Your Perfect Weight Week 21-23

Exercise goal: Walk seven days, three miles
per day in 45 minutes

Over the past five months you've become an exercise champ--no question! You should be feeling slimmer and more fit than you have in a long time. If you've diligently followed Your Perfect Weight 52-Week Plan walking program on a daily basis, you can rightfully feel a surge of pride and accomplishment.

By the way, we recognize that there have undoubtedly been days when you couldn't get out for your walk. We hope you've done your walk most of the time and have substituted an indoor workout whenever necessary. If you are sticking with this program, you deserve a reward! You should be keeping up your own personal reward system for meeting your minigoals, including your walking goals.

This is the week, though, when we separate the men walkers from the boys, the women walkers from the girls. Because now you have an option: to either continue your very impressive walking routine (seven days, three miles per day in 45 minutes) or step up the pace even more.

We will continue to give the above numbers as the weekly exercise goal through the end of the 52-week plan. However, as Casey Meyers, our walking expert, notes, you'll get even greater weight-loss benefits if you shave more time off your daily three-mile walk or if you walk farther each day.

Meyers, at age 66, generally does seven days a week, covering anywhere from three to five miles per day at about 12 minutes per mile. "I vary it, depending on the weather, the amount of time I have and my desire," he says. "You don't have to walk the same distance or at the same pace every day. But if you have no time constraints, add as many miles at a half mile per week as your schedule permits, up to five miles a day."

Alternatively, if you don't have an hour-plus to devote to exercise, you can work on cutting your three-mile time down to 36 minutes (doing 12-minute miles) by reducing your daily time by a minute or half a minute per week. So, let's say you decide to go from your present 15-minute mile to a 12-minute mile, three miles a day. If you reduce your walking time in a slow and steady way by a minute per week, you can expect to be down to a 12-minute mile by Week 26, the program's halfway mark.

Need an incentive to go for the walking gold? Listen to Meyers: "Do three 12-minute miles a day, combined with a low-fat diet, and you'll have your weight-loss program nailed!"

And while we've built the 52-week plan on a walking-for-weight-loss foundation because of walking's ease and accessibility, always keep in mind that exercise can take many forms. If boredom with walking is setting in, switch to something else you might like--swimming, tennis, cross-country skiing, biking. Whatever exercise option you choose, the key has got to be consistency. Permanent weight loss, remember, means being active for life.

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Week 22: Cook up a
low-fat family favorite

Exercise goal: Walk seven days, three miles
per day in 45 minutes

Getting your family to learn to love healthy, low-fat fare makes your losing weight and keeping it off much simpler. After all, how can you hope to slim down when your dining room becomes a nightly battleground between the fat eaters versus the fat fighters?

So this is an excellent time to focus on retraining your family's taste buds, for their sake as well as yours. The Shortcut Chili recipe on page 298 is a great addition to your low-fat repertoire. The palate-pleasing spiciness is sure to win raves at home. The spouse and kids will never know something so delicious is also good for them, and why bother telling them? The worst thing you can do is apologize for the food.

"You shouldn't present the meal saying, 'This is low-fat. I hope you like it.' It might turn the family off," says registered dietitian Anita Hirsch, nutritionist for Rodale Press. "Just serve it, without saying anything."

And try a new twist when you're asked that age-old question, "Hey, Mom, what's for dinner?"

"It used to be that when people asked 'What's for dinner?' the meat would always be mentioned first, or else the response would be, 'Roast beef,' as if there were nothing else on the menu. That's not good," says Hirsch. This perpetuates the idea that high-fat protein should still be the cornerstone of a meal, she says. You're probably not eating this way anymore, so why cling to old language that suggests you are? Instead, suggests Hirsch, "If the kids ask 'What's for dinner?' say 'Salad and corn,' even if you're serving some steak. Don't even mention the steak."

Recruit the Whole Family

Getting the family involved in meal planning and preparation is a good way to get them to understand why fried chicken and potatoes au gratin seldom appear on the dinner table these days. Hirsch says that, when her daughter was in junior high school, she'd be given simple, healthy recipes she could make as part of the family meal. Even younger kids can get in on the culinary act, as long as you're around to supervise.

