Health/Fitness program for an SEE-ESFp

[anndelise]

The school couldn't fit the Personal Fitness class into my daughter's schedule this year. She's currently pre-diabetic. If given her choice, she'd continue doing what she does, which would lead to more massive weight gain and full-blown diabetes. She recognizes the need to change what she's doing, but the process of changing it is difficult to plan and to develop the new habits.

At her request, I've agreed to try to figure out a program for her for this school year. She'll be in charge of her own food choices, while doing her fitness at home. A gym is not an option.

I'm asking for Gamma input on ideas. Both in what options she can choose from, as well as how it can be presented/explained to an SeFi.

I would prefer functional fitness ideas.
And a set of questions she can ask herself to aid her in determining what to change and how to change it.
I'm going for a set of skills and orientation towards lifelong habits that she can apply as needed. And one that is gradual change rather than a complete overhaul all at once.
I'm not looking for perfection, and don't want her to feel like a failure if she's not doing something perfectly. Iow, no all-or-nothing thinking.

Perhaps a system's way of approaching it or looking at it?
If she has a system's diagram for developing health/fitness, it would be like providing her with Ni+Te for a specific context that she can refer to as needed.
Where a small change here will lead to a larger change elsewhere, kind of thing.

Any ideas, Gammas?

[woofwoofl]

sounds like my cue!

Anyways, the first thing I did was to change what I was eating. I went vegetarian, then vegan shortly afterwards; I went from a flabby 185 pounds to about 150 or so within a few short months, and I've been oscillating around 140 pounds for the past few years... my diet consists largely of the following:

- lentils
- oats
- quinoa
- health food cereal (like Kashi GoLean, this stuff is really good on the protein and low on the sugar, get the stuff in the red boxes)
- assorted fruits and veggies

I switched over to almond milk, and I use loads of cinnamon, ginger, and cayenne pepper; all three are good for the body, with the first two relieving inflammation and the cayenne pepper being good for weight loss, pain relief, and the digestive system... I also cut out white flour, hydrogenated oils (which scar the arteries and allow cholesterol to take hold in them), and refined sugars, especially fructose...

As far as exercise goes, I generally do a combination of running, bike riding, and assorted P90X routines. I'm almost never within the confines of a gym. Doing a run first thing in the morning, before food, burns fat off incredibly well. Make sure she's able to go far on bike; if I can't outdo myself here and there and have the results to prove it, it's hard for me to find a reason to do so...

Space and ears permitting, it would also be good to get a drumset, as well as a heavy bag; both of them are really fun to pound on, and a great way to get the heart rate up... as long as it's fun and purposeful to do things (I installed bags on my bike so I could pick up groceries), everything else should fall right into place... the most important thing is to get it done...

[anndelise]

Hi woofwoofl,
Thanks for the input.
For whatever reason, most grains seem to increase lethargy in her, as well as increase emotional-reactivity. Neither of which is a good thing for her, nor the people around her. I haven't tried quinoa with her though, so that might be an idea to experiment with.

We are in the middle of nowhere. Biking is dangerous on the roads here. Which sux to high heaven. She's too overweight for running/jogging except intermittent bursts. She also walks heavily on her ankles, so combine that with the weight and you can easily see the potential damage of running.

I'll look more into the P90, as it often comes up when I'm looking at functional fitness stuff.

I can easily see her willingly, and enjoying, kickboxing and/or punching a bag. Particularly a human shaped one, lol. And I had (hopefully still have) a good book for learning that. Would have to look for some technique videos though. AND try to find a place in our small house for the bag/stand. ....hmmm, though we did finally get the deck cleared off and a cover on part of it. I wonder if it could house the bag/stand?...

Oh, and inspiring her inner Wolfette helps some.

Your ideas...how would you present it to someone so that they would choose that for themselves, rather than being told to do it from someone else?

[blackburry]

Have her meet a diabetic with neuropathy..and amputated limbs.

[mu4]

Reduce total calorie intake below 1800 while eating a balanced diet. If she is having a hard time with a vegetarian diet, it's possible it's simply not a good option for her.

There's no food one has to completely eliminate or focus on, I tend to think of these things as just big marketing ploy. A balanced diet is just that, balanced and the key is moderate exercise, portion control and not giving up.

Technically you can eat like crap as long as you work out practice portion control and don't give up.

[Azeroffs]

calories burned > calories eaten = weight loss
It's not hard

You could eat apples all day and gain weight, and you could eat nothing but pure lard and lose weight. Not that I would suggest that.

