Losing weight by swimming


One of the things that finally helped me lose the weight that I had gained during middle age was swimming. I had a friend who had a pool and he gave me permission to use it at any time. Mostly he was away at work when I used it, and only I did very gentle laps, especially using my snorkel, which if you've ever used one, makes swimming much easier, as you can just keep your head down and mostly float along.

I was 53 in this photo, and had gained about 40-50 pounds in my mid-forties, which I wanted to get rid of. Of course swimming was just part of getting my act together, learning more about food, that sort of thing. But swimming was the foundation. It got me off the couch and moving around. Of course it wasn't a social activity, I would just put on my goggles and snorkel and paddle around. As I got stronger I didn't need the snorkel as much, but I'm a terrible swimmer, so I got a lot of exercise doing it.

And using the term "swimming" gives me more credit that I deserve. I mostly did dog paddling, and I would paddle to one end of the pool and then gently backstroke back. I'm sure that it was good for my heart and my skeletal muscles, but mostly it reminded me that I had a goal, which was to lose weight.

It worked.

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