CRNA Wellness: Beverages are Making Us Fat

Driven to Drink?
The 6:30 a.m. drive-through line is long but the beverage baristas inside have got the gig down. Take the order, take the money, write on the cup, hand it off and move’em forward. Just across the overpass to our medical center, Starbucks customers line up bumper to bumper on their way to work. And another of the Seattle-based ‘bucks right inside the entrance to the med center picks up the slack. Mmmmm, creamy, sweet, warm…what’s not to like about lapping up your favorite frap on the way to tackling a heavy work schedule? Answer: The heavy part. Beverages are making us fat.

Getting Juiced
Let’s start with juice. Orange juice and the members of its expanding family, are loaded with sugar. They may be fortified with vitamin C, added calcium, or may contain those magical anti-oxidants that didn’t make it into your lunch bag, but most juices are also fortified with sugar, frequently over 15 grams of sugar per 8-ounce serving. An 8-ounce glass of Tropicana original orange juice has 114 calories. 70 calories are sugar and though it may satisfy 96% of your daily requirement for vitamin C, there is only a tad of added calcium and a smaller tad of vitamin A. Ounce for bounce, the payoff isn’t there. A fresh orange, however, has a much lower 62 calories of which 48 are natural sugar(fructose), and it provides 116% of your necessary vitamin C. An orange supplies twice the natural calcium as juice, three times the vitamin A plus 3.1 grams of natural fiber. Plus, you get to chew!

There are entire aisles devoted to fruit- flavored beverages in bottles, boxes and cans in your shiny, upscale grocery chain, but nothing satisfies your body’s needs like fresh, whole fruit, the more color and the more variety, the better. If ya just hafta have your bananas and berries in a beverage, get out the blender and give it a whirl. You won’t need to sweeten the pot.

Smooth Move
Blenders are used for making the smoothie. Originally, the smoothie was a fruit and ice beverage, sometimes with added sugar. Although it debuted as a beverage in the 1930’s, Wikipedia says that the term smoothie/smoothy was actually conjured up by the hippies, though I don’t remember seeing any at Woodstock, and that California, with its ready access to fresh seasonal fruit was the original venue for vending it. Now we blend smoothies choosing from yogurt, protein powder, kale, carrots, blueberries, strawberries, milk…the list is endless but the calories are increasing with the options. It isn’t difficult to find a smoothie shop right around the corner from your produce market, only you’ll drink close to 300 calories if you buy it already made. Go back around the corner, concoct your own smoothie and you take control. To get through a busy day in the OR and still get your nutrients, a smoothie is a great choice. Opt for low fat, no sugar-added, skimmed-milk, light yogurt or water-based, make either fruit or veggie drinks, and avoid expensive, high-calorie add-ins. If your smoothie is meant to enhance your work-out, a tablespoon of protein powder is a fine idea. If dessert is a smoothie, go back to the original 1930’s recipe by using simply fresh fruit and ice. Eliminate the sugar and pour it in a six-ounce wine glass. Now that’s a juice bar!

Are You a Soda Jerk?
Coke, 7-up, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper, Sprite, Mountain Dew, Orange/Strawberry/Grape/Teenage Crush(just checking to see if you’re reading closely), Cream soda and Root Beer are just a few of today’s and yesterday’s beverages-that-make-you-belch. For some reason, we get a kick out of slugging down that nutrient-free, sweet, fizzy bev and emitting a healthy g-blurp! within seconds after downing the drink. But colas do not satisfy thirst. They are wet and sometimes wild, but the ingredients are more de-hydrating than satisfying. If you choose a caffeine-loaded, high-sugar cola bathed in dark dyes, you are headed for more thirst after drinking than before. And you just slurped up at least 96 calories per 8 ounces. A 12-ounce Classic coke is 144 calories and the same fluid measurement of Pepsi or Dr. Pepper weighs in equally at 150. Don’t forget, there’s sodium in them thar streams of sugar and diet sodas have even more. When you just want a little something sweet, a clear soda is the better choice, and a tall, glass, glass of iced cold water is best of all.