The main problem, of course, is the psychology. She's gotta find foods that satisfiy her that are low in calories and/or excercises that she enjoys. For it to be sustainable, it has to be something she can enjoy and be consistent with. If she doesn't enjoy the process of it, or if there are other factors that make it unsustainable (costs, etc) then she will revert.

Imo, the easiest way to go about weightloss is to find inexpensive foods that are low in calories and enjoyable. It just takes some research, and then it takes 0 extra time or effort than it would take for normal grocery shopping.

The next step would be to find any physical activity that she enjoys and could make part of a routine. It always helps if you can find people to do it with and maybe it could be helpful if she asked some friends what they might like to make part of a regular routine. This is usually harder to work in because it usually involves a much bigger change of life-style. Depending on how drastically she can change her diet, it may not even be necessary for her to start losing weight. Though of couse there should be some form of physical activity for overall-health reasons.



For a lot of people, the worst thing you can do when you try to lose weight is to think of it as having to make a bunch of sacrifices. You shouldn't be making sacrifices as much as you should be making an enjoyable change of life-style. If the change in life-style causes more stress, chances are it won't last. Stress-relief should be part of the change.

[woofwoofl]

Hi woofwoofl,
Thanks for the input.
For whatever reason, most grains seem to increase lethargy in her, as well as increase emotional-reactivity. Neither of which is a good thing for her, nor the people around her. I haven't tried quinoa with her though, so that might be an idea to experiment with.

We are in the middle of nowhere. Biking is dangerous on the roads here. Which sux to high heaven. She's too overweight for running/jogging except intermittent bursts. She also walks heavily on her ankles, so combine that with the weight and you can easily see the potential damage of running.

I'll look more into the P90, as it often comes up when I'm looking at functional fitness stuff.

I can easily see her willingly, and enjoying, kickboxing and/or punching a bag. Particularly a human shaped one, lol. And I had (hopefully still have) a good book for learning that. Would have to look for some technique videos though. AND try to find a place in our small house for the bag/stand. ....hmmm, though we did finally get the deck cleared off and a cover on part of it. I wonder if it could house the bag/stand?...

Oh, and inspiring her inner Wolfette helps some.

Your ideas...how would you present it to someone so that they would choose that for themselves, rather than being told to do it from someone else?

Here's a link to BOB, it's the cheapest price of it I could find... here's a pic:



Here's a video on YouTube for the Ab Ripper X portion of P90X:



Quinoa's not a "grain" per se, and it contains a complete protein, might work good

Lentils, beans, those may work good; as for meats, I don't do them anymore, but fish is a good thing to eat... upping the fiber is generally a good idea...

Inspiring her inner Wolfette I like that!

I just got done from around 15 miles or so of bike riding, did some P90X stuff prior to that, still want to rally some people together to get that kickball game happening...

Any local karate dojos, or anything related, that look good? It's best to steer far away from any that try to get you to sign any huge contracts, those places are usually no good...

[Azeroffs]

Also, all else equal, just changing how you eat your food can result in weightloss.

If you eat more smaller meals, it keeps your metabolism going which burns more calories, but also you're more likely to eat less if you give yourself smaller portions. Sometimes simply saying "I'll get more if I'm still hungry" rather than "I'll put the leftovers back if I get full" can make a difference. Give yourself less than wht you think you'll want, you can always get more. Also, eat slowly. Take some bites and then do something else. This gives even more time for your body to recognize that it's full. Learn the difference between satisfied and stuffed. Stuffing yourself not only means you ate more than you need (which can be painful anyways) but doing it often also makes it so that you have to eat more to be satisfied.

Just a few easy ways to burn a little more and take in a little less with minimal changes.

[anndelise]

Woofwoofl, BOB's not as expensive as I thought he'd be, but he'll have to wait until I recover from the school clothes and supplies shopping.

Today's "assignment" was for her to find some images that represent to her her inner wolf...aka Wolfette. She was quite excited, but only found one image that I guess she's been using already. She's very particular about how her wolf looks.

She asked me why, and I explained that I thought it would be easier if we viewed the health/fitness program as nurturing our alter-ego. That any feedback will feel less like an attack or personal criticism, if we're talking about "her". And it would make decision-making easier for us, as we'd be deciding on how to care for Wolfette, rather than what we, personally, are in the mood for. Also, that it will be Wolfette's body we're improving. So she'd be made up of her own mind, and Wolfette's body. She was excited by the idea.

