Having Fun On My Walk

Let me start with the back story.

I started doing daily walks back in the middle of January. I have really bad knees, and a condition that I didn't find out about until a couple of months ago, called Multiple System Inflammation Syndrome. I started my walks out slow. Real slow. I increased my steps at a super slow pace, but it seems to work for me. My joint pain greatly decreased and I sleep through the night without interruption due to pain, most nights.

I am up to a usual daily target of 10,000 steps a day. I have been faithful, because I got my family involved, and we started doing family challenges. We have to log in our daily steps and mileage. We do different challenges and virtual trips. It really helps with motivation for sticking with it.

What I have not done, is lose any significant amount of weight. In five months, I have only lost six pounds. I would be seriously discouraged, except for the fact that I have gone from a size eighteen/twenty to a size fourteen/sixteen. I can actually fit into a size twelve, but they look like they are painted on. Not a good look on an old broad.

Anyway, to the meat of my post.

I was bored as Hell. My walk was not very stimulating. As I was walking, I past a house of a neighbor that is fairly new, and I did not know. He was out picking up fallen palm fronds that where all over his yard. They actually were right at my feet with every step I took. So I picked them up. I took them over and placed them in the cart he was using to collect them. I had made about three trips to the cart when he realized something was wrong. He looked around and saw me walking toward the cart carrying a pile of palm fronds, and the look on his face was priceless. He was speechless.

I appreciate the fact that he didn't go into asking me why I helped him. He was genuinely grateful. It made me will great. I walked a little further and saw a neighbor that I did know well, with a pile of stuff in his yard from cleaning out the garage. Yep. I helped him move all that stuff to the curb for bulk pick up.

I had a ball. Neither expected help, and I never would have thought that exercise could be so much fun. I even got in almost twelve thousand steps and over five miles. All that, having fun, and destroying the lie that America is divided, and there is no hope for civil unity. Can't wait to see what lies I can destroy tomorrow.

Good on ya! That's called being neighborly, something that most people seem to have forgotten about last few years.

As to that losing weight thing, part of the issue might be that your are putting on muscle as you lose fat. Muscle is more dense than fat, meaning that a smaller amount of muscle will weigh more than a larger amount of fat. You are not losing so much weight but you are dropping mass m(i.e. losing body fat) as witnessed by your smaller clothes size. As you drop fat weight (which takes up a lot of space), you are gaining muscle weight (which takes up less space for the same amount of weight). That's shy you are seeing a reduction in your clothes size but don't seem to be seeing a corresponding drop in body weight.

I'd bet that you are losing fat but replacing it with muscle, so you will not see a drastic reduction in your overall weight, but you will see the reduction in your body mass. Don't watch your weight so much as you watch your body mass, the loss of inches, the reduction in clothes size. That is your goal! If you can check your BMI (Body Mass Index), that might help.

Great job! Keep it up!
:

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn
Just an aside: I helped someone in a pinch and they said "thanks for helping me!"

I shook my head no, and said " It isnt me! God put me here right now...for you."

True. Angels...and for sure, Demons....

a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

That’s awesome, a family walk and challenge sounds great

Love how you said the ‘meat’ of your post, cause it made it all the more delicious!

It feels so good to help for nothing

Good for you Night!
I don't buy the "divided" crap either.
We have new neighbors, yet again. We are showing them what it means to live in the country. Hubby showed him how to use our rototiller, because she wanted to put in a garden, then let him borrow it.
Now that it is finally warming up, everyone is out and doing yard work so we help when we can, just because it is the right thing to do.
Plus, I really need the exercise myself, after sitting in the house all dang winter! Although today, after the long weekend working outside, I have muscles aching, that I didn't know I had. LOL

originally posted by: mysterioustranger
a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn
Just an aside: I helped someone in a pinch and they said "thanks for helping me!"

I shook my head no, and said " It isnt me! God put me here right now...for you."

True. Angels...and for sure, Demons....

You may be right. I started my walk much earlier than usual, because the night before I kept being swooped by a bat. I didn't realize until later, that it was just eating the mosquitoes that were eating me.

So I just happened to be in the right place at the right time, to assist those that could use some help.

As @CrazyBlueCat said

It feels so good to help for nothing .

And it was fun, and it did feel good.

My walk time flew by, I got in steps and some bonus exercise, and I got the opportunity to see shock and awe on the face of a new neighbor, by just doing a simple act of kindness. I know what it is like being the new kid on the block, and though I think I have some of the best neighbors you could ever ask for, it took time to build our relationships. I am sure he was not expecting anyone to help him, or to be so readily accepting of him.

Now my other neighbor has a bad back. He had tried to get a handyman to come move the stuff, but the guy proved not to be reliable. I guess it was the Holy Spirit that spoke through my mouth and said, "I am supposed to be walking, not standing and talking, so let's walk this stuff to the curb."

Even he said exactly what you said, "God must have sent you, and you came right on time."

It was dark when I got home. I felt so good, I had to write the OP. You can tell how tired I was, because I didn't proofread, and the two hour window was long gone by the time I woke up.

originally posted by: CrazyBlueCat
a reply to: NightSkyeB4Dawn

That’s awesome, a family walk and challenge sounds great

Love how you said the ‘meat’ of your post, cause it made it all the more delicious!

It feels so good to help for nothing

The walk challenges keep us stepping. We either set a combination step goal, starting Sunday starting after midnight, until midnight the following Sunday. There are eight of us and we range in age from 35 to 87. We fell short of our 500,000 steps in one week goal, with only 461,005 steps, but we where close, and to be fair there was only 7 of us at that time. First challenge we didn't win.

We also do virtual walks. We have walked from West Palm to Charlottesville, From Charlottesville to Indianapolis, and are just about to start our Indianapolis to Key West walking trip.

For each virtual trip we add up our daily numbers and post something interesting about the area where we land, often with pics and a little blurb about what transpired on the walk. It gets really crazy at times, and us six girls give the two guys a really hard time.

It is fun. It keeps us connected, and it keeps us stepping.

Always on the lookout for doable, walking challenges.

originally posted by: chiefsmom
Good for you Night!
I don't buy the "divided" crap either.
We have new neighbors, yet again. We are showing them what it means to live in the country. Hubby showed him how to use our rototiller, because she wanted to put in a garden, then let him borrow it.
Now that it is finally warming up, everyone is out and doing yard work so we help when we can, just because it is the right thing to do.
Plus, I really need the exercise myself, after sitting in the house all dang winter! Although today, after the long weekend working outside, I have muscles aching, that I didn't know I had. LOL

I grew up in the country. My mother used to always say, "Be the neighbor you would want to have." Where I grew up, it was more like a village. All the doors were always open, and people came and went as if they were family.

In fact, that was the rule in all the houses, and is still the rule in my house till this day. If you are invited to my home, your first visit you are treated as royalty. If you are invited to my home again, you are treated like family.

a reply to: incoserv

I am down another whole pound. That makes my weight lost about 1.4 pounds a month.

I have just about given up on the scale, but I admit I do like it when I see a weight drop, even if it is just a fraction of a pound.

Those size 12 jeans would look okay on a 27 year old, but I still think they are a bit tight for an old broad, closer to 70 than 60.

Keeping up the quest, and still stepping.