The Buzz
Alcoholic beverages are a whole other fast track to fat. We try to jump-start the day with coffee; we imagine we’re getting a nutrient-dense kick with juice; we substitute meals and assume we’re enhancing exercise with smoothies; we pretend to quench our thirst with sodas; but there’s no denying the reason for consuming that 16-ounce margarita or two 6-ounce glasses of Menage e Trois…red or white. It’s recreation. Recreational drinking isn’t a sin, but be aware and compare. One 4-6 ounce glass of red wine is typically 120-150 calories, no worse than a large serving of crunchy, sweet, juicy, red seedless grapes full of fiber and dessert-like qualities, but hey, I only said, “Be aware!” White wine, though lower than red in calories by 25%, does not supply the same number of nutrients as red wine, obviously. Think spinach and mushrooms, dark and light. But neither red nor white is great for metabolizing fat… it’s alcohol, after all. You’ll still need to drink plenty of water and skip the sucrose to avoid those heart-pounding chest rhythms. And do you really want your morning mouth to feel like a cardboard balloon?

Hard liquors are worse for you than wine. If you insist on preserving your right to imbibe the hard stuff, keep these things in mind. On a regular diet of hard drink, Your tummy will get soft fast and your red nose may qualify for holiday hire. Above the others in calories ounce for ounce, more toxic to your internal organs, completely free of nutrients, and potentially more addictive than adult beverages with lower alcoholic content, hard stuff is a poor choice all the way around. Particularly if you are on a wellness program that includes weight loss, deep six the Ten.

There are those who think that a nice cold one quenches the thirst after a nice hot one. It doesn’t. You will not cool down by drinking two pints of Fat Tire after mowing the yard or after playing baseball for two hours. But you can get a fat tire. Beer does not re-hydrate; it doesn’t even hydrate; it is not a substitute for water. What’s not to understand? And if you have any interest at all in a flat tummy, fresh, sweet breath, skin that isn’t sticky and smelly and sweaty at bedtime, and if you’d like less opportunity to make a fool of yourself during Sunday afternoon’s TV Testosteronathan, then load up on water before watching the game, drink at least a quart before playing in one, and don’t touch a beer after mowing until you’ve fully re-hydrated with agua fria. That beer-belly syndrome? It’s nasty-looking, it’s high-risk and it’s for real. Try Sparks.

Be-hold!
Here’s a last word about the extent to which industry here in the States has embraced the beverage boom. Behold the cup holder! We are so dependent on doing something with our hands that nothing with wheels passes market inspection unless it sports a holder for a cup. Nothing with wheels is exempt. There’s a cup holder in your car, your truck, your child’s stroller, your grocery cart, your golf cart, your bicycle(okay, safety issue, fair enough), your yard wagon, your oversized cooler, your computer bag, your rolling backpack, your commercial bus, train or plane tray, and your beach roller bag, not to mention purses, fanny packs, exercise belts, cardboard drink holders…the list is endless, but not surprising, at least in the USA. In Germany, a Bavarian Motorwerks standard issue comes cup-free, but in Spartanburg, SC, BMW assembles the high-end European parts and adds cupholders, “nur fuer uns!”

You Can Lead a Person to Water, but Can You Make ‘em Think?
When you are offered “something to drink,” do you think coffee, water, or a shot of Jack?
Okay, so that may depend on what kind of day you’ve had in the OR and whether it’s
6:00 a.m. or p.m., but, truthfully, if you are a two-fisted cola consumer, a caffeine dependent addict, a juice bar fly, or a regular consumer at Friday Nights Live, it may be time to balance your beverage accounts. Click on some of the links below to read some nutrition facts and beverage tips’info. Start thinking about what, why, and how much you drink BEFORE you drink it. A flat tire is a lot easier to fix than a fat one. Prost!

Compare the Keurig Chai Latte to the Starbucks Frappuccino

Click here for Smoothies

How many calories in a glass of wine? Click here

How many calories in a non-alcoholic beer? Click here

What drinks cause dehydration? Click here

The truth about green tea…Click here

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Liz’s Bands In The Park mobile browser, a perfect companion for your walking or running group.

CRNA Wellness: Heat and Hydration

Some very important things come as pairings: Your hair might be colored salt and pepper; it frequently rains cats and dogs; the OR has its ups and downs; Chez Paul offers wine and cheese. And summer? Summer pairs heat and hydration. As the temperature soars along with the humidity, here are some things to help you stay hydrated and withstand the heat.

The standard daily drinking water prescription for adults is eight glasses – that’s eight eight-ounce servings and varies by little from one body type to another. Add extra activity or summer heat to the mix and the recommendation increases to nine or more glasses. Move to an arid climate or humid tropical haven, and set RX-it a glass higher. You don’t need to drink until your food floats (see dilutional hyponatremia) but if you wait until you FEEL dry and thirsty before refilling your tank, you’ve waited too long to refill.