We'll likely spend the next few days writing up or collaging attributes and actions of Wolfette and Grockette. Basically creating an inspirational image of what we'd like to encourage in our alter-egos, and eventually work out how that might translate into human movements/skills.

This evening, I refound an old page/site that I loved. These are along the kinds of tools we'd be using for the fitness portion. http://www.stumptuous.com/no-weights-no-problem

I haven't yet figured out how to translate the nutrition part.
I was hoping to be able to use the physiological systems, so she'd get a decent grasp of what nutrient gets used for what. But it seems I had gotten rid of those books, argh.

I also found my fitness pyramid I had made for Grockette out of things like MovNat and Exuberant Animal. I'll use it as a bit of a guide for when we flesh out what kinds of activities Wolfette might do.

And finally, for the peer social aspect, esper directed me to a weight-management site for teens. I'm still researching it, as I don't want my daughter to get caught up in thinking in terms of "diets".

So, while I don't yet have the program designed yet, I like the outline "draft" I have so far.


As for gyms and dojos and such, we are too far out from town to make regular trips. So what we do has to be done in a small room of the home, and use the deck and yard. I also can't do as much as I'd like because of my back.

Nor do I want to have a battle of wills with her. So the program needs to be something she can refer to on her own for feedback and how to improve it, rather than relying on me to maintain it for her. Me setting a bunch of "do this! Do that!" isn't going to work. Which is one reason why I like the idea of fleshing out Wolfette. This way it's her who's figuring out what needs to change, and how to change it, rather than someone else telling her what to do.

Oh, and we have a small ipad program that we can use to make a "character sheet" for Wolfette. List her skills she's working on, and leveling her up. It makes for a fun tracking tool, we've learned.

[anndelise]

Walker31, she is 15 1/2yo, 10th grade this year.

She hasn't yet had much success with taking the typical approach to body health. And she tends to take things very personally. She's also finally been diagnosed as fitting on the autism spectrum.

She often recites to me things she's learned in health and personal conditioning class. But applying it has been a major weak point.

She does a lot of rpgs and online chat/forum role-playing. She used to do acting at a small local theater. In nearly every character she creates and plays, they each seem to have an alter-ego, an inner demon, two souls in one body, etc. Wolf traits are also common in her characters. So this Wolfette concept blends right into that.

In fact, this summer was when Wolfette first got named.
My daughter has already demonstrated a willingness to temporarily forego her comfiness/chatting when my Grockette asks her Wolfette to join me in a "hunt"/walk. But if it's me, asking her, she won't.

[anndelise]

Walker31,
She's relatively isolated. We live in a small area with no place for teens to hang out. Her biggest bully lives around the block from our home. And she has a difficult time making and keeping friends (related to her diagnosis).

This is why I allow her so much time on her forums/chats. It's a safe way for her to learn how to socialize and deal with the issues that come up with relationships, which she carries over into her socializing with her school friends.

We are close, and spend time with each other each day. When her friends are over, they ask me to join in whatever games their playing. But still, I'm not able to fully be there for her mentally and emotionally. And often I feel like she uses me to entertain her when she's bored.

As for permissive vs authoritative, I'm definitely not authoritative. I might state some 'new rule' but I can't maintain it. I don't like pushing myself onto someone, yet I also refuse to have someone push themselves onto me. Which she often does. I worry about her ability to handle some kinds of situations, but that doesn't usually stop me from letting her go do stuff.

I also try to encourage her to take actions for herself, but it's a slow process. I'd rather her have a safe environment to try out life and make mistakes, to help better prepare herself for when she moves out. Hence why the program I set up for her needs to be in such a way that she learns to make good food choices, and activity choices. The desire and choice has to come from her, it can't come from me.

On the other hand, there's a limit to how much slovenliness I'll allow. So once in a while I blow up and make her clean her bathroom, or I won't allow her to go anywhere nor anyone come over unless it's cleaned. Same with her room (basically, her side of the house).

She wakes herself up in the mornings, takes her vitamins, takes a shower and gets ready without being told to. She follows a set routine kind of thing when she gets home from school. Though she sometimes gets distracted by the internet. Natural consequence works for that. If the computer is distracting her from doing her homework, then it will be taken away for a couple of days.

In fact, she learns best from natural and immediate consequences occuring. And works well with triggers. (a set of behaviors following a trigger, each behavior being a trigger for another behavior) this is what the program I'm working on will also make use of.

