A GOOD YEAR: The Taco Bell fiasco

Now Cathy and I are turning our focus towards diet.  Cathy is tracking on a free app, MyFitnessPal, which is also a website, in case you don't have a smarty pants phone.  Just tracking what you are eating is super effective, even without putting a limit on calories.  Using a calorie limit is easily figured out by said app, or by several online calculators that take in age, height, sex, and current weight.  Once a calorie estimate is established, you may need more or less calories depending on how you feel, and how your actual weight loss is going.

The key is to develop the behavior, habits, and system that is not only effective but works for you.  Cathy shares some belief patterns that she is overcoming as she continues with her journey!

When I was in college I used to go to Taco Bell and order one value meal for me and then pretend to forget what my "friend" wanted before ordering a second value meal (for me) and an extra taco (also for me). I would get home and go to my room and just gorge. When I was done, surrounded by wrappers, the guilt and shame would set in.

I went on my first diet when I was 11. It was the summer between 5th and 6th grade and I didn't want to be "the fat girl" when I started Middle School. I was sick of being teased by this mean girl in school and tired of feeling so anxious and insecure about everything. 

My first diet was really strict - no snacks or second helpings at meals and I had to exercise 60 minutes every day (biking or jogging) no matter how much I didn't want to (even if the idea of exercise made me cry). From my perspective, at the time, it was a success. I lost so much weight that one of my friend's moms suggested to my mom that I was anorexic.

So here I am trying to get healthy and telling you all how well that's going. In doing that I'm really only telling you half of the story. The exercise is going well. I'm enjoying walks and yoga and I'm working through a lot of stress and frustration and powerful emotions at the same time. 

But food is a problem and weight loss begins in the kitchen. 

I started month two by tracking everything I ate.  When I lost weight several years ago I tracked my calories and it worked really well. But that was so long ago that I had forgotten what a difference writing everything down makes. I have the MyFitnessPal app and find it super useful. It seriously has calories for everything and you can even scan things. And that's great because I focus on portion control using a food scale and monitor my snacking. I have even lost five pounds this month just from refocusing on food. 

But here's the problem. The binges haven't stopped. Neither has the obsessive behavior that accompanies losing weight for me. I'm not sneaking out to Taco Bell and binging alone (although I do tend to sneak in the kitchen and steal cookies when nobody is looking which is odd behavior for an adult) but if I end up at an ice cream shop you can bet that I'll end up with a waffle cone in my hand and two scoops of moose tracks piled on. It's like this compulsion where pressure (probably stress) builds up and at a certain point I have to eat until I can't feel feelings.

I also don't want to be forced to track everything I eat for the rest of my life because it fuels my obsessive need to control every bite. It feeds into the "food is a reward/punishment" mindset I carry with me which ends up looking in my head, a lot like the "no more wire hangers" scene in Mommie Dearest. 

Instead, I want to eyeball correct portions.  I want to make good choices when I eat out. I want to just put whole, healthy food in my system. I don't want to let emotions fuel my eating.

So normally I like to end my posts with some big "aha" moment. Unfortunately I can't do that this week. I don't have this figured out. I don't know how to control the urges or obsessive micromanagement of food. But I do take some comfort in my ability to see the problem. I guess the last time I tried to lose weight (which is different from my 'get healthy' mindset today) I didn't see an issue with my control issues around what I ate. I didn't let myself think about the binging because it made me feel ashamed. By recognizing the problem I can at least start to figure it out. 

A GOOD YEAR: Olive the Dog

Prologue:
I wrote this blog post back in mid-June when I just started walking again and began "training" for the walking program.  I considered publishing the story  a while back but I thought it was more appropriate to focus on my progress with the Go Training walking plan.  Well stuff happened this week that made this more relevant so I'm sharing it now.

Just so you have a little background, I got Olive back in 2008 through a rescue organization.  I decided I needed a dog after being mugged in my driveway in the "transitional neighborhood"where I owned a house in Atlanta.  The irony is that Olive was the most anxious, timid, nervous lady dog ever when I got her and she certainly was not a guard dog.  But I couldn't resist her sweet face and her loving, trusting demeanor.  She has calmed down quite a bit, but still is glued to my hip and follows me wherever I go.  Regardless, she has been a constant companion over the last four years, during good times and bad.

