The World According to Jennyfur

I’ve started weighing myself daily, more out of curiosity than obsessiveness, to see what my actual weight range is over the course of a week. My average on the high side is 165, while my low is 163. I seem to be skipping over 164 altogether. Its just fascinating to me, I’ve noticed my weight stays around the high for a few weeks then drops to the lower weight and stays there for a few weeks and so on and so forth.

I’ve been having an off week mood and exercise wise since last week. I’ve just been feeling really run down and unmotivated and consequently while I still try to fit in something every day I am not working out as much. I’ve been doing 20 minute yin yoga workouts and a couple other workouts as well. I really need to get back on the proverbial horse. I don’t want to fall into old patterns. I probably should be a little more lenient on myself. I’ve also taken a few more classes at Dhyana Yoga, so I should give myself credit where credit is due there. I took a wonderful Kundalini Yoga class. I think the best way I can describe kundalini yoga is “yoga for the soul”. I’m going to try and check out one of there yin vinyasa classes this week.

Despite my fitness malaise,  I finished up the Abs & Core workshop at Dhyana as well, which was awesome. Well, save for my complete failure at handstands and headstands. I’ve noticed on key thing through doing yoga, since I dropped 35 pounds this year, my center of gravity is off as is my balance and it varies from side to side. Its getting a little better over time, but I still have a way to go. I remember the first few times I did Warrior 1 or Triangle and toppling over or having to hold on to something. Now, I can do those poses without incident. The headstand/handstand scenario perplexes me. I used to do this stuff all the time when I was younger. Heck, I even took a couple of years of gymnastics before I got too tall to do it. I get to a certain point and then my mind and body freak out in the OMG YOU ARE GOING TO DIE if you do this kind of way. On the flipside, no pun intended, I can do backbends just fine, even with having a consistent strain in my lower/middle back.

I’ve been meaning to write about this for awhile…. On July 11, 2009 in Philadelphia, a celebration took place cleverly called a “Flesh Mob for Fat Liberation” to promote fat acceptance to celebrate persons who are overweight or obese. At least the event promoted some physical activity i.e. running up the art museum steps ala Rocky and a post-BBQ dance party. I have to say at the very least I am conflicted about how I feel about celebrating being fat and/or obese. I agree with the basic mission of the event and that yes, fat people are people too, who deserve to be loved, accepted and whatnot. I would never advocate body dysmorphia and do think that we should accept our bodies and more importantly who we are as individuals.

I am conflicted about this as someone who has struggled with their weight for the better part of their teen and adult life. I’ve gone from both ends of the spectrum to thinking I was grossly overweight at 128 pounds to being grossly overweight pushing 220 pounds and being okay with the fatty & happy lifestyle.  I certainly was much healthier when I was within the weight range for my height and that overlaps anything from 135 to 169, so there are 34 pounds of leeway depending on other factors. As I grew more and more overweight, I became increasingly unhealthy as a result. Not to mention, when I was at my heaviest having to wear a back brace most of the time because I was in constant pain from carrying around so much extra weight on my torso.

Back to the event, I’ve been tracking some of the conversations happening in response to this event and some of the photographs taken at the event. I find the commentary on both sides to be enlightening. I think people should be happy with who they are as people and accepted as such, but always be working towards improving themselves because let’s face it — no one is perfect and should live in a constant state of status quo.

One of the arguments I’ve seen come up time and time again is that overweight & obese people are a marginalized  minority and the media is constantly shoving thin/skinny is better mantras down our throat. Really? Statistics show by 2015 that 75% of Americans will be overweight. So how marginalized is 75% of the population of this country? Wait, I’m not great with math and numbers, but I think that when something is at 75% that signifies it being in the majority. That remaining 25% minority is comprised of the people who are either within a healthy weight range for their height and lifestyle and the probably even smaller minority of people who are underweight, my guess there is that would be all those size 2 super models and actresses in Hollywood, meth addicts, coke head hipsters and extremely improverished persons.  So, perhaps the healthy and fit are the marginalized ones here? I’m curious, as always, to see how well a “thin pride” event would  go over.

Obesity related problems costs the health care system tens of billions of dollars a year and as Diabetes rapidly approaches pandemic levels. Unless, you are genetically predisposed towards it, its treatable and preventable with diet and exercise. I worked in health care for a few years back in the late 1990s and have seen how devastating diabetes can be on the human body. I have to ask will these people be celebrating their fat pride when they have to have their toes/feet/legs amputated? when they get wounds that won’t heal? when their flesh rots away from ulcers? and so on and so forth. I’ve seen it all in various degrees. This is the reality of the situation that cannot be ignored. The last point in contention related to the above and event in general, is that people seem to be offended by the “fat isn’t healthy” argument as if it shouldn’t be mentioned at all. What are the health benefits of being overweight or obese? I don’t know of any offhand, if you do please enlighten me. Isn’t not mentioning just how unhealthy our nation is part of the problem?

Personally, I don’t want to live in fear and I do want to enjoy life. I am a firm believer in moderation and balance. If you live every day in excess, it is going to take a toll on you throughout the course of your life.  Since I have lost 35 pounds since January, I have become a happier person, not because I am thinner, but because I am healthier.

Hopefully I haven’t offended anyone as that is not my intention. I am on a journey through various forms of thought on health and fitness since it is a whole new area of exploration for me.

