My Journey With Weight Loss – Back To Basics

It was a really busy morning today. I had to drive my brother downtown (an hour on a good morning) for a specialist appointment at 8:30am. That meant doing a quick 1/2 hour walk with the dog first thing and putting off training until I got home. I realized something on my training though this morning while doing the fartleks, the faster I run the longer my stride gets. I think it is just a natural way the body moves instead of doing faster little steps. Regardless, it is still hard but I figure that it must be helping me if this training is so difficult. I also noticed I have started a new mantra in my head, getting stronger, getting faster. It seems to be what is pushing me through the sprint training.

My husband told me that when he retired he wanted me to start training him for walking and help him lose some weight. I had to explain to him that it wasn’t going to work unless he made some other adjustments as well. I’ve learned along this journey that it is not just one factor that makes you healthy, you need to do a combination of several things. So for me, it is back to basics to help him kick start his journey.

I started with he has to eat 3 proper meals every day. He found this to be counter intuitive since normally he doesn’t eat breakfast. I referred him to my post a while ago that talked about why breakfast can be important. Next is avoid snacks but if you are going to have one try to make it healthy. Trust me, he is well aware of where my stash of almonds is kept. For me, especially after a long run, I need to have something to snack on and I love almonds. Another is eating a lot of fruits and vegetables. He was a bit surprised by how much he liked spinach/beet salad which I have at least once a week.

I think the hardest part of my basic health plan for my husband will be reducing carbs and focusing on healthy or ‘good’ carbs. My husband is addicted to bread and believes he may die if he can’t eat it. But this is not about depriving yourself of something you really like, instead it is about having it occasionally and adjusting your other meals during the day to compensate for things like bread (note we really only eat whole wheat bread). Besides, he is liking some of the healthy carbs that he is eating such as quinoa, low sugar blueberry bran muffins and my homemade whole wheat waffles (which by the way taste awesome).

So, how is all of this working? Well in the first week with targeted walking and eating differently he has lost 6 lbs. I remember at the start of my journey when I would lose big numbers and how motivating that would be. Now, he just has to keep it up but I admit it has also made me decide I can go back to some of those basics myself. I think the two of us working together is going to be good for both of us.