinking as her, I found what I needed to make the transition psychologically. Three weeks of withdrawal symptoms? Shrug. You just tough it out. I had to BECOME a non-smoker. So that's what I did.
So what does it take to become a thin person? What aspects of my identity or self-perception are wrapped up in being an overweight person, and can I let some of them go? For example, I have often offered up this justification that I can't be bothered to spend time at the gym working on my body because, you know, as an intellectual person I'm above all that. I have more important ways to spend my time than perfecting X muscle or maintaining Y weight. And while this is true in some abstract sense, that Dostoevsky is more important than deltoids, this way of framing it is also a partial truth, indeed a deception. Because the time I spend to make my body healthy is not just decorative. It makes me radiant with life, energy, confidence, optimism--and these things most certainly are as important as Dostoevsky! So I have to tell myself the new, truer narratives about these things, and most of all, locate those parts of myself that identify as a person who seeks radiant health, life, etc. For me, I think I can likewise draw too on those strategies that worked for me when quitting smoking over two decades ago. For example: do I want to be one of those ordinary fat entitled Americans (not to pick on my countrymen--there are fat people everywhere--but with 2/3 of our population overweight, we certainly have an international reputation as a culture of fatness). Do I identify with that?? Good God no! So I have to root out those self-justifications and habits that cause me to be identified as this, when I am not actively choosing it.
Thin Bibliogrrl is not just an intellectual. She is also a radiantly alive person, an optimistic and confident person. Thin Bibliogrrl has enormous amounts of energy. Thin Bibliogrrl surprises people with her real age because she is so healthy. Thin Bibliogrrl does not make the lazy or easy choices, but eats whole foods, rides her bike instead of driving when possible, does not mindlessly gobble down food or alcohol. Thin Bibliogrrl has a balanced life that is not all work but leaves time for taking care of myself, because taking care of myself means I can be more fully present for all parts of my life. Thin Bibliogrrl is not going to get diabetes like her mother. Thin Bibliogrrl does not wait until tomorrow to do things: she seizes the day with all her heart. Thin Bibliogrrl looks goddamn good in a pencil skirt.
Tuesday, June 14, 2011
Meeting topic: Support System
At a recent WW meeting (two weeks ago?) we talked for quite a while about our support systems, and the meeting leader encouraged us to spend some time thanking all the people who have supported us during our weight loss. She reminded us that when it gets difficult—and it will get difficult—that it will be especially important to lean on those people. And I realized that, truth be told, I had only told two people (!) that I’d joined WW: my sister, who hasn’t brought it up again since, and my partner. I started this blog in hopes of feeling less ashamed about my need to lose 20 pounds, and also to get some of the support on line that I wasn’t sure how to find in person. But I also promised myself I would find someone in person to “come out to” about this. I have lunch with her Wednesday and am going to tell her then. (Hey, I mean to tell other people in time. And soon they’ll spot it. But one step at a time).
I’ve been thinking a lot about this: why all the shame? Being ashamed about being overweight is one thing. I’m not saying one should feel ashamed, but there are certainly a thousand cultural messages that make that shame understandable. But why feel ashamed for trying to lose weight? Why not grab a bullhorn? Well, of course, in part because it casts a spotlight on the attempt and therefore possible failure (I’m not trying to be negative, but hey: we don’t succeed at everything we try in life, and nobody starts their weight loss program certain they will succeed. Though I’m getting more certain every day!). Partly I find I sometimes need to get used to something quietly, privately, and only later let people in on it—not just with this, but all sorts of big changes and decisions. I can be a private person that way. To be honest, then, it’s somewhat reassuring that for the most part my weight loss has so far been invisible to people—well, I do think I’m getting checked out more, and as I mentioned, my partner has noticed—but 7 pounds isn’t so dramatic that the spotlight is on me. I want time to get used to it inside myself, before I let the world and their opinions in. In this sense, weirdly, I’m glad the weight loss doesn’t go any more quickly. One needs time to adjust to one’s new self, pound by pound. How do I inhabit this changing body? How do I occupy a slightly different place on this earth? Who is this me whose form is changing?
