A few years ago, I went through a huge lifestyle revamp; I decided to start being more healthy. It’s not like I was ever really an unhealthy person, especially in terms of my body weight. I think at my biggest, I was maybe 30 lbs heavier than my ideal weight. I guess the worst I’ve been was “dumpy”. Yeah, nice word. But I’m 6 ft tall, so my frame could carry the extra weight without too many issues.
I have always understood the value of exercise, and I’m thankful to be of a generation that was knowledgeable about physical fitness. I won’t get into my baby boomer parents and their theory on exercise, because they didn’t have a theory on exercise; they simply didn’t do it on purpose. Sure, they went for walks, or maybe played games in the yard with us as kids that involved running, but they never participated in anything resembling an exercise regiment. As an adult, I have lapsed into a sedentary existence during certain periods of my life and also failed to exercise. But then I would get disgusted with myself and get back into it again. I would go to the community recreation center and lift weights or go for a run. My employers over the years have had onsite gyms, so I would drop in if I felt like it.
For a number of reasons, I became serious about my wellness in 2013. The biggest change I made was the tracking of my diet with a smartphone app. It began out of curiosity about my nutrition statistics, and I decided to take a closer look what I was eating and drinking. I was shocked at the amount of fat, sugar, and sodium that I was consuming. I thought I ate a reasonably healthy diet. I cut out some things, added some things, made a few other changes, lost 15 lbs in a little over a month, and have been at what I consider my “optimum weight” ever since. At about 167 lbs, this is the weight I would like to maintain the rest of my life.
As I logged my diet and reviewed the stats, my perception of food began to evolve. Instead of just something to fill my tummy, to alleviate my boredom, or to relieve my stress, food became what it actually is; fuel. Sure, there are occasions where food does play those roles, but primarily, it is fuel. That doesn’t mean that I don’t enjoy eating junk food or other fattening food occasionally, it just means that I ensure that I eat the right volume of calories and nutrients to provide my body with the necessary nutrition to be active and healthy. I stripped out the emotional aspects of eating.
The restriction of calories is not easy. It is so easy to eat badly and to eat to excess I’m at a break even point, at my ideal weight, so my goal is to eat the same amount of calories every day, around 2,500. If I do this today, I will weigh exactly the same amount when I wake up tomorrow. Remaining within my 2,500 calories can be problematic if something out of my routine occurs, like happy hour drinks, a birthday party, or dinner with friends. The cushion available is exercise; I eat back all of the calories that I burn. When I exercise, I activate my wrist heart rate monitor, make sure it is linked to my fitness phone app via Bluetooth, begin the app, begin to exercise, and document the calories burned. That total is now available for me to eat. So if I run for an hour and burn 700 calories, that is a nice supplement to my dining later.
So the documentation of my food and exercise is an everyday reality. It has been my reality for 730 days. Pick a day over the past two years, and I can tell you precisely what I ate that day, if I exercised, and if so, how many calories I burned. There are a few gaps here and there (maybe a late night at the bar caused me to just put in 1,000 generic calories and abandon the specifics), but it is mostly accurate. I have a food scale that I keep in the kitchen. The other night we had eggplant and pasta with marinara sauce. I put my plate on the scale, clicked “tare weight”, put the egg plant on the plate, and weighed it. 4 oz. I zeroed it again, now for the pasta. Another zeroing, now the sauce. Then I enter it into the phone app. Glance at the calories, carbs, fat, protein, etc. I still have a few hundred calories, so desert is in my future.
Why keep doing this, especially when I am in pretty good shape? I can ballpark the calories, weight, and macro-nutrients of most common foods, so why do I keep tracking with such precision? That may be something I blog about in detail in the future. I believe that it has mostly to do with watching a loved one neglect herself and the resulting fallout from this neglect, which ended up with her suffering an early death. I want complete control over my health, and this is my current methodology to ensuring that control. So tomorrow morning, day 731, my day will begin with logging my diet again…
Breakfast
Mp Combat Powder – Protein Powder- Cookies N Cream, 0.5 scoop 70
Eight O’clock Coffee K-Cup – Eight O’clock Hazelnut Kcup, 10 oz 2
Quaker Oats – Old Fashioned 100% Natural Whole Grain, 1/4 cup dry 75
Simply Balanced – Greek Yogurt Triple Berry, 1 cup 120
Klarbrunn – Sparkling Water Lemon Flavor, 1 Can 0
Quest Bar Protein Bar – Cookies & Cream, 1 bar (60g) 180
Dr. Mcdougall’s – Organic Instant Oatmeal Light Maple Brown Sugar, 1 packet 150
Heb Natural – Applewood Smoked Uncured Bacon, 1 Slices 30
Calories – 627
Carbs – 85gs
Fat – 14gs
Protein – 55
Sensus Communis 