Well that was a thing

[lnr]

Weight loss talk

So today was my first 90 minutes session on the Tier 3 "fresh start programme". It consisted of about 45 minutes of nutrition information and 45 minutes of physical exercise information, and that's the shape of the next 11 sessions too - one a fortnight

The nutrition part talked about diets we may have tried before, and then introduced the Eat Well plate, and its friend the Weight Loss plate, which differs in having more fruit and veg, and leaving off some of the finer details. Basically eat lots of fruit and veg, lean protein, preferably wholegrain carbs, healthy fats in small quantities, and everything else (e.g. cakes, crisps, sauces) occasionally in small portions. So far so nothing new.

The exercise part suggested we try "exercise snacking" - building in 5 sets of 1 minute exercise, alternating with 1 minute rest. Once a day for the next week, aiming to increase to twice a day next week. Try doing a set while waiting for the kettle to boil, or during an ad break! Example exercises were done with or without a chair, and with adaptations for if standing up from the chair is a problem. Grab a couple of cans of food! (I picked a pair of 1kg weights instead as they were more convenient). To be fair, doing this sort of thing a couple of times a week, making sure I include a variety of things, will be good for muscle strength and flexibility. But not cardio. And I'm skeptical about weight loss. I did not need to worry about my blood pressure. The actual time exercising was about 10 minutes, much of it stretches.

I was very polite, and did not outright say that I thought they were wasting my time. But I thought they were wasting my time.

My personal goal for the next couple of weeks: try and eat more fruit and veg. Aiming for 10 portions a day instead of 5 would probably make a difference, especially since I don't always manage 5 anyway. And I'll do the exercise snacking. I did some more ankle rotations in the bath, since I could. I'm very glad this programme also offers some one-to-one sessions with dietitions, exercise specialists and a psychologist, because otherwise it appears to be just the same advice we've all seen before. Apparently you need to attend 80% of the sessions to be eligible for Wegovy. And we'll need to have a session with a nurse practitioner for that, which should happen sometime after the second session. What I need to *not* do, is start obsessively calorie counting, because there lies unsustainability. No counting!

Comments

[rmc28]

Muscle strength and flexibility are both good but yeah, these are some bullshit hoops they are making you jump through.

[barakta]

Sounds stressful being told stuff you know (or disagree with) to get other stuff.

I hope it is able to help and you can survive the bullshitty elements.

[ailbhe]

There's never any harm in more fruit and veg, I suppose, and little bits of exercise when I can is my preferred method because I have to avoid cardio at all costs. But my body is not your body. I hope you can tolerate it long enough to jump through enough hoops to get to the useful parts.

[shermarama]

I am aware, via being in diabetes groups online and also from recently having lived with a shockingly inactive teen, that some people really need the encouragement to start moving themselves at all, and not to balk at, say, walking for ten minutes. But, yes, there are other people that are not really needing something at that level...

[lnr]

It turns out that exercise "snacking" is less irritating for me if I just binge it all at once, rather than doing bits across the day. And set the "rest" timer to just 15 seconds between each minute of exercise.

[jack]

Oh FFS, that's useless. It feels like "the same advice, but not insistently" not "advice to use if the obvious advice doesn't help" :(

Maybe plenty of people do need that but it's still a waste.

Fwiw I suspect that for me, even though I run three times a week and cycle to work, more smaller bursts would help me. And building up more different small muscles may help with burning calories. But it sounds like that are still aiming their course entirely at "people who haven't started doing any exercise yet" not "people who do lots of exercise but it doesn't make them thin"