Click here to learn more about avoiding dehydration

Drinking water in most countries outside the USA is served without ice and often at room temp. Although it remains part of the drinking debate, there is a certain amount of logic in drinking your beverages at room temperature, even tepid. But the American Council on Sports Medicine recommends cold water to challenge metabolism and burn the most calories. Others say that water is water; just get wet.

When I counsel clients on their nutritional needs, I encourage them to up their intake of watery vegetables and fruits. Raw, grilled or steamed tender crisp, between all those tiny turgid veggie cells are gazillions of antioxidants wrapped in high-fiber packages and dressed in vibrant, low-calorie color. Stylin’ as well or better than their veggie friends, fresh nutritious fruit comes water-tight. Red watermelon and strawberries (lycopene), orange cantaloupe and papaya(beta carotene), dark blueberries and purple plums (vitamin C ), green kiwi and honeydew melon (potassium, vitamin C) are refreshing, hydrating and abundant in summer. Make use of a juicer, blender, or food processor and create a colorful beverage to accompany your dinner salad. You can eat cold and be hot!

There always seems to be some Dallas Bubba who does his five-mile run mid-day in an adjusted summer temperature of 91 degrees Farenheit. Frequently, Kansas City’s Woodside tennis round robin doesn’t even begin until 9:00 a.m. with the sun bearing down. Golfers in hot, humid Florida are notorious for teeing off after 8:00 a.m. and for some strange reason, there’s always a crowd of daytime skaters in July on both boardwalks, east and west. Are they all nuts? Did they just consume a gallon of water each? Or, fancy this possible explanation: Perhaps members of Active Anonymous tolerate the heat because they are active and in shape. Withstanding both hot and cold temperatures is easier for those who maintain a healthy weight and strong, muscular body. Between the lines you know they have developed good eating habits and skills of endurance to even be labeled “strong and muscular,” but there is also a true chemical composition to the fit body that isn’t in the make-up of a soft, flabby, heart-stopping structure that acts more as a respiratory challenge during hot weather than a shelter in the shade. Only the strong survive the heat; the flabby flail.

While you’re sipping on your unflavored, cool, spring water, contemplate the following quips while remembering: Water hydrates, it softens your skin, it aids in digestion and the absorption of nutrients, it cools the body, it fills you up…and especially during the heat and humidity, it puts out fires.

Water spots

Booze on the Beach and Coffee with Caffeine are hot-weather de-hydrants. Nix the mix.

Being in shape increases your tolerance for heat. Round is a shape, not in shape.

If your body heat comes in flashes, drink water, stay still and switch to flash drive.

Water follows Salt. Take your dips without the chips.

Water is the fountain of youth.

Read Liz’s daily Lizlines Monday through Thursday and enjoy the Frisky Friday Lizlimerick each and every week at www.bdyfrm.com.

Ms Liz is the owner of Body Firm Integrated Fitness Solutions. She has developed the Bands In The Park work-out for indoors or outdoors and provides fitness consultations and complete, integrated online instruction. Contact Liz for a consultation to receive practical, affordable nutrition and fitness assistance and access to over 60 exercises, useful recipes and lesson plans.

CRNA Wellness: The fitness group

The Fitness Group – Not Just a Numbers Game

There’s strength in numbers. If you need proof, count the number of defensive players on the football field; observe the light produced by one streetlamp compared to a dozen; taste the difference between a chicken breast with one tablespoon of pepper and one teaspoon; shake hands with each member of the medical team that successfully separated conjugal twins. A group with a goal cannot be stopped. If you want great results in your wellness program, call some numbers and form a group.

Men’s Health Magazine suggests signing up for an event as one of its “top twenty ways” in which “to keep yourself on a fitness program.” The motivation of preparing for a contest involving lots of people – and perhaps prizes – keeps you focused. And focus is something all anesthesia professionals can do. There are fun runs involving 100’s, maybe a few thousand people, somewhere every weekend through October as well as cycling tours, tennis ladders, bi and triathlons galore and all it takes is one other person to help keep you motivated. If you have more than 2 or 3 on your anesthesia team, you can have the same number on your walking team. Are you going to San Francisco for the 2012 AANA meeting? Take the team for the fun run and make healthy headlines. Did the recruiter entice you to move kit and caboodle to Kansas City? Your fitness groupies can gather at the head of the 17-mile trail at the south end and power a walk all the way to Town Center in Leawood, or keep going on a bicycle into Missouri! Promise the Biggest Loser a lean latte at Dewey’s Coffee Café or buy the “most improved” person a bagel at Einstein’s. Re-set the bar a teeny bit higher every week the team meets. Improvement and reward are inherent in teamwork.

