Obesity | Coach To Lose

Exercise and Conscious Living

Diet and Nutrition, Health & wellbeing, Inspiration, Loosing Weight No Responses »

Aug 102010

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During my weight loss journey and often when people hear what I do “at my age” , I am asked how I can keep doing it. This question always catches me by surprise as I rarely have a conscious thought about not doing what I need to continue to reach for optimal health. A day wasted is a day lost.

Don’t get me wrong last week we helped some wonderful friends back and move their house. This was a 4 day project after work. Was a lot of lifting, stacking, packing, bending and all kinds of exercise. So after the first day, I didn’t do my morning workout for 3 days. I went to bed each night exhausted and feeling good about how well this old man humped all that stuff.

This morning I realized that my workouts are a lot like my life in general. I have come to realize over the years that life is lived in moments. Some moments are like the next rep of curling a dumbbell to my chin. If it is the first few reps it seems easy enough, but as the set nears completion, it will become harder for me to complete that set with the full number of reps. Now if I don’t increase the weight, it stays easy, but no progress is made.

: Image by Neeta Lind via Flickr

Life is that way isn’t? If we glide through it we get comfort zone results. We live from what is easy. There is little challenge, little growth and often no or very little progress. Kinda of boring don’t you think? That is where I used to survive from. It seemed like it was all I could do. Perhaps as you read this it is where you feel you are now as well. Well I have some good news for you, it isn’t that hard to get more from life.

When obesity limited my life, I had no energy, no motivation and struggled each day with pain, depression, and various concerns of my health. Had I given up I would have lived out my life in a much shorter time span. I would have allowed the doctors and the pharmacy to control how my body “survived” for the time I had left. I just had to make new choices and become more conscious that it really is about moment to moment living.

So ask yourself right now, what choices do I make in each moment to have a fuller, more fulfilled life. Notice I didn’t ask where you are now. I didn’t look for the reasons you got there, I asked what are you going to do to change it? I don’t believe in being stuck in the past, or what someone just said that hurt my feelings. I believe in the statement “If it is to be, it is up to me!” What say you?

Another Rant – FDA Warns Weight Loss Drugs Xenical and Alli Can Cause Severe Liver Damage

Health and Fitness News, Loosing Weight 1 Response »

Jul 082010

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I remember reading in an United Kingdom article over 2 years ago that Britain was looking into this. What the heck, how come it took 2 years for a warning come to the United States? I guess it had to travel by message in a bottle or something.

Now I have not been a fan of magic pill solutions that causes you to crap in your pants in oily ways to gross to imagine. But aren’t we supposed to be able to rely on the FDA to tell us about this stuff as soon as it is seen as an issue? Oh wait they aren’t telling us of the risks that 1 out of 25 could die from bariatric surgery either.

Well it just goes along the line of trusting the government to come up with a solution to the obesity crisis here as well. New studies just released that says that 28 out of 50 of the good ol’ USA just increased their obesity rates yet again.

Heck my own state of Idaho has gone over 25% of it’s population is now obese. Not just overweight mind you that makes the numbers go even higher. And all that I am hearing from the various committees on obesity is that it is a problem related to income, location, race etc. etc. No solutions for you being offered if you are broke or a member of various stereotypically lower income brackets. What a load of more brown stuff!

Common America, wake up and find your own answers. Obesity kills and your government is at best going to tax you while you die with it.

End rant!

Could you be bribed to loose weight? Probably not!

Diet and Nutrition, Health & wellbeing, Health and Fitness News, Inspiration, Loosing Weight 2 Responses »

Jun 242010

Locally here in Idaho and even in Britain they are looking at way to add incentive to weight loss. Idaho offers state employees a “rebate” of sorts if they participate in a very limited number of choices for weight loss programs. Interesting the choices are limited to only those companies that sponsor paying the incentive. Oh and when you do the math, the sponsors make a whole lot more on the programs then what they pay back for the weight loss. When I tried to probe deeper into why the program did reward all weight loss and not just if you sign up for a particular program my phone calls and emails were never returned. It was obvious, but I just wanted to have the debate with them.

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In order to obtain APFT badge, soldiers must p...

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Lets face it, if the Governor really wanted to add incentive to weight loss and fitness the program would reward whatever weight loss was achieved. They would sponsor more activities and incentives to cover the many aspects of becoming more fit. Truth here it is really a token effort put together to make it look like it matters and that they really care at all.

