How To Get More Steps in Your Day

Okay so in doing this work challenge I have been asked how I manage to get so many steps into my day. Here are some of the things that I personally do to help get more steps into my day.

1. Place time blocks in my personal calendar on my phone that remind me 15 minutes ahead of time that I need to be walking soon if I'm not already. It helps to pair this with a special alarm on your phone to be a helpful reminder in case a notification ding isn't enough. I have scheduled three 2 hour blocks into my day entirely devoted to walking, that's 6 hours! I like to get up at 5:15 and walk until about 7:15 to say hello to other fittie and pet-walking neighbors. I block the first two hours I get home to walking from 5:20-7:20 before I settle into cooking dinner for the evening. I then take a walk from around 8:00-10:00 on my gym's treadmill so I can watch live TV while I walk during prime time when all my favorite shows are on. To keep myself from getting bored in these 6 hours I spend that time talking with my significant other, calling friends and family to catch up, listening to an audio book or news podcast. I don't like to listen to music while I walk because it makes the time feel longer than it is. It should be whatever will captivate your interest the most.

2. Be a fidgeter! That's right, fidget, do NOT sit or stand still. If your eating a sandwich, walk while you eat it. If your cooking in the kitchen step back and forth - likewise for brushing your teeth! March in place when you watch TV instead of succumbing to the Sitting Disease (see post from 7/29/15 for more information on that), put your laundry into the washer one piece at a time so you have to take multiple trips to the washer, same for putting away dry clothes and bringing in the mail. Call your folks and make laps around your living room!

3. Walk at work. Again, to avoid Sitting Disease, be sure to stop and get up at least every hour. Take the long way around the office and go to the furthest restroom (our furthest restroom is 5 floors away so I get about 500 steps every time I visit the loo!) Need a drink of water? Go to the furthest water phone - again for me 5 floors away! Just every hour find an excuse to get up even if it's just to throw something away. I know most folks have their own trash but it'll help if you put your trash away in the furthest central location.

4. It's easy to convert a desk into a standing desk. I purchased 3 shoe racks from Target and propped 2 on top of each other for my monitors so they'd be at the right height and a third to go in front for my keyboard and mouse. I spent $35 in total for this simple fix and I had gotten wood ones so they wouldn't look tacky. It's a little hard to type at first but over time it's something you can grow accustomed to.

5. Shop like your lost. Park in the furthest place from the entrance (bring an umbrella just in case) and take a walk around the whole store before you even put a single item in your cart and when you change departments when you do start shopping make another lap before you move onto another department. For obvious reasons do perishables last. :D If you don't have to worry about the items in your cart going bad take another lap around the store before you check out. Bring your groceries in one bag at a time, starting with your perishables, and don't ask the hubby or the kids for help.

6. Basically unless there is absolutely no reason why you couldn't be standing you can be walking in place!

The Sitting Disease - Are You Dying from It?

Okay first a very brief overview on the history of man, they were primarily either nomads spending most of their day hunting and on their feet or a farmer and spent most of their day farming also on their feet. There was no such thing as an 8 hour work day back then and there were no grocery stores so a person likely hunted or farmed as much as they were able in a day spending the majority (probably almost all) of their waking hours on their feet.

People today sit about 9.3 hours a day factoring for time spent at work and on the couch or at a desk for their leisure time. Now review back to the history of man. We were not built to sit, we were built to walk. Now this is where it gets really scary, sitting for 6+ hours a day makes you up to 40% likelier to die within 15 years than someone who only sits for 3 hours a day - this factors in if after those 6+ hours you exercise. Exercise will not deter the sitting disease.

Okay enough about how it's killing you physically, let's move on to how it's killing you emotionally. Obese people sit for 2.5 hours more than thin people, 1 in 3 Americans is obese. Sitting only expends the energy you body burns just from having working organs, you aren't burning off all that takeout we're all so fond of in our busy lives. 

Actually let me insert a rant into here real quick on the "busy life". The busy life entails a person who works for 8 or more hours, sleeps usually for only about 7, spends 2 hours in transit and then spends the remaining 7 hours surfing the web. You are NOT busy. You can make time for a healthier you. Actual busy people are so busy they schedule everything and even they can usually find one hour in their day to spend at the park or engaged in a non-sitting activity. End of rant.

When a person is sitting the electrical activity in your legs stops, your body is only burning 1 calorie per minute (your organs keeping you alive), really great digestive enzymes that help you break down that double cheeseburger drop down 90%, after sitting 2 consecutive hours your good cholesterol (HDL) drops 20% (FYI - this one is a factor for heart disease), and after 24 hours (I hope NO ONE really does this) insulin effectiveness drops 24% risking diabetes. I realize most people have to sit at work but you CAN get up every hour or so and walk to the water cooler or to the restroom to simple lower the sitting disease's effect.