Story:
I have a dog.  Her name is Olive.  She is five years old.  She is the best.  Really. The. Best.  Olive and I used to run three miles a day before work, three to four times a week.  On days I went to kickboxing or spin class she would still get at least a mile long walk before dinner.  She adapted well to going on runs with me and really seemed to love it. 

I am currently in training to start working out.  I went on my first serious walk in a long time the other day.  I walked for 17:32 seconds at a pace that can be defined as "Level 7: I can still talk, but I don't really want to. I'm sweating like a pig."  It was exhausting.  Anyhow, because it proved more challenging than I expected I thought I'd give myself two weeks of "warm-up" walks to get me ready to do the awesome walking workout Beth and Go Training gave me to establish a base-line level of fitness.
Well today I decided to push myself to do a full 20 minutes of power walking at a pace that can be described as "Level 6: I can still talk, but am slightly breathless." I was really pleased/surprised/relieved to see a big difference in today's walk compared to the one on Wednesday.  I felt more comfortable in developing my stride, it felt good to move, and I didn't feel like I was overdoing it. 

But about two-thirds of the way through the walk Olive started to fade. At first I thought she just had to pee a lot but then she was panting and really slowed down.  After we hit 20 minutes I slowed down dramatically to allow her to catch her breath.  In that final stretch, walking home, I watched her.  Her movement was slow, she was panting really hard, she looked like she was struggling to keep going.  I felt awful.  Awful.  Here was my closest companion, who had stuck with me through a lot of crap (and some minor neglect when things were really falling apart with the marriage) and I had allowed her to get this out of shape.  She was a sausage and moving was hard for her.  

Wait a minute, I'm a sausage and moving is hard to me too!  After my ex and I separated, both Olive and I needed some basic TLC.  She got a good scrubbing at the dog groomer and lots of affection and chew treats and I got help from my parents and friends with pulling me out of kind of a dark place.  But it was just now, watching her trudge toward home that I realized, how badly I had treated myself, and in the process, hurt her.

Working on our fitness is a responsibility we have to ourselves (and our pets) in order to allow us to be whole people.  It is as fundamental as breathing and eating.  When I let my fitness go things started to go down hill.  That's not to say everything would have been okay if I just worked out. But I might not have found myself in such a dark place at the end.  At the same time, sometimes we get to such a bad place that we aren't able to care for ourselves in all the ways we need to, like getting out and moving.  That should be a sign to us that things aren't right.

Olive and I have a long road to get to the healthy place that we want to be at but we will get there. We will cheer each other on along the way and try to be proud of the strides we are making rather than focusing on the things we used to be able to do. And we will get stronger every time we go.

“A dog reflects the family life. Whoever saw a frisky dog in a gloomy family, or a sad dog in a happy one? Snarling people have snarling dogs, dangerous people have dangerous ones.”
― Arthur Conan Doyle, The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes

And healthy, whole people have healthy, whole dogs.

Epilogue:
Since I wrote this blog post, Olive and I have continued to go on walks together.  But she would still end up super out of breath and would be panting heavily when we'd get home.  I was concerned that I was pushing her too hard so I decided to only take her with me on our walks for the just first 15 minutes and then drop her off and continue on.  Since she was still exhausted after those 15 minutes I thought maybe it was the heat getting to her. So on super hot, humid days I stopped taking her with me altogether.  But then it cooled down and she still had trouble. 

I was a little concerned so I asked a friend who is a avid athlete and veterinary technician what she thought.  She suggested I make a vet appointment to have it checked out.  She said that at Olive's age it shouldn't be a heart issue but should still be looked at.

Well on Monday I finally called to make her a vet appointment and got her in for Wednesday. Then I made a TERRIBLE mistake that I would imagine my friends with kids know all to well:  I looked up her symptoms on Google.  After skimming a few pages I was terrified that she had heart disease, cancer, a deadly fungus in her lungs, and on, and on, and on.  I called the vet back and got an emergency appointment for Monday afternoon.

