Pros and Cons of Losing Weight and Getting in Better Shape

Reading and editing the emails into blogs got me to thinking that you may be unaware that losing weight and getting into better shape has cons as well as pros. Let me enlighten you:

Pro:
1. You have more energy and strength to do physical things like tubing and exercising and moving books and filing cabinets.

Con:
1. You have less energy to do things like sit and watch TV at the end of the day. I fall asleep a lot earlier these days. Sitting any where for any length of time makes me antsy and fidgety and gives me cramps in my back. I don't relax as well as I used to.

Pro:
2. You look thinner and better.

Con:
2. Thinner doesn't always make you look better. All of my clothes fit weirdly because they're loose. Because my pants are loose I can't always feel my pocket vibrating when my cell phone goes off so I miss calls and I'm late responding to txt's. (Sorry, Chele.) This is going to cost me even more money when I break down and buy clothes that fit.

Pro:
3. You are more toned and less fatty.

Con:
3. Being more toned and less fatty means that weekly allergy shots have become painful because my arms are thinner and there is less fat to put the needle into. I think I now know why men are bigger wusses about shots than women in general. (Don't beat me up over that. This has just been my observation from people around me.)

Pro:
4. You feel better physically generally speaking. I was gimpy and limping sometimes simply because it was going to rain or I slept on something wrong.

Con:
4. You feel worse specifically speaking. I don't get blisters without exercising in some form. I currently have 3 blisters and have had as many as 15 this summer. In my whole life I have NEVER lost toe nails and had bloody feet like I have this summer. I lost a toenail only once out of the 5 toenails I've lost over the years without the help of the Killer Trail. There isn't a morning that I wake up and don't have some kind of specific pain these days. But hey, at least I have a reason behind it and usually a good story to tell about why I am gimpy or limping.

Pro:
5. You feel better about yourself and are proud of your accomplishments.

Con:
5. You keep finding other faults that you need to work on. Nobody is perfect. Once you improve in one area, you find some other flaw that you need to improve on. I'm not sure that when I get to "average" in weight and can run the Killer trail without wanting to die that I won't go insane and let my fellow teacher talk me into a marathon!!!! Did you see the female marathon runners during the Olympics? Almost all of them looked like they had endured the horrors of a concentration camp. They didn't look like they were having fun at all. That's crazy and what's worse, 5 miles might not be enough to keep me happy and proud of myself. I might have to keep adding miles until....Viola! 26 mile marathon. Please don't let me do that. I want to keep my toes.


Pro:
6. You start getting complements after about 10 lbs of weight loss. People tell you how healthy you look and ask what you're doing to lose weight.

Con:
6. You start getting flirted with and hit on. This was flattering the first time, but I'm married and wear a ring. I've been flirted with more this month than the past 20 years. Of course, usually when this happens I'm with my 21 yr old daughter or one of my 30 something younger friends. It could be that I don't look like their mother or grandmother any more and guys are using flirting with me to get closer to them. Midlife crisis's don't work the same way for men that they do for women. Oh, and when you tell people you lost weight through diet and exercise they never believe you. I am really thinking about requiring people who say, "No way. I'm dieting and exercising and I'm not losing weight. You must be doing something else," to read these blogs starting with the first day so they will believe me. I don't know what else that they think that I would be doing. I have the guts (or insanity level---whichever you prefer) to run my toe nails off, but not for extreme things like liposuction or bulimia.

Pro:
7. You can get down on the floor and get back up without grunting.

Con:
7. You have to get down and get up for other people. I have reached under more furniture this week for other people including my husband because it's easier for me to do than for them. Before May, everyone took care of their own reaching under tables and chairs needs. I now am intimately acquainted with more dust bunnies than I care to know. I don't mind just bending over and picking things directly off of the floor, but reaching through cob webs----ewwwww.

Pro:
8. You look better in your exercise clothes. (If you don't count the how it looks when I sweat part.)

Con:
8. You see other people in their exercise clothes. There are a couple of 70 year old ladies who are in very good shape who wear skimpy outfits. The only trouble is....they are 70. Ewww... I hope my family has an intervention if I start wearing what they wear even as "young" as forty-something.

Pro:
9. I get up early with exercise and it energizes me better than coffee first thing in the morning.

Con:
9. In order to get up and exercise before going to work at the high school, I have to get up very early. As I was driving to the gym at 4:45 this morning I was thinking, "This is insane." I say that to myself a lot lately. As energized as I was this morning, I know that by 7 this evening I'm going to wish I just drank a cup of coffee and slept another hour and a half. UGH!

Pro:
10. My husband is noticing me more. He has even whistled at me a few times lately. That's a weird thing to do. I don't know why men think that's a compliment.

Con:
10. My husband is noticing me more. It makes you wonder if maybe he was just as disgusted as I was with myself before. Besides,I don't think whistling is a compliment...it's just a way to call your dog. Isn't it illegal for construction workers to do that any more?