Goodbye Flab

5/31/2013 ~ For a long time I wasn’t exercising because I shook so badly. When I stood on my scale, it said, “ERROR” because it was impossible for me to stand still.

Then I stopped eating GMOs. Two months later, 20 pounds were gone. But best of all, the shaking had diminished. I think that’s because I added Maca and other sources of potassium to my diet. Happiness!!! I can get back to 3 minutes a day on my Gazelle.

Nutrition difference between GMO and Non GMO corn ~ Read more.

Maca is rich in potassium, phytonutrients and is an endocrine modulator ~ Read more.

Potassium is Essential ~ Read more.

How much exercise?

Worrying News ~ The evening news reported a study saying we must exercise an hour a day, five days a week, to avoid cancer.

People who aren’t well can’t do that.

I’ve been exercising 3.5 minutes a day and losing flab. Below are pictures of me showing that 3.5 minutes a day works.

I hate the way I look in these pictures, by the way, not just because I am so heavy, but because I don’t look at all light-hearted. It’s partially the stress and unending worry. And yes, I should rise above that!

3/2/2007 ~ Before my first month of 3.5 minutes a day on my Gazelle, I looked the same standing up as I do in the picture of me in bed, where the flab piles up.  : (

I had lots of trouble with sleep apnea..

After my home was foreclosed I was able to see the doctor for the homeless for my tetanus. He said that sleep apnea can be caused by loose flesh around the neck and that if I did a little walking every day it would help. When I could walk, I did. I also began using my Gazelle.

Garden Threat ~ Tetanus ~ Read more. 

Lots of flab gone ~ Less sleep apnea

7/9/2007 ~ Lots of flab is gone, but with that much remaining I’m surprised I no longer wake up coughing, unable to get a breath. That’s with 3.5 minutes on my Gazelle every day. That’s all.

I began exercising a few months earlier than recorded on this page, but I was left outside in the cold and dark when I went to vote, November 2006, and again a month later, and I got sick – I could barely get out of bed. So I gained a lot of flab back.

I hate how I look, not just because of the flab, but because I see such severe concern and so little happiness in my face. I think that’s why looking at pictures of women modeling clothes and smiling was uplifting: I could imagine me looking like that, as long as I didn’t look in a mirror.

4 dozen pictures ~ One that’s less grim

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10/28/07 — I took four dozen pictures to get one that wasn’t quite as grim.

I was able to walk around my garden today and yesterday. Yesterday I tried to do two turns around it. That was a mistake. It caused my nerves to tighten my muscles again, painfully. Not the good way that muscles feel after healthy exercise.

You can see that the flab is diminishing. My goal is to get easily into a dress I fit into tightly now, and do my hair and put on makeup and then post my picture next to that of the model wearing the dress I’m aiming to see myself in. : -)

I look unhealthy because the City of Santa Fe turned off my water a few weeks ago. I got so dehydrated that the infection in my jaw (where I was supposed to have a bit of the bone taken out in surgery) came back and now I’m losing a lot of hair again. It was only one day without water, but it affected me a lot. I couldn’t type well at all. I had thought I’d recover quickly. But… not. The experience taught me how important water is.

Water Disconnected ~ Read more.

I meant to put on makeup, But

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2/14/08 – I’m sorry this image is so late. It was too cold to wash my hair, using candle heating, then after the day got warmer and I washed my hair I was so stressed that I forgot to take the picture.

Candle heating ~ Read more.

I meant to put on makeup but there’s so much stress with foreclosure looming, that I can’t handle it. Sorry. However, doesn’t it look as if my hair’s darker?

I lost hair when they shut off my water and I didn’t have any for a day. For months infection in my jaw (old dental implants) got worse without vitamin C (you have to take vitamins with a lot of water) and I could not get it back under control. 

Redness under fingernails may indicate infection ~ Read more.

Vitamin C is a natural antibiotic ~ Read more.

Notice how many more wrinkles I have on my neck. I think it’s because I have such a hard time remembering to drink water since I was deprived of it. I don’t feel thirsty the way I used to, and I forget to drink. Effects of Water Deprivation ~ Read more.

When we drink less water our skin looks less filled out. That seems to be what I am seeing. (So you’d think that would make me remember to drink water, wouldn’t you?)

At a doctor’s appointment for social security disability I was weighed. I’ve lost 60 pounds. I had hoped it would be more. Thing is, I was almost out of rice so I wasn’t eating it the way that is needed to keep burning off flab. Also, when I hurt my back around the time they turned off my water, that was the end of three minutes exercise a day. 

