Oct 31, 20204 min read

Staying Fit And Healthy My Way.

I am always asked questions on what I eat, drink and what type of exercise I do.

I am not an expert but this is all from my own personal experience.

My aim has never been to have a skinny body as I prefer a more shapely look.

I'm 62 and about to turn 63 in February and here are the most important things that come to mind when you want to maintain your weight :

1. Be consistent in exercise and also your food.

2. Throw away the scales and focus on body tone not your weight.

3. Do not count calories or even think about the word DIET

That's it in a nutshell and I will elaborate more.

Food & Alcohol

Food

I am basically good for at least 80% to 90% of the time and that includes holidays. I also eat a lot of meals out and still make good choices when dining out.

I am a huge fruit and veggie eater and will consume most days 6 -10 pieces of fruit.

I am not a vegetarian,I don't count calories and I eat normal portion sizes.

I usually don't eat breakfast until around 10.30 or 11 as I go to the gym early and will start the day with yoga and don't like having food in my stomach. ( you get the most benefits from yoga when your stomach is empty)

When I get home I'm really hungry and will have a smoothie most days.

In the smoothie will be 2 bananas, paw paw, dragon fruit, an orange, melon, half an avocado,mango honey, 3 tablespoons of oats, about 3 tablespoons of greek yogurt and top it off with milk.... nice and easy. I will share this with my husband.

I will usually eat lunch around 2 and it will be something like a a chicken salad or maybe sushi. I always have a fresh coconut in the afternoon.

If I am hungry at any time throughout the day I will eat fruit and nuts or crackers with some tinned tuna with cucumber and mayo.

Dinner will most often be out and I will most likely choose fish or chicken and salad or a traditional Balinese meal of satay chicken, rice and salad or a chicken curry.

If we go to a dinner party I will of course eat anything that is served.

I don't eat takeaway and I can't even remember the last time I had takeaway.

If I was really pushed for time I would much rather open a tin of baked beans and put it on toast.

Alcohol

My rule of thumb is that I don't drink alcohol during the week unless we are going out with friends.

If it is just my husband and myself I just drink ice tea or lemon tea.

If we are not going out with friends on the weekend I usually don't drink.

80 to 90% of the time I stick to this but there are times if you have friends visiting etc that things can change but this works for me.

Exercise

My first thought that comes to mind is if you have time for social media then you really do have time to exercise.

I have been going to the gym since I was about 30 and started with aerobics classes.

I basically exercise 6 days a week at a gym here in Bali and just love it.

Not only does it help with fitness but a great place to meet new friends especially after moving from another country as we did.

I will do 6 x 1 hour sessions of yoga per week and 6 x 1 hour sessions of group classes that include TRX, spin and pump classes.

The weights I use are generally 2 x 5kg for biceps, triceps and legs. I use lighter ones for arm raises as I always find these difficult.

When using a bar I always use 10kg.

When doing legs I always strap on 5kg leg weights to each leg.

So nothing to hard and I just try my best.

If I am travelling it is not easy to find gyms and yoga studios , so I just use what is available to me.

I usually travel with my own TRX suspension strap and just hook it up to a washing line or similar.

I will also do hikes and every second day do a really big walk of around 15kms.

I will also walk up the steepest hill I can find and spend about 1 hour each day doing this. I like to get the hill walking done early morning as then it's done and dusted for the day. If I can find some weights I will also use those to work on my arms as well.