Happily, serving food low in fat and high in taste is easier than ever before, says Hirsch. "Those recipes are everywhere. Everybody's looking for them now," she says. "It's true for commercially prepared food as well." It's just as well that it's becoming easier to eat low-fat fare, because, as you've known for months now, eating right is a lifelong proposition.

"You want your family to eat healthier from now on, not simply think that once Mom or Dad loses weight, they'll then go back to their old ways," says Hirsch. "As long as the food tastes good, they'll eat it."

And speaking of fine food, check out the other low-fat, high-taste recipes both in this book as well as in some of the newer low-fat cookbooks. Most recipes you'll see nowadays include nutrition information, including calories and fat grams per serving. While you don't need to keep a written record of these in order to lose weight, you should by now be able to eyeball a recipe's nutrition info and tell whether it fits into your diet.

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Week 23: Help your family
become more active

Exercise goal: Walk seven days, three miles
per day in 45 minutes

You were never thrilled about your kid's devotion to Beavis and Butt-Head. Now the word is out that television may be doing even worse things to your youngster's metabolism than to his brain. Research suggests that just 30 minutes of watching the tube can cause your child's metabolism--his calorie-burning engine--to plummet by 14 percent, a level lower than if he or she were doing nothing at all!

"That 14 percent drop is dramatic and can add up if the child watches a lot of TV," says study researcher Robert C. Klesges, Ph.D., associate professor of psychology at Memphis State University. "If a child goes from watching an hour a night to six-plus during summer vacation, for example, you may be talking about a five- to seven-pound weight gain." And that doesn't even count the snacks your kid may be gobbling while in his TV-induced trance.

Because you're now in the midst of your own serious weight-loss program, you can help yourself at the same time you encourage your youngsters to watch less TV--by organizing active family activities.

"It's best to get involved with your child and a new activity, rather than expect her to be suddenly inspired to go do something on her own," suggests human development specialist Susan K. Perry, author of Playing Smart: A Parent's Guide to Enriching, Offbeat Learning Activities for Ages 4 to 14 and Together Time: The Disney Book of Family Activities, Celebrations and Fun.

You all might be in for a bit of a jolt when you first turn off the tube. "The silence can be uncomfortable," admits Perry, the mother of two sons. But the rewards of swapping sedentary time for calorie-burning time are well worth it. Here are a few activities to share with your children.

Go for a walk. "One of my favorite things to do with children is to take a walk," says Perry. "It's such a simple thing, and there are lots of ways to make it interesting. For example, try a cat-counting walk, where you and your young child look for and count cats together. You may have to look sharply--for example, a cat may be up on a roof--so it trains the child's eye. Another walk is called Who Lives Here? where you look for clues around a person's house for his occupation or hobby--say, a car parked in front with a business logo painted on it, or an open garage filled with lots of carpentry tools."

Pump up the pulse. Another game that combines physical activity and learning about the body involves teaching your child to measure her pulse. "You show her how to take her pulse first at rest and then after various activities--for example, before and after jumping rope for 30 seconds, or before and after walking around the room three times," says Perry. "It makes her aware of how the heartbeat increases as you become more active," she explains.

Hit the beach. If your usual M.O. at the shore is to slather on the sun protection factor (SPF) 15, open up your spy novel and remind the kids to be back before nightfall, try something new: a family beach workout. There's swimming, of course, but also volleyball, jogging and Frisbee throwing. Running around at the beach seldom feels like exercise, and yet it's great for calorie burning.

Plan an active vacation. Pick a vacation with your weight-loss program and your family's health in mind. Instead of the usual theme park weekends or car-bound sightseeing trips, select an active holiday. Depending on the time of year and your destination, pick a vacation centered on nature walks, cycling through one or more states or backpacking. Or check into a tennis clinic to learn the game or improve your skills. You'll all come home feeling invigorated instead of feeling like you have to go on a diet.

A combination of stepped-up activity and a steady diet of low-fat meals such as the one described last week will ensure a better shape for everyone in your family. And remember that any physical activity you do counts toward your daily and weekly totals. You don't have to necessarily walk as much as you usually do if your walks are being supplemented by, say, a family bike trip or backyard basketball game.

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