I managed to drop two pounds this week. I had been hovering in around 167 for awhile and then was steady at 166 all week, then dropped to 165. I find it kind of funny since I am on the Weight Watcher’s maintenance plan that when I lose weight, I get these funny little messages saying things like: on the maintanence plan your weight should at best fluctuate two pounds in either direction of your target weight. If you are continuing to lose weight try using ALL of your daily points, your 35 flex points and activity points.  I actually balked at the idea of having to actually consume all those extra points during a week. I’ve never depleted the full 35 flex points, let alone delve into the 40+ activity points I get per week.

I’m actually quite happy losing  1-2 pounds a month even while on the maintenance plan. I’d like to maybe get down another 10 pounds, which would put me at the mid-range of the healthy weight range for my height (5’9″), which is 135-169. I’d like to be somewhere in the middle. In other news, my BMI (Body Mass Index) dropped from 25 to 24 since I lost an additional few pounds. I’m happy to have purchased and totally rocking out in two medium size t-shirts that fit nicely.

This week has been a little off as far as my exercise routine goes, mostly due to monthly girl problems… but I had the second part of the Abs & Core yoga workshop that I’ve been taking at Dhyana Yoga in West Philly.  I still have no idea how people do hot yoga or bikram. It was 85 degrees in the room and I sweat through every layer of clothing and then some. It has been a challenging class and a lot of fun.

I’ve been chronicling my health and fitness journey since January 2009 in random places mostly in Livejournal and Facebook and decided to compile all the information here on my blog since both Facebook and Livejournal require login/password and friending in order to access the information I have posted on my journey. I have to say, it was an interesting process of backlogging all of my posts over the past six months and seeing the progress clearly laid out in front of me.

Stay tuned for more updates. I have a couple of new posts in the works, which hopefully I will be able to crank out in the next few days. You can add the health & fitness blog feed to your Google Reader or RSS

I write on many topics some that overlap each other and others that are completely different. Rather than starting a blog for each, I have created separate feed categories for each topic category, so you can follow my social media postings without having to read about health and fitness. I may add or change feeds from time to time, but here are the main ones I use.

Social Media Feed – Postings on social media such as Facebook, Twitter etc.

Virtual Worlds & Gaming Feed – Postings about activities within Second Life, World of Warcraft and other online virtual worlds and games.

Health & Fitness Feed – Postings about my journeys through diet and exercise dealing with Weight Watchers and yoga primarily.

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Music Feed – Postings often deal with music and new media, local music stuff and events.

Since I last posted, I am holding steady around 166-167, which is fantastic considering that I have been overindulging a bit, though to be fair, my idea of overindulging has drastically changed. My worst day I rounded out at about 40 points on the Weight Watcher’s method versus my normal 26. Granted, I have an extra 35 points a week for splurging that even at my worst I never burn through let alone the 30-40+ activity points I get through working out. I was playing around with the limits since I had been losing weight while on maintenance, which suggested that something was out of balance. I don’t want to revert to any bad habits, but my appetite has been a little more increased over the past couple of weeks. I think this is probably due to slacking on taking my daily vitamin regiment, which I am trying to get back into the habit of doing. When it comes to vitamins, I do really good for a few months and then slack for a few weeks.

Since my last fitness related post, I am happy to report that I have started taking some yoga classes at Dhyana Yoga (They have locations in Olde City, Center City and West Philly). Much to my own surprise I am really loving the classes. I’ve taken a couple different ones: All Levels Vinyasa, Vinyasa 101, All Levels Kundalini and am taking a 3 week workshop for Abs & Core strengthening. Its funny I think the All Levels Vinyasa was much easier than the Vinyasa 101 class. I still wanna try out their Yin Yoga classes and their Jivamukti ones. The Jivamukti classes are at odd hours that don’t really work well with my schedule, one is on Sunday mornings and one is during the week, but fairly late in the evening.

I’ve also picked up a couple new DVD’s and a book as well. I am so totally loving Shiva Rea’s Yoga Trance Dance DVD. Its so much fun, as it combines free form dance, some kundalini yoga exercises and some more fluid dance like yoga asanas. I always laugh when I’m doing dance workouts because I turn everything into variations of good ole’ goth dances, either swishy or stompy. I guess old habits do really die hard. The segments are much shorter than the Liquid Flow DVD I have of hers and much more suitable for beginners. I really like her DVDs alot. I got an Abs & Core one in the mail from Netflix that I am looking forwards to checking out.

I’ve been exploring the Jivamukti Yoga method created by David Life and Sharon Gannon. I picked up the book and their DVD Transform Yourself with Jivamukti Yoga. The workout is challenging as it includes some amount of backbends, shoulder stands and headstands. I can do backbends pretty well, but my lower/middle back has been hurting for the past couple of weeks so I can’t sustain it too long. It only really hurts when I do things like wheel, cobra or upward facing dog, so I have to modify them a little bit. I’m not a fan of shoulder stands for two reasons, one I end up drowning in my own boobs and two I have a lot of loose skin on my abdomen from losing weight (hence the abs & core focusing lately). I did learn a modification at one of the vinyasa classes I took recently, which helps immensely, by putting a yoga block under the base of your spine. When it comes to headstands, I have to get over the fear of breaking my neck and also the same issues from the shoulder stands apply. There are a couple modifications that I am comfortable doing in the mean time. In any case, I really like Jivamukti Yoga. I’m still reading the book, so far its been focusing on some historic yoga information as well as spiritual, karmic and ethical focuses in ones path towards enlightenment.