Weight Loss Lies

Weight Loss Lies

The most nonsensical piece of advice—don’t think of this as a diet, think of it as a lifestyle. A weight loss regimen’s end goal is to reach a reasonable weight and eat normally to maintain it. Who would start restricting their calories if it never ended?  And I’m sorry, but while you will be healthier eating more fruits, vegetables, and lean protein and less processed junk, you won’t lose weight simply by doing this.

You have to eat fewer calories than your body needs before it will tap fat stores to make up for the deficit. Your body isn’t stupid. No matter how much fiber-rich, calorie-empty foods you eat to fill yourself up, your body will react. Especially in the beginning, hunger will haunt you. Then your body will adjust and lower your metabolism to require fewer calories. Exercise can raise the metabolism and lessen this effect but you still have to slog through it to find the balance.

And no matter what the promises of any diet or supplement, the body cannot lose more than one pound of pure fat a week for women. Men can lose one and a half to two pounds a week. Anything else is excess water or worse, muscle, if you don’t have the proper intake of protein or try to severely restrict your calories. We want instant results, but not going to happen. You have to set your mind to be in this for the long term. The more pounds you need to shed, the more overwhelming a task it can seem.

Exercise

Most know that exercise adds muscle, which weighs more, so determine your fat loss by inches rather than pounds when first starting to exercise. The latest studies suggest that exercise is less important to losing weight than diet. Exercising makes you hungrier and people tend to eat more, they say. Duh. If you are following a specific diet program with a prescribed amount of calories, you may have more cravings, but if you follow the program, you will lose weight. If is the problem.

The Diet Wheel

I have spent my life either gaining or losing weight. I’ve managed to maintain one weight for no more than a few weeks. They call it yo-yoing. It’s a wheel you start one way to lose weight. You lose focus or heart and it starts backtracking and you gain weight. It’s very hard to stop the wheel. I haven’t found the solution, and of course it’s getting harder with age to lose weight. If anyone has found something that worked for them—losing and keeping the pounds off—please share.

Crazy Pets

Pet Owners’ Quirks

Anyone who has loved a pet will say that their animals are family members. There is shared love, concern for each other’s welfare—anyone had a psychic dog who knew when you needed an extra lick or cuddle? We have to ensure our pets’ health—especially dogs who have to go outside and brave ticks, mosquitoes, hot pavement, etc.—provide care for them when we have to leave them at home. (I have to laugh. The computer is prompting me to use that instead of who in the above sentence. I dare anyone to call a pet owner’s dog a thing instead of a who.)

The first cat I fell in love with I called Blackie, despite the fact that he had a white chest and paws. He never bit or scratched me, not even when I dressed him in doll clothes and wheeled him around in my baby carriage. I don’t know why he didn’t jump out. I’d sit on the floor to watch TV with his head resting on my leg. If I had to get up, I placed a rolled-up newspaper under his head.

Crazy Pets

I bought myself a red Persian kitten after college from a pet store. That cat was certifiably crazy. Start playing with him and he attacked with the ferocity of the lion he resembled. I had to wrap my arm in a sweat shirt while he chewed on it to prevent punctures. An indoor cat, he was determined to go outside and lay in wait at the door whenever he knew my mother was coming in. She never paid attention.

I took to clipping him into a harness and leash outside. Stupidly, I never gave a thought to other animals bothering him. He was attacked right before I was to leave for vacation. My father agreed to take care of him. Unfortunately, Dad wasn’t of the breed to consider an animal family. He called me to say my cat was dying. I rushed home. Poor kitty couldn’t even stand up. I hand fed him pieces of chicken and stood him up and held him to walk. He recovered.

Next time I went on vacation, I took him along. On the highway, he rested half on the back of my seat, half on my neck. Pouring rain, I almost missed a turnoff and screeched into it. The cat grabbed hold of the nearest support—my neck.

Okay, wait a minute. Which of us was crazy?

The Bladder and Kegels

The Bladder and Kegels

I looked up Kegel exercises on Wikipedia. It explained the purpose of the exercise, named after the originator, a doctor trying to help women with incontinence issues and both men and women in sexual functioning. It didn’t explain how to do them.

I meant to ask my doctor but of course forgot at my last appointment. I saw a broadcast on PBS with Chritiane Northrup, who is a gynecologist. She described the exercise. Pull in the pelvic floor muscles. Do not let this engage abdominal, thigh, or buttock muscles. They should remain relaxed. Hold the muscles in for a slow count of ten and slowly release.

Then do a rapid pull in and release—once per second. Finally, pull the muscles in and while holding them in, push out as though having a bowel movement. The abdominal muscles and anus will contract for this. Hold for a slow count of ten before slowly releasing—no rapid pulses for this one.

Exercise Regimen

Dr. Northrup recommends starting gradually. It may take a while to hold the muscles to a count of ten. Work up to repeating each exercise ten times, which is one set, and do a set three to five times a day. Stay at ten each for one week then add five more and five again after another week for a final twenty reps. Do three to five sets of these twenty reps each day. They can be done anywhere. No one can tell that you’re doing them. It probably takes three to four weeks at twenty reps to see a change in incontinence issues.

