Thanks everyone for the replies... gives me a lot to think about....
I guess I wonder what is an active lifestyle, and what would actually be considered exercise? Generally in a work day I am lifting, squatting (my best guess is 50 in a day, but I'll count it today), running, walking, and I sit for about 20 minutes on my lunch break. At home, I spend about an hour cleaning, moving furniture, taking recycling out, doing laundry, dishes. On our days off together the bf and I walk around a lot, but I don't consider this exercise because I am not wearing runners..
Would that be considered to be active? I feel a little dumb asking.. feel like I should know, but I really don't. If someone asked me if I were an active person, I'd say 100% no. I definitely need to change my mindset, that is clear to me.
What did you all do first? Did you add both weights and cardio in at the same time? Or one at a time?
Thanks everyone, definitely gave me something to think about. Even if I sometimes don't want to think about it
Oh, that would be awful! To gain weight because you started exercising! I haven't been doing anything long enough to give advice, but maybe you can change your exercise as you loose the same way you change your calories? start with walking and then add minutes or weights or whatever as you need to? Anyway, megacongrats on surviving the birthday! And happy birthdat!
Why do I always remember stuff after I post? I wanted to tell you that my plate has an place you can look up all sorts of exerxise to see how much calories it burns. You could check out the stuff you are doing every day. It is pretty funny reading, it has stuff like coal minnig and praying in church. The numbers seem too high to me tho.
Oh, that would be awful! To gain weight because you started exercising!!
Any weight gained due to exercise would be a good thing, not a bad thing. If you're indeed speaking about weight gain due to added muscle. A VERY good thing in fact. The more muscle the better. That's what we're aiming for. The more muscle we have the more calories we burn just standing still, hence the reason men have a much easier time with weight then woman, for the most part anyway.
Any weight gain from exercise due to water retention, is just WATER. NOT FAT. Also nothing to fear. It'll all adjust itself.
So please, don't put off exercise due to fear of gaining weight. It's just not the case.
Swimgirl, there's intentional exercise and unintentional exercise. UNintentional exercise is what you described - doing your ordinary, every day stuff. That's what we're supposed to do. Move around like eager beavers. If this is how you've always moved, then it won't create any more of a calorie deficit, since, well, it's what you've always done.
INTENTIONAL exercise is what you do ON TOP of the every day stuff. It's usually at a higher intensity, thus burning more calories and providing more benefits.
You could try some sort of dance class - zumba's pretty hot right now. Aerobics classes. Exercise DVD's - I LOVE LEslie Sansone's Walk Away the Pounds series.
A great easy way to start muscle training is with resistance bands.
Scrounge around. Try some different things. But please at some point (sooner rather then later) add in some intentional exercise. You may find that you become an exercise junkie!
I think most of weight loss is what you eat, but exercise still has tons of benefits! You're doing your body a favor by doing it, just find a way to integrate it while staying focused on your eating. Moving around definitely does count, just add some more on top of it-- if you don't make it all or nothing it will probably be easier to eat right and exercise.
Last edited by thinpossible; 09-01-2009 at 11:42 AM.
Just gradually increase. Rockinrobin's right about the benefits. Just take a 20 minute stroll 3-5 times a week until you're ready to go a little faster &/or longer. Eventually you'll increase your cardio, and at some point you'll hit the urge to strength train. It doesn't have to be all or nothing!
First of all, congratulations on your success and for making such good choices during some challenging situations - that's awesome!
As with most things, I think the diet/exercise balance is a very personal thing that varies from one individual to the next. Some people find it's essential to incorporate exercise into their weight loss program to be successful, while others find it isn't. I'm going to be a slightly contrary voice here in saying that you may be part of that second group (at least for now). If you're successfully taking off weight, I'd say it's fine to stick with what's working. I don't think you should feel bad about not adding in that other element yet, especially if you have a history in the past of gaining weight while exercising. I think people sometimes (myself included, in the past) get super-focused on exercise and can unconsciously overcompensate with food and cancel out the calories they burned exercising by being a little lax about what they eat after the fact. I'm definitely not saying this happens to all or even most people who exercise to lose weight - just a small subset, of which I have been a member in the past!
It's true, what robin said above is right - if you're careful with your calories, then weight gain due to exercise is likely due to something like water retention, etc. But if you're someone who often finds themselves getting lax about her calories after exercising, or if you find it revs up your hunger to the point that it's hard for you to stick within your healthy caloric window, then I don't think it's necessarily a bad thing to hold off on an exercise regimen as long as your healthy eating plan is allowing you to move toward a healthy weight.
I say this because it's my understanding that the most important thing, health-wise, is to get to a healthy weight. I think as long as what you're doing is taking you in that direction, then stick with it. You may get to a point where your weight loss stalls, or at some point you may feel like you've mastered your eating enough to incorporate something else, and then the idea of exercising may appeal to you. But I don't think that you should feel like you have to incorporate exercise or else your weight loss experience won't be authentic (which is an underlying concern I saw in your post, apologies if I read too much into it). I know anecdotal evidence is always kind of sketchy, but my brother lost and kept off eighty pounds without exercising at all (aside from occasional rounds of golf). He watched his calories like a hawk, and the weight came off.
All that said, I definitely don't want to seem like an anti-exercise person, because in fact, part of my whole healthy lifestyle thing over the past year has been to start exercising. But to be honest, this has largely been due to factors separate from my weight loss: I wanted to have more stamina so I could carry luggage through NYC without feeling like I was going to die; I have a family history of osteoperosis and wanted to do something to help my bones; my good cholesterol is a little low so I wanted to boost it. But the biggest threat to my health when I started was my weight, and I really feel like the biggest component in what we weigh is what we eat. I waited a couple of months until I had my eating habits under control, and then I felt ready to add in exercising to pursue those other health-related goals.
Just my two cents! Though really it's more like two dollars, given how endless my post ended up being. Apologies!
