Oh weight loss journey, how I have missed you. NOT! I will admit that I loved every minute of being pregnant and eating whatever I wanted whenever I wanted. Including the 5 dozen sugar cookies I ate at Christmas. Hey, my doctor was concerned I wasn't gaining enough weight; showed him! It was an extremely enjoyable 10 months (and then some) but now it's time to get back to reality, and into my clothes! If you've followed my weight loss posts then you know where I originally started. If you haven't I suggest you check them out, then you'll understand where I'm coming from.
When I found out I was pregnant I weighed 153lbs. Just typing that makes me long for the days! One 8lb 9oz baby, and 5 dozen sugar cookies later, and I weighed 184 two days before Bianca was born. I think that's about average weigh gain during pregnancy, and I was pretty happy because that was still under what I weighed after I had Roman.
I've attempted to get back on the wagon a few times since I had Bianca, but I just wasn't ready. Of course I wanted to be back to where I was, but my heart and mind just weren't in it yet. I think this is a great point about weight loss in general. Until you're completely ready and committed to the process it isn't going to work for you. So many times I tried to keep track of what I was eating and stay within my calorie allocation for the day, and each time I failed because I just didn't care. I didn't care that I shouldn't be eating an extra portion of supper, I didn't care that I didn't look the same as I did pre-Bianca, and I didn't care that it had already been 4 months since Bianca was born and I hadn't changed my ways. I was completely fine with all of it because I knew when I was ready I would be able to get back in the groove and get back to me!
The reality is that I'm now sitting at 171lbs, not bad but not great either, but I have a plan! I'm back to using the MyFitnessPal app and I'm sticking to it this time. This time of the year isn't without it's challenges though. Summer means BBQs, birthday parties, cake, hot dogs, marshmallows, burgers, basically all the amazing things. It's basically a food Christmas. That being said, I know you can lose weight and still enjoy your summer because I have done it before. The key to success is allowing yourself to enjoy the things you love about summer but not in massive quantity and not every day. Eating 12 s'mores every day and expecting to reach your goals likely isn't going to happen.
I have noticed that my weak time of the day is in the afternoon when both kids are napping (I'm blessed, I'm aware). As soon as the second kid is asleep I immediately have the urge to stuff something in my face. Cookies, ice cream, pop, bread, it really doesn't matter. My go to healthy snack when this happens is a rice cake with a little Nutella and sliced strawberry. I've recently discovered that walnut halves also work if you don't have strawberries. I'm sure I'm the only person on the planet that craves rice cakes. I could really go for one right now...
If anyone else is on a weight loss journey I'd love to hear when your weak time is and what you do to curb it. I'm always looking for more yummy food options!
Showing posts with label weight loss. Show all posts
Showing posts with label weight loss. Show all posts
Wednesday, July 13, 2016
Tuesday, March 24, 2015
Weight Loss Update - 1 year mark!
If you've been following these posts then you might be wondering how it's been a year already. Well I originally posted about the starting point for my weight loss journey back in September, but I had actually been working on losing weight since March 2014. It's a little mind blowing to think I've already been at this for a year and how far I've come, and how far I still want to go. But I'll get into all of that in this post!
Back in March I decided to join a "Biggest Loser" group through one of my mommy Facebook groups. I had no idea that this little challenge was going to turn out to be one of the best decisions I ever made. To be completely honest I didn't think it was actually going to work. I figured I'd lose a few pounds and end up leaving the group out of sheer embarrassment haha. How wrong I was! Turns out my competitiveness isn't just limited to Mario Kart!
This past month was a bit of a tough one for me. I was trying to come down off my Christmas food coma which was harder than I thought. When you get used to just eating, eating, eating, and all of a sudden you try to stop, it can be such a shock to the system. You know you don't need that cookie but the little devil on your shoulder says "but we always have a cookie at 3pm!!!!" I spent most of the month bouncing around 165-163 and was really getting frustrated with myself. I knew what I was doing wrong but just couldn't kick it. I finally managed too after a couple days of desperately wanting to eat junk. If you're having problems cutting out the 3pm cookie, the first two days are the hardest, but after that it's so much easier.
