Losing Weight...Geek Style!

Well...another good week, sort of....

I lost 2.5 pounds, but only one pound was actual fat! Since they are remodeling the gym, and I have been in serious sloth mode, I decided to do some Geek Style training, and try to fit in my exercise while playing role-playing games and watching Dr. Who. Here is what I did...

Arm Exercises: I bought some inexpensive wrist/ankle weights from Target . All I do is three sets of twenty of the following: Curls (those are the ones where your arms are at your sides, and you bring your fists to your shoulders.

After twenty of those, I move on to the exercise I call "The Sexy Jesus," named after a song from "Hamlet 2." I stick my arms straight out to the side (the Jesus pose) then I do ten rotations of my arm forward, then ten backward. (On a personal note, no disrespect is meant to the J-man, to whom I give mad props.)

Then I do twenty of an exercise call "I Give Up!"--this link has the best description of it I can find. But basically, raise your elbow to the ceiling, touch your neck with your hands, then raise your hands to the ceiling. Add weights and you are good to go!

I basically do three sets of each while watching television. If can get in all of these exercises before the first or second commercial break of MythBusters or Dr. Who.

(For those of you who love Arnold Schwarzenegger and going to gym to work, you have to check out this site...HI-LARIOUS picture of the California Governor!)

Cardio: What's a Geek to do when her apartment complex has shut down the gym and she is too lazy to leave her GeekCave to go to the gym (plus she really, really doesn't want to change into exercise clothes!) Mini-cardio bursts! Many people do not realize this fact, but you just need to exercise for 30-60 minutes a day to stay healthy! Plus, those do not have to be consecutive minutes!! You can do them in 10-15 minute increments! SWEET!

When I am in a non-exercise mood, all I do is stand in front of the T.V. and walk. If you walk from one commercial break to another, that is roughly ten minutes. If you have DVR, you can walk up to a mile briskly while watching Stephen Colbert (or another half hour show), if you fast forward through all the commercials. You can also try this technique when you are playing Facebook games and Civilization. How much time to we really spend waiting for our crops to grow or our turns to finish-- a lot! I guarantee, if you just stand for 20-30 minutes instead of sitting while playing your games, you will lose some weight! (For gadget Geeks--think wireless controllers!)

The bottom line is you can walk up to four miles in one hour in front of the t.v, but can you burn fat while playing role playing games? YES!

Here is my trick: at my weekly RuneQuest game, I stand for ten-fifteen minutes during the game three times. Standing doesn't burn lots of calories, but it does burn more than sitting. It also takes me away from all the food that abounds at such events (which is the subject of a different post!) I also take a brisk walk with a friend an hour before our game, which revs up the ole metabolism before I sit down for six hours and attempt to kill fiends of Chaos with my pencil and some dice.

My point is that we all have down weeks exercise-wise. Every bit of activity counts, and you don't have to sacrifice doing those things you love to get some exercise into your life!

For my non-geeky friends...I haven't tried incorporating exercise into crafting or reading, so if you have some tips...leave a post!

Outer Goal: 160 (30.5 more pounds to go!)

Inner Goal: World Peace, Inner Peace, and, honestly, a piece of cheese!

Three Pounds BABY!

Despite the gym being closed in our building and my total sloth-like attitute, I still managed to drop three pounds since my last weigh in!



Here's some stuff I learned that might be helpful to everyone in the blogosphere:

Sleep matters! I got a minimum of seven hours of deep sleep every night this week by not drinking more than a few ounces of water an hour and half before bed. (I used to be up all night processing all the liquid I was consuming.) I also do three minutes of deep, abdominal breathing before going to sleep. It's relaxing and helps me sleep better. I found out that a good night's sleep reduces the cortisol in your body; cortisol is a hormone that is part of the reason why people retain fat (it has to do with the fight or flight response).

Activity not exercise! Despite being banned from the gym due to remodeling, I still made time to do some mimimal activity everyday. Yesterday I walked up three flights of stairs and didn't even breath hard! I've been making a special effort to take extra trips to the office (1/4 of mi round trip), to squeeze in a few extra steps. It's phenomenal how many calories one can burn by parking far away or taking the stairs instead of the elevator! For those of us who despise working out, thinking about activity instead of having to dress in spandex and fight with body builders for time on the nautilus machine is A LOT better!

Outward Goal: 160 pounds (33 pounds to go!)
Inner Goal: Sylph-like body in manner of Olivia de Havilland or Taylor Swift...and World Peace!

See you next week!

The dreaded....PLATEAU!

Yes...even on 960 calories a day, one can hit a plateau apparently! In real world terms, I actually lost a good bit of weight: 1.5 pounds. Most people would be thrilled with that amount (as my doctor reminded me as I was whining to her!). The bottom line is that my body is 30 pounds lighter, so it doesn't need to shed weight as quickly. As I remind my students about life, "it's a journey, not a destination."

However, it is hard to not feel bad when you have had two weeks in a row wherein you have lost three pounds each time. I just need to remind myself of some simple things, like..

1) I am only 15 pounds heavier than I was when I got married.
2) My daughter has never known me to be less than 200 pounds, now she does.
3) I can shop in the regular section of department stores now (that's mainly due to the fact that 30% of women are overweight, so they put larger sizes in the regular sections now. I remember a time when 12 was the largest size available in the standard sections!)
4)My blood pressure is in the healthy range!

In our class, we call these "non-scale" victories. I call them hints of what my life will be like when I finally get to my goal.

External Goal: 160
Internal Goal: Ommmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm!

Leave me a post!

Did I Break 200 lbs?

YES!!!

And, yes, it is true that I did the cabbage patch in the lobby of the medical office! I guess discrete is not exactly my middle name!

For the first time in almost a decade, I am below 200 pounds! The Tanita scale at Kaiser stopped at 197.5! Usually it taunts me by pausing...then adding two pounds! Not so this week!

So here is the kicker...I actually lost 4 pounds of fat last week, but I gained a pound of water---so that is even better news! In my mind, the fat loss is so much more important that the actual number of pounds lost! So far, I have lost 18.5 of just FAT. Since fat mass puts soooooo much pressure on my knees (three times as much as anywhere else), my knees think I have lost 55.5 pounds. Ahhhh knees, I knew you were my favorite part of my body for a reason!

Challenges this week:

1)Staff Appreciation Day: FREE YUMMY FOOD ALL DAY AT WORK!
2)Remodeling: My building is remodeling the leasing officeand GYM! Working out is a challenge!
3) I made Coq a Vin on Friday--apparently it was delicious....sigh....

So, my goal for the week: 194.5
My outward goal: 160
My inward goal: self discovery, getting rid of the batwings, oh and of course! World Peace!

See you guys next Thursday!