OK, so a desire for privacy, space and time to think and adjust. But is there still some shame, some hiding? Yes, for me there is. And over the last few days the “why” has started to come into focus for me, in part because of some thinking I’ve been doing for a long time, and in part because of something I read on my new most favoritest blog ever. Sheryl (aka “bitch cakes”) wrote about one somewhat uncomfortable aspect of reaching goal: people feeling endlessly free to offer unsolicited comments about her body. And boy, do I get that. It’s not just the intrusiveness alone (like her, I’m tattooed; like her, I get very sick of people commenting on them; unlike her, I still love mine!). When she lost her weight, and I can corroborate this from being at goal in the past, not all comments one gets are positive. Some, she observed, are downright passive aggressive, such as the comment that one is too “skinny,” a very charged term, I think. “Don’t lose more weight!” “You’re wasting away!” I’ve heard equally upsetting comments, even at the upper end of my healthy weight range. I even was told once—by a nutritionist—that I had an eating disorder because I was tracking all my food. People, I was glowingly healthy, happily poised around 130-135, and came in to talk about how to safely get down to 125-130—see if there was anything I could fine-tune that would work for me as a hypoglycemic and a vegetarian. I did NOT have, and indeed have never had, an eating disorder. It was a real eye-opener, but it also destabilized me quite a bit, and actually threw me off my eating plan. Very upsetting: I felt more disordered when I left her office than when I went in!! (In her defense, I was a graduate student, and a nutritionist in a college setting must be on the lookout for eating disorders. But I am still flabbergasted about it to this day: I simply had none of the symptoms. Tracking food is not disordered!).
This was a freak thing, but let us be frank, some people do not want you to succeed—either their misperceptions or upbringing or jealousy gets in the way. You know, some people are actually more comfortable if you’re overweight. Because then you are not putting pressure on them to change their lives.
This gets close to the heart of something very real for me that I rarely see talked about: the anxiety of losing solidarity with other overweight women. That there is something traitorous about becoming the thin one, singling yourself out. I think this can work in couples too, where one partner decides on a lifestyle change that the other resists, but in my experience and opinion it is much worse with fellow women. There are, as Mary Gaitskill once said, two girls, fat and thin.
I’ve thought about this a lot, because over the years I’ve become aware of what I can only describe as anxiety when I am at or near my ideal weight. I’ve never been obese: I’ve always kept myself just plump enough (although, over the years, this has crept up from 10 to 15 to 20+ pounds above where I’d like to be). It’s partly anxiety about unwanted attention, but more often that’s merely uncomfortable, not fear inducing. The anxiety, though: well that is more seriously a fear of being shunned in some way. Being one of the thin women. One of them, not one of us.
I am still trying to sort through what all this means for me, and more importantly start developing strategies now, while my weight loss is still hiding in plain site, for dealing with what I fear might be snarky or jealous or edgy comments from some quarters. I’m trying to run through scenarios in my mind, to be prepared. And I’m also trying to talk about it, here and with trusted people in person, so that I can get a hold on it. It puts a new angle on “emotional eating,” doesn’t it?
Anyway, one of the reasons for this blog is to try to find a support system of other like-minded people on line, those truly dedicated to this process, so we can thrill for each other rather than hold each other back. I hope you’ll come with me.
Sheryl at Bitch Cakes, thanks for the enormous inspiration.
Monday, June 13, 2011
First month on Weight Watchers!
Gentle reader, I am happy to be able to look back on my first month on Weight Watchers and tell you that a lot of exciting changes are already happening for me. I SO wish I had started earlier, because the changes are already pretty magical. I don't just mean the weight loss--which I'll get to in a moment--but my attitude, my hopefulness, my general sense of health and energy: it's just gorgeous how different I feel. My beloved is also looking at me... rather approvingly. He has always made me feel loved and desired no matter what, but it's clear that he is liking what I've been doing. I have also had almost no hypoglycemic episodes (though there was one very bad day, and it began, as bad days almost always do for me, with an inadequate breakfast. If I don't start right, I can't seem to get back on track no matter what I do). I have more energy through the day--so much that I am starting to cut back on caffeine. And my skin is clearer! This is all in 4 1/2 weeks!
So, first: I've lost 6.8 pounds. That might not sound like a lot, but I already look and feel so different. I'm only 5'2", so even that amount of weight loss really changes my shape. It's not just the pounds, but also the exercise, because everything is tighter all around. I didn't have the nerve to take measurements before I started, but I obviously have lost at least 2 or 3" off my hips and waist: skirts that were verrrryy tight now fit comfortably, and I'm confidently putting on outfits I'd hid in the back of my closet for too long. And I've gone back to a less cumbersome cup size. My tummy is flatter, my arms are beginning to look sculpted, my face looks thinner... People! In a month!
