Fitness Notes

Back when I was first diagnosed with migraines, the neurologist mentioned that I might benefit from losing some weight. I didn’t think much of it at the time, but now I am adding this as another reason to lose weight.

Migraines are not headaches. They are an extremely acute state which involved your entire body. For me, they include loss of speech ability, spasms, severe nausea and vomiting and diarrhea. Not fun.

As it turns out, the link between obesity and migraines has been fairly well documented. This recent study which was carried on over 21,000 participants, men and women, clearly showed that obesity is linked to migraines. Obese women aged 20-55, especially those with fat concentrated in the abdomen, are much more likely to be afflicted with migraines. We’re talking 36.9% of obese women reporting migraines, compared with only %28.8 of those within the normal weight range.

So, there you go, yet another great reason to lose the excess weight!

Moving on with my project, let’s discuss the second reason I came up with to lose weight: so I can shop for sports clothes more easily.

You see, I am not that fussy when it comes to sports clothes. As a total amateur, I don’t need specialty fabrics or designs. I just need them to be comfortable, really, and long lasting would be a nice bonus.

Living in Israel, plus sizes aren’t really sold at regular stores. You have to go to one of the special plus size shops. They never have actual sports clothes and the best they can come up with is stretchy lycra pants. It’s not a bad solution, except for the fact that they’re usually very expensive. I’m talking $40 and upwards, which is fairly steep for a pair of tights to sweat in, IMO.

Regular shops have tons of simple functional and cheap tights. Wrong size though.

So, assuming I am not about to change the local market, I guess I need to adapt my body to the market, huh?

In my Reasons to lose weight post I said I’d elaborate on each of the reasons in separate posts. Ok, so not doing these daily, but here goes…

My first reason was – to be able to run with a lessened risk of knee injury.

I really do enjoy running. If you told me a decade ago that I’d be writing this sentence I’d laugh in your face. Moi?? running?? Still, at some point a couple of years ago I decided to give it a try and I’ve joined the ranks of wannabee runners. I can’t really call myself a runner – even at my best, which was over a year ago, I could only run for 5 km. And that high point in my running career was short lived. A few weeks later, I traveled out of the country, didn’t have the time or motivation to keep on and went back to couch potato.

Still, working out now, I started running again. Just because I like it.

The problem is I am carrying too much excess weight. I can feel my feet, ankles, shins and most of all knees, groaning under the strain. I limit my runs and increase distances very very gradually. It sucks – once you get into the run, you want to go on, as much as your lungs allow you to. It’s the adrenalin pushing you forward. Having to stop myself to protect my knees is no fun.

So, in order to have more fun running, I need to lose that extra weight.

Yup, I need a good motivation boost for losing weight again. It’s not that I don’t want to lose weight. Duh, of course I do. I just need to want to lose weight more than I want to eat, I guess. In other words, I need to become more motivated.

So, being a blogger and all that, I figured a good way to do that would be to come up with a brutally honest list of reasons why losing weight will benefit me. The idea is to throw it all unto this post here, and later work this list into a series of short daily posts. That way, everyday I will dwell on one more reason why I really really need to lose weight.

So, here goes, let’s see how many I can come up with. I’ll be leaving comments open on this post, so if you have more suggestions, please do add them as comments.

So, throwing them out here at no particular order other than the one in which they come to my mind.

X Reasons to Lose Weight

Once I lose the excess weight…

1. I’ll be able to run with a lessened risk of knee injury.
2. I’ll be able to shop for sports clothing in a regular store and not the overpriced Plus sized ones.
3. I’ll be able to go on longer and more difficult hikes with my family.
4. I’ll be able to wear my pretty “thin clothes”.
5. I will drastically lessen the chances of me developing diabetes.
6. Clothes are going to last for longer, with no worn out inner thigh areas.
7. I’ll be able to do things on our up and coming vacation next year, like riding horses.
8. I will feel less self conscious about eating around other people.
9. I’ll be able to feel good in any old outfit and won’t have to dress up just to go pick the kids up from school.
10. I’ll be able to go to the swimming pool and actually swim and have fun without feeling awkward.
11. I won’t have to come up with excuses for being overweight.
12. I’ll feel good about having my picture taken for the family albums.
13. I’ll be getting compliments from people again instead of worried looks.
14. I’ll be able to buy cheap sexy clothes for just one season at a time.
15. I will be able to exercise more and have more energy.
16. I will hopefully have fewer migraines.

Ok, the last one felt kinda repeatitive and blah, so I better stop here. I was looking for concrete stuff, mainly.

So there it is, so far 15 reasons. I’ll edit and add more as I go along.

ETA another reason – I’ve been getting more migraines lately, and I think losing weight might help with that.