I learned two things at that appointment:
1. Olive has put on 12 pounds since we came up to Michigan and is extremely overweight.
2. Olive has laryngeal paralysis (LP)

I've linked to the Wikipedia page for laryngeal paralysis which is a little technical.  I found a curtain analogy on another site that explains it really well.  Think of it is as if you have two curtains side-by-side in front of your larynx.  The curtains open to allow you to take a breath and close so you don't inhale your food.  The problem for Olive is that her curtains don't open and close.  They just hang there.  This can make it harder to breath and since dogs pant to cool down, it can mean that it's easier for her to overheat or get too excited and not catch her breath.

Nobody has a clear picture of what causes LP, but it is exacerbated by obesity (check) and hot, humid weather (check).  Typically you see LP in older dogs so I think her weight really drew out the symptoms at a young age.  Eventually, Olive is likely to need surgery to permanently tie back one of the curtains which will allow her to breath better.  Fortunately, the vet caught it early so I can keep an eye on her and recognize symptoms quickly if it gets worse.  In the mean time, Olive's food has been cut back to appropriate levels, she only gets half a cookie in the morning with breakfast, and she only gets one chew in the evening instead of two.  What's hardest for me is that Olive cannot go with me on walks until she loses weight AND it cools down. 

So the reason I'm telling you all of this is not to educate you on LP.  If you have a big dog, you should be mindful of it, but that's not the point of this post.  The point of this post is to demonstrate some of the things that happen to your body when you don't take care of it.  As I said above, Olive is really a reflection of me.  We both have food issues and we eat too much - we also both like to eat garbage although she literally eats garbage and I am drawn to foods that are unhealthy and lacking nutrients...okay so still garbage.  Neither of us have exercised in the last few years.  The difference is that the toll the weight is taking on Olive's health is showing up much more overtly than it is for me.  I would be setting myself up for health problems if I wasn't doing something to improve my fitness too.  I just haven't seen the results of my bad choices as soon.

Hopefully, if I can help Olive with portion control, keep her out of the garbage and away from the cat food, she will lose weight and be able to start walking with me again in the fall.  But I need to stay away from my trigger foods too (I'm looking at you ice cream) so that I will lose weight and start feeling better in the fall as well. So ultimately, the point of this post is that it's one thing to talk in abstractions about the importance of health and fitness but another thing entirely when you see the outcomes of poor diet and lack of exercise right in front of you.

Get your Pumpah Pumping! Heart Rate and Effort Throw Down Talk

Fun Fact Number Blitz Time!  Sorry about the delay in posting, I just was Capitan Zoney last week, and kept trying to include too much in this post...Yes, this long written word pile has already been heavily edited!

I am going to cover...

• How much exercise you should be aiming for
• Establishing heart rate zones, using heart rate monitor or taking your pulse
• How to use the Borg Perceived Rate of Exertion chart to get in the right zone

Cathy had posed an excellent question to me about heart rate...where should she be at? Let's reflect a bit on what she is doing and then answer that after some wordy paragraphs!

Cathy has a solid month of walking under her belt.  Her workouts include long and short interval walks, endurance walks, and  recovery walks.  During her intervals, she is working in moderate to vigorous intensity ranges (more effort on the shorter intervals).  Interval training is a really great way to improve fitness but not every session is an interval session.  On her easy walks, moving her body is the goal, if her heart rate is in the low to moderate range that is fine (for now!).  On her long walks, I'd like to see her cruise up into a moderate intensity in the middle of the workout for maybe 10-20 minutes, then wind down.   Balancing out effort sessions with relative recovery workouts and effort sessions helps prevent burn out and injuries.  Cathy does not have any underlying issues that would make it important for her to stay in a low or moderate range, but that is were screening yourself comes in.  If you are looking to kick off fitness, check out this post to see if you need to see a doc prior to getting out there, or maybe you need to start with low intensity first and see how your body responds.

Note:  Exercise has been shown to help just about every illness, and is appropriate and helpful for people with all kinds of known disease.  It can help reverse disease, and increase quality of life.  If you do have chronic disease, this is for you too!  You may just need some checking out prior to getting started, check out this post for more info!  YOU CAN IMPROVE YOUR LIFE!

