If my bathroom scales were showing pounds instead of kilos I’d be fine. They’re not. I’m not fine, I’m at least 45 kilos overweight and have been for nearly ten years. This has really started to worry me lately though, as I have gradually lost my fitness through being too overweight to walk, cycle and swim like I used to. I walk into work most days and get out of breath only a few metres into the hill climb. I’ve also had chronic problems with both my ankles of late and I know this is mostly caused by the strain they are under propping up way too much of me.
I’d really like to regain my fitness and walk up that hill without puffing and sweating for half an hour afterwards. In fact that is another of my goals for this year: to increase my fitness so that, by the end of this year, I can walk up the hill to work at a normal pace and not get badly out of breath. And I’m going to do this by budgeting. I know a typical weight loss/fitness goal is achieved by dieting and exercise but I have worked out that my problem is not my diet and exercise. The poor diet and lack of exercise are the symptoms of my problem and my real, underlying problem is over-consumption. The poor diet is enabled by not controlling my money and the lack of exercise is a side-effect of too much internet, movie and book time and not enough nature time.
I always buy good quality, healthy food in my weekly grocery shopping but later in the week, when I get home from work late and tired and I don’t feel like cooking, I go out to the takeaway shop and buy something unhealthy to eat. I end up having a high intake of calories, fat and sugar and throwing away really healthy ingredients because they have gone off after languishing ignored and unloved in the crisper of my fridge for far too long. When I was a single parent and quite poor I had to eat healthy food I prepared at home as I could only afford takeaway meals once every month or two. Now that my income is so much higher I no longer have external restrictions on what I can buy and I have gradually fallen into the habit of spending money on food unthinkingly and uncontrollably.
Likewise, I don’t restrict the amount of time I spend on the net, reading or watching movies. I will usually start reading news feeds and social feeds shortly after I wake up and usually spend hours every day with a screen in front of me passively consuming content rather than having a life. I haven’t owned a television set for years and have always thought that people who organised their routines around the broadcast of their favourite series were mindless slaves of the broadcast network but when I consider my own internet habits I can’t see much difference except that I am enslaved to a few apps and websites.
Both these bad effects of over-consumption create a vicious cycle and breaking this is going to be a challenge. I am looking to my budget to help by forcing me to menu plan, buy only what I need, prepare it at home and resist the temptations of the takeaways shops. If I only go to the supermarket once a week I will spend less than if I shop every day. If I go with a list and stick to it I will not buy too much. If I pay all my spare money off my debts and restrict my food spending to a sensible amount I will not be able to afford unhealthy food choices. It is proving a bit challenging re-learning my old recipes and limiting what I buy, when and how often I shop.
It is proving easy to relearn my old habits of regular exercise. I have always been quite active and used to love my daily cycle to and from work along the Upfield Bike Path. I always found it improved my mood to be outside in the fresh air, even if it was walking home listening to my lectures on my iPod. This month I have been walking five days a week or more for between 40 and 50 minutes around Herston and along the Enoggera Creek Bikepath. The photo at the top of my blog is a shot from my phone of part of this beautiful pathway. Once I got started exercising at a regular time again I quickly became addicted and have really missed it when the weather has prevented me from walking. The regular hour a day of time after work away from all distractions has stopped me from brooding about things that get on my nerves at work and helped to improve my mood enormously.
Japanese Garden at Mt Coot-tha Botanic Gardens
Today the creek path was in danger of flooding so I went for a short stroll in the Mt Coot-tha Botanic Gardens instead. The Japanese garden looked beautiful and I was the only one out there in the rain.
I have a wall chart up in my bedroom where I record my weight every morning and the exercise I have done every evening. In the first 28 days of this year I have lost 2.1 kilos and exercised on 22 days. So far the plan is working, hopefully I can keep this up and at the end of the year I will be a shadow of my former self.
Hopefully I’ll re-establish my good habits quickly and by the end of the month I will pass another big milestone on my road to a debt free, healthy life.
