Me and calorie counting are Done: Part II

Continued

So I started trying to lose weight because I wanted to get faster. I wanted to take my training to the next level. I wanted to be more efficient and I wanted to be more able-bodied in the rest of life. Stronger.

So that was also why I started lifting weights at at the end of marathon season. I just went back to look for a link for that and I realized I haven’t really been writing about that at all, which is a shame because its been a big fun successful part of my life.

I’m not really following a plan, so to speak. I read a few books and and pinned some workouts and troll /r/fitness. I even had a plan revamped by the athletic trainer at Planet Fitness, but I was unimpressed with his (mostly machines) recommendations.

So I’ve been mostly following the plan that the previous AT at Planet Fitness set up for me last year, which is this, more or less:

  • 3 sets of 12 reps of upper body exercises (usually 6-7)
  • next day: same thing for lower body
  • next day: abs

I got my abs workout from Runners World via Pinterest:

 

So it’s on a three day rotation, and some days I do a run workout (or, like yesterday, a swim workout) on the same day. Some weeks I get 5 or more weights workouts in, other weeks just three.

I took measurements last week and even though I weigh almost 6 pounds more than I did a year ago, I am at (pretty much) the same measurements as I was at then.

So I’m seeing success in that arena, and I’d rather focus on that than calories in, calories out. Because focusing on calories in, calories out makes me focus on the fact that a bowl of oatmeal with a dab of maple syrup and walnuts and raisins  is more calories than two pop-tarts, so I should just eat the pop-tarts. Or that a candy bar has fewer calories than an apple and peanut butter.

I started reading Gary Taubes book “Why We Get Fat” yesterday. Like most of the books I blog about, I’m only at the beginning.

Serious morning face.

He’s got an interesting premise: That calories in, calories out is a big myth. That if it were true, we wouldn’t see so much obesity in poor, malnourished populations (in the first chapter, he goes on to provide 20+ examples of this observed in many different places and times in the past two centuries).  That the kind of food we eat makes a big difference. And that hormones have more to do with weight gain than calories eaten or expended.

I’m willing to dig it, though it flies in the face of most of the literature I’ve read, including my beloved Nancy Clark.

So I’m focusing on more strength training and more conscientious eating. And I’ve got that.

Pattie Reaves

About Pattie Reaves

I'm a new mom and renegade fitness blogger at After the Couch. I live in Brewer with my husband, Tony, our daughter Felicity, and our two pugs, Georgia and Scoop.