Move That Body!

Never let the music make you feel lazy
Get on the dance floor, feelin' that backbeat
You never had it so good, you never had it so sweet
Raise your hands up in the air
Shake your derriere like you just don't care
Rockin', rollin', doin' it steady
I do believe y'all are ready to move that body
Move that body, baby

-Technotronic "Move That Body"

B. Good over at She's Opinionated got me thinking with this comment on one of her Weight Watchers Wednesday posts. So far she's lost over forty pounds and counting but knows she has to move her body in order to keep the scale going down.

I hate gyming. I actually have plenty of time to do it, but I still don’t go. And I have this thing about sweating. I hate to do it. So I have to find ways to absentmindedly move my body, so I don’t realize that I’m “working out” and burning calories.

B is not alone. A lot of women feel the same way for various reasons. Big box gyms can be such meat markets. Sweat and permed hair are not a perfect combination. Who has the time? The machines can be so boring.

Over the years, I've given all these excuses and more for not moving my body. However, I realized that the key was to find something that didn't feel like a chore. I had to think of it as my personal time where I was doing something that was good for me...but also something I actually enjoyed.

I started out swimming laps. I've always been in love with the water, learning to swim at an early age. By the time I had my surgery, I had gone natural so I didn't have my hair to worry about.

I walked - but not on a stationary treadmill or around and around an endless track. I walked through the woods and around bodies of water - anywhere scenic. I made an exercise playlist on my IPOD and I moved my body to the music.

I knew the key was not to let my body get used to any one exercise. I had to use different muscle groups. I had to keep myself from getting bored. Here's some of the things I tried:

• Jazzercise: a 60-minute class incorporating cardio, strength, and stretch moves for a total body workout. We’ve taken moves from hip-hop, yoga, Pilates, kick-boxing, and resistance training and bundled them into one hour. All ages, levels, and sizes welcome. I've tried this once or twice and it's quite a workout. You can find it hard to keep up at the beginning but they do offer a very good tutorial on the site to help you learn the core moves before you attend the first class.
  
  
• Strip Aerobics: This is probably one of the best workouts I've ever had. I leave every class exhausted and sore for days afterwards. I prefer the floor/chair class so I've never done the pole workout. I've seen women of all sizes doing both classes. I find that you tend to bond with the other women in the class as you struggle through! It's a fun struggle though...if that makes sense.
  
  
• Bellydancing: This is also another form of exercise I've only tried a few times. I never could figure out how to isolate my movements. I think I'm going to try again though because I find it such a sensual form of exercise and it's great for the abs - definitely my problem area.
  

I'm also interested in trying hand dancing and a hip hop dance class in the near future.

What alternative, fun ways are you finding to move your body?


Vivrant Thang blogs about live, love and music over at Songs In The Key Of Life.

Our Hair is Killing Us

We are letting our hair kill us:

WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. – About a third of black women cite complications of hair care as the reason they do not exercise or exercise less than they would like, according to Amy J. McMichael, M.D., the lead investigator of a study from Wake Forest University School of Medicine.

McMichael, associate professor of dermatology, specializes in hair and scalp diseases, ethnic and pigmented skin diseases, and general dermatology and skin care. “I see a lot of African American women in our clinic and had noticed how many of them are overweight. This puts these women at risk for hypertension, diabetes and other serious problems.”

In fact studies show that 77 percent of black women are overweight or obese, McMichael said. “I thought it would be interesting to look at what role their hair plays in their amount of exercise. Many African American women with coarser hair use either heat straighteners or chemical products to straighten their hair. Depending on how coarse or fragile their hair is, they can’t just wash their hair after exercise without having to go through the whole process again, and that can take hours. Over-washing fragile hair can make it break off easily.”

McMichael and the team of investigators from the Department of Dermatology, the Division of Public Health Sciences, and the medical school interviewed 103 black women about how much and what types of exercise they do, and the time, expense and complications of caring for their hair. Sixty-four of the respondents had relaxed their hair by various means.

All of the respondents believed it was important for them to exercise. And 50 percent stated that they considered changing their hair to make it easier to exercise.

To read the rest of the article click on "Dermatologic Barriers to Exercise in Black Women" in the left sidebar under "Articles."

I'm not unsympathetic to the hair issue. But I will readily admit I don't understand it. When I had hair I still exercised and exercised hard. I never allowed my hair to stop me from working out, but then again I rarely went to the beauty salon either, unless it was to get a relaxer. So, I rarely had a hairstyle I had to "protect." I've talked hair on this blog before, but as the study notes there are no easy solutions. If you have straightened or relaxed hair, you're gonna sweat it out. There's no way around that if you're working as hard as you should work.

To those who navigate their workouts and their hair, how do you do it?

Black Women's Magazines Giving Bad Diet Advice

Seems Essence, Ebony and Jet are doling out bad diet and fitness advice:

African-American women's magazines are more likely to encourage fad diets and reliance on faith to lose weight, while mainstream women's magazines focus more on evidence-based diet strategies, according to the study by UI researcher Shelly Campo, published in a recent issue of the journal Health Communication.

AA women's mags are more likely to suggest Faith as a weight loss strategy, which never is a suggestion in more mainstream mags:

Relying on God or faith was suggested by 1 in 10 weight-loss stories in the African-American magazines, but in almost no weight-loss stories in the mainstream magazines.