Though expansion is a curse word of the weight-watcher, it’s the goal of the group. Your companions at the clinic need not be limited to anesthesia junkies (I use the term loosely), so once your “team” is up and running, let it grow. Evite another department, then another, and another to join you in the effort to be well. Perhaps you already have a wellness offer at your hospital and perhaps you regularly participate. Great! Now get out and evangelize and expand! Your improved level of energy and your own success at achieving and maintaining a fit, healthy body are perfect advertisements. Add your voice to the ads, and the group will go viral. Your team should “change up” because that’s what keeps it vibrant and challenging – sorta like 10,000 minutes on the schedule with five anesthetists on vacation!

Scott and White Medical Center, Temple, TX, has a hospital-wide cycling group that meets once or twice weekly, year ‘round. It is highly organized – matching shirts and shorts! – and has become so popular that spouses and community residents frequently join the 145+ membership for the Saturday morning ride policy of “no cyclist left behind.” Watertown Regional Medical Center in Wisconsin offers patients and employees one-on-one personal training sessions and several group fitness events each year. Cleveland Clinic in greater Cleveland offers free employee membership to its fitness centers where you’ll participate with a group of 1,000’s! Your upstate New York group can have a cross-country skiing team and your WEE employees in Colorado (We Enjoy Exercise!) can form a hiking club. New Mexican anesthetists can train together for the annual climb to Sandia Peak and Georgians can scramble as a team up the backside of Stone Mountain. The opportunities to form a cohesive, enthusiastic group committed to the freedom of wellness are only limited by your imaginations and the Dunkin’ Donuts sticking together in the anesthesia lounge.

It takes a leader and one friend to form a fitness group. Add a little organization with some consistent commitment, and “they will come.” Your health will improve as the result of being part of a team, and if it’s a good team, strength isn’t just added – it’s multiplied.

Click here for Cleveland Clinic’s wellness program

Click here for Scott & White cycling club

Click here for Kansas City bike trails

Please visit Liz at www.bdyfrm.com to read the daily Lizlines and Friday Lizlimerick. Discover

Liz’s Bands In The Park mobile browser, a perfect companion for your walking or running group.

CRNA Wellness: Nutrition

Gary, Gary, quite contrary
How does your garden grow?
With onions, tomatoes,
Vine-ripe sweet potatoes,
And lima beans all in a row.

April is the time to plan ‘n’ plant the garden. The delightful thing about your garden is that it will provide a solitary escape after a 50-hour work week. Or it will serve as a dual retreat for you and your partner. And, it’s sure to be a family affair in which everyone can select some favorite veggies to coax and encourage to fruition. When you grow things, you grow, and when you grow, your body heals.

Sweet potatoes are an amazing garden food, big on nutrients and huge on color. There are lots of varieties but pick one that grows well in your soil. Beta carotene has enjoyed solid mag’ rap in the last ten years having been praised and criticized nearly equally. The truth about sweet potatoes is that in addition to the starch and sugar, the abundance of A, C and beta carotene make every sweet sensation worthwhile. I recommend that my clients consume at least one serving of a variety of sweet potato each week. Prepare it clean – bake without butter, boil and peel, microwave in a potato bag and slice, cut into strips and bake as fries. You don’t need salt, fats, or seasonings of any kind to enhance the flavor of this already sweet, generous source of nutrients. Click here to learn about Sweet Potato nutrients.

Green beans provide a rich supply of vitamins A and C that do not stick to your ribs or add unwanted calories to your spring plate. You can plant pole beans or traditional snap beans in a raised garden. But if you have room for rows and rows of snaps, haricot verts or favas, go ahead and plant the seeds, fertilize, water, watch for worms, harvest and enjoy. Eat them fresh-steamed next to your grilled tuna, or stir fry them with onions and mushrooms. Cut and drop raw into veggie soup or snip, steam and eat them with your fingers in front of HGTV. If you get at this early in the season, you may have time to plant a second crop. Click here to learn about Green Bean nutrients.

