My Exercise of Choice

The doctors have talked to me about exercising for decades, and I have indulged in that activity from time to time. It has always been a passing fad, something that captures my attention for a while, then graduated fades off my radar.

All that changed about two years ago. To prepare for my knee replacement surgery, I began to swim laps in the heated pool at the Wellmess Center. I had not ever swam seriously in my entire life, but I found a love for being in the water.

Two years later, I'm still swimming. I now swim in a larger pool at a gym, and my love for the water continues. My swimming time is an hour and my distance is now 1200 yards, the length of 12 football fields.

Swimming is simultaneously relaxing and challenging. I can push myself to swim stronger and faster, and at the same time feel the tension leave my body. Extra benefits. The main benefit is that I burn 800 calories for every hour that I swim!

I hope to be able to swim the rest of my life.

Stress and Over Eating

I have a friend who is one of those naturally thin people. She is in great shape and always looks wonderful. When she is under stress, eating is the last thing she wants to think about, much less do. When she is under pressure for some reason, her appetite leaves.

No so, for us who fight the downsizing war. We tend to want to eat whenever we feel stress. Our eating patterns may be very well controlled, but then something will happen and then we want to eat whatever we can find. Right?

This falls under the category of emotional eating and Paul McKenna's Techinques for conquering it is at the very least helpful and at the most a way of overcoming this critical eating urge.

Stress happens. Just as sure as the sun rises every morning, stress is going to happen. We must be prepared for it if we are going to be overcomers and victorious in our battles.

By the way, this week I wore a blouse that I had not worn in at least 5 years! The winning and losing continues!