Not About the Number

Most of my friends know that I have a bra fitting and personal image consultant business.  Yes, I fit women for bras, hit me up (www.fitsmeright.com).  One of my clients has lost 30 lbs (woo hoo) and needed to be fitted for new bras.  S/N - when you lose weight, its time to assess everything in your closet, especially bras for the ladies.  Anyway, I'm so very proud of her.  It takes a lot to be dedicated to working out regularly and eating right when we all have these incredibly full schedules.  She proudly announced her weight and I quickly (without thinking) said, "Oh we weigh the same now!"  Then she retreated her excitement and said, "But I don't look anything like you."  (Yes, I do stop traffic, sorry . . . a little horn tooting)

I had stopped worrying about the actual number once I got into my good tight jeans again but in just a few words, I had killed her joy and I didn't mean to.  I quickly recovered and reminded her that everyone is different.  All my life, I've been a dancer - ballet, jazz, tap, hip hop, West African - and my thighs and calves are the proof that I worked hard.  They don't call me Hamhocks for nothing!  I also weight train.  I teach 6 Zumba Fitness classes a week.  Once I noted these differences to her, she came back to life.  Whew!! I thought I had destroyed her excitement for good. 

We spend so much time comparing ourselves to other people that we can often lose sight of the great progress we've made.  I'd rather compare me to me any day and take feel pride in what I have accomplished.  We also forget that there is one uncontrollable factor - genetics.  I may not EVER have 6 pack abs but I can make any little black dress look SMOKING HOT!!  174 lbs is the smallest I have ever been in my adult life.  That's where I am now and consequently may or may not reduce that number but a whole lot BUT I like the way I look.  I am proud to say I can go through my Zumba Classes at top speed without a significant break and without collapsing.  Can you hang with me?

I do agree that we should use weight as one of the markers to indicate we are moving in the right direction, but if that's your only number, you're not getting a clear picture of your state of health.  This is why I like Doctor Oz's truth tube.  It tells what's really going on inside and can't no body magic cover that up!

Can you walk up the steps without huffing and puffing?
Are you able to get to your target heart rate without passing out?
How many inches is your waist line? How much visceral fat are you carrying?
What's your average blood pressure?
When was the last time you had your fasting blood sugar checked?
Can you go run around with the children in your family?
And yes, Cholesterol still counts!

If you go to the doctor and your weight is the only number the doctor is concerned about, I'd venture to say that you're doing pretty good.  I don't want us to obsess over the number of pounds we weigh since gravity pulls us all down at 9.8 m per second per second (one of the few things I remember from Physics).  I want us to be concerned with the factors that make us prime candidates for Heart Disease, Diabetes, Kidney Disease before the doctor has to give us that diagnosis.  Skinny people have Heart Disease too, did you know that? 

Weight for Love

I met my fiancee just short of a year ago. He's a chef but loves to eat rich food, high fatty foods, he loved Kool-aid, drank Mountain Dew, and frequented the local "Greasy Spoon" restaurants and carry-outs. When we met, I was still a new Zumba (r) Fitness Instructor but absolutely married to eating healthy. I couldn't afford to go back to my 200lbs and sick life. He would fix me food and plop mashed potatoes or rice on my plate. At first, to be nice, I'd eat it, but then I finally told him that I was serious about my health and if he wanted to be with me, he would take his health serious too.

Like most men, he hadn't been to the doctor in a few years. When he finally went, the doctor told him he was a candidate for all the things I had tried to warn him about: High Cholesterol, Hypertension and Diabetes. She gave him 30 days to make some changes but he couldn't get around the Diabetes in 30 days. Now, he had reason to listen to me when I said, "No, we're not eating that." That ended the last night stops to Wendy's and McDonald's and when we do, we get Chicken. I encouraged him to stop over eating or piling the plate or at least, SLOW DOWN and chew. Yes, he is a victim of eating everything on the plate as fast as you can and we now know this to be one way we over eat since our brains don't calculate the "STOP EATING" message quite that rapidly. We don't make Kool-aid and we don't buy sodas. Water is our main drink. I've tried to get him to try my fruit and vegetable blends but I don't think he's ready for the green machine (Spinach, Blueberries, Pineapple, Kiwi, Pear, Granny Smith Apple).

I am proud to say that approaching our 1 year anniversary, my sweetheart has lost about 30 lbs AND is quitting smoking. I've even gotten him to wear a suit!! OW!!

