Long-Term Fat

I have this theory that there’s a difference between Long-term fat and Short-term fat. How I define those is as follows:

Short-term fat consists of those few extra pounds gained or lost in the short term. For example, I weighed 165 a few weeks ago and gained seven pounds and was up to 172 a few days ago. As of today, I’ve lost some of that weight and I’m now down to 168 again. That’s Short-Term Fat and I find that particularly easy to lose with some diligent eating over a week or so. In reality, some of that “fat” might have actually been water or some other type of weight gain, not necessarily 100% fat.

Long-term fat consists of that fat I gained over the previous 15-20 years that brought me to an all-time high weight of 235 pounds in October of 1996. In the first year, I was able to lose 20-25 pounds of that, however my weight kind of stabilized at 210-215 for a while (likely that 20-25 pounds was only gained in the previous 1-2 years). In 1999-2000, I was successful in losing another 35-40 pounds of Long-term fat to bring me to 170-175. I managed to gain some of that weight back over the next few years (back up to 185 in 2002-2003), but then got diligent with my eating/exercise in early 2003 and managed to lose 10-15 pounds. I stabilized at 173-178 for quite a while. My next breakthrough in burning Long-term Fat came in the fall of 2005 when I was able to lose another 10 pounds taking me to a new all-time low of 165 pounds. I’m up a few pounds from that now, but that’s my new “baseline” of Long-term fat that I am trying to break through.

So, why the distinction between Short-term and Long-term fat? Well my theory is that Short-term fat is relatively easy to lose as your body has been that weight before and it easily adapts to that level. But Long-term fat is much harder to get rid of as it’s never been burned before. It requires new levels of calorie reduction and exercise to burn it off. And it’s damned hard to lose! It also requires much more of a lifestyle change and permanent changes to eating habits – not to mention the psychological and emotional changes that go along with it.

Of course, I have nothing but my own anecdotal experience to back this up, but that seems to be the way it works for me.

My current “Long-Term Fat Loss Challenge” is to break through that 165 barrier and get to 160 by mid-fall. I am realistic in thinking that it might not be feasible to expect that I will lose any weight in November and December as that’s peak holiday party time, but I hope to be able to maintain whatever I lose by the end of October all the way through until January. That’s when I can focus on my next goal: 150!

When last we left our heroine...

She was reporting in on two recent races. Well, I've run (and swam and biked) two more since then and I am now done for the summer.

Short reports:

July 8: Did a sprint tri (750m swim, 20K bike, 5K run) and won my category (that I like to call "Fat Chicks Over 40", or Clydesdale F40+). I also had a personal best at the distance, which made it all that much more sweet. My time was 1hr, 27 minutes.

August 5: Did a long course tri (2K swim, 56K bike, 15K run) and finished 12th of 12 in my category (W40-44), but took 6 minutes off my previous PB on that course from 2005 and took 3 whole minutes off my swim time (37 minutes), which I am totally stoked about. My finishing time was 4hrs, 20 minutes.

My racing season is now done, so my focus will be on:

1) Healing these stupid injuries (hamstring, glute, plantar fasciitis)
2) Losing some weight (Goal: 160 by my birthday in December)
3) Painting and decorating my condo
4) Going on dates

The weight part will be hard because I seem to have this 166-168 set point that I am fighting. If I can break through that and get to 160 and stay there for a while I will be super happy. I am not going back to the dietician because it was the most useless way to spend $450. The only thing she told me was to reduce my proportion of carbs down to 55% (from 65%) and take in fewer calories. Ya think!?? I'm not sure what my strategy is going to be, except I am going to experiment with exercising less. Yes, that's quite the concept, isn't it! My theory is that all the hard training messes with my appetite and my metabolism, so it just wants to hang onto fat. I'm going to keep all my workouts to less than 60 minutes (mostly 30-45 minutes) and also incorporate some weight training twice a week. I'm also going to try really hard to eat about 1600 calories per day. That will be really tough for me as I tend to get squirelly on anything less than 1800. I'm hoping that the reduction in exercise will help me do that.

Painting and decorating will be fun. I already have my colours picked out (two shades of medium/dark beige, plus a brick-red accent wall), so it's just a matter of buying the paint and getting started. And I think I found a solution to my window covering/hardware dilemma (thanks 1kea!).

Dating, well I'm not sure if that's going to be more or less difficult than dieting! So far it's been a big old pain that hasn't yielded anything. My relationship with the non-BF is getting in the way a bit (it's working well for him, just not so well for me), so I'm trying to figure out the right balance there.