Battle of the Bulge

Yesterday while I was running and contemplating over the previous evening's Biggest Loser episode, the need to battle the bulge seemed even more important than ever. As I watch the show it's great to see the contestants loosing weight and feeling happy and excited again. It's great that they're overcoming emotions and obstacles that kept them from being healthy and feeling good about themselves. In all of that thinking the question of "But how did they become so overweight in the first place?" came to mind. And the answer, they gave up the battle or perhaps they never learned how to fight in the first place.

Never learning how to fight stems from childhood in which the child either had overweight parents as examples or was taught and GIVEN poor nutrition. As I raise 2 young girls these things are important to me. I want to give them an example of how fun and satisfying it is to eat healthy and exercise. It's also my responsibility to teach them what is healthy and what isn't and to GIVE them proper nutrition since they're to young to do it on their own. Hopefully, by the time they are able to make all of their own healthy decisions they will be educated and motivated. I also tell them I love them just how they are...I hope they always feel happy and confident in themselves.

Giving up the Battle. Danny, on the show, is a great example. Everything was fine, got married, had kids, got in a rut, had no time, lost his fire, didn't exercise and ate lots of food..probably in that order. It's been great to watch him find some time, exercise and eat healthy, get out of the rut, get his fire back...probably in that order.

The battle of the bulge is easy for very few people. Here in North America it is amazingly easy to get food, too much food, and too much unhealthy food...and then to eat it all!

I think we get busy, get stressed out, don't plan, don't prepare and wind up at McD's. We have so much going on that we just want to relax and enjoy a big meal and not worry about what we're eating--we have enough to worry about! We want to hang out with friends and laugh over appetizers, entrée, drinks and dessert. We don't want to have one more thing to think about, to plan, to busy ourselves with. And so instead, when we turn 55 we worry about diabetes, prescription prices, insurance rates. Giving up on the battle is like telling a lie. It kind of feels good, might make you look good or like you're having fun, but you can be sure it's going to catch up to you and then things won't feel so good or be so funny.

I just read a study that put some people in front of an automatically refilling bowl of soup and the other a group that had to get up and get another good of soup on their own. The group with the automatically refilling bowl ate twice as much!!!! When you have a bunch of food in front of you, you're probably going to eat it!

So, instead plan to be healthy, make a plan as to what you're going to eat, crunch the calorie numbers, be responsible.

The battle is not always fun and sometimes it's a hard decision, but eating healthy and exercising will make you feel good and keep you healthy for all of the years that you keep on fighting.


...wew!