There is one downside to all this weight loss though, I never seem to have pants that fit! Yes I can hear your eyes rolling from here, and yes I'm aware this is a good problem to have, but it's a problem none the less. People always say losing weight is expensive because fresh food is expensive. I disagree, weight loss is expensive because you have to keep buying clothes every couple of months. In my last update I mentioned that I could finally fit into Old Navy clothes (size 14 jeans and large shirts). Well those same jeans are now constantly falling down and come right off without even undoing the zipper, and those shirts are so baggy that Roman has recently learnt the word "boobs" because he's constantly seeing them. I did purchase some tighter fitting white t-shirts a few weeks back in the hopes that they'll last me a little longer, but I have to wear a cami under them because they are fairly sheer. So I pulled out a cami from Ricki's that I've had for a couple years. No word of a lie it could pass for a night gown now. Not only is it too baggy but it's now so long that it hits me mid thigh. Who knew losing weight made your shirts longer?
People often ask me what diet or plan I'm on and, as I've said before, I'm still eating anything and everything I want, just maybe not all at once haha. I use the My Fitness Pal app on my phone and I love it. If it fits in my allotted calories for the day you can bet it's going in my mouth. If I want a Double Fudge Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Blizzard for lunch I'm going to have one. Granted that means that's all I've having for lunch and it's going to be a small, smart supper, but I can still have it. I have fewer days where I feel like I'm doing to die if I can't have something to eat, and I've actually had days where I ate a popsicle at 8pm because I needed those extra 40 calories to get me into the "safe" zone for the day (if you use the MFP app you'll understand what I'm talking about). I hate that people think they should learn to survive on lettuce and soup if they want to lose weight. If you love lettuce and soup be my guest but I just can't do that. I LOVE food! The way it tastes, smells, cooking it, going out for it and sharing it with people. You don't have to give up everything to be healthy. The best quote I've heard when it comes to eating smart is "You can have it all, just not all at once".
Now for the cold hard numbers. When I posted my starting weight it was a little nerve wracking to say that I weighed 195 pounds. It has become easier as the posts go on, but this time is different. This time I want to scream my weight from the rooftops. Why in the world would I want to do that? Because I have never in my memory weighed what I do right now. I now weigh 154.6 pounds! When I left the 180s I thought it was amazing, but leaving the 160s is just shocking to me. That makes a total weight loss of 40.4 pounds! Now I don't normally pay attention to BMI numbers mostly because I've always felt they weren't totally accurate, but I check mine the other day and I am .62 away from being in the normal weight category. Considering I've spent most of my life in the obese category I was a little surprised when I checked it. I had always thought my ideal weight would be 160 pounds and that I didn't want to lose any more weight than that. Turns out I'm not done at 160 and am going to keep this weight loss train humming down the tracks!
Back in March I decided to join a "Biggest Loser" group through one of my mommy Facebook groups. I had no idea that this little challenge was going to turn out to be one of the best decisions I ever made. To be completely honest I didn't think it was actually going to work. I figured I'd lose a few pounds and end up leaving the group out of sheer embarrassment haha. How wrong I was! Turns out my competitiveness isn't just limited to Mario Kart!
How much easier? Kicking that bad habit to the curb I managed to lose 5.4 pounds in 3 weeks and 3 pounds of that was in just one week! I can't take all the credit though. During that week I attended the most grueling DanceFit class I have ever been too. I don't know if the instructor thought we were way more advanced than we were but she gave us a beating. There was a point in the 50 minute class, about 3/4 the way through, where all you could hear in the room was panting. I was quite convinced I was going to die. The instructor actually had to yell at us to get us to keep squatting because we were all on the verge of giving up. Remember the steaming car window scene from Titanic? That is exactly what the windows of the studio look like half way through that class. You know you're getting your butt kicked when the body heat in the room steams up the windows. It was really a miracle I made it down the stairs from the studio, and even when I got to my car I had to sit for a minute because I was a little light headed. Now that might sound like the cruelest form of torture to some, but it was pure bliss for me. Why? Because I survived! The instructor tried to kill me and I not only survived but I kept up and didn't quit! I've noticed in the last few dance classes that I'm starting to get quicker on my feet, my balance is better, and I can dance like I did when I was a competitive dancer in elementary school!
