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Volume 40, No. 7 |
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Picking up the pieces: UI office helps Iowans save history |
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Teamwork eases presidential switch |
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Lloyd flips for Gothic coin design |
New program: Lose weight, feel better
Ads on television and in the back pages of magazines talk about inches and pounds lost, but participants in the Balanced Choices weight management program are more excited about how much better they feel and how they have changed their lives. The Balanced Choices program, provided by Counseling and Health Promotion Services of UI Health Care, is offered as part of the pilot wellness initiative sponsored by UI Wellness and UI Benefits.
Not that participants don’t lose weight. Cindy Kalvig, research assistant in epidemiology, lost 22 pounds and 5.5 inches. Denny Gritsch, senior associate director of purchasing, lost 26 pounds.
“Everybody lost weight, but the best thing was feeling better and having more energy,” says Kalvig, whose 12-week class finished in November. She is signed up for an aerobics class in March. “I’m in a much better mood and now my blood pressure is good. It’s still amazing to me the difference. When I started, I could do only a few minutes of aerobics, but pretty soon we were really going good.”
Gritsch, who says he has had cancer and been on medication for high blood pressure for more than 20 years, says his doctor has reduced his medications since he began the program. But still the biggest thing for him was the change in attitude.
“I’m motivated now. I compete with myself to do better,” Gritsch says. “The program taught us to think differently about a lot of things that affect our health. When I go out to eat, I look for things that are lower in fat. I still love to eat, and I don’t miss eating that fat one bit.”
Both Gritsch and Kalvig talk about the flexibility of the program and the way it allows for individualized experiences. Classes offer a variety of exercise options, from aerobics to free weights to yoga.
“If you had some limitations that kept you from doing one exercise,” Gritsch says, “the great people who ran the program would help you find something else to do.”
Gritsch and Kalvig continue to meet with their support groups for exercise and talk.
Joni Troester, the new director of UI Wellness, a unit in UI WorkLife, was part of a team that developed the Balanced Choices program in 1998 and has worked with the program since.
“We wanted a program that wasn’t a quick fix, that offered a change in lifestyle,” she says. “It’s designed to help people develop skills to live a healthier life.”
For information, contact Counseling and Health Promotion Services at (38)4-7900.
Article by Charles
Drum