The thing is, I've lost weight before. I know how to do it. But I somehow had it in my head that it had been too long, that I was too old, that that was no longer available to me. This was the first of many things that I had to reframe. One thing was reminding myself that although my weight has gone up and down, and I've spent a good four or five years now heavier than I want to be, that I've also spent a lot of my adult life thin: that this wasn't a fluke, or only something achieved through a quick diet, but something I have and can again maintain. To figure that out, I started hunting down old pictures, and while I found plenty where I am overweight and uncomfortable, I also found plenty where I am slender and strong. And I realized during those times, the big difference for me was activity level: regular and serious exercise. If I wanted to be thin again, not for a month or a year but for forever, then I realized I needed to start exercising my heart out. The calorie restriction, as I see it, is the extra push to help me undo the damage of over-eating, and obviously I will need to keep a close eye on the eating even after (especially after) I get to maintenance. But the thing that will keep me healthy, slim, radiantly alive is not one more or one less slice of cheese, but EXERCISE.
I come to this maybe from a different place than some people. I'm just speaking about my experience. Obviously I ate too much, since I'm eating less and losing weight. But I have never had a huge snack tooth. I've eaten a mostly whole foods diet most of my adult life. I haven't eaten meat in 28 years. Fried food disgusts me; I almost never touch candy or chips; I don't think I've had more than 6 or 8 cans of soda in all my years on this earth. I'm not an unhealthy eater. But I DO have monstrously challenging hypoglycemia: and when my blood sugar falls, I will eat a car if I have to in order to feel stabilized again.
So I've figured out that the key for weight loss for me, and the key to a healthy lifestyle, is simply this: blood sugar moderation, and exercise.
At some level, it is actually that simple. When blood sugar is stable, there is less of a biological panic driving me to eat. So eating every 3 or even every 2 hour (even just 10 or 12 almonds) keeps me from ever feeling the need to over eat. And guess what else? Exercise is helping to keep my blood sugar stable too.
I'm figuring a lot of things out, and I feel like I'm figuring out the keys to regain and keep the body that I want. It's beautifully disorienting and simple at the same time.
So, first: I've lost 6.8 pounds. That might not sound like a lot, but I already look and feel so different. I'm only 5'2", so even that amount of weight loss really changes my shape. It's not just the pounds, but also the exercise, because everything is tighter all around. I didn't have the nerve to take measurements before I started, but I obviously have lost at least 2 or 3" off my hips and waist: skirts that were verrrryy tight now fit comfortably, and I'm confidently putting on outfits I'd hid in the back of my closet for too long. And I've gone back to a less cumbersome cup size. My tummy is flatter, my arms are beginning to look sculpted, my face looks thinner... People! In a month!
The thing is, I've lost weight before. I know how to do it. But I somehow had it in my head that it had been too long, that I was too old, that that was no longer available to me. This was the first of many things that I had to reframe. One thing was reminding myself that although my weight has gone up and down, and I've spent a good four or five years now heavier than I want to be, that I've also spent a lot of my adult life thin: that this wasn't a fluke, or only something achieved through a quick diet, but something I have and can again maintain. To figure that out, I started hunting down old pictures, and while I found plenty where I am overweight and uncomfortable, I also found plenty where I am slender and strong. And I realized during those times, the big difference for me was activity level: regular and serious exercise. If I wanted to be thin again, not for a month or a year but for forever, then I realized I needed to start exercising my heart out. The calorie restriction, as I see it, is the extra push to help me undo the damage of over-eating, and obviously I will need to keep a close eye on the eating even after (especially after) I get to maintenance. But the thing that will keep me healthy, slim, radiantly alive is not one more or one less slice of cheese, but EXERCISE.
I come to this maybe from a different place than some people. I'm just speaking about my experience. Obviously I ate too much, since I'm eating less and losing weight. But I have never had a huge snack tooth. I've eaten a mostly whole foods diet most of my adult life. I haven't eaten meat in 28 years. Fried food disgusts me; I almost never touch candy or chips; I don't think I've had more than 6 or 8 cans of soda in all my years on this earth. I'm not an unhealthy eater. But I DO have monstrously challenging hypoglycemia: and when my blood sugar falls, I will eat a car if I have to in order to feel stabilized again.
