Routine = Consistency which then ends up with successful results!

Well that’s my observation of this all, this weight loss journey and I’m finding that I do need to have routine. Think about your daily life; you get up every day, your morning routine is basically consistent - brush your teeth, take a shower, get dressed, eat breakfast (well at least you should be doing such), maybe you read the paper or watch the news, do a load of laundry, answer emails, whatever, it is your routine, it is what you have adapted to on a daily routine basis.

 So how did you develop this routine? You weren’t born doing this routine but you did get to this as a routine and because of your routine and the consistency of your routine you get results; like keeping your teeth, like being clean and smelling good. So then why do we find it so hard to make exercise a routine? One reason is we get complacent, lazy, busy; another reason, we just weren’t brought up doing this as a routine. Yet brushing those teeth, yes we were taught that and yes we were made to get a bath/shower so now it became a routine.

It’s a shame that our past can ruin so much of our future; of course that is if we let it, if we don’t take that control and modify it to suit our needs and desires. Think of your youth, your years as a child and what your routine was like. Sure playing was in there, but did you have parents who exercised? Worked out? Involved you in the same? Did your meals consist of salads and healthy food choices? Was soda and candy and pastries a big part of your growing up? Shame, shame on those parents who led our paths like that, but a bigger shame if we’re now instilling it on our own youth! We have to make the effort, live the example and become the teacher.

So now you need to evaluate your existence on this planet. Do you want to stick around and be able to do this and that, go here and there, live long enough to enjoy that pension, that 401 or that social security that you’ve been working to pay in on most of your life? Do you want to live an active older age of doing instead of just existing or do you want to just be dependent on another because you chose not to make the effort to turn things around now? Then get a routine going to make it work for you and your lifestyle, your fitness level and your health issues. There is always something you can do, a casual walk, water aerobics, HIIT, jogging, biking, kayaking, ect. Start working on better food choices, experiment with new and unusual healthy foods to your diet. Whatever you decide you need to start now, not tomorrow, not next month, but NOW!

Again, slow and steady will win and it won’t overwhelm you. Think of your changes as a big rock and chisel. You wouldn’t take that chisel to the rock to take one big piece out of it, it might crack but if you chisel bit by bit on the rock you can end up with a wonderful sculpture, a masterpiece and that masterpiece is you!

Routine

I am coming to realize that what is important and makes for a successful weight-loss as well as conditioning myself to be healthy is simply ROUTINE.

Yes, you need to have routine like the routine of your everyday life- brushing your teeth, cleaning your body, doing your hair/make-up, eating a meal, getting dressed; these are just some daily routines, routines that you didn’t just start doing at birth but you now adapted as a daily function.

Why have you adapted them? Because they needed to be done! So why do we as adults not make exercising and eating healthy as part of our daily routine? Yes part of it is our upbringing, part of it is we get busy living our lives, working, playing, raising a family and we just can’t fathom fitting that function into our already busy day. So now we forget that working on our health and a proper diet is not that important and we start to age, we gain weight, we get health issues and have health crisis’s, we start to get lazy, I don’t mean lazy like being a rock and veg’ing all day in front of the television or sleeping excessive hours away, I’m talking lazy like not making exercise your routine, like giving up on getting healthy,  like trashing your healthy eating, like overindulging on junk food and alcohol and under eating good wholesome foods.

So I’m now trying to correct my bad habits and rejuvenate my good habits. I use to work out better, ride bike, hit the weights, go hiking and when I had a serious health crisis I slid from my once better routine. Yes I had to preserve my strength to get through that year and I did, I did it very smoothly considering what I dealt with and I was able to do so because I was in good physical health. But I’ve aged, quite a bit! I’m not as energetic as I use to be, not as fit, not as strong and some of my determination seemed to have dropped from me. But I’d like to think 14 years later I am going to succeed, I’m going to get back to a better healthier me and I need to do this just by having a routine!!

Are you ready to make a change to your routine? You need to! If your life is so busy you just can’t possibly think you can fit it in, YOU ARE DEAD WRONG!! You don’t have to start big and hard and do long workouts. Just try to dedicate to 3 days a week of some form of cardio, your mind will love you, your body will love it and you will begin that much needed change in your routine. Than you can gradually work on doing more, doing better, whatever works for your lifestyle. Stop finding excuses, yes you’ll be tired and yes you’ll probably get sore

Dedicate this year to a change in your future health, start small, build up to a good solid routine and live longer and a more active life. Do you see yourself as a rock on that chair in your future years or do you want to be that mature person who is moving and doing, getting and going, able to live that rest of their life to the best of ability, if so, you need to react now!!

 

So when I decided to start this journey into losing the excess weight, to becoming a healthier me I had some decisions and choices to make. I’m in my mid 50’s, I have had a serious health crisis in the past and I have some physical limitations (not that I let that stop me). One of my choices was – can I do this? How much will I have to sacrifice? What do I HAVE to give up? Who will become my buddy/fitness pal/support team?

I realized that I don’t like BIG changes in my life, I do enjoy an occasional change up in my routine, my entertainment, my extracurricular activities, etcetera however for the most part I prefer calm to chaos, I need normalcy to my daily routine it’s what keeps me from being over stressed and helps me to enjoy living better.