There is one downside to all this weight loss though, I never seem to have pants that fit! Yes I can hear your eyes rolling from here, and yes I'm aware this is a good problem to have, but it's a problem none the less. People always say losing weight is expensive because fresh food is expensive. I disagree, weight loss is expensive because you have to keep buying clothes every couple of months. In my last update I mentioned that I could finally fit into Old Navy clothes (size 14 jeans and large shirts). Well those same jeans are now constantly falling down and come right off without even undoing the zipper, and those shirts are so baggy that Roman has recently learnt the word "boobs" because he's constantly seeing them. I did purchase some tighter fitting white t-shirts a few weeks back in the hopes that they'll last me a little longer, but I have to wear a cami under them because they are fairly sheer. So I pulled out a cami from Ricki's that I've had for a couple years. No word of a lie it could pass for a night gown now. Not only is it too baggy but it's now so long that it hits me mid thigh. Who knew losing weight made your shirts longer?
People often ask me what diet or plan I'm on and, as I've said before, I'm still eating anything and everything I want, just maybe not all at once haha. I use the My Fitness Pal app on my phone and I love it. If it fits in my allotted calories for the day you can bet it's going in my mouth. If I want a Double Fudge Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Blizzard for lunch I'm going to have one. Granted that means that's all I've having for lunch and it's going to be a small, smart supper, but I can still have it. I have fewer days where I feel like I'm doing to die if I can't have something to eat, and I've actually had days where I ate a popsicle at 8pm because I needed those extra 40 calories to get me into the "safe" zone for the day (if you use the MFP app you'll understand what I'm talking about). I hate that people think they should learn to survive on lettuce and soup if they want to lose weight. If you love lettuce and soup be my guest but I just can't do that. I LOVE food! The way it tastes, smells, cooking it, going out for it and sharing it with people. You don't have to give up everything to be healthy. The best quote I've heard when it comes to eating smart is "You can have it all, just not all at once".
Now for the cold hard numbers. When I posted my starting weight it was a little nerve wracking to say that I weighed 195 pounds. It has become easier as the posts go on, but this time is different. This time I want to scream my weight from the rooftops. Why in the world would I want to do that? Because I have never in my memory weighed what I do right now. I now weigh 154.6 pounds! When I left the 180s I thought it was amazing, but leaving the 160s is just shocking to me. That makes a total weight loss of 40.4 pounds! Now I don't normally pay attention to BMI numbers mostly because I've always felt they weren't totally accurate, but I check mine the other day and I am .62 away from being in the normal weight category. Considering I've spent most of my life in the obese category I was a little surprised when I checked it. I had always thought my ideal weight would be 160 pounds and that I didn't want to lose any more weight than that. Turns out I'm not done at 160 and am going to keep this weight loss train humming down the tracks!
Tuesday, December 30, 2014
Weight Loss Update
I thought this was quite fitting to post this amongst the Christmas cookies recipes. It's been a couple months since I posted about the beginning of my weight loss journey so I thought I would give you an update of what I've been eating and doing, and how that has affected my weight loss.
October and November are always crazy months in our house. John works for a tire company and work gets extremely busy during these months with people switching over to winter tires. This means that he usually isn't home until 7:30/8pm which affects my weight loss in a couple ways. First off I haven't been able to make it to DanceFit every Monday night. Heavens knows John tries his best to get home in time for me to go, but it doesn't always work out. The other problem is that I am a social eater. Which means when John comes home at 7:30 and sits down for his supper, I often find myself suddenly sitting at the table talking about our days and stuffing something into my mouth, even though I just ate an hour before. Lack of dancing combined with my social eating was starting to cause some problems. So I quickly learnt to seclude myself in the living room, where I can still see John and we can talk, but I no longer feel the urge to stuff my face. Small win!
