Biking for the First Time: This Year vs. Last

I did some bike riding this weekend and you'll forgive me if I start by saying, "Wow!"

It was such an intense, soul-scraping moment last spring. That's when I ever so tentatively tried to get on my bike and ride down the street. It was under the cover of night on bent wheels. An activity that I loved all my life was shaming me to my core as I attempted to get back on the saddle, as it were.

I strained just to get thirty yards up the street. I returned home thinking cycling was over for me. Or, if it wasn't, I figured it would be years of hard work before I could get there.

This year I had a big plan to start getting in shape for cycling by using a stationary bike at the gym for at least six weeks. Well, spring snuck up on me and I didn't get much of a chance to prepare.

This weekend I headed out on my bike again, wondering how I'd do the first time out. I was apprehensive but it went very well! My family was left behind in my dust.

Staying strong all winter got me ready for summer cycling.

Staying strong also gives me confidence in my body and the ability to do much more than a person my weight should be able to.

It started one year ago just by putting one foot in front of the other.

I'm looking forward to a fun summer.

What I Learned from a McDonald's McGriddle

I've eaten a lot of McDonald's breakfast sandwiches in the last fifteen years. I'd hate to know the amount of calories and fat that my body had to process.

I even continued to indulge for many months into my year long quest to save myself from myself. I had a coffee habit from Tim Horton's and, more recently, McDonald's. I often included a breakfast sandwich with my morning coffee.

By coming up with a cup of coffee that works for me at home (a Keurig) at Christmas this year, I stopped going to those places and eating their high fat, high calorie breakfasts. Finally.

So I've been on the wagon in that regard for over three months. But I had my first breakfast sandwich a couple of days ago due to an unusual time management issue. I'm happy to say that I learned a lot from the experience.

Consistently, I have three slices of toast for breakfast made from Smart Bread. It includes fibre but hides it. It seems like white bread when you're eating it but it is more filling. I put lots of fat and sugar on my toast, but at least it has fibre.

I know how long I can last on that toast before getting hungry. The breakfast sandwich has about the same number of calories as my all-toast breakfast but I got hungry sooner. Much sooner. I could feel my blood sugar rise and fall quite rapidly. I also craved more fat, it seemed, after I got hungry again.

This confirms my belief that bad eating breeds more bad eating. That's also why I go in cycles with my diet. If I'm consistent and keep crap out, I crave it much, much less. If I eat something bad, I seem to hunger for more bad things in a physical--not emotional--way.

Thank you, greasy breakfast sandwich. You've taught me well.

The Incredible Lift My Podiatrist Gave Me

Many of you have applauded me for being very enthusiastic about my fitness quest. But there was a dark cloud for me. It was the pain in my lower legs/ankles (mostly from tendons, I'm told) during jogging. It happened a few minutes in and caused me discomfort that subsided a few minutes after I finished.

This was a barrier to me being all I wanted to be physically. Now, I'm over 300 pounds still, and jogging probably could have been a bit much for me, but I suspected that it was something else. The rest of my legs did fine. This part of my leg would fatigue long before the rest of my legs.

I have high arches--very high arches. You can limbo under them. They've never really been addressed, until now. I decided to take advantage of my wife's work medical coverage and seek out an opinion from a foot professional.

Right away he saw significant problems with the way I walk. Friends have been telling me that I walk funny ever since I was in high school. Shoe salespeople could do little to help me.

I got my custom orthotics yesterday. They cost me $420! My insurance will pay for most of that, but boy, that's a lot money. A computer scans the bottom of your feet. They send the data away, and in a couple of weeks you get custom insoles to put in your shoes. They last a couple of years. I plan on mine lasting a hundred years.

I took them for a jog and I couldn't believe that I for once didn't feel discomfort in my lower leg tendons. The lower legs felt as the upper parts of my legs did. My legs were getting a work out, but there was no pain. I felt like I could go on forever.

This is huge for me. It opens up the potential for me to progress physically with no boundaries. I no longer have this problem holding me back. In short, I need feel I can get as fit as I want to. My jogging time can now start increasing up to a length I'm happy with, say twenty minutes or so, for now.

I've said before that there are probably a thousand things that led to my severe obesity. Bad feet was probably one of them.

Chocolate lovers tend to weigh less, study finds - Healthzone.ca

Chocolate lovers tend to weigh less, study finds - Healthzone.ca

CBC.ca | The Morning Edition | Obesity Epidemic - A Medical Blind Spot?

Dr Sharma interview from this morning's CBC Sask morning show.
CBC.ca | The Morning Edition | Obesity Epidemic - A Medical Blind Spot?

My First Winter as an Active Person is Now Over

Winter came and went and I regret it's over. Because it was an unusually mild winter, my kids and I didn't actually get enough of a chance to enjoy it. We could have done a lot more tobogganing.

From the onset of this attempt to reclaim myself from obesity, I dreaded the coming of winter. Even in my previous athletic/dieting periods I slowed down in winter and didn't do much. Having access to my clinic's gym helped this time out. It also helped that its not a regular gym. You make appointments and you feel obliged to keep those appointments. Even when I start to slip off the wagon, my appointment at the gym twice a week keeps me on.

