Posts Tagged Weight Loss
Lose Weight While … Sleeping?
This month’s Glamour features a cover story called “Lose Weight While You Sleep.”
The results are pretty surprising and, when looked at holistically, seem to make sense — in that if someone is getting 8 hours of sleep, they are likely not noshing late at night and likely have more energy to exercise and therefore are likely eat better … and so it goes.
I have to say, I’ve been focusing on more sleep lately and I even posted about sleep and exercise a couple weeks ago … but I’ve not seen any results on the scale. But I also haven’t been giving it a conscious thoguht, either.
And though I usually think “diets” like this are a crock, I think the article makes some good points that any of us could benefit from. (more…)
10 comments February 18, 2009
Even “Know-it-Alls” Need Refreshers
I’m a self-titled fitness and nutrition buff.
I was active as a kid between four types of dance and cheerleading.
I’ve been running and lifting weights on and off since freshman year of high school.
I worked out pretty regularly in college, and then once I started Weight Watchers Online in 2004, became an official gym rat.
I religiously read fitness and health magazines, books and blogs. When a new study comes out, I read it. Six months later when another study comes out to refute said study, I read that, too. I ponder, I discuss, I … ok, I admit it, I obsess.
I know what foods make my body happy, and the amount of exercise that makes my body happy … but I don’t always do either of them (though I eat mostly clean, I have a penchant for honey wheat pretzels, Chex mix and animal crackers … and I tend to exercise more than I should. Plus, I am not lifting regularly right now which I know makes my body happy).
Which basically means I know what to do … and am not always doing it.
And so, for the first time in my life, I’ve decided to ask for help in the fitness department. I mentioned a couple posts ago about how my employer is giving us each an annual wellness fund, following a general wellness exam which we completed last week.
I gave it some thought and since I already pay my gym membership and WW Online memberships, I plan to use mine for something above and beyond the norm for me: a personal trainer. (more…)
17 comments February 12, 2009
Change I Can Believe In
Change is coming to America, and the world … you can just feel it in the air, can’t you?
Ok, I might be exaggerating just a smidge, but I think you’d have to be living under a rock not to know that today, our nation’s newest president will be sworn in. It’s a historic moment … and also an American moment.
Regardless of party affiliations and loyalites, it feels like, for the first time in a long time, much of America is on the same page with where we want things to go in this country: we want change. And, in typical American fashion, we want it STAT. (Ok, we wanted it yesterday).
I’d be lying if I said I wished I weren’t there amid the throngs of celebrants. Back in 2000, my senior year of college, my friends and our boyfriends (now husbands) all bundled up in the sleet and snow and went downtown to watch the swearing-in ceremony thanks to some awesome tickets scored by a friend working for a senator at the time.
(OK, full disclosure, I went to see President Clinton and that was it). Anyway, it was quite an incredible experience being there first-hand in 2000, and today’s Inauguration is going to be even more momentous.
Yet the 2000 Inauguration was the last pre-9/11 inauguration and the world has changed dramatically. Today, President Obama will inherit essentially something comparable to World War 2 and the Great Depression combined. Change isn’t just important; it’s essential to the future of our country.
But with change on the horizon (and believe me, I am sooooo excited to see a change of government!!) it’s important, too, to remember that any change doesn’t take place immediately. (more…)
7 comments January 20, 2009
Cool, Calm & Collected
Sometimes it just takes a nudge to get us moving again towards a goal.
I remember that feeling of being paralyzed about mid-way through my senior year of college.
I didn’t have a job lined up for after graduation, I
knew my then-boyfriend (now husband) was moving overseas after graduation to fulfill his military obligation in his home country, and my friends were all making their plans to spread out around the country.
I felt alone, lost and uneasy–fairly natural for most co-eds about to be tossed into the “real world.” I wanted to stay in D.C. but my internship at U.S. News & World Report wasn’t going to last past May, and even if I stayed, where would I live if all my best friends were leaving?! (more…)
9 comments January 19, 2009
Making Mantras
I know I said I wouldn’t be back til the new year, but I have been feeling kind of blah and felt compelled to write tonight. So … here goes! Forgive the rambling; I’m all over the place right now.
This is what I want my mantra to be for 2009: “I am going to let it be.”
I say it all the time: how I need to do it, how half my anxiety would dissipate if I’d just act it and live it … but here’s the rub: anyone who knows me knows I don’t actually do it.
And — something Dr. G. has confirmed through our sessions — it’s like, as an anxious person, I’m hard-wired not to be able to just “let it be” … and I think that is what is standing in the way of getting back to a comfortable weight.
Fighting against my own nature, my own hard-wiring, instead of using it to my advantage. Wanting to be someone I’m not capable of being, instead of accepting the person I am, the hard-wiring I have.
I don’t mean to imply I’m not capable of getting back to a comfortable weight. But rather, I’m fighting myself and my hard-wiring, berating myself for not being able to “let it be,” when maybe I should be using my anxious nature to my advantage (i.e., tooting my own horn for being a good friend and partner, a disciplined and consicientious woman).
