Ah, exercise!
I have never been a really active person as an adult. As a kid I was never still, I was a major tomboy and I climbed trees, rode bikes, played crazy games and kept myself moving all the time. I don't know what happened but except for spurts of activity over the years I just haven't exercised much at all. Now here I am, 63 years old, just had gastric bypass and I absolutely have to exercise to help get the weight off and more importantly, to keep it off! But here's the rub; I am now so disabled that I can't do much of anything. I am making a big effort though. I walk on my treadmill about 10 minutes. Before surgery I was getting close to 15 but I have had to kind of start over at the 1 minute point and I am getting to the 10 regularly. Most active people just won't get this, I know. I am on 2 liters of oxygen so that slows me down a little but the main issue is my back and my joints. I have had a knee and a hip replaced and I need the other knee and hip replaced. My replaced knee hurts more than the one I haven't had done so I am not rushing to have another major surgery that might not give me positive results anyway. I walk with a cane and I cannot walk very far or stand up for very long because of something I have in my spine called lumbar stenosis. My prayer is that losing a lot of weight will ease up the pressure on my back and my joints so much that it won't be such an issue. Time will tell and in the interim I am trying to be faithful to my good old treadmill. One of the blogs I love is http://www.300poundsdown.com/. It was the first blog I ever read and Holly continues to inspire me every day. In the beginning she could only walk to her mailbox but she did that and gradually she made it to the next mailbox and then the next. She continued to push herself and at some point on her journey she has run a 5K and she has lost about 240 pounds so far. I have age and physical limitations to fight against, she had a lot more pounds to deal with than I do but the point is to do a little and then do a little more and keep increasing as you can. I just saw this article at The American Journal of Health Promotion about a study that has proven that even little short bouts of exercise are beneficial. Yay! Good news, huh? If you'd like to read it here is the link. http://www.ajhpcontents.com/doi/abs/10.4278/ajhp.120606-QUAL-286 So if you struggle like I do to move for whatever the reason, just do a little. It counts!
On the weight loss front I am down another pound or so. I was stuck for a few days. My weight this morning was 208 down from 245. That is 37 pounds so far! Woo hoo! I am such a slave to the scale! I hope I can someday become the person who only gets on once a week but for now I can't seem to stop myself. That scale just stares at me and says, "Ah come on, you know you have to check!" And I give in to it, lol!