Each exercise follows the F.I.T.T. principle, frequenc, intensity, type and time.  Today's blog really zeros in on intensity.

HOW MUCH SHOULD I SHOOT FOR!

These are American College of Sports Medicine recommendations for general population, which are pretty similar from organization to organization (American Heart Association, Center for Disease Control, Mayo Clinic) as they are all evidenced based.

• 150 minutes of moderate intensity aerobic cardiovascular activity (minimum), 75 minutes of vigorous intensity, or a mix of the two types of intensity will reduce your risk of the Gnarlies, also known as chronic diseases, that will steal the beauty of life.  Heart disease and diabetes, cancer of the colon and breast, all these yucky diseases are within our control to influence!
• 30 minutes of walking 5 days a week will check this box to get started! Or maybe you start with ten minutes and work up from there.
• 150-250 minutes is associated with modest weight loss (diet being the other key component!). At least this amount of activity is recommended to prevent weight gain.
• > 250 minutes of moderate intensity cardiovascular exercise a week has been shown through research to be the amount of exercise required during maintenance after weight loss.
• Your workout does not have to be continuous.  Ten minutes three times a day can accumulate and count as a workout.

We have been focusing on cardiovascular exercise (any rhythmic movement counts, swimming, biking, etc) , and I wanted to point out that other components are important in a well rounded program. Remember, Cathy's program is specific to her and all the things going on in her life. We discussed starting with walking but you could get right into weight lifting, a tai chi class and kick off in another way!  Other things to consider and components that we will be folding into Cathy's life are:

• Weight lifting 2-3 times a week
• Balance or neuromuscular training 2-3 times a week
• Flexibility training 2-3 times a week

One last side bar, the other major exercise component is just not sitting too much!  Being sedentary has been shown by research to be another health threat even if you are doing exercise.  Taking lots of get up and about breaks if life or work has you sitting frequently will lengthen your life!

HOW DO I KNOW WHAT INTENSITY I AM CRUISING AT?

How will you know if you are putting out light, moderate or high intensity?  Low intensity is 50-63% of your max heart rate, moderate intensity is 64-76 percent of your maximum heart rate and high or vigorous intensity is 77-93 percent of your maximum heart rate.  This info is referenced from the American College of Sports Medicine.  A lot of consumer sights will point you to moderate intensity as your target to keep things more concise.

If you are just getting started, low intensity is a great starting point.  You will improve and push on to a new level when your ready.

To know your numbers, start with an estimate of your maximum heart rate.

220 - Your Age = Your Maximum Heart Rate

(NOTE: there are other ways to calculate this if you find you are consistently below or above your zone. Check out this link to alternative evidenced based equations if you find your having a hard time hitting your rate or your way over your heart rate zone. Another nugget to consider, unless you have had a stress test, this is truly an estimate of your maximum heart rate.)

SO I am 36, making my estimated maximum heart rate 184.  This is an approximately how much my cardiovascular system could tolerate.

220 - 36 = 184.  OK, simple math victory!  184 is my Maximum Heart Rate.

Let's start with low intensity.  Just getting started? Maybe this is where you begin, your training your cardiovascular system and this is a great zone to explore first if movement is brand new to you!

Low Intensity Aerobic Exercise =  50-63% of your Maximum Heart Rate

Low intensity = .50 X 184 = 92
                       = .63 X 184 = 115

Moderate intensity is breaking a sweat but you can still carry on a conversation.  Another way to define that is 64-76 percent of your maximum heart rate.

Moderate intensity aerobic exercise =  64-76% of Max Heart Rate.

Moderate intensity  = .64 X 184 = 118
                               = .76 X 184 = 140

For me, that's 118 to 140 beats per minute.  Considering resting heart rates can be anywhere from 60-100 beats per minute, that is a DOABLE shift to scoot into the moderate intensity town!

High intensity or vigorous aerobic exercise = 77-93% of Max Heart Rate

High or vigorous intensity = .77 (77%) X (Max Heart Rate) 184 =  141
                                          = .93 (93%) X ( Max Heart Rate) 184 = 171

I think the highest I have ever gotten with my heart monitor is 171-175.  And I was crankin'!