Speaking of DanceFit, I am in love with this class! It is something that I look forward to all week! I no longer feel like I'm going to die after the first 10 minutes! That happens around the 20 minute mark now haha. There is something so satisfying about sweat burning your eyes mid workout and being a little shaky going down the stairs afterwards. This session of DanceFit is over and we have a few weeks break before it starts up again, but I will most definitely be going back. I recently signed up for a free demo fitness class at another gym in town. It's a combination of Insanity and PiYo (Pilates/Yoga). The class is in a week and I'm already a little concerned that I'm going to die half way through. If you haven't heard of Insanity search it out on YouTube and you will see why I'm a little nervous. I must have been having a really good day on the day I signed up because I clearly thought my abilities were way above what the actually are. If my blog posts suddenly stop you'll know that the class killed me.
Food has been a fickle beast for me lately. I'm not really on a schedule for my meals and snacks anymore. I've gotten to the point that I consume most of my calories at my meals and found I was overdoing it with my snacks. If I divide up my calories between my meals I don't feel I need I snack in between. That being said I am a boredom eater, and if I am just sitting around with nothing to do I will demolish a handful of sugar cookies or a few slices of puffed wheat cake. I've learnt that in order to keep my snacking under control I have to keep myself busy. Which, as most of you know, isn't very hard to do.
My go to breakfast as of late has been 1/3 cup quick oats with 1-1.5 T of dark brown sugar and 3/4 cup of whole milk (because that's all we have in our house these days). I like using dark brown sugar because it has more molasses in it and has a stronger taste. This means I can use less and still get that delicious brown sugar flavor that I love. Does anyone else like to eat straight brown sugar or is it just me? Again, I wonder why I'm overweight haha.
One of the hardest changes for me to make was to stop drinking my calories. I LOVE milk, always have always will. It's only been recently that I've actually forced myself to drink water when I'm thirsty rather than milk or orange juice. Tea has actually been a great help in ditching the milk. I'm not a huge fan of water because it has no flavor so I have really enjoyed cold steeping fruit teas. I started out by adding a 1/4 cup of agave syrup to a pitcher of tea and slowly reduced the amount of sugar. Now the sugar free tea tastes delicious to me, and it doesn't have any calories but it tastes like juice!
These two months haven't been without their struggles, such is life with weight loss. I'd fallen off the rails a bit before and still managed to loose weight so I guess I got cocky. With Christmas coming up there has been more baking sitting around and ending up in my mouth. I would be sitting on the couch while Roman napped and 4 sugar cookies would jump right into my mouth. Honest! They climbed out of the container, ran across the kitchen and living room avoiding both dogs, scrambled up the couch and flung themselves into my mouth mid yawn. Don't you hate when food force feeds itself to you? I know I can't be alone on this one! Oh look, here comes one now!! In all seriousness there aren't enough DanceFit classes in the world to save me from the amount of baking that I can ingest over the holiday season, so it's up to me to be accountable and learn to keep my paws out of the treats!
When all is said and done I've now lost a total of 30 pounds! I think that most people hope for a speedy weight loss but I'm quite happy with my average of one pound per week. This is much easier to maintain and there is a lot less disappointment on the scale if every week is the same. There is nothing more discouraging than loosing 3 pounds one week and one pound the next when you were expecting another 3.
For the first time in years I had to buy clothes because the ones I owned were too big! Actually I don't ever remember having to buy clothes in a smaller size. Also a first is that I was able to fit into a large Old Navy shirt and actually find pants there that fit me! I even bought skinny jeans, which I swore I would never EVER wear, and now they are my favorite pair of jeans.
If you are joining me on this journey I hope that you are reaching your goals! Don't be discouraged by the tough days. If your eating falls off the wagon, embrace it, have one more cookie, and start the next day fresh. Don't dwell on the small stumble just focus on the big picture and try again tomorrow!