Yellow zucchini is becoming more and more expensive to purchase, so you may as well grow your own and eat the best. Like sweet potatoes, the vines take up some space but vertical gardening is always a space-saving option. Packed with vitamin A and plenty of C, this vegan delight is so low in calories that you can eat a bowlful of sunshine several times a week. Stir fry it, steam it, slice it and grill it with olive oil or flavored Pam, and use the leftover slices on a fresh veggie sandwich. Watery and lightweight, zucchini begs to be undercooked. Your lean machine will love both yellow and green. Click here to learn about Zucchini nutrients.

Tomatoes are a thing of beauty in your diet and on your table. By now most guys know the health benefits of lypocene to the prostate, and both genders are continually reminded through research studies of the cancer preventative capacity in a snappy tomato. There is some proof that cooked tomatoes are a better option than raw but all kinds, sizes and methods of prep are tasty and healthful. Think A (B) C then go ahead, prepare a big old ground white turkey burger, slap on a thick slice of Beefsteak tomato, put on a layer of avocado and support it all with an unbuttered whole wheat bun and some leafy lettuce…serve steamed broccoli florets as a healthy side, and indulge. You’re a Garden Gourmet! Click here to learn about tomato nutrients.

Mary, Mary, quite contrary,
How does your garden grow?
With orange, green, yellow, red,
A rainbow in the bed,
With rich vitamins all in a row.

Gardening is an art form that delivers pleasure to every sense. Feel the cool rich earth slipping between your fingers, see the tiny sprouts and watch them flourish, hear the sweet songbirds nearby, then smell and taste the results of your labor. There is no place on earth like a garden for feeding both mind and body. This, you understand, because you’re a healer.

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CRNA Fitness: What goes Up, Must Come Down

What goes up when the rain comes down? Answer: Your weight. If you thought the correct answer was “an umbrella,” then you probably heard it from your kids or grandkids. March does bring rain, but even more than moisture, March brings a change of seasons. And as the season changes, so do your fitness opportunities.

If you have been walking on a row of treadmills all winter, hiking virtual trails while listening to gym-girl Greta’s visions of grandeur, aka gossip, on the machine next to yours, you’re more than ready to hit the pavement, wet or dry. Asphalt streets, dirt trails, and school tracks exist in nearly every community and only really nasty weather should send you back to Greta. Fitness experts often claim that outdoor cardio actually burns calories faster just because of the elements of wind, breathing outdoor air, and dealing with natural changes in elevation. Yes, on Lion days, you can go back inside and adjust your treadmill to outdoor standards, but it would be a shame to miss watching that Bartlett pear tree on the corner of Magnolia and Vine go through its spring metamorphosis. Don’t forget to take drinking water.

Bands work-outs are a fantastic source of strength-training and once you’ve taken them to your favorite park, you just might opt to stay outside in the wind and rain if only to enjoy the freedom and flexibility of the work-out. If you’ve been going to the gym three mornings a week to lift weights, or to do Body Pump, or to zip through the circuit of machines, taking your bands outside to a park will provide a nice break in the winter routine AND if you walk there, you can keep checking on that Bartlett pear. When the nitrates start falling from the sky, you can always take the bands inside at home or at the gym. Is there a fitness center at the hospital where you work? Is there a children’s outdoor area with some poles that support swings or climbing apparatus? Perfect for bands. How about doors with hinges. If there is a low-traffic area inside the hospital where some infrequently used doors with hinges are hanging around, that’s another perfect place for anchoring bands. Maybe you’ll need “permission” to use the space or maybe you’ll need the chief’s approval, but if you really want to do your work-out, you can work it out. Don’t forget your water.

March brings a variety of weather to your exercise routine – rain, wind and even some stubborn snowfall. You will probably need to do a blend of trail walks and treadmill, outdoor cycling and indoor elliptical, and you may need to tote the Totes. But it’s a great time, a hopeful time of year when as the season changes, you can take advantage of the change. Then when April arrives and the rain comes down, the only thing that will go up is your umbrella.

Learn more about the Bands In the Park work-out on mobile browser at www.bdyfrm.com.

CRNA Fitness: Circuit Training

The Circuit Train

Working out can be whole lot simpler when you know the drill! If you need one day a week to “relax your mind” while actually getting your work-out, try circuit-training. There are several good things about using an established circuit and here’s just one. You can go get a member of the training staff for a free orientation around the circuit. Reservations encouraged.