People who sit and watch TV for 3 hours are 64% more likely to die of heart disease. Yeah, believe it, I watch several hours of TV a night and I have heart valve disease. It's all true. Now, when I want to watch TV I make sure to do it walking in place or streamed over a tablet or TV while I'm on the treadmill (way to reward healthy habits, with TV!).

Statistics were pulled from MedicalBillingandCoding.org, I claim all the snarkiness. :)

My Attitude Depends on My Success

Work Walking Challenge Week #2

I lost a little steam this week once we actually passed the "finish" line but I aim to gear back up this week after the successful weight-loss!

 

Daily Averages

41,320 Steps

17.13 Miles

46 Floors

3,366 Calories

 

Workout Buddies...Easy Ways to Cop Out

Stability Ball Bouncing - Miracle?

Okay, so part of what I've been doing to help increase my fitness level is bouncing on a stability ball instead of sitting still. Healthy Living has said you can burn about 50 calories in an hour bouncing on a ball instead of sitting. Think about this math for a moment, if you work an 8 hour day and you bounce through all of it, that is 400 calories. That is about what you would burn doing 45 minutes of Zumba. Yes it takes 8 hours but what else are you doing besides sitting anyway? It's an easy thing to add into your daily routine with little effort.

Am I saying this should replace your exercise? No. Good cardiac exercise and strength training is key. This is more like supplemental exercise. Besides, it will help you remember to get up and walk which is even better! I'm sure you're wondering if you'll look silly, yeah you probably will, but you'll be smiling like a goon while doing it because who can be mad while you're sitting on a trampoline?

I got mine from a friend who purchased it from Walmart and I don't find it distracting. Like with walking in place while working (standing desk hack - lift your monitors, keyboard, and mouse with stackable shoe racks) over time you re-learn skills and get better to accommodate for the perpetual motion. I've been using mine off and on for about a month now and continuously the last 10 days and no drawbacks as yet that I can see. :)

As to the effectiveness, I ran my heart rate monitor to track my calories burned over an hour and while Healthy Living quoted 50 calories, I found in an hour I actually burned 125 calories. I might be bouncing more vigorously or It might be because of my heart condition but either way I feel like 50 calories for an hour is a conservative estimate.

Sources
http://www.livestrong.com/article/529589-does-bouncing-on-a-yoga-ball-help-you-to-lose-weight/
http://healthyliving.azcentral.com/bouncing-yoga-ball-lose-weight-10647.html
http://woman.thenest.com/bouncing-yoga-ball-lose-weight-5553.html
http://www.thehappyrock.com/2007/06/02/strengthen-your-abs-and-burn-calories-with-no-effort/

Work Walking Challenge Week #1

 

 

So my company started a work week challenge whereby we are trying to get to 168,000 steps in 28 days (6,000 per day average). I am what some might call detrimentally competitive. Meaning, I would push myself to exhaustion to be the first team to reach 168,000 steps.  In my efforts to guarantee this wide lead I over-walked because it takes the team average. If you took the daily average of my stats they would be:

55,631 Steps

43 Floors

23.3 Miles

4013 Calories

 

Below are my stats from the week including daily steps, distance, floors climbed, calories burned, amount of sleep (before you cringe 6 hrs is about normal for me these days and I missed logging a few days) and minutes spent lightly, fairly, and very active. I actually reached a new daily best on Tuesday with 75,337 steps. Going for 80k some day before this challenge is over to get the next FitBit Badge. I'm sure you're burning to know, did I lose any weight? Sadly, no, because I kept stuffing my face with junk food. I'm sure if I had eaten right I would've lost something but such is life, I will do better this week.

I Wouldn't Really Do This...Honest

Thinking of Rejoining LA Fitness

So I altered my work scheduled for the 15-16 school year to accommodate trips to the gym. I've got the cardio thing down pat but I know I need to work on my strength training. Originally I had hoped to join  a small local gym since they specialized in Pilates and strength training and classes are guaranteed to be smaller than seven people but they were soooo expensive, it was like $250 for 12 classes which is just crazy for a person just starting. I ultimately decided to join a signature LA Fitness Gym since they offered all the classes I wanted at the time I wanted and they had spa and sauna services which definitely suited me just fine. This is the schedule I'm looking to follow, it might be a little ambitious but I don't know what I'm capable of yet. I hope to have a personal trainer for maybe the first 2 months to get some additional assistance with the weight machine so I don't fear walking over into the weights area and looking like a complete n00b. The numbers in parenthesis is the highest possible calorie burn for the class.

I go back to the Cardiologist in September for a follow up and when they get me all situated properly again I will actually join and then post a review of the signature gym to let you all know if the extra dough is worth it or not.

Every Tuesday...The Struggle

Who Needs Zumba...Dance at Work!