Cathy and I just happen to be age mates!  SO her numbers are also mine! For Cathy's program, I want her to watch her heart rate monitor for these numbers especially during her intervals.  Her longer intervals, I'd like to see her right at the 130-150 range.  Since she is doing long intervals, maintaing that would be tough for several minutes.  With her shorter intervals, I'd like her to try to get up to the 150 or up range, she only needs to maintain this for a minute or so.

DO you need a heart rate monitor?  Even though they can be convenient, you can simply take your pulse!  Taking your pulse for 30 seconds then multiplying by two or for a straight 60 seconds  gives you a nice accurate form of feedback.  YES, you could do ten seconds and multiply by six but the longer interval you utilize to assess your pulse the more accurate the reading.  Your only risk there is the fitter you are the quicker your heart rate recovers while you are checking it.  Use your second and third fingers at your thumb side of your forearm is an easy way to access your pulse at the radial artery.

Radial Pulse

Carotid Pulse

Brachial Pulse

Your carotid artery on the side of your neck and your brachial artery nestled amongst the elbow pit can work too.  Do not use your thumb as it has it's own pulse and can mess you up.

I want to note something here.  Cathy does a 5 minute warm up to increase her heart rate so she is ready to get into the meat of the workout.  Remember, the acronym SENSE, Start Exercise Nice and Slow EVERY TIME!  Even with a warm up, it may take until the second or third interval to get the heart rate response she wants.  Every person is different!  This is a great way to get to know your body and monitor your responses.

HOW DO I CHECK MY INTENSITY WITH PERCEIVED RATE OF EXERTION?

Another way to pretty darn accurately assess intensity with some carry over to heart rate is the good ole' Borg Scale.  The scale I am using with Cathy is the modified version, she has a heart rate monitor and the modified scale is great too BUT it doesn't have this nice little correlation shown below.

Check it out below.

SO if you are working between a 9 and 11, it has been shown to be close to 90 to 110 beats per minute.   Adding a zero to how you feel is pretty close to your heart rate.   Is this system perfect, no.  We are all individuals!  But studies show a pretty good correlation.  This is a great way to increase your body awareness and create connection to how it feels to work at certain levels by how you feel.

I went for a 6 mile run yesterday sans heart rate monitor.  And I pushed along at what felt like a hard intensity, and mid run stopped and checked my heart rate, it was 148.  It took me a second to get my timer going so it might have been a little higher, and since I stopped to check my heart rate recovery might have already happened.  The Borgy worked out for me, anybody else use this system!?  Try it and give me a little feedback.

I like the descriptors in the chart, a "6", which is essentially resting heart rate, usually around 60 beats per minute for many folks, is just sitting in a chair, makes sense.  From our earlier calculations, moderate intensity for me and Cathy would be between a "9-10", fairly light (118 HR) and  a somewhat hard 13-14 (140 HR).  Our vigorous or high intensity range is 141-171 correlating to feeling hard to very hard (150-170 HR) .

Medication!  Some medications, beta blockers, digoxin, etc, inhibit heart rate response so check your meds and see if you are on any of these guys.  This chart is a good guide for those were heart rate will not be a reliable indicator of effort.

AS ALWAYS, if you are starting a program, check out this post.  Yes, I am a nervous nelly on the upfront for new exercisers.  BUT once cleared for take off, I like to deliver the business.  That post has information regarding getting started and you may need to check in with the doctor prior to getting awesome!

I am always cruising the Internets for inspiration and ideas, and ACE, the American College of Exercise website, is about to launch a 28 day challenge in August and they have a great getting started week by week program that is a walk and gentle body weight strength training.  Really user friendly!  No equipment required.

Try out the ACE challenge

And check out a great and progressive, no equipment required 12 week program,
http://www.acefitness.org/acefit/healthy-living/

Referenced Material

• CDC website: http://www.cdc.gov/physicalactivity/everyone/measuring/exertion.html, regarding Borg scale.

• ACSM Guidelines for Exercise Testing and Prescription, Eighth Edition, Walters Kluwer, Lippincott, Williams, and Wilkins. Page 5.