Weight Management

After the holiday season, staying on track with your health goals may feel like an uphill battle. Your motivation may lessen with the cold weather, winter comfort foods, and the mix of advertisements that promise a quick fix to optimal health.  But, despite the temptations, don’t lose sight of the progress that you have made (even in the face of challenging times).

It’s that time of year. We reflect on a year that’s past and look forward to living our best in the year to come. January is an especially rich month filled with resolutions, goals, and promising dreams for the New Year.

But, too often, our resolutions fizzle. We fumble through the cold months until we renew our resolutions before the summer season arrives.

What if this year, instead of making goals that often bear little rewards (such as ‘Lose Weight’), we approached our year with little intentions that may slowly and meaningfully transition us to lasting life presence?

You see it everywhere, standing in line at the grocery store or while watching television: flashy weight loss programs that promise immediate results and dramatic drops on your bathroom scale. The truth is weight loss does not work that way! In fact, managing your weight is more like a rollercoaster ride rather than a steady decline. It can be discouraging when you dictate your weight loss journey by numbers on a scale…but you aren’t alone!

Are you struggling to maintain a healthy weight? Having a good night’s sleep is more important than you may think. Indulging in a restful night’s sleep is a major contributor to the health of your own well-being, and in maintaining a healthy body weight.

Picture this: It’s Thanksgiving Day. You have been looking forward to the delicious food that your family has prepared. As you sit at the extended table with your family, you start to feel like you haven’t had anything to eat in a week. After enjoying the lovely home cooked meal, your grandmother starts to roll out a delicious pumpkin pie, but now you are feeling more stuffed than your Thanksgiving turkey. But how can you go from feeling like you haven’t had anything to eat in a week to feeling like you don’t want to eat for a week?

Body Mass Index (BMI) is a measurement that is calculated using your weight and height squared (BMI = kg/m2). This number is then assessed by placing it into one of four categories:

underweight  <18.5kg/m2
normal weight 18.5-24.9kg/m2
overweight 25.5-29.9kg/m2
obese >30.0kg/m2

Sounds easy right?

As much as calculating your BMI can be easy, it doesn’t tell you the whole picture. The BMI calculation does not take into consideration the composition of your body weight.

It’s 12:00pm, and your lunch break is in half an hour. Your stomach is starting to sound more like a pack of communicating whales, and your co-workers in the cubicles next to you are becoming concerned. You can’t concentrate, and all you are thinking about is your delicious lunch. So why are you so hungry, even though you have had a snack an hour ago?

It’s all thanks to a hormone called ghrelin.

Ghrelin is known as the “fast-acting hunger hormone.” Its main function is to increase appetite so that you seek out (and eat) food.

Do you really know how you are nourishing your body?

Take, for example, this 24-hour food and beverage recall:

Breakfast:  1 whole wheat bagel with cream cheese, a glass of orange juice, coffee with milk

Morning snack:  banana muffin, coffee with milk

Lunch:  tuna sandwich on whole wheat bread, handful of chocolate-covered raisins, handful of grapes

Afternoon:  2x 500ml water

Snack while making supper: carrot sticks, crackers, cheddar cheese

So, you’re about to embark on a weight loss journey. As you approach the big ‘day’ … whether that be the date for your bariatric surgery or the date for your weight loss program initiation, have you been mourning the potential ‘loss’ of food by indulging in treats and less than healthy foods? By saying to yourself ‘this could be the last time I have (insert delicious and less healthy food choice here) …I should treat myself while I can.’

You’re not alone.

But, ask yourself: how committed am I to valuing my health above my desires?

What would it be like to wake up and just enjoy your day? No distractions. No lingering chatter in your mind. No math equations. No flattened self-esteem after a trip to the bathroom scale. Whoa. Freedom.