The study also says that Black magazines put too much blame on the individual and not enough focus on envrionmental and economic issue that make it difficult for Black women to lose and maintain their weight:

"Both genres are highly guilty of over-reliance on individual strategies," Campo said. "We blame individuals too much for circumstances that are not entirely within their control. We know people living in unsafe neighborhoods are much less likely to exercise. And fast food is cheap compared to fresh fruit and vegetables. To tell a poor person that they made a bad choice because they couldn't afford the salad fixings raises some ethical concerns."

Why is there such an unwillingness in the Black mags to discuss health issues? I haven't been a regular reader of Essence, Ebony or Jet in years but I distinctly remember plenty of articles on making more money, finding a man, God and any number of other issues but not too many on health and fitness and leading a healthy life. It feels like Black women's weight is the elephant in the room (no pun intended) for many Black women and out magazine's reflect this.

What do you think?

To read the rest of the article click on the link in the left sidebar under "Articles."

Set Your Dieting Rules

Set your dieting rules. What are dieting rules? Dieting rules are a set of guidelines that you will follow to help you achieve your weight loss goals and hopefully, by the time you've reached your goal weight, they become habits and an everyday part of your life.

On average you have to do something 17 times before it becomes a habit. 17. So don't think you're just going to wake up one morning, decide you're gonna lose weight and all your old habits will just fall by the wayside. No, you have give yourself a set of rules to follow to make that transition possible. And remember these have to be things you can live with FOR LIFE. Not just something you're doing until you get fit into the little black dress.

Just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about here are my dieting rules:

T.S. Johnson's Dieting Rules

1. Eat breakfast no exceptions. Even if it is just a piece of fruit.

2. Drink at least a glass (8oz) of water after I eat anything. And I mean ANYTHING. If I chew a piece of gum I've got to drink water.

3. Walk at least 30 minutes a day 6 days a week. No exceptions. If I do other things fine but if can't do anything else I gotta at least walk.

4. Eat 25 - 30g of fiber everyday. No exceptions. Doesn't matter what else I eat...gotta get the fiber in.

5. Don't feel guilty about falling off of the wagon. Recognize it happens and as long as I'm doing Steps 1-4 I should be okay.

So there you have it. Those are the rules I live by and let me tell you it makes a WORLD of difference in trying to lose the weight and sticking to my goals. So if you haven't set you some rules...get to it. It could mean the difference between losing the weight and trying to lose the weight.

Today is a new day. So what are you waiting for?

90 Minutes a Day Keeps the Fat Away

90 minutes.

That's the magic number to losing weight AND keeping it off.

Some years ago I was watching Dateline and they were following three people who had lost a significant amount of weight (30 pounds or more) and kept it off. What they had in common and what a medical study the show quoted showed: if you want to lose weight and keep it off, 90 minutes a day of working out is what it is going to take.

Period.

That's very different then the 30 minutes a day that was recommended for decades and more in line with the new government guidelines that say 30 - 45 minutes of aerobic activity at least 5 days a week PLUS an additional 30 to 60 minutes of additional physical activity a day (walking, taking stairs, housework, yard work, etc) for weight loss.

So how do you get 90 minutes of exercise a day into a busy work and home schedule?

Well ask yourself this: Do I watch 90 minutes worth of TV a day?

If the answer is yes - then you have 90 minutes to work out.

I recognize that it is not that simple but my point is that 90 minutes represents an hour long drama and a sitcom or three sitcoms or a Lifetime movie, so it is possible.

Practical Tips for Getting 90 Minutes Worth of Exercise a Day

1. Take the stairs. Stairs burn lots of calories. Instead of taking the elevator, hop on the stairs. Yes, even if you're on the sixth floor. The higher the better.

2. Park far away. You'll be amazed at how much walking you do when you don't park near the building you're trying to enter.

3. Take a page from Tracy's book and work out on your lunch hour (or half hour). A brisk walk or weight work out will contribute to the 90 minutes you need to make each day.

4. Get up early and walk, run or go to the gym. If you just don't have the time during the day to work out, get up early and make it happen. Yes I recognize that could mean 4 or 5 in the morning for some of you, but hey if you treat exercise like you do work then it shouldn't be a problem.

5. Go for a walk after dinner. It's simple yet effective.

Exercise Log: Summer Blues

It's been hot. Really HOT. One day it was almost 5:30 in the evening and it was 98 degrees outside. 98 DEGREES! Sheesh. Last Friday was 100 degrees, without the heat index. SMH.

Anywho this heat is wrecking havoc on my workout. I usually get up in the mornings and go for a jog. But because I'm a bit of an insomniac and because it gets hotter much faster in the mornings, I haven't been able to run in the mornings.

Also, my school's gym is closed for the rest of the summer until school starts up again at the end of the month. But hey, even if it was open I wouldn't make it there because it's too hot to walk (I don't drive) there. I guess I could take the bus. But who wants to wait on the bus?

So now I try to jog or wog as I like to call it (walking + jogging = wogging) in the evenings around seven. However, because I haven't been able to sleep lately I'm usually knocked out taking a late nap only to wake back up to go to bed late to start the cycle all over again. Sigh.

Thank goodness I work from home 'cause I don't know what I'd do. But I am a little paranoid that I'm putting back on the weight that I lost. Sigh. I'll be glad when school starts and the gym is back open and I can get back on my regular exercise schedule.

Oh and here's praying for an early cold snap.

Today is new day. So what are you waiting for?