Kenneth Gardner
Dear Mr. Gardner,
I HAVE always had a weight problem. I exercised a lot as a teenager and was fine until I had a child at age 20, then my weight went out of control. I work two jobs totalling 92 hours per week so I get very little sleep. I am 5'3" and weight 209 lb.
- Sophia
Dear Sophia,
Persons who do physical exercise regularly and correctly and complement the exercise programme with a prudent diet should observe improvements in how their bodies look, feel and function. If not they could be victims of an underlying pathological problem. However, pathological problems are rarely the cause of lack of improvements in our body's response to exercise.
All things being equal, if you are exercising regularly and your diet is adequate, yet there are no improvements you need to examine your exercise regime more closely. Your diet could also need closer examination. Exercise is medicinal, thus the prescription must be the correct one for your needs.
Perinatal weight gain can be controlled quite efficiently with the use of the correct exercise prescription and diet. This needs a conscientious effort on the part of the mother to adhere to both the exercise prescription and the dietary guidelines. Unfortunately, many persons do exercises without a good grasp of what should be done as well as how and when specific exercises should be done. This leads to frustration and disappointment because of the mismatch in their investments and returns.
One who works 92 hours each week and exercises five times each week for an hour each session should have little problem with weight management if the caloric intake is ideal. You have also indicated that you do not eat much, however, the most important factor with your diet, in this case, is your caloric intake. You need to be aware of how many calories you are having on a daily basis compared with what you utilise during your exercise sessions. Crash diets are not a part of our protocol for prudent weight management. A diet that includes all the nutrients, that is, carbohydrates, fats, protein, minerals, vitamins and water in the right proportions is the best option.
USING WEIGHTS
The use of weights in an exercise programme basically serves three purposes. Weights are used to increase muscle strength, increase muscle size and increase muscle tone. When you observe the loss of inches in your measurements but no weight loss due to weight training, your muscles have improved their tone and become more compact or denser. Likewise, if the weight training lasts long enough you will use more of your body fat to produce energy. This results in reduced body mass in fat content while the muscles experience increase in their size. Muscle is much denser than fat so your size will reduce but not your weight.
To avoid the weight retention you need to exercise with very light weights that will negate the increase in muscle density. This will make your exercise routine less attractive. Quite often, weight-training exercises do not last long enough for them to have the aerobic effect that is needed to help in weight loss. Your exercise programme needs to focus more on activities like the treadmill activity that you have been doing. However, the rate or pace at which you are doing the four or five miles could be too slow, so the exercise is not intense enough to get you to burn enough calories to observe any weight loss.
You can do your daily routine in two intervals rather than running on the treadmill for 45 minutes to an hour non-stop. Jog or run for 30 minutes at a faster pace, then rest for a short while, then repeat the routine. This can help you to get more out of the exercise because if the exercise lasts very long and you are fatigued, your effort and gain will diminish.
Your observation of an increase in your weight when you do not exercise validates your need for the exercise. Therefore, your exercise programme needs to be adjusted by making it more intense or increasing the potency of the prescription. This will result in greater increases in your heart rate and breathing rate initially. In time you will improve and be able to exercise even harder, thus helping you to manage both your exercise programme and your weight more efficiently.
Kenneth Gardner is an exercise physiologist at the G.C. Foster College of Physical Education; email yourhealth@gleanerjm.com.