So I've figured out that the key for weight loss for me, and the key to a healthy lifestyle, is simply this: blood sugar moderation, and exercise.
At some level, it is actually that simple. When blood sugar is stable, there is less of a biological panic driving me to eat. So eating every 3 or even every 2 hour (even just 10 or 12 almonds) keeps me from ever feeling the need to over eat. And guess what else? Exercise is helping to keep my blood sugar stable too.
I'm figuring a lot of things out, and I feel like I'm figuring out the keys to regain and keep the body that I want. It's beautifully disorienting and simple at the same time.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Staying on plan while travelling (part 1)
What kind of emergency/supplemental/long road trip foods should weight-watching hypoglycemic mostly-vegetarian take when going out of town? I'm writing you from my splendid vacation among the lakes and islands of northern Michigan--details of the trip to come. But however splendid the trip, I always worry that I won't be able to find "my food," and have developed a list of supplies that are reasonably portable, keep my blood sugar stable, and allow me to have balanced meals (breakfasts are especially urgent for us hypoglycemics--and if you don't eat eggs, or don't want to eat them every day, it can be a real stressor). Here's what went into my collapsible cooler:
Edensoy travel-size soy milk
Fage (keeps pretty well, since it's yogurt)
Almonds, walnuts, peanuts, peanut butter
Rolled oats
Sandwich with tofurkey, veggies, cheese on Ezekiel break
More Ezekiel bread
Strawberries, blackberries (in tupperware)
Blackberries
Pre-made salad (for eating on the road trip itself--won't last)
Shelled edamame
Nutritional yeast (for adding to served foods)
Protein powder (ditto)
Vitamins
For pescetarians: cans of tuna and sardines
What other foods do you bring? I'll write again later about staying on plan while on vacation: what I've eaten, how I've not made myself or my beloved too crazy about what I'm eating, and what a delight to discover I can actually do so!
Edensoy travel-size soy milk
Fage (keeps pretty well, since it's yogurt)
Almonds, walnuts, peanuts, peanut butter
Rolled oats
Sandwich with tofurkey, veggies, cheese on Ezekiel break
More Ezekiel bread
Strawberries, blackberries (in tupperware)
Blackberries
Pre-made salad (for eating on the road trip itself--won't last)
Shelled edamame
Nutritional yeast (for adding to served foods)
Protein powder (ditto)
Vitamins
For pescetarians: cans of tuna and sardines
What other foods do you bring? I'll write again later about staying on plan while on vacation: what I've eaten, how I've not made myself or my beloved too crazy about what I'm eating, and what a delight to discover I can actually do so!
Friday, June 3, 2011
Weight Watcher
If anyone has found me and come back, you'll notice a change (beyond the aesthetics; I did tweak some of the visuals on the blog, and may play around with those a bit more until I'm satisfied): I've expanded the already silly long title of this blog further still in order to add "Weight Watcher." Ridiculous as it might seem, this actually took some courage. I did, it is true, mention in my first post and in my "about me" that I wanted to lose some weight. But I included it almost as a parenthetical, and in fact not in the first draft of either of those items, as it made me flinch to announce it on the blogosphere ("announce" being a little grandiose, since I think only one or two people have found their way here thus far!). It's a measure of the large degree of shame that I can carry around this issue that I find it hard to say even anonymously, and in "real life" I've mentioned it to no one outside a WW meeting except my beloved and my sister. Which makes it clear that it's pretty damn important to say.
Clearly by first mentioning it as an aside, I wanted to make it seem like it's just not that big a deal--yeah, I'm here to write and think about food, and, um, I'm just going to quietly lose this weight on the side. It's so hard to admit that I have to do this--like it's an admission of failure. And to make it worse, I'm reluctant to talk about my attempt to finally lose the weight out fear of... yes, more failure!! I recognize in an abstract/intellectual way that that's a lot of emotional drama to heave onto this process, that it is unhelpful to make the stakes about shame and failure rather than just about... wanting to lose 20 pounds. But I guess there's very rarely a "just" when it comes to weight, is there?
I've spent some of my adult life really healthy and thin, a lot of it just a little bit overweight, some of it more overweight then I really should be. But in general, especially in recent years, I've hovered 15 pounds above where I'd really like to be, pretty consistently. Not catastrophic, maybe just not catastrophic enough to fool myself into thinking I don't have to do anything about it (if you see the logic). But as a person who is only 5'2", those pounds can make a huge difference. I look at pictures of me at my thinnest and my heaviest, and the difference is pretty shocking.
