the weight loss chronicles

more musings from moi

about the body journey,

fitness, etc

I had been going to the gym three days a week to go on the weight machines, prior to The Lockdown. I even fitted in one last workout the day before isolation. I loved my gym workout, much to my surprise. I was very, very beginner, though. Which I accepted. I had all sorts of immediate benefits. I was so happy about it all.

And I had in mind that I would do the cardio machines in the cold, wet days of winter, as well. Until then, I decided that I'd do walking outside every other day that I wasn't at the gym. Ha! Silly moi, I did not do the walking. I just didn't. 

Then came self isolation. And I had to rethink everything. We didn't know how long it would be before we could go back to the gyms. The gym culture is so big in this country, which I think is great, I really do. I worked for years in gyms, teaching yoga, and I saw some fantastic results for so many people. But I didn't want, at that time, to be going and doing other classes and the machines. 

In my isolation during lockdown, I pondered. One of the great things that I got from yoga, and very quickly, was the ability to be able to sort thoughts and feelings out logically in my head, without emoting on it all. Go back through happenings and put them into sequence, to look at cause and effect. Now, I know that for many, this is naturally easy. But I (obviously) had to acquire it. Honestly, some years this ability just went out the window, but, overall, yeah, it's been part of me for a long time.

What I pondered was to do with health, weight, and fitness. When problems started, and the tendency for them to re-emerge from time to time. Why and how they came, and developed. Going back, going back more, until I found the original cause and effect. I 100% recommend doing this. Sorting oneself out is so rewarding and empowering.

And, interestingly, I finally remembered a health situation from childhood, something that I was born with. And it underlined exactly how my body would react to stress, and food. What was behind most health issues I'd had during my life. I had a "well-I-never" moment. 

And then, with my yogic knowledge, I set about creating a small do-able daily plan, to manage it. I went back to what I was doing before the gym, but with some changes:

Each morning I get up early:

• I do some chiropractic stretches for my back, about two minutes
• followed by yoga flexibility moves (I know a gazillion of these), for five to eight minutes
• about ten minutes body tone with one kilo weights, and sometimes two hundred and fifty gram weights on my ankles. I alternated between pilates (hard), moves from an old Tony Little video that I remembered (nice and easy), old fashioned yoga leg waving stuff with some arm and shoulder moves that my sister, Geri, taught me (easy), and some little known yoga sculpting moves that I came across in the 1970s (hardest)
• then specific yoga breathing to reduce inflammation
• meditation
• and a walk. I've noticed that people who work and/or walk outside in all types of weather, have better resistance to viruses than the rest of us. When the lockdown is over, I'll be buying a big strong golf umbrella and a raincoat

In the evening I do some yoga: 

I went back to old fashioned floor traditional yoga with rest periods between each pose, to reduce stress and inflammation. Followed by meditation.

(I'll keep all of this up for a while, as I'm really too neurotic about viruses to go back to the gym just yet. I'll rethink it all maybe in a month or so) 

Now, how does this all relate to weight? Everything that I'm doing is for health reasons, and weight is included in this. I'm working on cooling my body. And reducing stress and the inflammation caused by it, which is my body's stress response. When I am stressed, I overheat. Which causes the inflammation. My weight is around my middle, which is the classic stress depository, and it is inflammation. I'm really happy with how I'm going right now, and am resisting my normal overkill with exercise, that I can't even maintain for even a week. 

Does anyone have any thoughts or resonance with any of this?