A circuit provides a moderate level work-out and consists of gym-level machines set up in a circle, a neat little rectangle or at the very least, all on the same side of the gym. If they are not grouped, it’s not a simple circuit, it’s a hairy maze. There will be one or two machines for each specific muscle group and in a well-thought-out arrangement, muscles will be grouped to keep you in order. Remember? It’s 4:30 a.m. before a 12-hour day of one heart, two gall bladders and whatever last-minute trauma is scheduled and you’re looking for a straight-forward work-out, not discombobulation. Start with shoulders and begin working your way around the circuit.

Overhead Shoulder Press and perhaps Incline Shoulder Press will be your starting place. If you’ve not had the orientation, you’ll need to read the instructions printed on one of the supporting braces of the press. Adjust the weight plates, adjust the seat front-to-back and up or down, sit with “Body Firm” posture, use an overhand grip and press the contraption overhead(or angled up and outward) until fully extended. Voila! Rest 30 seconds between one or two more “sets” or press onward.

Note: Adjusting the set-up options correctly and appropriately is tantamount to getting the most out of each exercise, but even more importantly, to remaining uninjured. Too much weight can crash back down, hunching shoulders can pinch your neck, exhaling at the wrong time can challenge your heart(and not in a good way), and failing to use your abs will arch and injure your back. Use caution and common sense. You too, Men!

Chest Press and Seated Chest Flies will be next and, once again, read the instructions, adjust all of the set-up options – front to back, seat up or down, weight plates – and be seated. When seated, your feet should be flat on the floor unless there are little angled platforms for your feet. Both of these machines are harder than you think so err on the side of caution and keep it light until you’ve found the level of exertion that challenges without causing pain.

Seated Lat Flies are the reverse of Seated Chest Flies – not to be confused with seated front flies which require elbows bent and arms to open and close like French doors – and may be part of the same machine. To work the chest, you’ll face outward; to work the back, you’ll face inward. And the Seated Lat Row, which has three set-up adjustments, should be next.

These require feet flat on the floor, not tucked behind you so you fall forward, nor extended in front so you can row your boat. You’re not in an outrigger canoe in Hawaii. You’re in the gym, darn it, at 4:30, darn it, before doing a heart, darn it…feet flat on the floor, please.

Triceps and biceps are next on the circuit. Note the work-out moving from strong shoulder exercises, to large chest and back muscles, to the smaller, but potentially so down-right gorgeous tri-bi muscles, the ones that never show in the OR but show big time on a beach…in Hawaii. You can see what’s on my mind in February! Biceps will be a standard Seated Biceps Curl and/or a Preacher Curl. I don’t get why this is called “preacher” but google says it’s because the arm position resembles someone praying. You’ll actually look like someone holding a Bible or a hymnal a whole lot more than praying, but whatever floats your boat is what you should visualize. Just do it! Remember, the key to good biceps curls and triceps curls is the anchoring of the elbow and maintaining neutral wrists. Curl is the basic motion, not the rolling and bending of the wrist to avoid effort.

Legs are next and last. Expect to do Seated – or angled supine – Adduction and Abduction as well as Seated Leg Extensions and maybe Leg Curls. You’re a lucky little guy if there is also a Seated Calf Raise and a Leg Press. A circuit is not generally meant to challenge to the extent or even in the same way as a full-blown 45-set work-out, so three leg machines are really enough. Lunges and squats are “on on your honor.” Crunches can wait.

Okay, you’re done. But if you did only one set of the circuit, take a 60-second break, not a 5-minute text conversation with your broker, and do the circuit again. People tend to monopolize equipment at the gym, especially cardio equipment, but the circuit may be popular, too. So you may just want to claim each machine in its turn and hang onto it until you’ve completed your two or three sets of each. Then when your legs are finished – and they WILL be – you can wobble in and out of the shower, hide your coif under a scrub cap, and take a non-circuitous route to the hospital without looking back.

To learn more about exercising with safe, efficient form, visit Liz at www.bdyfrm.com.

Read Lizlines and the weekly Lizlimerick posted Monday through Friday every week of the year.

CRNA Fitness: Calories Count

If you’re really serious about taking off those last ten pounds or just improving the way you eat, use a calorie log. Daily calorie logs provide a source of personal accountability and act as a learning tool. Balancing calories IN and calories OUT will guide you to your goal.

