About 1970

For most of my life, I weighed around 100 pounds which was way too little for my five foot six inch height.  Then, one year, I made several changes to my lifestyle that sent me into a weight gaining spiral.  I turned 50, stopped smoking and stopped going out dancing (almost my only physical activity). 

1992 or so, just before the weight gain started.

My weight started to climb which seemed like a good thing at first.  I’d tried many times over the years to gain without success.  However, once it started, I couldn’t seem to stop it.  Adding 75 pounds in a year simply didn’t seem like a step toward better health. Since I was working full time with an hour commute each way, more exercise wasn’t really an option. 

Around 2012

So, I started the diet roller coaster.  After years of struggle, I finally got my weight back down to 155, still 20 pounds more than I wanted.  Then I retired and started college.  I climbed back to 165 as my commute became a total of three hours a day instead of two and instead of spending a lot of my day moving, I began sitting in class most of the time. 

Then I graduated and spent my days sitting at my home computer.  I quickly realized I would have to accept that I needed to find ways to exercise.  My daily food allowance, just to maintain, was 1250 calories, only one meal in a restaurant or two regular meals at home.  I was continually going over by a couple of hundred calories a day.

I began a walking regimen, starting at 1.25 miles and gradually working up to three miles a day.  I also started doing Yoga twice a week.  I finally stopped gaining again, but every time I let the exercise slide, I’d start lose ground.  I became obsessed with diet and exercise plans.  

I read everything I came across that had even a remote relationship to weight loss.  I bought DVDs on exercise plans and various kinds of equipment that I didn’t have the energy to use. I bought books and magazines.  I clicked every link on Facebook or in my emails.  I counted calories, made plans and set resolutions that never seemed to work out.  Through it all, the best I could do was stop gaining.  Nothing brought my weight below 160.

2014

Then my babies started having babies, as in my grandchildren started have children, and my time became consumed with childcare as their mothers went back to work and my home became a daycare.  I gave up on the idea of ever making my goal of 135 pounds and began to focus on staying below 170.  

The years passed and my lifestyle adapted: the babies became toddlers, then preschoolers, and the older ones started “big school.  I became more of a chauffeur than a nanny.  I still dream of being slim again.  I don’t spend money on useless equipment or DVDs, but I still read everything I come across about weight loss.  

Today, I found an interesting article on Facebook about “intermittent fasting.”  In a nutshell, it says that fasting makes your body healthier and may help some people lose weight. According to the author, Kyle Boelte of Outside Online:

“There are three main ways to do an intermittent fast: the 5:2 diet, in which you eat regularly for five days a week and reduce your intake to 600 calories during the next two; alternate-day fasting, where you rotate between standard and 600-calorie days; and time-restricted eating, in which you limit eating to a four-to-eight hour period each day.”

I have been doing a limited version of this for a year or so now because of an article I read about improving your sleep by not eating for at least two hours before you go to bed. My sleep has improved, which was the original goal, but I think it has also helped with my weight.  I haven’t really lost weight, but I have maintained the status quo without getting much exercise or really limiting what I eat, just when. 

I get up around 7:30am most days.  I’ve never liked eating as soon as I get up anyway, so I usually eat “breakfast” between 9am and noon depending on what else is happening. If I eat breakfast late, I skip lunch, otherwise I eat lunch between 1 and 2:30pm. Dinner is usually between 6 and 7pm. If I ate both breakfast and lunch, I just have a salad or a light snack for dinner. In any case, I make a concentrated effort not to eat after 8:30 in the evening because my normal bedtime is between 10:30 and 11:30pm. 

As a child chauffeur, I spend a lot of my days in the car.  I still spend most of my spare time at the computer.  My walking routine has disappeared.  My Yoga routine has become more like an occasional thing when I’m feeling the need to stretch. I still wear my fitbit, but I use it more as a watch than an exercise tracker.  I still tell myself that I will get back into walking and working out.  Since, I’ve managed to stop the upward spiral, maybe finding time to exercise would make some loss possible.  Our youngest little is almost three years old.  Just two more years and he’ll start kindergarten.  Then my daily child routine will be limited to a couple of hours in the afternoon.  There’s a chance it could happen…..