So. I joined Weight Watchers, for the first time ever, on May 11th. I weighed in at 154.6. My last weigh-in was on May 31st, and I was down to 151.4. Three pounds so far, but already more healthy and toned, thanks to working out really consistently.
My goal at this point is to get down to 134, or a 20 pound loss from my start. I do think this is doable. It's at the upper end of what's considered healthy for someone who is 5'2": the BMI charts list up to 137. But I'm pretty muscular, so I think the BMI doesn't tell the whole story for my body. It's hard to say now, but I think that at 134 I'll look pretty good. Remember, in that first photo I'm probably at 127, and I definitely look thin. (So... maybe the invisible ink goal is to get down to 130 or so, but I'll make that call after I hit my first goal!). I'm 42 now, not 30 like I was in that first photo. And I want a goal that I can achieve and above all maintain. One step at a time.
Clearly by first mentioning it as an aside, I wanted to make it seem like it's just not that big a deal--yeah, I'm here to write and think about food, and, um, I'm just going to quietly lose this weight on the side. It's so hard to admit that I have to do this--like it's an admission of failure. And to make it worse, I'm reluctant to talk about my attempt to finally lose the weight out fear of... yes, more failure!! I recognize in an abstract/intellectual way that that's a lot of emotional drama to heave onto this process, that it is unhelpful to make the stakes about shame and failure rather than just about... wanting to lose 20 pounds. But I guess there's very rarely a "just" when it comes to weight, is there?
I've spent some of my adult life really healthy and thin, a lot of it just a little bit overweight, some of it more overweight then I really should be. But in general, especially in recent years, I've hovered 15 pounds above where I'd really like to be, pretty consistently. Not catastrophic, maybe just not catastrophic enough to fool myself into thinking I don't have to do anything about it (if you see the logic). But as a person who is only 5'2", those pounds can make a huge difference. I look at pictures of me at my thinnest and my heaviest, and the difference is pretty shocking.
So. I joined Weight Watchers, for the first time ever, on May 11th. I weighed in at 154.6. My last weigh-in was on May 31st, and I was down to 151.4. Three pounds so far, but already more healthy and toned, thanks to working out really consistently.
My goal at this point is to get down to 134, or a 20 pound loss from my start. I do think this is doable. It's at the upper end of what's considered healthy for someone who is 5'2": the BMI charts list up to 137. But I'm pretty muscular, so I think the BMI doesn't tell the whole story for my body. It's hard to say now, but I think that at 134 I'll look pretty good. Remember, in that first photo I'm probably at 127, and I definitely look thin. (So... maybe the invisible ink goal is to get down to 130 or so, but I'll make that call after I hit my first goal!). I'm 42 now, not 30 like I was in that first photo. And I want a goal that I can achieve and above all maintain. One step at a time.
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
Introductory
One night when I was 14, my little sister asked my parents what that "red stuff" on our dinner plates was. My father flinched and said gently that it was blood. At that moment I had The Epiphany, and the abstraction in front of me suddenly resolved into muscle, bone, blood, and tendon: a dead animal, my dinner. I had never really let myself think about it before. I was horrified. I put my fork down triumphantly and announced, "I will never eat this again." That was 28 years ago, and I never have, but certainly nothing about that choice has ever been as simple as the pronouncement itself.
For one thing, I was initially so oblivious--in my defense, I was in eighth grade--that it took a few weeks to grok for that the "this" I was eschewing also included bologna and pepperoni, not just steak. I wasn't avoiding it; I just didn't actually make the connection. The cognitive category of "meat" only gradually came into focus, and as it did, I eliminated more items from my diet, and meanwhile learned how to find, prepare, and eat new ones (more about this later). When I was 15, I stopped eating chicken; the next year, fish. Some years later I stopped eating dairy, then started again, then stopped, then started (repeat), ultimately settling on a limited number of the most nutritionally-dense, delicious, and ethical dairy products, these criteria rarely appearing all at once. Greek yogurt and condiment-sized portions of cheese are staples; eggs I cook until burnt and still kind of have to choke down, but they are a good go-to especially when traveling or eating out (pancakes at brunch are not exactly an option for a hypoglycemic). I keep the quantities as limited as possible, and some things I've never reintroduced: milk is in some of the food I eat in restaurants, of course, but I haven't had a glass of the stuff in that same 28 years. I'm guess I'm still something of a wannabe vegan, though I fear it's not possible for this body, at least not now, and so I struggle to maintain some reasonable compromise.