You remember that song, “More Than Words?” Well, right now I’ve been talking the talk but not walking the walk when it comes to acceptance; I’m not showing my body the love it deserves because deep down I don’t believe I deserve to “let it be” — not here; not at this weight. I’m not ready and maybe I never will be ready to “let it be.” In fact, trying so hard to loosen up my thoughts, to “let it be” — I’ve gained weight. Since September, all I’ve done is gained. Literally.
It’s a fact. And it’s not the usual couple pounds people moan about after the holidays; it’s been a steady gain all fall/winter, just like last fall/winter and the one before it.
I can see it in photos, in how my clothes fit (tighter than they should, though not so bad that I can’t wear them) and of course on the scale. (As if I needed that darn machine to confirm what I already know!)
And though I wish I could just accept it and not be bothered by it, I’m not happy about it; I don’t want to be ok with it. And I won’t settle for it because this is not my body’s happy weight, nor is it my happy weight. (more…)
10 comments December 30, 2008
Voyages of Discovery
This is my last post for a while, dear readers, as the much-needed holiday va-k season officially begins.
After hosting a holiday cookie exchange with fab friends on Sunday, at the crack of dawn Monday morning, my husband and I are driving to DC (where we met and where I moved here from) and Annapolis (where we got married) to see friends and family over the Christmas holiday.
We won’t be back until late Sunday night, so I probably won’t blog again until Tuesday or so.
This means several things:
1) I will be away from my house. (my usual food/morning get-ready routine)
2) Away from the gym. (my usual exercise routine)
3) Away from my computer. (my technology addiction)
Could be scary, but I’m not afraid. After all this time, I know some certainties about myself. (more…)
17 comments December 19, 2008
Life’s Like a Dreidel …
Hannukah, like Christmas, is just around the corner.
And while I’ve long out-grown my Hebrew School days and the eight nights a year spent playing dreidel with my siblings (always figuring out a way that *I* could win the most of whatever we were playing for, be it money, chocolate coins, etc) … I recently had the opportunity to revive my Jewish roots by teaching a friend’s bright-beyond-his-years four-year-old son about Hannukah …
Hannukah, the Festival of Lights, the holiday where Jews around the world remember the miracle that occured when, at the rededication of the Second Temple in Jerusalem, oil that should have burned for only one night, burned for eight.
Sharp as a whip, her son had come prepared with really good questions to ask me about one of my favorite holidays. I answered them, and we talked about special Hannukah foods and shared some Hannukah songs, which of course brought me back to my childhood.
Then, we played dreidel, a game beloved by children around the world. For anyone who doesn’t know what a dreidel is, it’s a small top that children play with on Hannukah. The prize can be anything, but it’s usually gold chocolate coins (called “gelt“), which are distributed to each player before the game begins. (more…)
13 comments December 18, 2008
Maintenance is HARD
After living in “maintenance world” for almost four years now, I can verify that losing weight was easy and maintaining is damn hard.
OK … I guess it’s not too hard or I’d have gained all my weight back (not just 10-12), but my point is, it’s still not an easy feat and not one I take lightly.
I’ve said it before that when I joined Weight Watchers in April 2004, it was my first attempt at losing weight and worked like a charm. (Probably because I had never tried to lose weight before — even just skipping my daily sugary, whipped mint mochas was enough to cut calories back then).
In 2004 when I began, everything was beautiful. Magical. I loved the feeling of my clothes being loose, needing safety pins and then a new wardrobe, the attention from friends, co-workers, family, strangers … The way my body changed and with it, my brain. (Before the disordered eating behaviors and thoughts began, that is).
But keeping it off requires thought, preparation. Just like when losing — only magnified like twenty-fold. (more…)
17 comments December 17, 2008
New Year’s Resolutions — Thanks, But No Thanks
It’s ironic (or maybe not?) that during the most joyous, food-filled time of the year, everyone seems to be talking about dieting, “being good” or “being bad”, weight loss, exercise … it’s like a national past-time this time of year. A fixation on “fat.”
At work, at home, out socializing, at the mall, restaurants, you name it … I’ve heard it. I’m convinced the topic du jour is the dreaded, dirty four-letter “D” word.
Collectively, we indulge and talk about it. We don’t indulge and talk about it. We talk about the new pudge around our middles and the extra flesh forming on our backside, real or imagined.
We commit to the gym, our trainers, our nutritionists, our diets, our programs.
We pooh-pooh things people bring to work (or to the gym or deliver to our home) as “too fattening” and groan when we see it … then we over-indulge at home on Puffins or something equally ridiculous. (more…)
23 comments December 16, 2008
Not Quite There Yet
Today I read this post about going ahead and enjoying the holidays by Anne at Elastic Waist. You can see my comments (Melissa); I appreciate what she wrote, but I have to admit:
I’m just not quite there yet.
And I don’t know which came first: the chicken or the egg. As in, I don’t know if it’s because I’m not at the weight I want to be at, or because I still look at some foods as “healthy” or “unhealthy” even though rationally I know I shouldn’t.
Food is, after all, food. In small quantities, there’s no harm in it. Yet I still attach stigmas to certain foods, even when I don’t realize I’m doing it. (more…)
9 comments December 8, 2008