Over all, 60 pounds is 5 pounds a month. That’s not much and it’s scary to think how easily it could come back. On the other hand, when 5 pounds comes off month after month, totally pain free, doing nothing more than eating brown rice and exercising three minutes a day, it’s begun to feel like something I can count on, the way I used to count on gaining weight. It’s an amazing change of perspective. I LOVE it. (Good way to feel on Valentine’s and all year long.)

A year after the first flab picture

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4/27/08 – I’ve got color in my face. Working in my garden is healthy: it produces food and calms my worry re my home in foreclosure. My condo was foreclosed and auctioned without letting me know, then the court wouldn’t let me redeem. So this is scary. But, my garden helps me stay calm.

I think I mentioned that I gained back three inches, but today the tape measure shows that I’ve lost one of them. So I’m happy. Especially since I ate masses of chocolate for Easter as well as scrumptious coffee cake my cousin sent.

Because I’ve been so stressed I walk in my garden rather than use my Gazelle. That’s because ever since I had tetanus stress makes my stomach feel like it’s turning to cement. If there’s a lot of stress my tightening stomach pulls me over and makes me look as if I have osteoporosis. Rest resolves the tightening. Using my Gazelle is the opposite of rest. That said, I walk around my garden five times, which leaves me breathing heavily but more rested than stressed, and still upright. Could tetanus happen to you? ~ Read more.

I was terrified the other day when my leg gave out twice. I was lucky I was near a counter once, and the other time near enough to a wall to not hit the floor. So I was reluctant to go outside and walk, but if I stop walking then I’ll gain the weight back. That won’t be immediately painful like a fall, but the weight would be long, low pain.

I’ve been making a point of eating brown rice every day. When the stress is horridly intense I also eat lots of nuts.

Does exercising face muscles make a difference

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May 25, 2008 – It hasn’t been three months, I know. What I want to keep track of is how much difference it makes to exercise my face muscles. I’ve been doing exercises for about two weeks. I didn’t think to take a picture in the beginning.

Basically, what I do is push out my chin to tighten my neck (50 times), purse my lips then tighten my cheek muscles in a smile that rolls the muscles up toward my eyes, squint to tighten the skin under my eyes (each of these is 50 times) and then raise my eyebrows and forehead. It goes quickly; then, I repeat one time.

Under eye bags less dark, fewer wrinkles

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July 4, 2008 – My hair seems browner. Plus, the bags under my eyes are less dark and don’t have such a defined line to them anymore.

To see the difference my face and neck exercises make, look at my neck in the 5/25 picture, then look at it today, there are fewer wrinkles under my chin.

I’d hoped for more difference but on June 9 a man tried to break in. Apparently Wells Fargo’s lawyer told the man’s company that my home was foreclosed and I’d vacated. Not true, but pretty typical for these lawyers and Wells Fargo.

After that I couldn’t sleep and any noise scared me, thinking he’d come back. Then I started losing my balance and having blindingly sharp pain that caused me to fall. Exercising didn’t feel good, instead my muscles cramped and spasmed.

So it’s been only the last couple days that I’m exercising again. (I did walk in my garden, though, except for the days when I was losing my balance so much.

1/6/2009 ~ I’ve been failing to take pictures: it just got so stressful after I found my home was in foreclosure but I hadn’t been served. The stress affected my balance, and muscles in my chin felt as if they would spasm, then freeze. I feared it was a pre-stroke thing and stopped exercising. Now my face looks horrid. I may have gained inches. I was going to measure myself today but it’s so cold the measuring tape kept slipping out of my cold fingers.

I started doing 3 minutes a day on my Gazelle. I want to be better next year so that I can travel to Crete. I’ve LONG wanted to go to Crete.

I’m up a lot of hours doing tasks like refilling my candle containers, vacuuming with my nifty cordless vac, and tidying. My house was very untidy.

8/9/09 – I had to go to the doctor’s for some letters last week, and they weighed me. Sadness: I’ve gained back 23 lb. I’m sure it’s from falling last fall. The fall was painful and scared me off walking. (Luckily nothing broke, at least not in my body.)

When spring came and I tried to walk around my garden I could barely make it one time, my legs felt so heavy. Now I’m back up to five minutes and I’m feeling much better. I’m being careful not to overdo, and with that my muscles and nerves are further healing and I’m beginning to not be bent over. It is amazing how much younger I look when I’m able to stand tall.

One other thing: I wanted to save money so I bought cheaper food (same old bad thinking): instead of buying nuts, I bought cheap-o Saltines. Within three weeks I could not fit into dresses I had been wearing, so it just goes to show that protein is a better investment for ones health, in the long run. Plus, protein helps reduce pain.

Increasing and Decreasing Pain ~ Read more.