[Reuben]

Hey anndelise

Nutrition:

I know this may sound a little extreme, but trust me maybe you'll love it too yourself.

Eat only raw fruits and vegetables everyday. Do not eat too much fruit because sugar in high quantities, even natural sugar, may cause you to become hypoglycemic if you do not exercise enough. Hence if your girl becomes very active, she can eat more. As for vegetables, go for every single colour possible. Don't eat vitamins, your body cannot process them. You can try juicing your fruits/vegetables as well for fun and as an outlet for creativity.

Contrary to popular belief, even a person who exercises frequently does not need high levels of protein. Roughly 25 to 50g a day will do. Anything more may result in thinning of bone marrow. Go for vegetables with high protein percentage like spinach. Other sources will include nuts and seeds, which are good to add flavour and texture to your fruit/vegetable meal.

For fat, virgin olive oil and flax seed are good choices. They also tend to go well with salads (: You don't need too much of this, but if you're not eating a whole load of carbs, fats are what makes you feel full. Still, consume sparingly.

This diet will tend to make your girl interested in nutrition, since it is vital to get as much vitamins as possible from many different coloured fruits/vegetables. You can get her interested in researching the purposes and necessities of different vitamins, and where to get them from which fruit/vegetables. This knowledge is very helpful to her in future as she can even recommend friends who are deficient in certain vitamins to eat more of the particular food. Furthermore, it'll get her to think before she eats, teaching her responsibility, and making her feel that she is a major stakeholder in the project she is building: herself.

Of course, when she's out with her friends, or if say you guys are having a meal with your relatives/friends, feel free to eat whatever you want. Any diet should not be so strict that you ostracize yourself (and indirectly others) in a social situation. Finally, as she increases her work out regime, her knowledge of nutrition will guide her as to what foods to take. For example, if she finds herself in need of much more energy, then a baked potato at night will help (although do try to keep everything else that can be eaten raw uncooked because cooking denatures too many enzymes and vitamins that your body needs).

Very soon, you'll find that she will have more energy, her thinking will be clearer, her emotions more stable, and her attitude more positive. I can testify because I've tried this out myself. It really works. And the strangest thing is I don't even crave for meat. I use to be a steak lover. Right now, I still can appreciate some good, medium-rare ribeye with butter sauce drizzled all over it, but the thought of it doesn't make me crave or drool as before. Once you make the shift, it's these kind of food that truly satisfies (and still, you don't lose the enjoyment of the food you used to love! you just like it relatively less ).

Exercise:

Your daughter can run in intermittent bursts. Fortunately, that is the only thing she needs to do: interval training. You should know the longest time she is able to sustain a run at a moderate speed without injuring herself. Take this time and divide it by 20, for a minimum of 10 seconds. Get her to run her fastest for this amount of time, 5 reps per set. After each sprint, she gets to rest for 3 times the time given. Do this up to 3 times a day if possible.

That's all the exercise your girl needs right now. When she gets better, you can do 3 things to help her improve:
1) Reduce rest time gradually
2) Increase the time of the sprint
3) Decrease/Increase the number of reps/sets depending on how you want to train her (i.e. longer rest time, more reps, shorter rest time, less reps, longer time sprint less sets, shorter time sprint more sets etc.)

Of course if she is unable to do so many resp/sets at the start, do introduce it to her at a comfortable pace. Try to help her set a goal for herself to unleash the inner wolf

Once she is of a comfortable weight (able to do longer distant running), her base should be pretty well built (legs can support her weight well), and she can start on weight training. I'll get back to you once wolfette has reached that stage (:

The goal of course is independence. Wolves work in packs, but in the end they trust their instincts above anything else. After a period in time, depending on her adaptiveness and thirst to grow, she should be able to instinctively know what her body needs in terms of nutrition and exercise. By then, she can adapt instinctively to her needs and her goals, which every wolf must cultivate in themselves to succeed and be the leader of the pack (which I believe she will be one day). I do hope that you will continue to raise her up to be the best leader she can possibly be, because in that light, you are not only investing in your daughter's life, but also those of her friends, and everyone else she comes into contact with in future.


All the best!

[mu4]

I hope I'm not being too firm or presumptuous.

I don't think that there is a problem of knowledge or wisdom here, but one of discipline and motivation. Any diet plan can work given adequate discipline and motivation but these are difficult to maintain without a support system.