As I got older and my hypoglycemia symptoms became more severe--including several terrifying experiences of blacking out altogether--I gradually, with a lot of angst and internal conflict, reintroduced occasional fish. After all the ups and downs, a casual observer might therefore see little difference between how I ate at 15 and how I eat at 42. But however similar it might look superficially, a lot of very noisy thinking has gone on inside, along with countless small-but-laden changes.
For example, my reasons for being a vegetarian (and I'm going to use this as shorthand; I recognize that this will horrify some people, but surely 95% of the calories I eat are vegetarian) have changed over the years. As a teenager, it was the idea of killing itself that upset me most. Hunters seemed like the lowest human life form. Dairy eating seemed more ethical than fish-eating. Now, I accept that there is a food chain and a life-cycle, that avoiding meat is a privilege supported by a decent income and an urban environment. It seems pretty clear to me that a life spent suffering endlessly on a CAFO is infinitely more horrifying than a life spent frisking around the woods and then suddenly being shot. My brother-in-law hunts, and what he doesn't eat he donates to a local shelter. It makes me cringe, I have to confess, but it's hard to pin it as unethical on a relative scale, since I figure that every pound of venison he eats is a pound of ham that he won't be buying from the supermarket. Myself, given a choice between eating fish and dairy, I will often choose the fish, because it seems to me that dairy animals suffer far more than fish do.
And so, I have come up with my own somewhat messy criteria of ethical eating, based on a calculus that (mostly) makes sense to me, though it's hard to convey or even to always feel confident in. Sometimes it's hard to eat a bite of food without thinking of it along some dizzying vector involving locality, environment, animal suffering, glycemic load, calorie density, and cost (if it ever turns out I can't eat gluten, just kill me). One could think oneself into starvation, or at least insanity.
That's not a fate that awaits me (well, maybe the insanity), because the truth is, I also love food: love shopping for it, cooking it, sharing it, occasionally even growing it, thinking about it, geeking out about it. I read food blogs, love going out to new restaurants, love trying new recipes, love thinking about the tastes of rich foods I love in the same way that I enjoy thinking about the tastes in a single malt scotch. When I make a commitment to something--e.g. "I will never eat this again"--I can display pretty single-minded devotion. But I'm not an ascetic and don't aspire to be one, though this too is complicated by the fact that I'd like to see myself lose 15 or 20 pounds without becoming a crazy person. It seems to me that living fully and eating wholeheartedly are deeply intertwined, and I want to live fully and wholeheartedly. But I also believe that there are ethical decisions behind every food choice I make, and since those are choices I make some six times a day (not three: remember, I'm hypoglycemic!) I want them to be conscious ones, good ones--at least as much as I can, given the vagaries of life, including my life. I think Michael Pollan has it mostly right, and so when in doubt I do eat food. Not too much. Mostly vegetables. That seems to work for the most part, but boy, I can make it complicated.
I've spent a lot of time delving into my conflictual ethics in this short history, but I anticipate spending just as much time on this blog talking about food and cooking as I do thinking aloud about how to balance the complexities of eating well, eating ethically, eating low glycemic, and eating lightly. One of the great benefits of discovering vegetarianism in 1984, in a suburb utterly untouched by vegetarianism, was that I had to teach myself everything, but above all, what in the world to cook and eat. Over the years, in addition to vegetarian and vegan American dishes, I've learned to make vegetarian Mexican food, Indian food, Middle Eastern food, Thai food, and more--and I've made most of these recipes low-glycemic and healthy. I've been perfecting some recipes for almost three decades now, and I'm going to share some of the best ones with you--to leaven the self-reflection, philosophizing, and over-thinking.