A calorie log should include what you consume, as well as how much you consume, and how often you consume it. And a really good log starts with what you planned to eat and then what actually passed your lips and took the dive. There are numerous online logs to choose from, but building a calorie-log of your own personalizes it and makes it work just for you.

You can develop a short excel food log that takes no more than 15 minutes per day to fill out. Provide spaces to note the date, the time of day that you ate, and, of course, your daily totals. Develop your columns to allow space for food measurements and food descriptions, like poached pears, frozen edamame and fresh tuna. Your excel program has the capacity to total your calorie intake automatically which removes the responsibility from a mind and body on operation overload.

Include a column or block for logging calorie output which applies to cardio, strength-training and power walks. Estimate a calorie per minute for all cardio and adjust upward or downward for maximum or minimum level of exertion. Estimate half that for strength-training. Even though your heart rate and metabolism are elevated after cardio, strength-training immediately afterward doesn’t burn calories at the same rate as non-stop, heart-challenging cardio exercise. When you spend eight to 14 hours a day standing or leaning against your anesthesia chair and turning your head to follow a monitor, your eyes burn and your brain fries, but calories do not. You don’t get to subtract 1 calorie per minute for sitting.

Tweak your excel program to include issues unique to you. Do you want to know what percent of your calories were wasted? Relegate all non-fructose sugars, added fats, junk foods, non-nutrient beverages and excessive or unnecessary foods to the “wasted” column. Then divide wasted calories by gross calories to get the % of should-have-had-something else calories. Do you have GI issues? You may want to have a block on your log that represents how often you fully empty. There will be a relationship between what you eat, how much you eat and how well your GI system functions. How many meals did you eat at a restaurant or inhale on the fly? How many desserts did you consume? Do you drink enough water? Throw in a log block for number of glasses of unenhanced water you drink daily. Do you walk the stairs instead of taking elevators and do you do a lunchtime walk? I have clients who wear pedometers at work in order to track how active they are, a great way to remind yourself to use stairs, to go for 15-minute walks, and to lunge down hallways between patients…unless you’re working on kids, which will keep you running all day! Add a log block for calories burned during your normal daily activity, but don’t subtract it from your gross total. After all, most of our bodies were designed to get a leg up.

It is generally accepted that 3500 calories equals a pound, lost or gained, so to lose a pound, you need to consume fewer calories than your body needs for function. Since you do not actually know how many calories you require, simply take in a few hundred less per day than you usually do. If you want to ditch 10 pounds, reduce your normal daily intake by a couple hundred. If you are morbidly obese – isn’t that a lovely admission of sin? – you will need to drop several hundred unnecessary calories per day, maybe a 1000. But, if you are seriously overweight, the bonus is the rapid, safe weight loss you will enjoy right up front. Thinner people will lose much more slowly, but they get to adjust their intake less dramatically, too. Beware of the RDA recommendations when planning your food day. It does not take 2000 calories to run a 5’4”-female body for 24 hours. In fact, it doesn’t take 2000 calories to maintain a 6’-male body that isn’t active. In further fact, if you eat a nutrient-dense, mostly plant-based diet, it is nearly impossible to consume 2000 calories per day without bloating into a state of flatulent, comatose exhaustion.

At the end of each day, total your column of gross calories(food intake). Add your blocks of expended calories(cardio, strength training, strenuous sport activity). If you’re figuring percent of wasted calories, now’s the time. Then subtract output from intake for the total net calories. Your net should be noticeably less than your intake used to be, and your weekly reduction should be around 3500 to lose one pound. Eight to nine-hundred well-balanced calories is safe for most women and nine to eleven-hundred net works well for average men. Don’t forget: Fried chicken is not the same as grilled chicken breast; broccoli with cheese is not called fresh broccoli; ¼ cup of granola is not ¼ cup plus several-bites-while-measuring; and trail mix with fruit is not an apple. Be honest.

Using a food log gives you control over your daily nutrition plan and your weight loss. By writing down each and every item, you take charge of what you’ve planned and responsibility for what actually went down. The log will reveal to you what works and what doesn’t, when you’re really hungry and when you simply indulge. And it will also give you a sense of power over an issue that used to leave you feeling powerless. To get your power back AND lose ten pounds, count your calories because calories do count.

You can visit Liz online at www.bdyfrm.com where “…a fit body is a friend for life.”