It was a fun winter, much more enjoyable than any I've had--save one where I took up skiing--as an adult. I bicycled with the family on a cool night in November. I trained on a treadmill with the highest incline to get me ready for climbing our large tobogganing hill, then I climbed it. Then it became easier and easier to climb. Hill climbing became my winter exercise and it did wonders for futhering the improvement (fitness level) of  my cardiovascular system.

But the highlight of my winter was when I faced my fears and preconceptions head on by going for a walk in -45 wind chills. It was on my wife's birthday, we had gone out for supper and it was bitterly cold that night. The four of us huddled under covers for an hour just to warm up again. Walking from the car to the house was excruciating.

Yet I came up with the idea later that night to try out my MEC balaclava with my new warm gloves and layers of clothes. It was an amazing experience and I doubt I'll ever forget it. Obviously, it proved I could do anything in any weather, so winter was no longer an obstacle to staying healthy.

It was even enjoyable being out that night. The air, as cold as it was, was fresh and being in nature when it's fierce is still being in nature. My senses were heightened to the max and I loved it. My walk in -25 a few days later seemed like a ho-hum non-event.

Now I'm doing some time on a recumbent bike at the gym twice per week to make sure I'm ready for bicycle season, Chapter 2. Spring snuck up on me but I can't wait to see what this year brings.

Work burnout tied to 'emotional eating' in women

This is right up the alley of our Craving Change class.

During the work day, do you ever find yourself in the office cafeteria or in front of a vending machine, wondering why you’re buying more food? You had a good lunch. You’re not hungry.

But you could be suffering from work burnout, according to a new study.

The study, from the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health, found that women who are fed up with their jobs are more likely to eat for comfort when they’re stressed.

Here's a link to the story in the Globe and Mail.

McDonald's Canada: Switching Healthy Choices to Even Worse

I'm pleased to say I don't go to McDonald's nearly as much as I used to. It's more of an emergency that gets us there now rather than the thought that pleasure would be gained by eating their food.

I was out shopping with my daughter yesterday and we needed some lunch to keep going. I pulled into McDonald's and tried to order one of the very few healthy things on their menu: the chicken fajita, weighing in under 10 grams of fat each.

Well, I was told they are discontinued. A year ago they introduced 800 calorie Angus burgers (50% worse than the gold standard of bad food, the Big Mac.)

Needless to say, McDonald's is not committed to serving healthier foods. In fact, it's quite the opposite. They are concocting even worse foods to get us hooked on a drug-like fat fix.

They're not all that different than Big Tobacco. Or the drug dealer on the corner.

Keeping Certain Foods Out of the House

The philosophy: Don't completely cut out the foods you love.

The reality: Having those foods around leads to over-consumption and unrestrained eating.

I keep most of those bad foods that gave me problems out of my house these days, mostly desserts and take-out pizzas. But something new crept in. I needed to make sure I had snackable foods around so I didn't overeat but one of those snacks was liked too much by me and has become a problem I now have to banish from my kitchen.

It's simple and maybe a little unusual: Wheat Thins crackers and cheddar cheese. They go so well together. It all stems from a night when I was super hungry and I started to combine these two items I found in the kitchen. I really enjoyed it and began looking to recreate that original experience of pleasure. This is a problem because it leads to emotional eating. Emotional eating leads to an over consumption of calories.

I've decided I can't easily beat this problem, so I have to just not buy Wheat Thins crackers. I can keep the cheese for other things, but the combination has been unhelpful.

I Coulda Stayed Home Tonight

Snow has been a rarity this winter around these parts. It's a shame that I take up a winter sport and we have a winterless winter. The sport is tobogganing, in case you're new here.

It started snowing today and, although there were reports of numerous accidents on slippery roads, my son and I went tobogganing at Mount Pleasant (not a real mountain, just an old landfill site but a significant hill for the large person nonetheless.)

The air was still and the temperature mild. It was perfectly still out there on the fresh powder. We had the mountain to ourselves. Wafts of wood smoke from fireplaces filled the air. Everyone else was keeping warm and dry in their homes. To punctuate the magical and surreal atmosphere, we could continually hear coyotes in the distance, not uncommon for our neighbourhood on the edge of town. I guess they were trying to find each other in the falling snow.

I can see why skiers love fresh powder and will pay for a helicopter to go up a mountain to get it. It's so quiet, so peaceful. Cutting into the fresh, virgin snow was a thrill for us on our sleds. You go down in a wavy but unbelievably soft motion, like skipping along the surface of a cloud.

Laying on my back, watching the snow fall from the sky, I noticed a light. My son told me it was the moon shining through the clouds. I didn't have my glasses on.

The lesson is obvious. Get out and enjoy life. Don't let anything stop you. You're missing so much if you stay on that couch. The greater the reasons not to go, the more amazing the experience will be.

Link: Why It’s So Important to Keep Moving

Hoping to learn more about how inactivity affects disease risk, researchers at the University of Missouri recently persuaded a group of healthy, active young adults to stop moving around so much. Scientists have known for some time that sedentary people are at increased risk of developing heart disease and Type 2 diabetes. But they haven’t fully understood why, in part because studying the effects of sedentary behavior isn’t easy. People who are inactive may also be obese, eat poorly or face other lifestyle or metabolic issues that make it impossible to tease out the specific role that inactivity, on its own, plays in ill health. ...

Link to full article