July 2011

February 2012

We took his mother out to dinner recently and y'all know how tight those booths can be. As we slid into the booth, she asked him, "Do you have enough room?" Then she chuckled, "Oh yeah, you got plenty of room now, you fit just fine," as he proudly looked down at the space between the table and his shrunken belly.

I'm also down to my pre-Love weight (WOOO HOOO) but still on my journey to try to drop just one more size.  I've added more Zumba Fitness classes so I'm currently teaching five times a week, whew!  I've moved to a satellite office at work and there is a FREE gym in building so I will definitely be lifting before the Spring Swings all the way in. 

His family says they tried to get him to lose weight and change his eating but I guess it just took a different kind of love to make that change.  We're looking forward to living happy and healthy lives together and teach our future children better.

I've been Setback!!!

Eating right and working out is hard. Eating right and working out is hard when you have a tight schedule. Eating right and working out is hard when you have a tight schedule, are lacking sleep and just down right down feel like it. What’s harder is feeling like you fell off and have no way to return; when you feel like you’ve failed. (Sigh)
This weekend I had a photo shoot with my favorite photographer and my Radio Show Co-Host (Speak on That coming soon to blogtalkradio.com). We chose red dresses for one look; RED is my favorite color! I bought this dress two months ago and let me tell you, I look HOT in it!!

As I slid the dress on and zipped it up, I found out that I had gained weight in EVERYONE’S favorite spot . . . yes, the midsection, the belly, the dreaded abdominal devil had expanded just enough to make me say, “AW MAN” and at that point, I hated my favorite red dress. I didn't even NEED a spanx or ANYTHING to hold it in just TWO months ago. Now I’m thinking, “I’m here, I don’t have a back up red dress, WTH do I do?” I go for the suck in and PRAY that it doesn’t look that bad in the pictures. Do you know what happens when you suck it in? You look stiff and fake and scared and like you’re not breathing . . . makes it hard to look natural in pictures; my advice, don’t do it, no matter how good you think you look, it just makes you look like . . . uh, you’re sucking it in. (Sigh)

So now, I’m sitting here evaluating what did I do wrong? I’m drinking my water, I’m going Zumba crazy, eating good food, eating often . . . wait, how much did I eat? My new beau is a chef and has been making the best meals. Only one problem, he doesn’t know how NOT to fix me a huge plate of food and I’m bad at saying, “I’ve had enough” especially when it’s so good. And yes, I, even I have slacked on the weight training because of a tremendously busy schedule. Key Key, you’ve got to make a choice honey. I’ll admit, I went on scolding myself and then gave myself the “yo, snap out of it” look in the mirror. This is a minor setback that I can come back from. I just have to reorganize my schedule and tell some people and things, “No, can’t do it. I’m busy taking care of myself.” My schedule is already packed pretty tight (actually it’s being held hostage by my full time 9 to 5, but let’s not go there). Last summer, I was weight training on my lunch hour and doing cardio at home. That’s not hard is it? Nope, it just means going back to being diligent and going to the gym the same way I come to work every morning (I love seeing nice, hunky men sweating and grunting . . . oh, sorry, sometimes that is the extra motivation).

Let me just say, I want to beat myself up so badly and say to hell with it all but then I remember how good I feel now compared to how I used to feel. I admittedly think about the people I know that say to me, “I wish I could look like you” and I really want people to keep saying that. I like going into a store and being able to fit a regular size and even more than that, I think of how I’ve lowered my risk for a myriad of diseases that plague my family like Type II Diabetes, High Cholesterol, High Blood Pressure, Gout, Migraines due to poor food choices, increased adult acne, chronic fatigue, joint problems because of weight, asthma, and on and on . . . That’s when I remember that it’s just a minor setback. We can come back. SO . . . if you didn’t do so well on the food challenge the past two weeks, let’s try again. This time, You may eat food outside of your house on the weekends (except fast food) but TRY really hard to be sure you fill up the food chart, eating vegetables and fruit. AND DON’T FORGET THAT WATER!!!

The next installment will be “What you don’t know about food.” You’d be surprised at how some foods we eat are marked as “Healthy” but some of them turn out to be the culprits in our diet. One that you’ve probably had recently: Cereal. I know, I’m getting ready to ruin your life over cereal but trust me on this one.

Keyona
#PixieDustPotent