Add that to the hospitals promoting new ways to carve up your body in often untested over time ways, junk food sponsoring of things like the Olympics and you start to see a pattern. There is a huge industry around the idea that is weight loss and fitness. What is a person to do.

Let’s start with some education. Take some time and read this article in the Guardian. Then ask yourself a couple of questions. Is my health important to me? If so, then why am I not taking care of it? Next, Can I do it myself or do I need some help? Truth is everyone can but few people do. Why because they don’t have the time to do it efficiently and effectively. They don’t have time to plan their workouts, plan their diet, get back in shape, and do it all without damaging themselves. Add to that the understanding of how their body uses food and processes it, they just don’t have the time or the willingness to do all that.

What’s the answer? Find someone (give us a try for an hour on the phone) and spend the time to see if you are serious about your health and fitness. Look at the fact that it is half way through the year. Did you make that New Years Resolution that this year would be different? If so, is it? Can you do it on your own? Sure you can! But will you? You can’t and won’t be bribed, it is all about choices and lifestyle changes. Let us guide you carefully through the journey to a point where the force of habit takes over and you can and will do it on your own.

Losing Weight and Gaining Life

Athletics and Sports, Diet and Nutrition, Health Coaching, Loosing Weight 1 Response »

May 262010

Walking to a first place win

This month has been a new milestone for me. I have won two first place awards in sporting events in one month. Now for many of you that would seem like old hat. I knew your types and their abilities my whole life. I just was never on a first place team or came in first on any sporting event in my life. This month I received a first place ribbon in a 5k walk for my age bracket and our volleyball team won the university staff tournament for staff appreciation week.

Now for you folks that have been good at sports getting 2 first place awards in a month might seem small. Stop for a moment and imagine being in your 50’s and never having taken first place before. Twice in one month seems like a life changing event. In fact it was due to a lifestyle change that it came about.

I now know why people who are good at sports seem to walk a little taller. It feels good to compete honestly and win. Win with humility and not in their face but win none the less. Imagine a whole lifetime of never winning and you understand why someone might give up the idea of ever winning at anything. I have lived my life thinking I would never win. It did keep me from trying until the last couple of years.

Rick Dorey Great Idaho Potato Marathon 2010

Still moving at the end

After I lost my weight someone suggested trying for a 5k run. My first one I did some training and came in better than some but didn’t place at all. The great thing was it keep me focused in trying to improve. I found I could get faster. I found I could run longer. I found that I could train for a purpose that was as much about me as it was the people I was working with to improve their health and fitness.

The results are, it continues to motivate family and friends to do more for their health. They remember when they couldn’t get me off the couch, or to garden, heck even sometimes to just go visit somewhere. I was too tired. I was too sick. It gives them hope. I get the benefit of enjoying more life. I believe because of my choices to lose weight that people in my life and those yet to come along will live longer, more enjoyable lives. And that my friends is a prize worth winning.

Tobey and April not far behind

I say if I can do it I can help someone else do it. What say you? Your comments are welcome!

Weight Loss – You can’t afford not to.

Diet and Nutrition, Health and Fitness News, Loosing Weight 2 Responses »

May 032010

Many of you interested in health and fitness probably follow TV shows like “The Biggest Loser” and the new one with Jamie Oliver’s “Food Revolution”. What you don’t probably see is what is going on in the background. Obesity and the costs of it are becoming more and more talked about. Our policy makers, you know the guys and gals that just got you “free” medical insurance, are looking at the costs of a society that continues to struggle with weight issues.

: Image by SavaTheAggie via Flickr

I came across this article Jamie Oliver Trims the Fiscal Fat that you might find a good read. It shows a growing trend (pun intended) that when it comes time to trim some budgets obesity will be one of the areas that is looked at very closely. The article in fact mentions that obesity related illness in this country costs us over 90 Billion a year. Now if you have been following the deficit numbers you will know that curbing that spending could easily become a priority.

Having felt the stigma of obesity I can tell you now is the time to rethink your comfort level with being overweight. You can look in the mirror all you want and be happy with yourself. I in fact hope that you are. The question is with all this information coming out about costs of obesity, will an employer looking at you, just be looking at your qualifications or will they take into consideration your health and costs to the company.

