Health Risks and a Wake Up Call

If you have noticed by now, I haven't posted anything about my Food Journal, morning walks / jogs, and everything else that I used to post with regards to my journey to losing weight. That's because I allowed myself to stay out of track, and while my weight has been the same and that I even lost a pound from the last time I updated my weight, fact is... I still am not as enthusiastic as I was the time I started the journey.

While in La Union, I got to be with my paternal family - two aunts with Diabetes and an uncle who had a stroke years back and is living a life with so many health issues. When I got home, another uncle dropped by to pick up some stuff from La Union and I learned he's currently suffering from GERD. All are my dad's siblings.  Interacting with them, I realized how bad my family history is as far as health is concerned. I am under 200lbs, but I still am obese, and seeing them just gave me a peek into my future...

...if I don't act about it.

I am going back to the biggest reason why I want to lose weight - to live longer and healthier. There is no turning back now, I really have to control how things will unfold if I don't want to see myself the way people have predicted my outcome - Diabetes at age 40, probably death before I reach my 60th birthday (all because I am fat and is living a sedentary lifestyle).

During one of my idle days last week, I got to read an article entitled "Prevent Diabetes in You: Start Now" by Ferdy Susanto (October - December 2011 issue). It stated there the risk factors for Diabetes including:

• Family History
• Obesity
• Diet and Physical Inactivity

All three I could very well relate with. One thing that caught my interest was this line - Extra fat above the hips is riskier than the fat in the hips and thighs for developing Diabetes. Back then, when Dr. Mehmet Oz guested on Oprah, I learned that BMI wasn't really as reliable and this claim was backed up by Covert Bailey in his book "The New Fit and Fat." He said that being overweight isn't the problem, but being overfat. True, two people can be 250lbs. but one can be all muscle and one can be all fat, therefore even if both persons have the same BMI, clearly, one of them is at risk to develop health problems. Going back to Dr. Oz, he mentioned in the same TV guesting that the waistline can be a much reliable way to check a person's health risk and that women has to have 32 inches or lower waistline, if I remember it correctly. My current waistline is 4, sometimes 5 inches more than what it should be and being a person with big tummy, I know the health risks. Yikes.

In the said magazine article, the author listed some warning signs (for Diabetes):

• Extreme thirst
• Frequent urination
• Blurred vision
• Being tired most of the time
• Leg pain or numbness
• Losing weight though feeling hungrier than the usual

I still haven't checked my FBS, but of these warning signs, the only one I had lately was the leg pain or numbness, but I was thinking maybe it was because I sat too long most of the time the past weeks because of traveling and sickness. Still, I don't want to be over confident, which is why I am doing what the article asks me to do: Start Now!

I have been looking for that  one great motivation and inspiration... sucks to know it would have be something "negative," but I'd like to think it is something "positive." I want to be healthy and I want to live longer, that's all the motivation I need.