It’s been a month since I rededicated myself to living a healthier life. I’m in “the zone” exercise-wise where I jump out of bed, tie up my sneakers and march out the door to attack the hill. No peptalks needed. I love it when I get like this and I make the most of it because I can get booted from this zone at any time for any reason and getting back in… well, let’s say I’d have a better chance of walking into the Playboy mansion and getting picked for the centerfold spread. I even managed to take a gym class this week. Our 24-Hour Fitness offers two-hour daycare for $2, so I dropped my baby off and got the best workout of my post-baby life. Unfortunately, she came down with the sniffles this week, so I don’t know when I’ll next be able to take the class again. Soon, I hope.

In other news, I weighed and measured myself this morning before working out. But before I get to the results, there’s something far more interesting I’d like to share first. Tomorrow I’m going to wrestle my rolls and bulges into the swimsuit I last wore on my honeymoon, the only one I own, and get my body fat tested at a university 30 miles east of where I live. The method they employ is the most accurate test there is. In preparation I won’t be allowed food or water four hours before I’m to be measured and I won’t be allowed to exercise. Then I’ll climb into a chair, which will be lowered into a tank (of hopefully clean) water, expel as much air out my lungs as possible, then hold my breath for a few seconds while I’m completely submerged. This will be repeated seven or eight times to ensure accuracy. The whole thing costs $20 and takes about 15 minutes.

My friend, let’s call her Lola, talked me into this. She’s getting married in four weeks and has been on a weight loss kick for the past nine months. (Funny how weddings do that to a person.) So far she’s down 33 lbs (exactly what I lost for my wedding in the same amount of time). She’s shown remarkable improvement in her body fat test since her engagement, but the most startling realization came the first time she got measured. Lola is 5′ 7″ and always assumed she should weigh about 135 lbs. This didn’t seem extreme to me as I have another friend who is the same height, weighs that amount already and has plenty of “softness,” as she calls it, to spare. But when Lola got measured she was told that her lean body mass alone, her bones, muscles and organs, weighs 120 lbs. Weighing 135 lbs would make her deathbed skinny. What an empowering discovery that was for her. She now weighs 155 and knows she can only lose at most another 10 lbs. to put her in the optimal body fat category.

Now I am painfully curious as to how much my lean body mass weighs. I have a friend just a half-inch taller than I who is naturally thin. She weighs 95 lbs. She is definitely underweight, but her body likes this weight. She is fit and eats whatever she wants whenever she wants to and still fits into the clothes she wore in Junior High. I bet my lean body mass alone weighs about what she does. I guess we’ll see tomorrow. (Of course, I may just as likely discover that I am composed of 60% fat. Move over, bacon! Something fatter’s moving in.)

Incidentally, Lola and I were discussing our measurements a few weeks ago over the phone and when I told her my waist size she said, “No, that’s not possible.”

“Um, yeah it is. I measured it myself.”

“Nope,” she said, “I don’t believe it. Where’s your waist?”

“Where’s my waist?” I asked, flabbergasted. “What do you mean where’s my waist? At belly button level–”

“No! Your waist is where your sides naturally indent the most.”

“Whaaaaaa? That would be my lower rib cage. No way that’s–”

“Yes, it is! That’s why those 1940s pants are so high-waisted, because that’s where every woman’s natural waist is.”

Oh. OOOH. How come I didn’t know this? How come I went to college, got a degree and I still have no idea where my waist is? I felt like I did Freshman year when I realized that besides eyeliner and mascara I had no idea how to wear makeup and how did I manage to miss the class every other girl seemed to have aced?

On the upside, my waist is far smaller than my gut. So let’s do the numbers, shall we?

In early January, I measured as follows:

Waist: 35.25 inches
Belly button: 43 inches
Gut (and hips): 46 inches

As of today, I measure:

Waist: 34 inches
Belly button: 42.25 inches
Gut (and hips): 44.5 inches

In that time I have lost five pounds. (Side note: The Vegan Til Six eating regiment is still going strong. I went off a day here and there for various reason, but going back is never painful. Now I just have to stop eating pizza and M&M’s after six–sigh.)

I think the reason I am showing so much improvement in my belly area is because I am simply strengthening the muscles that atrophied and stretched during the pregnancy. I have referred back to measurements I made when I stood at this weight before and my gut was at least five inches smaller. I am not necessarily losing fat, just pulling in the muscles. At least that’s my theory.

So do you think you’d want to get your body fat professionally measured?

– by Christine

Tags: BMI, lean body mass, measuring body fat

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 3rd, 2009 at 11:45 am and is filed under Blogs, Hippo in a Tutu. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.