My personal strategy: I will go for a checkup each year and have tests appropriate for my stage of life. I try to eat a variety of things, and I try not to eat unless I am hungry (or by the clock*) and stop eating when I am no longer hungry. I try to put less on my plate than most because I hate to waste, so I will eat it if it is there. I don't like to eat out in any place where the portion size pushed me to eat more than I would normally eat. A buffet is completely lost on me unless I just want the variety. At reunions and family get-togethers there is such a variety, and of course I want to try it all. So I get a teaspoon of each of the items, and I am often shocked at how large a plate that makes. Otherwise, I put an appropriate amount on my plate, and eat that, and if I truly desire, I will go back for seconds, but eat that more slowly so I can better enjoy it. But truly, seconds are rare for me.
I get a check up whenever.
I have minimized what I eat which is very hard to do as it requires that ugly "lifestyle change" which is fancy way to say habits.
I have lost weight but I would like to loose another 10-20 pounds. I think the BMI metric is BS. There is another metric that says your waist size should be no more than half of your height which makes more sense to me. I weigh more today than when I was 18 but I am far stronger today than I was at 18. BMI does not take that into account. If I could just loose that 10-20 pounds. I was really burning off the calories this year with an exercise bike but then work got crazy and there was not as much time for the bike.
We don't eat out much anymore to save money but also calories. I have never been big on buffets and I really don't like to over eat. Now that I have said that.... :laughing::laughing::laughing:
At work we have had two end of year lunches. One was last week at a very nice very high end place and we had a very small buffet. Some people might have been critical of the buffet size but Oh My Goodness was it GOOD. Some of the best food I have ever eaten and I have eaten some good food. I went back THREE times for lunch and twice for desert! :shocked:
At least the main course was salmon, AWESOME, so it was healthy, right? :licking::licking::licking:
This place is right across the road from a major university and teaching hospital. In fact my wifey's doctor's office was in walking, well, lets be honest after that meal, waddling distance. :laughing::laughing::laughing: I over ate so much I need a wheel chair to get back to the truck.
At least I did not have dinner that night!
This week we had another work lunch which was interesting. We had more money to spend than I would have guessed. I had planed on having a hamburger but we had enough money for me to have a rib eye! :licking::laughing::laughing::laughing: I got a 12 oz steak, the smallest, but it had a good 2-4 ounces of fat which I cut off.
For $22 you only got the steak and ONE side. I don't eat fries much so I ordered the steak fries. So $22 for a steak and fries. :confused3: Wow, that is alot of money. We normally eat at fancier places on vacation which means we are at restaurants that charge more because of the location. The vacation places ain't that bad when a steak and fries cost $22. So for $22 I wanted more food. On the other hand it was ENOUGH food. Most people got a big lunch and desert but to be fair they did take the desert home. I skip desert. Still shocked at $22 for a steak and fries. Maybe we need to get out more. :laughing::laughing::laughing:
I have been really good at holiday family meals in just getting a very little to eat. I will only get what I most like, not everything I like, which helps hold down the calories though I think it ticks off family members that I don't eat THEIR food or eat enough. Too bad, I don't need the calories.
At work we have been discussing food, diet, and health quite a bit over the last month or two. It is just so easy to overeat and it is fun to eat. Even with food getting more expensive, it still is cheap to eat. It is easy to down a couple beers or soda which can easily add up to 20 pounds of fat in a year. I think we have been conditioned to eat three times a day which made sense when we had heavy manual labor to do. I stopped eating a scheduled lunch years ago. I wish I had stopped decades ago and I would not have this 10-20 pounds to loose.
I would eat lunch not because I was hungry but because the cafeteria would close soon. Now I eat dried fruits and nuts at my desk WHEN I get hungry and only what I need to eat. For dinner, I eat very little, often just a sandwich. No more beer during the week either which save money and calories. :drink::laughing::laughing::laughing:
I stopped gaining weight years ago and often am loosing a bit of weight. I think the big mistake people make when trying to go on a diet is to try to loose weight first and fast but that step is too big. They need to change their habits so they are not GAINING weight then ease into changing the diet to LOOSE weight. If you just loose the weight without changing habits, that weight is gained right back. People try to change over night, what has taken years to build, which is a recipe for fat loss failure.
Later,
Dan