So what I knew is my current routine wasn’t working as it was, it wasn’t helping me in getting smaller, losing weight, living healthier, things had to change. So now that I recognized that and knew I HAD to make changes I thought how do I do that without overwhelming myself? Well I decided, start with small changes girl, I thought if I made small changes over the course of the next weeks/months/years I’d be better able to achieve my goals, be successful, stick to those changes and not revert back to old habits.

So first I needed to watch what I consumed; this meant counting calories or points, I chose to count calories and am using a program to do that; I knew I needed to start back to working out (both cardio and resistance), I knew I needed to make healthier food choices yet I also wanted to live life, enjoy my days, do my other hobbies and have relaxations in my life. I knew that I can’t give up the foods I love, but I could modify quantity and I thought I will just have to earn that ice cream, that soft pretzel, that wine or cocktail when I wanted them or had them!

My first step was calorie counting. Let’s face it, you have to count for everything you stick in your mouth, any successful weight loss program/group or loser will tell you that. I joined a on-line program, I chose to lose a pound a week – no big endeavors for me, I didn’t want to starve and I didn’t want to lose it too quickly, I need my skin to shrink back slowly, I’m okay taking a year or 3 to get to my long term goal.

 Let me tell you, I was hungry A LOT; I went over my daily allotted calories, A LOT. So that led me to my next small change, get more calories into your daily allotment. So then I picked up the cardio routine.

So I started walking on the treadmill, this I did in small changes too, like 3 times a week for 30 minutes. I realized that I needed to get up and do my work out before I got involved in my day – coming home after work and trying to dedicate to a workout didn’t always work for me, so I got up 30 minutes earlier than before, iced my feet and then put on those sneakers and hit the belt. So what do you know, I managed to stay on track, get those work outs and earn those extra calories. Now I was seeing days I had extra calories and this meant I had weigh-ins with losses and I wasn’t starving so much. I do know this, when I first started cutting back on my calories it took about 2 weeks for me to stop feeling hungry all the time, so endure, hang in there, it gets better; you need to shrink that stomach. With that said I DO NOT want to over eat and then stretch that stomach again.

Well now I was ready to earn more calories so I then added more time on the treadmill, then I added another day or two, the stationary bike here and there to give my aching feet a break; I’ve been happily pleased with how far I’ve come, yes, I had to get up earlier, but for the most part it is worth it. Next I started being better about what I was eating, pushing myself to not cave in for that treat, that goodie, that unhealthy food. I do still cheat, I do still fall short and I do still get some moments of being hungry and some weekly weigh –ins are not as wonderful as I’d like them to be, but for the past 3 months it is a steady loss and that’s enough to keep my going.

Now I moved into wanting more, needing to be better, do more yet not over do. So I now wanted to get back to lifting weights, something I have done for years, something I enjoy as I liked being strong, I hate having weakness in myself and lifting weights gives me confidence and strength along with fitness. So I then got up a little earlier some days to get some lifting done after my cardio. I’m now up to 75 minutes earlier than I use to get up before working out, this allows me time to ice those feet (yes, I have endured plantar fasciitis for over 12 years and refuse to stop doing because of it), get my body moving, get my workouts in, soak in the hot tub, get cleaned up and dressed, eat breakfast and get out the door for work. Some days I am rushing but it’s better than coming home from a long day of work and then trying to fit my working out in before eating dinner and heading to bed and yes, I do go to bed earlier than before but I believe in getting that 7-8 hours of much needed sleep.

Now I’m ready to get more from my workouts so I’m modifying my workouts to maximize my resistance routines, we’ll see how this goes and I will re-evaluate after 4-6 weeks of trying this.

For the most part I look forward to my workouts and on the one day I dedicate to no working out, getting an extra hour of sleep I now have to make myself relax and enjoy that day of rest; keep in mind, I do miss an occasional workout day or short change my workout in addition, I do get tired, I do get sick and I do get busy and fall short, but this routine is my new normalcy and it is working for me.

As for my eating routine, well I’m still working on that but I have noticed the more I get away from sugar the sweeter and unappealing sweets are, the less I eat processed foods, the better I feel and when I do introduce them I realize how bad they make me feel; eventually those ‘bad foods’ will be very far and few and hopefully non-existent in my life, but making the small changes works for me and this I need to continue.

So thankfully I have 1 great workout support person (thank you honey), we both work at cardio and lifting and watching what we consume, what choices we make and it helps to have that support. I’m hoping that you too can join us in reaching a healthy goal by the end of this year and be a winner too. You know what you have to do and who to reach out to, so get to it or I’m winning this year!

Remember ~ Slow and steady wins the race.

     So as I struggle to get my weight to decrease I am aware it comes down to calories. Calories in, calories out. So I use a program to track my calories, they tell me how many I should be consuming to get to my projected goal and this means I need to cut back. What I have found in cutting back on calorie consumption is this my dear friends - give it 2 weeks for that constant hunger, that constant I want more to eat, it seems to take me that 2 weeks before I start feeling SO hungry all the time.

     Now the good thing is I can help myself out here. If I gain extra calories I don't have to cut back so much which means I don't have to be SO hungry, just a little bit hungry then. So I'd like you all to think when you finally get serious about making the plunge into controlling your hunger, controlling your weight and getting a grip on your path to being a better healthier you that you will be hungry but you don't have to starve.