Health Risk Assessment

My company offers a discount on our medical premiums if we participate in a wellness program. You're not required to do anything but actively participate in becoming healthier... you don't have to meet certain guidelines to start, which is great. Last year, I had several "moderate risk" issues, although generally healthy. It kind of bugged me after all the hard work I had done on eating right, losing weight, and being very active. But, I was still in the category that didn't require any follow up with a counselor, so that was good. Cholesterol was good, bp is great, in general, pretty healthy. They just didn't like my WEIGHT!

So, this year..... the people they brought in to do the on-site testing were a joke. They measured my height with shoes on! Wrote down that I was 5'8"... 2 inches high. Then they weighed me on a cheap bathroom scale on carpet! Wrote down that I was 183... maybe about 5 lbs high. (The tests were done in June.) So I got to update my information on the website today. I answered all of the questions, then got to height and weight. So, I answered honestly at 5'6" and 161 lbs. It STILL told me I was overweight! This survey allowed you to go back (last year it didn't). So I played with the numbers a bit to find a reasonable combination. I'm just tired of hearing that I'm overweight!!! So, I'm now 5'7" and 159 lbs... officially a healthy weight! I figured one inch and 2 lbs really wasn't all that much of a lie... certainly the closest I have ever been.

I've had a Tanita body fat scale for several months now. I've been watching pretty closely and figure my body fat % to be between 24% and 26%. So I googled healthy ranges. "Acceptable" is 25-31%. "Fitness" is 21-25%. I'm pretty happy with that range! Just goes to show that BMI isn't the only measure of health. I may be just outside the BMI range... which, by the way, is just a calculation of height and weight... but my body fat, which is much more important to me, is right on target.

Also, the site recommends that you exercise 3 hrs a week. I'm at NINE. HMMMMM.... think I need some help getting healthy?? I think NOT!

The "honest" healthy height/weight combination for this site would have been 5'6" and 154 lbs. That may be the deciding factor for my new goal. I thought 160 would be good, but I still see some "fluff". 150 seems too far away, too hard to get to. 154 might be it. We'll see... I'm still a believer in flexible goals... you know when you get there.