A Weighty Subject

For me - for this family - the topic of weight is a heavy one in absolutely every sense of the word but since I sniffed around that pen in my last post where I referenced the Great COVID Weight Loss Campaign, I might as well dive in. 

The reality is I'm like others out there: women in our postmenopausal years that find we've got the stubborn belly fat, and metabolism that is going so slowly it's almost pedaling backwards. We might still exercise, but our weight seems to almost take that as a challenge to show us it can add more than we can sweat off. And, I'm sure if you're thinking, yeah, that's me then you also have at least one friend who still looks svelte and you sometimes secretly hate her. It's all very stressful, and as it happens, I learned a long time ago that I tend to eat my stress.

Despite "diet" being the ultimate four letter word in our family, I had gotten to a point where my weight was starting to not only be a cosmetic issue, but was beginning to lean into a health concern. My cholesterol was borderline bad, any kind of bad air quality day winded me terribly. And, yeah, I hated what I saw in the mirror. So when the Pandemic shut us all in, I decided I was going to do it differently than certain others under this roof. I wasn't going to binge watch streaming channels, and I wasn't going to binge bake (well, okay, I did a little). I was going to get healthy. I got help from a program from our insurance at work that allowed us to enroll in a coaching program for free that lasted a year called RealAppeal. Add that to the Peloton my husband had gotten us for Christmas the year before, and while it took the whole year plus some, I did it.  I lost 50 pounds.

Fast forward almost three years and where are those 50 pounds?  Well they're with me; I seem to have found them. Actually it's more like 20 found their way home, but enough to be depressing.  And I ride the Peloton with a religious fervor that exceeds what I was doing even in 2020-21.  So what happened?! Great question - but it's probably the ice cream. Maybe the chocolate stout beer I allow myself every now and again. Maybe it's the croutons I eat straight out of the bag (seriously, I got a "year in review" kind of email from Sam's Club recently and the number one item I bought was Member's Mark croutons). After 18 months of denying myself the simple little pleasures of The Oakmont Bakery, maybe I went a little hard the other way. Now don't get me wrong, I didn't park myself out at Oakmont or anything, it's still a special treat, but yeah, my granddaughter and I have made our way out there a few Saturdays. And, when I was counting out the number of times she and I went for ice cream when I was babysitting more than I am now...well, that might contribute to why I'm not babysitting as much now (seriously, the number of photos I could have chosen of her with ice cream in her hand was sort of an a-ha moment).

I know the science behind all of this, but this isn't a blog about the science of aging, it's the experience of it. I wanted us to share our WTF moments as we journey down the road, and what I realize as I contemplate my reaction to all of this is that all of these changes we're going through have made me want to react emotionally and impetuously, throwing reason out the window. I want the easy fix products like Golo promise. Man, I came so close to ordering that a few times, it's like my finger was hovering over the keyboard...and I KNOW there's not an easy button. Losing that 50 pounds was hard, hard work and a lot of giving up things I enjoy, like that pumpkin flavored cone Cookie's Creamery carries year round. Like not just enjoying it less but giving it up altogether - at least that's what it takes for me.

And it's not just women.  I listen to local sports talk every morning and in the last 30 minutes I've heard two different weight loss for men ads.

The decision is: do I enjoy life a little and just accept I'm not model thin, or do I want to have the body and not the ice cream?  So far, I've chosen to live a little.

What's the journey like for you?