To me it sounds the only reliable support system that is avaliable is each other, so this is where I would focus on how to maintain that discipline and motivation. Be positive, work each day at a time, don't give up. It's going to be painful, there will be times you will be hungry and sorely tempted, but if there is a job you want to have for the rest of your life. This is probably the one, to keep yourself and your family healthy, physically and emotionally. Start now, not tomorrow, not next week.

Eat what your currently eat, just a lot less of it, work out more then you currently work out, fight the pain, hug each other more even if you're angry at each other, good luck.

[Saberstorm]

Go to dadamo.com and check out the genotype diet. It uses MBTI type in determining food choices, in addition to blood type and body measurements.

She is likely bloodtype O if she has such a hard time with grains. The dadamo system is pretty hard to follow, but seems to work.

[anndelise]

Update time:

First, yes, I was more concerned with how to build the program in a way that would appeal to an SeFi, as well as how to introduce it to an SeFi. My concern was motivation and interest, with a dash of clear concrete information she could use rather than prescriptions of how to reduce fat weight.

Currently I have a social arena idea available if my daughter feels a need for connecting with others who are going through a similar process.

I have information in a very nice diagram regarding female cycles, which my daughter found interesting, and helpful in understanding some of what's going on in her body.

While I haven't formalized a program yet, we have already implemented some stuff which so far is showing signs of being highly enjoyable in its own right.

I made two medicine balls from two small basketballs...not the full-sized ones. I used sand as a filler. The weight is about 9-10 lbs or so. I just filled the balls, I wasn't concerned about actual weight. I have some other items to make which will serve a similar purpose...that of "strength play". Meaning using this items in a playful manner, but which also builds functional strength. For example, these balls are being tossed back and forth between us, tossed in the air and caught, rolled like a bowling ball to try to hit a target or distance, thrown for target or distance, and carried while racing.

I also purchased some wii games that we decided on, that would provide cardio workout in a fun way...but where the cardio workout isn't the focus of the games. For example, Just Dance (not a rhythm game like DanceDanceRevolution) will help her learn some whole body dance moves which she can use outside of the game. (an added benefit to this game is that in less than a week, it's helped build her dancing confidence enough that she decided to go to the HomeComing dance tonight.)

Two other games deals with boxing movements, which will translate to a sandbag I'll be building which can be used as a punching/kicking bag as well....for strength play.

Another game has her playing the part of an rpg like Explorer, where you earn outfits, tools, etc, and get to explore an rpg like world. It has her running in place, jumping, squatting, etc.

Basically, the games are motivators in their own rights, and the cardio workout is a side benefit.

Coming home from school is the trigger for doing Fitness activities. This means we are both automatically reminded. And she's actually quick to come home, give me my homework (papers to fill and info I need regarding her school and classes), then changes into shorts in preparation....and without having to be told to. We do a bit of strength play, small things, not a full blown strength workout. Then she plays her wii cardio games. Then we walk around the block to help stretch the calves and such from the effects of using the wii mat/board. Then she showers and is done. All total it's about a 25-35 min workout that can be done 5 days a week, with minimal soreness. As I said, I'm more concerned with developing a habitual lifestyle that can carry over even after she leaves home.

Food-wise we sat down and thought about the kinds of take-out food we get, why we get it, and how we can make those times healthier. We had already begun changes in the take-out arena...for example, we can have a burger and fries but no soda/dessert, or burger and soda but no fries/dessert, or burger and desert but no soda/fries. It has helped her see that she can be perfectly filled without all the extra food. But it also means that it's not really worth the price we're paying for it. So now, for example, in the case of pizza...instead of getting a pizza from a shop, we bought pizza ingredients (sauce, meat, cheese) and cooked it up with corn (for now), and had a perfectly spicy pizza taste, with a lot less calories and filling.

She's also choosing better lunch items, and eating a breakfast pocket at home before school, so she has less temptation to go to breakfast at school and pick the sugary foods there. We will eventually change the hotpocket meal to something better, but for now this is already an improvement.

She enjoys tracking her these "skills" on her character sheet.
She also enjoys talking about things in terms of Wolfette being more active in her life.
She's not interested in tracking changes of weight/inches, so we don't do that. Instead, the measure of improvement is being based on how many songs she can do before wanting to collapse, or far she can Explore, or how well (or if) she can beat me in strength play.


Information I am still looking for is a diagram on micronutrients and the body/mind, the digestive process, and non-prescriptive descriptions of how insulin, fat, energy, etc are related.

Thank you all for taking the time to provide input which you thought might be useful.