Body Weight Fluctuations

Of the times in my life when I experience body weight fluctuations, the last two seem interesting.

I often wonder how people can carry significant “extra” body weight – fat. Look around and we see most people in the US today carrying an extra 20, 30, 50, or more pounds of unnecessary body weight. Oh, the scientific term, I almost forgot – for those who are up to speed with the jargon – Adipose Tissue.

And so we’re not kidding anyone – all these people don’t have a “glandular problem’, are “big boned”, or any of the other nonsensical excuses for being otherwise lazy.

And I really don’t think it lazy – these people have worked very hard for years to accomplish this carrying of extra weight.

This brings me to my point. Over the last several months we have bought a newer, bigger home that I worked on before and after we’ve moved in and done some work on the previous home in getting it ready to rent. In adding the extra activity I realized that I didn’t have the time or the energy to continue exercising three to five times a week as I had been doing.

The net result is that I am now 20 pounds lighter than I was when I exercised on a regular basis.

This is not the first time this has happened either. Soon after my son was born (nearly seven years ago at the time of this writing), I had a similar time/energy concern – what with a toddler already, newborn baby, my wife, the job, etc., etc. – I stopped exercising then too. The result was the same. Within a couple of months I dropped about 20 pounds.

I know that once I resume exercising again I will gain back the previous “lost” weight. This isn’t a concern.

What would be incredible would be for me to not exercise, as is the case for the high majority of people, and to gain, retain, and increase the extra weight that most folks carry around with them – for years of their lives.

It would take a major life/habit change for this to happen to me.

Is it that people have conditioned themselves through years of ‘training” to buck the natural order of things – to basically take homeostasis and turn it on its head?

The training in this case is the modern 20th/21st century lifestyle:

  • minimal, if any exercise
  • 1-2 meals per day
  • eating processed, packaged, prepared foods devoid of any real nutrition
  • taking no vitamins or supplements to encourage health

The culprits are more than the short list above – or so we point to the culprits as named.

Or is the real culprit indifference. Letting things be as is with little regard for what we all know to be right, true, and good for us. Only to end up years down the road with little more than excuses and stories as why we are as we are.

It seems a simple conclusion to come to. What kind of body do you want? How much extra body weight do you want to carry around? And beyond that – what kind of life do you want to live?

It’s not necessary to reiterate all the adverse side effects of being overweight and sedentary, or to enumerate all the good and positive results of maintaining a healthy body weight and being active.

What will you decide?