It has been a crazy week and weekend.

This week was OK. I know I need to shop for food for lunches, I just haven’t made time. Unfortunately, I also skipped my exercise again this week, due to unexpected events that made it pretty much impossible to do so.

I have noticed that lately I have not been craving sweets as badly, and every week it gets easier for me to make healthy food choices.

Unfortunately I did not exercise when I had time this week on Sunday and Monday, and then my car broke down on Tuesday, so I was not able to use the gym. By the time I got home each evening it was dark.

Although I am still making better food choices, I do not feel like I have the motivation to exercise like I usually do when I start exercising. I know I need to eat meals during the day, but should I be doing something else like taking vitamins?

You were so busy this week you forgot to eat! I don’t usually recommend a no-food diet! I am amazed you could even go all day and not eat until dinner.

What is even more remarkable, you didn’t really pig out when you finally got near food. You are either working too hard, or someone would say you are in love.

Seriously, no snacks, no sweets, skipped meals, all this is very uncharacteristic. Your average fat grams were 30, but your calories look lower than usual. And, you lost 4 pounds!

Nutritional quality is a goal equal to weight loss, so keep healthy eating in mind. Skipped meals might be opportunities to avoid high-calorie foods, but they are also missed opportunities to consume healthy foods. By the way, you have lost 20 pounds. Do you feel different? Tell us about the change in clothing size, and re-measure you hip-to-waist ratio for next time.

Sharon

Armand’s Reply

Mandie,

Because you are struggling with maintaining a regular exercise program, you are at a critical point where many people simply give up entirely. Don’t let yourself do that!

Just because you had a bad week of exercise doesn’t mean all is lost. You must get back on the wagon and aim to have two good structured cardiovascular sessions this week (not including Walleyball). Can you promise me that?

For motivation, let me offer two tips:

Find someone at the gym to exercise with. Schedule a day and time to meet twice each week. You will be less likely to let your friend down by not showing up.

Set a short-term goal — such as for the next month you will do 10 workouts. The workouts can happen at any time during the month.
Once you have reached this goal, reward yourself with a non-edible treat such as a spa session or new clothes. Then set a new short-term goal.

Tags: cardiovascular, exercise, gym

This entry was posted on Friday, June 29th, 2012 at 6:22 pm and is filed under Health. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.