Welcome To 52 Fitness

Join me as I take my health and well-being to the next level.

Hello, everyone. I’m so happy you’re here.

Mind if I ask how you got here? Did you find me through my original Medium publication, 52 Fridays? Or perhaps some other way? Like all Medium writers, I’m curious to know how the algorithms and alchemy and other unseen forces of this platform work.

But regardless of how you got here, thank you. Today I greet my new baby, 52 Fitness. She (he? they? it? who cares?) was conceived over a the course of a few dark nights of the soul (I know! TMI!) and arrives in a maelstorm of frustration, shame, self-doubt, and indecision.

In other words, welcome to the world, beautiful child! May the cloud that hangs over your arrival pass soon.

(And rest assured, dear readers, my actual babies were conceived in love — I know! TMI again! — and arrived into the same).

Sorry. What exactly am I going on about here? And what the heck is this new publication all about?

Great questions. I’ll do my best to answer them.

52 Fitness: The Origin Story

At the beginning of this summer (2023), I had the brilliant if misguided brainwave to begin a fitness challenge with the specific goal of shedding 10 pounds in preparation for our late-summer family trip to Japan.

I wrote about it here, and here, and some other places.

When I first began, my main focus was primarily on exercise and less on diet. I was under the delusion that if I burned enough calories, I could eat more or less what I wanted. Because I like to exercise, I figured I had this in the bag — that I could have as many cakes as I wanted and eat them too.

I think you see where this is going, and that’s nowhere great.

I failed to factor in a whole bunch of stuff, not the least of which is my age (let’s just say I’m not 25 years old — more on this in future posts), and the increasing research that suggests that exercise, especially cardio, is actually not as important to weight loss as we once believed.

Is that actually true? I don’t know. I’m not a doctor or a scientist, and I have proved beyond the shadow of a doubt that I am no expert in the fine art of losing weight.

But it certainly seemed to be the case for me this past summer.

I spent hours at the gym to little avail. I finally had to concede that no matter how many calories the treadmill said I burned (I always took the number with a grain of salt, but the way), diet was going to be more important than I had anticipated.

That was bad news for me because I love to eat.

But I made some halfhearted attempts to just, I don’t know, eat… less. I incorporated strength training into my workout regime. I lost a little here, gained a little there.

Long story short, in the end, I failed. Colossally so.

But, as failures always are, it was an education, if a humiliating one.

Now I’m back from Japan (beautiful country, by the way!) and despite all the walking, hiking, lugging suitcases up and down train station stairs, and an off the charts humidity index that made me sweat litres on the daily, I did not lose a single pound while I was away.

Not an ounce. In fact, the scale tells me I gained two pounds. It seems no amount of suitcase-lugging could offset the delights of Japanese cuisine, of which I partook with abandon.

In better news, the humidity took 10 years off my face. But… still. I mean, come on.

I’m annoyed. I’m frustrated. I’m mad.

I am not all “Who cares? You look more or less okay and you’re healthy and active and why don’t you just accept that weight loss is challenging at your age and just relax and eat whatever you want within reason and be a little more body positive about the whole thing?”

Don’t get me wrong. I believe on balance, that the body positivity movement is a good thing. I would never comment on anyone else’s weight or food choices or make a judgment about how they feel about and treat their own body.

But guess what? I’m talking about my body.

And I want my body to weigh less. 30 pounds less, to be precise.

And I’m giving myself 52 weeks — one year — to make that happen.

Sounds Good! But What’s The Actual Plan?

The plan is simple. No extreme diets or expensive food plans or useless apps.

It will be a straightforward, consistent effort towards daily activity and sensible food choices.

I will probably lean towards higher protein and lower carb — something that’s worked well for me in the past — with plenty of vegetables and fruits and chicken breast and salmon.

There will be regular walking. Regular running, but less than I once did because I’m old and my joints are protesting. I’d like to do more yoga. And I definitely would like to do more strength training, something I began in the summer and found incredibly rewarding.

There won’t be much “You go, girl!” and rah-rahing, at least not from me. I don’t feel like a rock star or a hero or any of that.

I don’t even feel particularly motivated, if I’m being honest. But letting my weight and fitness slide no longer feels like an option, so I’m just doing what I have to do.

I’m starting slow, but I will be hitting the gym today. And having scrambled eggs and a smoothie for dinner.

I will be writing about all of this regularly. I hope you’ll follow along, and thank you in advance for doing so.

So… go, me? (Okay, I rah-rahed a little.)

Thanks so much for reading. If you enjoy my writing, you can receive an email whenever I publish if you click here.