Adventures in Dieting

About a year ago I decided I needed to work a little harder to be a little healthier. I signed up for "Boot Camp" and started exercising regularly with Laura, the best fitness instructor for miles. While attending Boot Camp I learned about "Clayton", the Building Healthy Lifestyles Coach at the Raymond Clinic. I got a referral and started visiting with Clayton regularly.

I think I've always known that physical health is really all about weight and I learned a long time ago that weight is all about "calories in" vs "calories out". And I know that calories are all about choices! So I began this journey to lose the "last ten pounds" with my eyes wide open and a pretty good, realistic attitude.

At my first visit with Clayton we talked at length about numbers-an area in which I'm not particularly gifted. But it looked something like this:

1. I was 48 years old the first time I visited with Clayton.

2. I have given birth 5 times.

3. When I got pregnant at age 20, I weighed 125 lbs.

4. My weight was hovering 155 lbs. for about the last 5 years.

5. That's 30 extra pounds in 28 years- just over 1 pound per year...or

6.... a mere 6 pounds per baby! It didn't look that bad when I looked at it like that. (Unfortunately, I did look that bad and it was time to do something about it.)

7. To lose that weight I would need to lose 1 pound per week for 30 weeks! I could be back to babe-o-licious in less than a year! (30 weeks -7 months and change- February 2011 be exact)

8. To lose weight I would need to exercise about 150 minutes a week; or take 10,000 steps a day or decrease my calories to about 1100 per 24 hours.

I was determined to do it and set off with enthusiasm. I loved Boot Camp. I've always been a morning person so 5:30 am worked out well for me and I loved being outside in the early morning. Everything was fresh and cool and the workouts were tremendous. I experienced a couple of firsts last year at Boot Camp. I actually got to the point where I could do two minutes of push ups effortlessly and then I pulled a muscle doing sprints one morning. I've never worked hard enough to pull a muscle-EVER! It was a new and exhilarating experience for me. And my body was feeling awesome. I looked better and I lost some weight over the summer-about 5 pounds.

And then I stalled! And I stalled hard. Week after week I would head off to Clayton's office to weigh in and week after week I weighed the same give or take a few ounces.

Winter arrived with a fury and as it got colder and the snow got deeper I decided I could not go to exercise class anymore- too early and too cold. Then I decided I couldn't visit with Clayton anymore either. There was Halloween candy, Thanksgiving and Christmas dinners to contend with. I was just done. I would eat healthy and walk on my treadmill but all that other extra work was hardly worth the 5 measly pounds I'd dropped.

So spring has arrived; I'm down 5 pounds from last year but SERIOUSLY?! 5 pounds...so I headed back to Boot Camp and over to see Clayton.

I had finally broken the 150 mark around Christmas time and on my scale at home weighed in anywhere from 147-149 on any given day. Last week when I visited with Clayton, he laughed right out loud as he looked at my numbers.

He explained, " Weight is generally very dynamic. It goes up and down during the day-sometimes there will be as much as a four pound difference in one 24 hour period."

But not me. I have weighed EXACTLY the same each time I've stepped on that high tech scale since the beginning of the year; regardless of the time of day or my eating habits. I've had cake for my birthday and I finished off all my nieces' Valentine treats and chocolate Easter bunnies.

That's 6 visits in the last 4 months and absolutely NO CHANGE in my weight. So it really didn't seem to matter if I ate hershey kisses for breakfast or stayed in bed through my exercise class. My weight is stable. That's a nice way of saying "stalled"!

So if ever there was a reason to be discouraged or unmotivated, this has got to be it. But I will carry on in my quest for the acceptable BMI; right after I finish these Doritos.

(to be continued...of course)