Not to get ahead of myself and start prematurely doling out advice, but here are three lessons I took too long to learn, for anyone else who may be following this thread and struggling to lose weight and get healthy:
1. Cardio is Key. I used to think it was stupid and bad on my joints and I hated cardio. As a high school basketball player cardio was punishment--when you did something wrong, you had to run. Turns out making space for that extra 500-1000 calories each day goes a long way in the calorie balance; it also gives you energy and strengthens your heart and other muscles. That’s not to say you absolutely need cardio to do it. But I’ve learned that it’s a whole lot easier to do it in a sustained way with cardio. And if you’re like me and your knees suck or you hate one type of cardio, find another. For me it’s rowing which is low impact and easy on my knees and it seems to be working, and I don’t absolutely hate it. Heck, I almost look forward to it. But just find something that lets you get your heart rate up and burn 500-1000 calories in 30-60 minutes almost every day (at least 3-4 times a week, but more is better for a variety of reasons).
2. Alcohol is Poison. Lots of us grew up and live and work in a culture of alcohol abuse—where it’s totally accepted. And even though it never really made me do any alcoholic-y things like lose a job, and I still don’t and wouldn’t qualify myself as an alcoholic, the multiple or several bottles of wine Mrs. O and I ripped through on a nightly basis for years is just so awful for you. That’s hundreds upon hundreds of extra calories every day, and what’s worse, it makes you feel like crap in the morning, which means you’re less likely to make a good decision and exercise in the morning, you’re going to feel crappy, and you’re more likely to make lots of bad eating decisions all day. It’s a death spiral, quite literally. Do this over a sustained period of years and I don’t see how one could possibly be in good physical, or hell, mental shape. I’m not quitting alcohol—I’ll still have a beer on occasion, or a scotch or two at the end of a long week. I may still tear it up with a few drinks at a big event like a wedding. But gone are the days of daily and habitual alcohol abuse. All these years I thought that question on the form at the doctor’s office was laughable and didn’t apply to me (2 drinks a week, or 4, or 6+? How about per night???). Turns out them doctor folk actually know when they’re talking about when it comes to doctory stuff.
3. Don’t Diet. Everyone has told me this for a while but I never really understood it. I always imagine I had to be sitting there with an apron at my counter every night dicing tomatoes and arugula or whatever, which is never happening. But it turns out there’s a moderate way to eat. Instead of the bad sugary snacks, why not have some peanuts? Some cheese? A piece of thin whole grain bread with avocado? It’s actual food. You can have a Chips Ahoy on occasion when you’re really hankering, but just one, not a whole sleeve. Drinks lots of water instead of alcohol, or get saucy and stick up some flavored seltzers in your fridge to mix it up. This isn’t a diet. I’m not counting calories. I’m not only eating one type of food. I eat sensible meals, with proteins and some veggies; I work some salads in when I can. And I cut the really bad stuff and the excess. Could I eat better than I do currently? Absolutely, and I’d like to keep improving on it. But for now I just eat like a normal human should eat. No wacky restrictions, not staring at a piece of lettuce for dinner and thinking “man just two more weeks and then I’ll hit my goal and go back to eating what I like to eat!” Just find a real way of eating real food that works for you, and do that. Like, forever. And keep the sugary snacks to a minimum, because I’m convinced that, after alcohol, they’re the second worst thing for you. Again - a cookie is cool on occasion, a little chunk of dark chocolate is cool, but that’s it. Maybe a piece of cake after a Sunday dinner at a family party. All acceptable. It’s not about taking things off the menu entirely; it’s just about making the menu mostly about the good stuff the vast majority of the time.
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I’ve come to figure out that, at least for me, it can’t be about weight loss. That’s the wrong way to think about it, sets up some perverse incentives, and just wasn’t sustainable. Instead for me it was about finding a lifestyle that makes me feel good and be fit and healthy, and the weight loss just follows all on its own. But it isn’t the driver.
Not preaching, because I ain’t quite there yet, but I feel like I’m sort of almost there. And maybe I just needed a decade or so to figure this all out for myself. It’s pretty simple stuff and yet was pretty enlightening for me.