For one thing, I was initially so oblivious--in my defense, I was in eighth grade--that it took a few weeks to grok for that the "this" I was eschewing also included bologna and pepperoni, not just steak. I wasn't avoiding it; I just didn't actually make the connection. The cognitive category of "meat" only gradually came into focus, and as it did, I eliminated more items from my diet, and meanwhile learned how to find, prepare, and eat new ones (more about this later). When I was 15, I stopped eating chicken; the next year, fish. Some years later I stopped eating dairy, then started again, then stopped, then started (repeat), ultimately settling on a limited number of the most nutritionally-dense, delicious, and ethical dairy products, these criteria rarely appearing all at once. Greek yogurt and condiment-sized portions of cheese are staples; eggs I cook until burnt and still kind of have to choke down, but they are a good go-to especially when traveling or eating out (pancakes at brunch are not exactly an option for a hypoglycemic). I keep the quantities as limited as possible, and some things I've never reintroduced: milk is in some of the food I eat in restaurants, of course, but I haven't had a glass of the stuff in that same 28 years. I'm guess I'm still something of a wannabe vegan, though I fear it's not possible for this body, at least not now, and so I struggle to maintain some reasonable compromise.
As I got older and my hypoglycemia symptoms became more severe--including several terrifying experiences of blacking out altogether--I gradually, with a lot of angst and internal conflict, reintroduced occasional fish. After all the ups and downs, a casual observer might therefore see little difference between how I ate at 15 and how I eat at 42. But however similar it might look superficially, a lot of very noisy thinking has gone on inside, along with countless small-but-laden changes.
For example, my reasons for being a vegetarian (and I'm going to use this as shorthand; I recognize that this will horrify some people, but surely 95% of the calories I eat are vegetarian) have changed over the years. As a teenager, it was the idea of killing itself that upset me most. Hunters seemed like the lowest human life form. Dairy eating seemed more ethical than fish-eating. Now, I accept that there is a food chain and a life-cycle, that avoiding meat is a privilege supported by a decent income and an urban environment. It seems pretty clear to me that a life spent suffering endlessly on a CAFO is infinitely more horrifying than a life spent frisking around the woods and then suddenly being shot. My brother-in-law hunts, and what he doesn't eat he donates to a local shelter. It makes me cringe, I have to confess, but it's hard to pin it as unethical on a relative scale, since I figure that every pound of venison he eats is a pound of ham that he won't be buying from the supermarket. Myself, given a choice between eating fish and dairy, I will often choose the fish, because it seems to me that dairy animals suffer far more than fish do.
And so, I have come up with my own somewhat messy criteria of ethical eating, based on a calculus that (mostly) makes sense to me, though it's hard to convey or even to always feel confident in. Sometimes it's hard to eat a bite of food without thinking of it along some dizzying vector involving locality, environment, animal suffering, glycemic load, calorie density, and cost (if it ever turns out I can't eat gluten, just kill me). One could think oneself into starvation, or at least insanity.
That's not a fate that awaits me (well, maybe the insanity), because the truth is, I also love food: love shopping for it, cooking it, sharing it, occasionally even growing it, thinking about it, geeking out about it. I read food blogs, love going out to new restaurants, love trying new recipes, love thinking about the tastes of rich foods I love in the same way that I enjoy thinking about the tastes in a single malt scotch. When I make a commitment to something--e.g. "I will never eat this again"--I can display pretty single-minded devotion. But I'm not an ascetic and don't aspire to be one, though this too is complicated by the fact that I'd like to see myself lose 15 or 20 pounds without becoming a crazy person. It seems to me that living fully and eating wholeheartedly are deeply intertwined, and I want to live fully and wholeheartedly. But I also believe that there are ethical decisions behind every food choice I make, and since those are choices I make some six times a day (not three: remember, I'm hypoglycemic!) I want them to be conscious ones, good ones--at least as much as I can, given the vagaries of life, including my life. I think Michael Pollan has it mostly right, and so when in doubt I do eat food. Not too much. Mostly vegetables. That seems to work for the most part, but boy, I can make it complicated.
I've spent a lot of time delving into my conflictual ethics in this short history, but I anticipate spending just as much time on this blog talking about food and cooking as I do thinking aloud about how to balance the complexities of eating well, eating ethically, eating low glycemic, and eating lightly. One of the great benefits of discovering vegetarianism in 1984, in a suburb utterly untouched by vegetarianism, was that I had to teach myself everything, but above all, what in the world to cook and eat. Over the years, in addition to vegetarian and vegan American dishes, I've learned to make vegetarian Mexican food, Indian food, Middle Eastern food, Thai food, and more--and I've made most of these recipes low-glycemic and healthy. I've been perfecting some recipes for almost three decades now, and I'm going to share some of the best ones with you--to leaven the self-reflection, philosophizing, and over-thinking.
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