Do I really weigh that much?

I went on vacation last week, and I never expected to have the epiphany that I had. I learned how food consumption and exercise really work.  I went through the Pilates For Men 10-20-30 Challenge and I understood that while I was exercising vigorously, that eating only 1500 calories per day was really effective in helping me ditch those extra 20 pounds.  BUT…what I learned on my cruise to the Bahamas last week was so much more meaningful in learning what NOT to do and why.  I went on this beautiful Norwegian Epic ship leery of what could happen with 20 gourmet restaurants to choose from and my crazy appetite. I was prepared mentally long before I ever passed over the gangway and onto the ship. I’ve been down this road before and I know that in 7 days a schmuck like me can gain 10 pounds.  It wasn’t going to happen this time.  I was a rock I tell you.  My first stop was to the fitness center, which of course, was state of the art.  It was equipped with everything (sans a scale…gee I wonder why?).  Now, I was still going to eat – that’s what I paid for afterall, but I was also going to work out every single day.  Pilates, weights, cardio…all of it.  And for 7 days, that is what I did.  I ate, I worked out, I swam in the Atlantic Ocean, ate some more, worked out some more, sweated, ate, drank…I did it all.  After about my fifth day I knew I put on weight.  I hadn’t a clue how much because they smartly don’t have scales on board these ships.  I would say my ‘activity level’ had been extremely high, yet I knew that familiar bulge forming around my middle.  I could see a little extra puffy skin under my jaw line, and I feared I’d put on about five or gasp seven pounds.

Here’s what’s frustrating…I was watching myself at the buffet table!  I was careful about what I was eating. It was on the forefront of my mind, and I didn’t go all out like I’d done in the past. So, sweating it out in the steam room, it came to me.  It’s so simple. Humans weren’t meant to consume 4,000 calories per day. Think about it.  As little as a couple of thousand years ago we were meant to hunt and gather our food.  Our bodies are still accustomed to that. If we could consume 1500 calories per day in nuts, fruits and meat that we’d hunted, our bodies were thrilled, and gave us boundless energy to continue to hunt and gather. Soooo, when we stuff 4,000 calories per day down our gullet, our body does what it was built to do, it saves it, stores it, and turns it into big walls of sticky, icky fat! Let’s go back to our few thousand years ago scenario. We consume veggies, fruits, meat (about 1500 calories) and we can run, hike, gather, move our bodies for an entire day. If we have a day where the pickings were slim and we only took in 1,000 calories, no problemo, our bodies went into conservation mode, and we functioned perfectly well.  Now, back in present day and we add all the processed goop that we eat and we fool ourselves into thinking that 40 minutes on the bike, or treadmill is going to right all those wrongs, and we’ve got another thing coming.  It’s virtually impossible to burn it all off because we are conditioned to conserve energy and be extremely efficient.  Our wonderful and perfect bodies are saving all of that glorious energy waiting for the famine that will never come.  Instead what comes is tomorrow, which brings another 4,000 calorie day of consumption, then another, and another and so on, until we are unhealthy, immobile heart diseased, diabetics in big big trouble wondering how this happened to us.

The scariest thing I learned on the cruise was that it doesn’t take much.  I definitely ate, and sadly nearly everything “good” is rich on the ship.  So, in the spirit of honesty, I’m going to give you my before cruise weight, and my after cruise weight.  Don’t get too attached to the after number, because I’m going to lose every last stinking, filthy (delicious) ounce that I gained.

Ready?

You sure?

Okay.  Here it is…Before cruise – Art’s weight = 193 pounds.

After cruise – Art’s weight = 201 pounds.

I worked out every single day and was only gone for 7 days.  Scary isn’t it? Remember friends, our bodies were designed to function extremely efficiently.  Food is for fuel.  That’s how the biology of our bodies function.  We stuff crap into it, and we’re in trouble and it doesn’t take long.  I got home from the cruise on Saturday and immediately went for a 35 mile bike ride.  I will follow that up with an hour of vigorous Pilates every day until my “after” picture is securely hanging nicely on my bones.  I’ll keep you posted, and I won’t let ya down!