Living the Lifestyle Monday January 22 - Early Edition

gadgetgirlIL

We meet here to explore, share, celebrate, and (sometimes) agonize over how we do (or don't) incorporate weight loss guidelines into our daily lives. "It's a lifestyle, not a diet" is easily and often said, but sometimes not so simply put into practice.

This is a thread for everyone. If you're new to GoaD, or to weight loss, your questions and comments are always welcome. If you're maintaining, or a long-term loser, your thoughts on the topic may be just what someone else needs to hear. If you're reading this, join in the discussion!

Each weekday, a new topic is offered up for discussion. Thread starters for January are:

Monday - GadgetGirlIL (Regina)
Tuesday - 88olds (George)
Wednesday - Beachwoman2006 (Cindy)
Thursday - Imastar2 (Derrick)
Friday - Jimb376mfp (Jim)

Today’s LTL topic: Keeping your chin up.

You've been working the program. You've been living the lifestyle. You have your annual checkup with your doctor and routine tests are ordered. You expect to get normal results to reflect the work that you've been putting in over the years. And then the results aren't what you expect, in a negative way.

What do you do to stay the course, or perhaps make a small course correction? Or do you just say to heck with it and go back to your old ways?

gadgetgirlIL

I had my annual check up last week with my doctor. Because of my family history of severe osteoporosis, I've been getting bone density scans every few years. Everything was within normal ranges in 2013. My test in 2016 put me into the category of osteopenia (age 54). I found this surprising since I weight train, although not with the consistency as I probably should have been doing. I also run and do other weight bearing exercise. I get plenty of calcium and vitamin D. I'm also on HRT at the advice of my doctor.

The past 3 months I have been very religious with my weight training. I also started putting a scoop of hydrolyzed collagen in my morning tea as there is some research that suggests that it helps with bone development (I've certainly noticed an improvement in my toe nails in the past year).

While I wasn't expecting a reversal of the 2016 results, I certainly was hoping that I was holding steady. Nope. I lost another 5% of bone density again. Given that I'm 56, I find this disconcerting.

So where do I go from here? Well, I wondered how much more bone density I would have lost if I wasn't doing all these things. So I will continue to stay consistent with my weight training. I'm adding a second scoop of the hydrolyzed collage to my intake, taken later in the day. And I'm slowly rebuilding my running fitness. I had a major setback last April with back issues and seemed to lose my mojo for running. Even if I just do shorter run/walk sessions consistently on the treadmill that will be more stimulus than I have been getting over the past several months.

Next up is my bloodwork. Not worried about my lipids, but am curious to see if I'm stable with my white & red blood cell counts. Those have often been below normal limits. A bunch of testing with a hematologist in 2005 ruled out any serious issue. She just said I'm one of those outliers. It still freaks out physicians who aren't familiar with my history.

podkey

I hear ya. I have hi cholesterol and lymphoma cells in my off the charts white cell count. Nothing dietary I can do so stay the course. DW is getting bone density done again.
Best of luck to you with it all.

beachwoman2006

I also have osteoporosis which was first diagnosed when I was about 55. I'm now almost 70 and, so far, have had not problems. I'm the first to admit that I don't do anything in the way of weight training; however, I do try to walk a little bit every day.

My issue is hypertension that just refuses to go away without medication. I inherited my mom's BP genes I guess There's not really anything that I can do differently from what I'm already doing so I just continue doing what I'm doing.

Everything else is fine. At least it was the last time I had an appointment. My next appointment is in March and right now I'm just looking forward to seeing weight loss on the scales at the doctor's office.

minimyzeme

I think it depends how far out of bounds the results are and whether they could possibly be indicative of something else going on. (Oh, just now read your response, @gadgetgirlIL .)

First, a thought that might lead to something helpful, with the caveat that I really don't know anything about bone density and the treatment of same. But just this weekend at the opening of Dr. Zorba Paster on Your Health radio program, one of the topics was about calcium and Vitamin D not necessarily helping with bone density as is commonly thought. Here is a link to his site, which references a recent journal article on the topic. ( https://tinyurl.com/y9nkr5yz ) Unfortunately, I didn't hear that part of the show!

So far, I've been lucky not to have a similar situation. If I did, I guess I'd try to weigh the costs:benefits of pursuing some generic issue under the circumstances you described. That would not negate the disappointment I would feel having thought I was addressing the concern and then learning despite my efforts, indicators / metrics were saying otherwise.

If there was likelihood I could really make a difference doing something else and the benefits were "significant", I'd probably give it a try--at least for awhile. If the anticipated change was only incrementally better and in reality would only result in marginal (insignificant) change, I might not. The difference between 'do I' or 'don't I' would probably lie in the quality of life implementing the change would require.

88olds

When I was diagnosed with cancer nobody suggested I’d be better off 20, 40, 100lbs heavier.
I count myself lucky. Mostly I was able to just keep going like before. I did have about a minute long pitty moment along the lines of all this trouble to lose weight and now this. Didn’t last. Quite likely I would have avoided the CA with a heart attack if I hadn’t got involved in WL.

But this. Some of us will be here one minute gone the next. Some of us will get sick and eventually die from it. Whatever the outcome for me. I’m not dying fat, or from being fat. I won’t have the ppl who have to cart me away wisecracking about my weight.

The old ways got old. Lost their appeal I guess.

imastar2

I get it with reports from my Doc. Got a six month check up coming up with my Cardiologists this Wednesday. Best I can tell from my records I am approximately 5 lbs above my last visit on June 21, 2017. He is always on me and for good reason.

On the positive side I got my blood analysis back a couple weeks ago and everything was normal nothing high. Really pretty phenomenal at age 70 I feel very blessed.

So on to the tracker and weight control.

SW 400.8
CW 318.0
Next GW 300.0
Final GW 185.0

82.8 lbs Total lost