Sunday, July 13, 2008

MY TICKER




Double-entendre here.... this post relates to the little progress-meters in my sidebar (scroll down) AND to my heart.

I have lousy lipids. I've gone the medication route but it gave me muscle pain. I've made a modest improvement via oat bran, kidney beans, apples, and Metamucil capsules.
I've been doing some reading on the relationships of body fat, body weight, cholesterol (and all its variations, LDL, HDL, triglycerides, etc., none of mine are good), weight loss, BMI, etc., and playing with online fitness calculators. I'm deciding that weight and BMI are not reliable measuring sticks; they don't tell the whole story. Especially for athletes who may weigh more because they have more muscle mass and don't fit the charts.

The new kid in town is waist-height ratio. Ideally, as an indicator of lower risk for cardiovascular disease related to body composition and lipids, one's waist should be half one's height, or less. Here's a site I like for calculating it all out and explaining it. There I found out about the Willoughby Model, after the researcher who developed it, with "normal" and "athlete" or "ideal" WHR's. "Normal" WHR is under 50%; "Athlete" or "Ideal" is 45.8%, which for me would be 28 inches.

So that's what I'm aiming for, and I've added a new ticker to my sidebar to track my progress. Twenty-eight inches would represent a waist loss of 2 inches. Unbelievably, with a new food plan (but that's another post) I'm down 0.8 inches from when I started (a week ago?) already. Or else I just measured my starting waist wrong. But I'll take it!



7 comments:

Ann (bunnygirl) said...

I'm no doctor, but I think the whole cholesterol thing is overblown. There are new studies that are starting to say the same thing.

I'm glad you're not on meds, since a clean diet and healthy exercise appropriate to your interests and abilities are probably all you need.

But yeah, we gals do like to have that nipped-in waist. I think you should chase it for vanity, but that's just me. :-)

Losing Weight: said...

Hi again...I live in Martinsburg.

Kewl Nitrox said...

28 inch waist? Isn't that the stuff of teenagers? In fact, isn't 30.5 inches the waistline of teenagers too?? :-)

Ellie Hamilton said...

Teenage boys, maybe :-)

Mine was about 24 when I was a teen. I was shocked when I found last week that it was over 30. Never saw that before without being pregnant!

Marshamlow said...

The military has switched from a weigh in to a waste measurement calculation. One thing though is that some people are naturally small and others are naturally bigger. Think of Asian VS African Americans, would it be right for them to be on the same waste measurement calculator? My husband being very athletic was trying to gain weight with weight lifting etc. His blood pressure got very high. When he lost the excess weight his blood pressure got better even though his diet got worse. He was barely 30 at the time so losing 50 lbs for him took a couple of months and was no sweat. Still it is something that he keeps in mind and hopefully will continue after the military.

And then there is me, 100lbs overweight and great blood pressue. Go figure.

Sunshine said...

My HDL was finally in a great range. Besides running, I have been eating more of the good fats, in moderation, of course: nuts, avocados, olives/olive oil (also 2 eggs every morning).. and almost no other fats.
I have not been reading past posts on your blog, so forgive me if all this is irrelevant.
Best of luck on all!

Jade Lady said...

Scales and measuring tapes scare me! I keep them away from me!