There are Kegel exercise weights that can be inserted in the vagina and supposedly work the same muscles to hold them in. Dr. Northrup recommended them. Wikipedia said there is no proof that they work any better or even as well as the exercises alone.

Am I Doing it Right?

Some women like the weights just to be sure they are doing the exercises correctly. You can tell if the muscles you are targeting are working by inserting two fingers into the vagina and doing the exercise. You should be able to feel the muscles squeezing your fingers.

I have common women’s issues with spritzing urine when coughing or sneezing, but my mother has major problems, which I’m trying to avoid. I’m just starting the exercises, so can’t speak as to how well they work. Anyone been doing them for a while? I would love feedback on others’ experiences and will report on any progress or lack thereof I notice.

The Future of Jobs

Will the Job Crisis Be Remedied?

Just last month, my teenage son shared with me his vision of the perfect world. People wouldn’t have to work, basic needs would be supplied, and people could concentrate on creative dreams. Pie in the sky, right? Well, on the weekend I read an article in The Atlantic, “The End of Work.”

Manufacturing jobs have steadily declined the last few decades and phasing in robotic workers has escalated—think drones and self-propelled vehicles. Social change has started and we are well into the throes of the consequences. Computers open a small percent of technical jobs compared to the jobs they replace. Americans in particular consider their jobs or at least working as part and parcel of who they are. To have that stripped from us will have long-lasting emotional and financial repercussions.

The New Landscape of Work

What will the future workplace look like? Many cities revolve around their office complexes, jobs that can be done more and more by computers that don’t need multi-storied buildings. Will we find new uses for them—apartments?—or will they become part of a dying city? And all the displaced workers, will they stay in the city or spread out? Depends on how the transition is handled.

Some, like my son, see a world where people’s basic needs are met, so they can concentrate on raising families, taking care of the elderly, becoming artisans, or other jobs machines cannot do. Some suggest something like Craig’s List where people can gain work credits for doing sundry jobs or community centers in individual neighborhoods where people can go to socialize and prevent isolation as they work together on needed jobs.

Emotional Consequences

The majority of Americans find self-worth in working. Those who have been ousted from their jobs and spend long periods unable to find another, tend to suffer greater substance abuse, spousal abuse, and depression. We need to be useful, though the American dream of a worthwhile, fulfilling job isn’t the American reality. Most find their jobs boring, especially low wage jobs that are becoming the norm, even for college graduates.

No one knows how resources might be divvied up or by what criteria. Whichever way we wind up will in large part depend on the foundations we build now for this coming change. As a parent, I find this especially daunting. How do I prepare my kids for a future with which I have no familiarity? I never had trouble finding a job as a young person—a well-paying job is another story. After college, I worked a full-time job and two part-time jobs. Still couldn’t afford an apartment. Since my son has already been thinking about this, however, maybe he’s already on the right track. I hope so.

Forcing Morality

Free Will

When did God in the Bible ever force anyone to follow his laws or to believe in him? Yes, there were consequences for not doing so, clearly spelled out, so no one could say they didn’t make an informed choice. But never in any instance was a person made to follow God’s laws and advice. So why do some Christians insist that man must pass laws to force certain behaviors—on abortion, marital contracts, prayer in school, on and on—when all the laws we need have already been given to us?

Everyone not insane or otherwise severely mentally handicapped has the ability, right, and responsibility to choose their behavior and beliefs. Christians say every life is ordained by God, who has a plan for each of them. Really? Bible doesn’t say that. Romans 8:28 and Ephesians 1:3-4 say all Christ’s followers have been known to him from the beginning of time. He has a plan for his followers. Hang in there. I’m following a point of logic.   

Forcing Morality

Jesus said that all people who follow him are first drawn to him by the Father and that few will enter the narrow gate and find the path to eternal life. So we can share Jesus’ message, sow the seeds, but all those lives born outside of God’s plan and will or not drawn to Jesus as one of his followers will never be changed through laws. If that were possible, all the laws in the Old Testament would have been sufficient and we wouldn’t have needed a Messiah.

Of course we humans don’t possess the knowledge of who is or isn’t God’s, which also means we haven’t the wisdom to judge others’ behaviors. Those we admire may turn out to have dark hearts and those we scorn may simply not have found their way yet. Manmade laws won’t make us more moral or more apt to follow Jesus’ teachings. They work only on those who already agree with them or want to avoid the law’s punishment, not the change of heart God requires.

Having faith means believing God has a plan despite the fact that we don’t know the details or always see its effects and believing He is perfectly capable of orchestrating that plan. We are meant to follow and serve his will, not force it on others. God has never done so. People trying to do it indicates fear to me and a lack of faith that God’s promises are true. Follow your beliefs, be an example to others—not a dictator—and let God take care of judging others.