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Venerated Citizen                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                          
What about my Health?
by Sophia Barkat

My husband is a body-builder. He has been for the last seven years. Has it had any effect on me? Not one bit. I have been enjoying everything from mashed potatoes to rice and curry these last seven years that I've lived with him, while he's been getting into shape.

Why didn't his habits ever rub-off?  Well, for one, I never wanted to workout at a co-ed gym, which is where he works out, and I had a nice waist and no reason to work out, or so I thought.

Some time has passed since then, and after lots of sedantary activities and a haywire diet, I'm no longer a slim 115lbs with a 28" waist.

Recently, though, something changed. After measuring a robust 145lbs at just 5ft 2", I threw in the towel. I had had enough. Just a week ago I was a sound 139lb. What did I possibly do in that time to become a bloated fish?

Usually I try to avoid rice for every meal or even white bread. For some reason the curry was fabulous and I ate rice, enriched wheat tortillas – 150-175 Cal each and at least three per meal. And this was the result.

As it is I love sugar. Whether it's in tea or soda or processed food, I love sugar. And then there's the potatoes I eat in almost any form -- fried, mashed or cooked.

But after looking at the scale something in me snapped. I got very mad at myself.  I'm barely 30 and already feeling tired all day, a by-product of not eating on time and eating carbohydrates when I did. Not a good sign.

Giving Up:


But it's not like I never worked out or this is my first trial at this.

I had been working out with weights for a while, but going to the gym everyday meant a commitment I just wasn't interested in, especially since I don't feel comfortable working out in co-ed gyms. So I quit that after a month, and my 130lb weight, which was already too much for my height, also gave way.

On TV I'd see people doing aerobics and really wanted to. I didn't end up doing it though as everytime I did I was told to work out in the gym with weights by my hubby, and so ended up doing neither.

And frankly speaking I just wasn't interested. If I was I'd start with the food.

The Right Diet:

The first thing I started doing was accepting the fact that my diet is screwballs. I went through Zahed's Your Health columns again and found the Glycemic Index list. From there I found out foods with the lowest Glycemic Load and Glycemic Index values --- low in sugar.

I made a long list and went shopping.

Normally, I never look at calories nor do I look at ingredients when I'm at the supermarket. But this time I bought nothing with added sugar in it, and nothing more than 100 Cals per serving size. More so, I looked at the food I always bought -- sugary jams and sodas and white bread and enriched wheat tortillas and corn chips and salsa and canned fruits and just threw up. ADDED SUGAR!!!!!!!

The processed foods especially had huge amounts of sodium, saturated fat and non-fiber carbs. I couldn't believe what I'd been doing to my own body.

It took a while of loitering with a list around the supermarket, but I eventually found something to buy:


Quaker Oats -- no salt
Black Beans
12 Grain Wheat Bread
Veges -- not frozen
Bananas, Pears, Peaches --
not canned or dried or added sugar
fish
meat
cheese
juice -- no added sugar
nuts

I decided from Zahed's success with the Atkins Diet, that I'm also sticking to proteins and fats, fresh veges and fruits, and avoiding the sugar and the calories.

Anything more than 110 calories per serving and I won't eat it. Also, I don't want to exceed 400 cals per meal anymore, which can so easily happen when you're eating white enriched rice or white enriched tortillas. The latter food seems light but in effect your eatings a lot of sugar.



Exercise:

Not eating sugary foods is a start but it takes a lot more effort to lose weight. I knew I need to workout a lot to kick the pot-belly. I knew that I had to lose more calories working out than I had eaten in the same day. So I decided to start a frequent workout routine. Mornings and Evenings were a must. But in between it didn't harm to get up from the computer and jump around either.

The radio was a god-send. I found a station to keep me jumping for an hour and it works. In the middle of my monkey dance, when I'm adequately relaxed, I start using weights in the routine. 

When people here about using weights they shrug, especially women. I'm not suggesting you use a 200lb bar-bell.  But go to a store that sells small hand weights, 1-5lbs, and find out what you can pick up without injury. It shouldn't be so heavy that you can't stand up. It should be just right for you.

To lose fat and gain muscles these weights are an absolute must.

I myself, use four 2.5lb weights on barbells that can be adjusted. Zahed had them at home for me as early as last year, though I admit, my lack of interest got in the way.

I am very invested in losing all the fat in my abdomen. It's just gotten to the point of unacceptible now, and I know that I must do the right work-out with weights for this to have any effect.

Usually most people just lift some weights with their hands and they think that's useful. If you're not trying to look like Arnold Scharzneggar you don't need to have a lot of definition in your hands. The weights have to be used in ways that actually make you stress your fat.

What weights do is help you build muscles. If you focus on abdomen, thighs, hands and shoulders -- where people gain fat the most – you can convert fat to muscle and the good thing is this: muscles burn energy faster.

And you won't get muscles from aerobics. So, weights are a must. They will give you muscles to burn calories faster, and that's the ultimate goal.

So for people with pot bellies, weights must be used in ways to make the belly muscles work.

Right now I'm doing lots of squats and lots of aerobics, plus a good ten minutes of weights every 30 minutes of aerobics.

No Binging:

Losing 4lbs in a week is no sure victory but it's a trend. It's going to take a lot of work for this to continue and I must say it's not going to linear even if I put in linear effort. Fact is women's bodies are subject to different kinds of metabolism than men's bodies, and so we need to take that extra caution when it comes to what we eat and when.

It's not going to be easy having less sugar in tea, or no more cakes, but that's the requirement for losing the fat fast.

As long as I can keep this in mind, I only have luck to worry about.

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Discuss this article at Juryfury Chat.  For more about the Author see Contributors.

November's Prize will be

Health Writing Prize^New


Michael Zwerdling, author of

Postcards of Nursing: A
Worldwide Tribute
(Publisher: Lippincott)


will be giving away his book to the
reader's choice Writer of Best Articles
on Health at Juryfury.com.

Articles written before April 2004 will be eligible for this prize.

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Screenplay Contests


Quietpoly.com, our sister magazine, is
now running a Screenplay Contest on
the theme of:

Energy Conservation and
Renewable Energy Use.

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