23 lb from last entry lost, again

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1/7/10 – I was determined to add a new picture today, but it’s so cold I’m not wanting to wash my hair, so this isn’t quite the picture I had in mind.

But it shows that I’m not as fat-faced as if I were still 23 pounds heavier. And it shows that I have less of a turtle’s neck.

5/23/10 – In working on reducing the infection related to my old dental implants I drank a lot of cheap fruit drink to wash down vitamin C. I gained weight. I reduced the infection, but I increased my sense of it all being almost impossible… It takes so long to lose 5lb (a month) and in three weeks that’s back and more because of drinking the flavored liquid that wasn’t good. 

But, I’m back on track. I have a supply of protein, some real oranges to keep up the vitamin C intake, without relying entirely on supplements and I have a new mattress so that hopefully I will sleep better, have less pain and be able to exercise (walk in my garden, use my Gazelle, do step ups and windmills) and return to my lower weight and slimmer body measurements.

6/30/10 – SHAME on me! I wanted to get more results, faster, so I pushed myself to five times around my garden, pretending that the pain had nothing to do with my nerves… and I began getting this intense, stabbing pain at the top of my leg that made me gasp, but worse, made me lose my balance if it happened mid step.

NOW Methyl-B12 1000 mcg

I was afraid I’d gotten some sort of degenerative disease. But, I remained cognizant of the fact that overall my nerves have healed when I’ve given them enough vitamin B12 to work with, as well as rest.

One night it was nearly impossible to sleep because the pain kept happening so repetitively. During the day I could do almost nothing, just because I was so tired, but because every few steps the pain would hit and I risked falling. So stressful.

Come the third day of rest, meaning that I walked at a snails pace when I went to the kitchen to get coffee, and, I didn’t even attempt to walk around my garden, much less use my Gazelle, the pain was significantly less frequent.

Today I walked around my garden twice. Tomorrow I’ll add a minute on my Gazelle.

My wrinkly neck appears to have healed

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10/16/10 – I’m loving two things about myself in yesterday’s picture. First, my wrinkly neck appears to have healed once my body had a chance to remake some of that skin. Happiness!!!

Second, I bought some Lancome makeup, which I’ve loved in the past when I could afford it, and I love now because it helps hide the affects of the stress I’ve been living with for far too long.

11/20/10 – Four days after the picture at left, I tried to move a trellis and sprained my back. I’m still in pain, but not as severe. Now my discs feel as if they’re grinding if I lift the least little thing. My problem is that my muscles aren’t strong: I don’t do the right activities to strengthen them to be at a good performance level.

So, I ordered the Weider Total Body Works 5000. Its reviews were good and it was only $129. It arrived quickly, on 11/10/10. I needed help to put it together because of my back injury, but then I could see why people said it was fun. And with that, I overdid it which is hard to believe since I was doing less than 7 minutes of exercise at a time.

I’m not strong enough to do one of the exercises I think would be best for my lower back muscles. I’m not even strong enough to change the machine’s setting so that I could do the exercise. And, I’ve discovered that it really is best to have some days of rest, rather than exercising every day. It reminds me of school when I read that studying for long sessions without a break was less effective than studying short periods with breaks because our brains store information better with some rest.

80 pounds gone, but sadly I’ve hurt my back

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October 16, 2011 – Well, I’ve lost weight: my neck and face are skinnier. I haven’t been doing the exercises to tighten my skin, darn it.

Since the first picture I’ve lost 80 pounds, but now that I can barely walk, even with my rolling walker, losing more is… I’m unclear how I will do it. It seems like something is always setting me back. This time it’s my back, again. I’m trying to make light because it actually makes me very sad.

Jarrow Methylcobalamin 5 mg.

9/1/2013 ~ I can barely walk. I shook badly when I tried to stand w/o holding on to my walker ~ pain extreme ~ had to hire someone to put Epsom salts in a basin for me to soak my feet, which helps with pain ~ took a lot more B12 ~ began getting excruciating muscle spasms ~ learned muscle spasms can result from taking B12 when you’re low on potassium ~ read up on potassium and began using Maca ~ strength increased ~ I can take 8 small steps without my walker. Improvement is happy making. Also learned about GMOs and switched to Organic. I lost 20 lb of the weight I’d gained back ~ I’m now 1.5 pounds lower than I was at my best point before. Happiness!!!!

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1/29/2016 ~ I’ve never lost the full 100 pounds I set out to lose. Darn! But, on the other hand I’ve not gained back the flab I lost. So overall I’m happy.

I think if there had not been the foreclosure stress, I could have done better. But, I’m still in my home, still fighting the foreclosure, so again, I’m happy.