Another number included in the article was a estimate at what obesity costs an individual (that would be your costs) for obesity over a lifetime. It was $29,000 in added health care costs. So I ask you do you think it is time to take notice? Is it time to take this issue and do something about it? I have seen obesity when it was mostly a non-issue cost people their jobs as well as their health. I don’t think our planners that feel like they are responsible to “take care” of us will let this one slide much longer.

The Guardian’s health editor introduces our health factfile – and the full dataset behind it
• Get the data
• Tomorrow: politics

Health, as the work of Professor Sir Michael Marmot most recently eloquently demonstrated, is in no small part a function of where and to whom you were born. The most deprived communities, where jobs are low-paid if not scarce and those who make it to university are a talking point rather than the norm, are also those where cancer rates, heart disease and strokes are high. One government after another has been uncomfortably aware of this and made promises to do something about it. It has always defeated them.

But while the health inequality gap persists, the UK’s health overall has been getting better. Comprehensive childhood immunisation programmes have virtually wiped out some diseases. Smoking has become the number one public health target, and although we still struggle to get certain groups – young women and people in those deprived areas particularly – to quit, the public smoking ban, high taxes and campaigns have had an impact that must show up in lower rates of lung and other cancers and reduced heart disease. Diagnosis and treatment of cancer has improved – even if we still trail much of Europe in death rates. The politicians (and the drug companies) argue that is because we don’t buy the newest, most expensive cancer drugs. The cancer tsar, Professor Mike Richards, will tell you it is because we are slow to diagnose the disease, especially in those deprived areas (again) where men and women do not stride into the GP’s surgery demanding attention.

In recent years, the health gap has become visible, manifesting itself in obesity, which is often most rife among those with less money and less education, who are more likely to buy affordable and filling pie and chips than a smoked salmon bagel. Obesity puts people at risk of heart disease, diabetes and cancer – the big killers of our age.

To make a momentous improvement in the health of the nation today, those social inequalities have to be addressed. Yes – we are all living longer but, to misquote George Orwell, one of our greatest critics of social inequality, some of us are living longer than others.

Sarah Boseley

guardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

Happy Birthday to Me

Inspiration, Loosing Weight, The Why I Needed to Loose 1 Response »

Mar 242010

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Yesterday was my birthday. It was a day of mixed emotions and feelings as birthdays normally are for me. My wife remembered as did many of my friends on Facebook. My son remembered by giving me an extra special dose of a hard time. My mother chose to be mad enough with me not to call so I had to deal with those emotions. Then at work the usual happened, I fell through the crack of the usual card and well wishes system we have there. All in all it was a very normal day, some sweetness, some sorrow and a lot of gratefulness for the good things in life.

But this morning I am reflecting on my own age and where I am. I am coming up on the first year anniversary of my 100 pound weight loss. The middle of April last year I went back to eating what I wanted and how I wanted. I looked at that this morning and realized after another year in my life I am in better shape than I was 30 years ago. I can do things that I couldn’t do physically and mentally. I am stronger all the way around. I have given myself the gift of life and as a weight loss coach I am able and willing to give it to others.

This time last year I felt like I had arrived. I had reached my big goal in life. Now I realize I am just getting started. This month alone I started working with three new health coaches. These people will join me in making a difference to people. Being there with them in a journey that can often challenge people to their core. The rewards are there each step of the way but it often feels like a hill that cannot be climbed. It is great to walk side by side with some one and say, of course you can do this, look how far you have come already.

Today then I am grateful for all the new friends I have. I am grateful for my journey even when that last step might seem a bit harder. And I am grateful that my spirit has moved me in the direction it has. I can’t express the joy I have being involved with so many good friends and people that are taking on the same journey. Optimal health is a journey, weight loss is just a beginning. Loosing weight is just the start of the search for better health and happiness. Come and join us!

Older Entries

Coach To Lose

Exercise and Conscious Living

Another Rant – FDA Warns Weight Loss Drugs Xenical and Alli Can Cause Severe Liver Damage

Could you be bribed to loose weight? Probably not!

Losing Weight and Gaining Life

Weight Loss – You can’t afford not to.

Sarah Boseley explains: What’s happened to the UK’s health?

Happy Birthday to Me

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