How I am Losing Weight By Practicing Self-Care

How I am Losing Weight By Practicing Self Care

I was compensated by Med-IQ through an educational grant from Novo Nordisk to write this sponsored post about the realities of obesity as A chronic disease. All opinions are my own.

Do you see weight management as self-care?

My weight loss journey feels like it has stalled. I lost 12 pounds and then stalled. Then gained back 2 and then stalled. Life came at me hard in the last 6 weeks, my stress level went up and I may have gone back to a few not so healthy habits.

I was absolutely stuck on how to manage this until I saw someone on twitter say that working out was a part of her self care. That stuck with me. For a few weeks, I kept thinking: Adopting a healthy lifestyle is a part of my self-care. Getting to a healthy weight for my body is self-care.

I talk about self-care all of the time. But I never stopped to think of working out and managing my weight as a part of self-care. I think my issue is that I’m looking at it as just another thing to do, instead of thinking of it as something that I’m doing for me.  

My life is busy. There is no way around that fact. Between being a wife, mom, a business owner, a friend, a daughter, a sister. There is hardly any time left over for me.

But I’m on a mission.

I’m so happy to be working with Med-IQ again to help generate awareness around obesity and its status as a chronic disease. Med-IQ is an accredited medical education company that provides educational experiences for physicians, nurses, pharmacists, and other healthcare professionals.  Through a Med-IQ survey on Obesity,  in which more than overn1,100 people participated, the responses show that the majority of us have the same issues when it comes to managing our weight!  Mainly that roadblocks to successful weight management include too much stress (57%), lack of time to exercise (56%), and inadequate sleep (48%); all of these barriers increase the risk of poor cardiovascular health!

I have got to do better! 

How Practicing Self-Care Can Help

It is known that scheduling time for self-care begins with small, sustainable changes.   

I understand that it is important to schedule a time for self-care and to begin with small sustainable changes in my behavior and habits.

I’m using SMART goals to help me manage my goals related to weight loss.  Remember SMART goals are Specific Measurable Attainable Realistic and Trackable.

For example. I know I want to start running again. But I know that saying I will run a half marathon by the end of the year is unrealistic! But saying that I will use Couch to 5K to start running again and run a 5K by December 31^st is much more attainable.

So my SMART goals for weight loss are

1. Exercise 3 x a week for 30 minutes each session with my friends as accountability partners.
2. Eat one meatless meal a week.
3. Regularly get more sleep by going to bed at the same time every night(no later than 10 pm)
4. Sitting down and eating with my family at least 3 times a week without devices and not on the go. 

I love that these goals are not only SMART goals, but they are goals that are truly SELF CARE. These goals will help me on my journey to manage my weight, get healthier and feel better. Isn’t’ that what self-care is supposed to do?

Help Med-IQ Help You

Med-IQ is currently conducting a survey and would appreciate your input. The survey, which includes more education on this topic, will take less than 15 minutes to complete. Survey responses are anonymous and will be shared only in aggregate. Your responses to these survey questions will provide Med-IQ with important information about your experiences with obesity and your care team, which will help them develop future educational initiatives for healthcare providers to improve care.

Once you’ve completed the survey, you will be asked to provide your email address if you’d like to be entered into a drawing administered by SOMA Strategies to win 1 of 10 $50 VISA gift cards. If you choose to enter, your email address will not be sold, kept, or stored; email addresses are used only to randomly draw the winners and notify them of their prize.

Losing weight by practicing self-care is something that I am determined to do. Because I matter. My health matters and self-care matters. What about you? Do you see losing weight as a form of practicing self-care?