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Debbie Leigh: Shop till you drop...a size
THERE are few times when being a ditherer can be an attribute but I think I have discovered one.
Like all women I was ecstatic to read recent research claiming we burn just as many calories indulging in retail therapy as we do in a gruelling gym workout.
It sounded slightly too good to be true.
A bit like the notion that broken biscuits contain zero calories – because they've all fallen out during the break.
But when it comes to weight-loss theories, us girls are always gagging for the next big solution.
Why else would so many of us actually try to exist purely on cabbage soup, grapefruits or syrupy water for months at a time?
But you can forget all that nonsense.
The news we have all been waiting for has finally arrived; shopping is officially good for our health.
A fitness study by Skinny Cow low-fat iced desserts found the average British woman burns off a butt-busting 48,000 calories a year while shopping!
Hiking
Apparently we burn 385 calories every time we hit the High Street – and that's equivalent to an hour's tough weightlifting or hiking, eradicating all fatty traces of a packet of crisps and two glasses of wine.
Us girls cover almost three miles and take 7,305 steps each time we pound the pavements hunting for the perfect accessories and outfits to turn us into Alexa Chung or Rachel Bilson.
Do it twice a week (if only the budget would allow it) and we'll apparently be getting a 'workout' that could help us lose 4lbs a month.
As Masterchef's Greg Wallace might say: Ladies, weight-loss news doesn't get much better than this.
I mean slogging it down the gym and desperately trying the latest fad diet is so last season.
Who needs that hassle when you can get yourself looking and feeling fabulous sorted at the same time.
Not only that, you can even look glamorous while working out – something verging on impossible when you're pumping out sit-ups in the mud at Roundhay Park, and leave looking like you've been run over by a tractor.
However, there was one immediate problem I spotted with turning a passion for fashion into a fitness regime.
Cash. Or more accurately, lack of.
Now, say I'd just won 58m on the lottery I'd be hitting those boutiques so hard I could have a body like Megan Fox in no time.
But on a slightly tighter budget, there's a limit to how many shopping expeditions you can make each month.
This, however, is where my indecisiveness pays off and makes my money (and more importantly, my legs) go the extra mile.
If you're a "see it, buy it, move on" shopper like Mr N your calorie-burning opportunities are limited because your shopping trip is over before you can say "everything must go".
If you're more of a "spot it, check out all the different stockists and prices, move on and ponder at length, then return and dither some more before possibly purchasing" – chances are you can ditch that gym membership right now.
I'm probably the least efficient shopper known to womankind, never sure what I'm looking for, rarely sure if I've found it, unsure whether I really need it and always dubious about whether I can afford it.
But when you think about the energy involved in checking out every shop, comparing prices and religiously trying before buying, you can see how a bit of dithering could lead to a whole lot of exercise.
I decided to put Skinny Cow's research to the test and, armed with a ridiculously hi-tech pedometer and some belated birthday money, set out on a military-style mission.
Of course, the unwritten rule of shopping instantly came into play.
When you have money, nothing screams "buy me now, you can't live another second without me".
But when you're strictly window shopping and so far in the red you're convinced it's the new black, every garment sings your name like a siren and makes you look like Olivia Palermo.
Exhaustion
Still, by the end of the trip, my state of exhaustion left me in no doubt I had burned more calories than Victoria Beckham probably consumes in a week.
I walked for four hours, non-stop except for brief trying-on sessions, and must have climbed around 300 stairs.
But the great news is, I burned more than 840 calories.
And let's not forget, as well as walking around eight miles, there were also the stretching benefits of reaching for those must-have shoes, not to mention strengthening those arm muscles carrying ever-increasingly heavy shopping bags.
My bags were so weighty by the end of the trip I was convinced my arms had morphed into Madonna's.
And no wonder, when I weighed them I discovered I'd been lugging around 8kgs. That's probably the combined weight of several members of Girls Aloud.
I'd always thought celebs were being divas when they had hangers-on to carry their bags but now I understand.
Seeing as most of them are already calorie-neutral, they'd probably vanish into thin air if they had to try use the energy from a bowl of edamame beans and grapes to get them down the high street during a hefty bout of retail therapy.
You won't catch me starving myself in future; I've found my weight-loss solution.
And FYI, it is no longer to be known as shopping.
It is shoppercise, a form of exercise I know I enjoy and am guaranteed to stick to come rain or shine.
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Sunday 12 February 2012
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