October and November are always crazy months in our house. John works for a tire company and work gets extremely busy during these months with people switching over to winter tires. This means that he usually isn't home until 7:30/8pm which affects my weight loss in a couple ways. First off I haven't been able to make it to DanceFit every Monday night. Heavens knows John tries his best to get home in time for me to go, but it doesn't always work out. The other problem is that I am a social eater. Which means when John comes home at 7:30 and sits down for his supper, I often find myself suddenly sitting at the table talking about our days and stuffing something into my mouth, even though I just ate an hour before. Lack of dancing combined with my social eating was starting to cause some problems. So I quickly learnt to seclude myself in the living room, where I can still see John and we can talk, but I no longer feel the urge to stuff my face. Small win!
Speaking of DanceFit, I am in love with this class! It is something that I look forward to all week! I no longer feel like I'm going to die after the first 10 minutes! That happens around the 20 minute mark now haha. There is something so satisfying about sweat burning your eyes mid workout and being a little shaky going down the stairs afterwards. This session of DanceFit is over and we have a few weeks break before it starts up again, but I will most definitely be going back. I recently signed up for a free demo fitness class at another gym in town. It's a combination of Insanity and PiYo (Pilates/Yoga). The class is in a week and I'm already a little concerned that I'm going to die half way through. If you haven't heard of Insanity search it out on YouTube and you will see why I'm a little nervous. I must have been having a really good day on the day I signed up because I clearly thought my abilities were way above what the actually are. If my blog posts suddenly stop you'll know that the class killed me.
Food has been a fickle beast for me lately. I'm not really on a schedule for my meals and snacks anymore. I've gotten to the point that I consume most of my calories at my meals and found I was overdoing it with my snacks. If I divide up my calories between my meals I don't feel I need I snack in between. That being said I am a boredom eater, and if I am just sitting around with nothing to do I will demolish a handful of sugar cookies or a few slices of puffed wheat cake. I've learnt that in order to keep my snacking under control I have to keep myself busy. Which, as most of you know, isn't very hard to do.
My go to breakfast as of late has been 1/3 cup quick oats with 1-1.5 T of dark brown sugar and 3/4 cup of whole milk (because that's all we have in our house these days). I like using dark brown sugar because it has more molasses in it and has a stronger taste. This means I can use less and still get that delicious brown sugar flavor that I love. Does anyone else like to eat straight brown sugar or is it just me? Again, I wonder why I'm overweight haha.
One of the hardest changes for me to make was to stop drinking my calories. I LOVE milk, always have always will. It's only been recently that I've actually forced myself to drink water when I'm thirsty rather than milk or orange juice. Tea has actually been a great help in ditching the milk. I'm not a huge fan of water because it has no flavor so I have really enjoyed cold steeping fruit teas. I started out by adding a 1/4 cup of agave syrup to a pitcher of tea and slowly reduced the amount of sugar. Now the sugar free tea tastes delicious to me, and it doesn't have any calories but it tastes like juice!
These two months haven't been without their struggles, such is life with weight loss. I'd fallen off the rails a bit before and still managed to loose weight so I guess I got cocky. With Christmas coming up there has been more baking sitting around and ending up in my mouth. I would be sitting on the couch while Roman napped and 4 sugar cookies would jump right into my mouth. Honest! They climbed out of the container, ran across the kitchen and living room avoiding both dogs, scrambled up the couch and flung themselves into my mouth mid yawn. Don't you hate when food force feeds itself to you? I know I can't be alone on this one! Oh look, here comes one now!! In all seriousness there aren't enough DanceFit classes in the world to save me from the amount of baking that I can ingest over the holiday season, so it's up to me to be accountable and learn to keep my paws out of the treats!
When all is said and done I've now lost a total of 30 pounds! I think that most people hope for a speedy weight loss but I'm quite happy with my average of one pound per week. This is much easier to maintain and there is a lot less disappointment on the scale if every week is the same. There is nothing more discouraging than loosing 3 pounds one week and one pound the next when you were expecting another 3.
For the first time in years I had to buy clothes because the ones I owned were too big! Actually I don't ever remember having to buy clothes in a smaller size. Also a first is that I was able to fit into a large Old Navy shirt and actually find pants there that fit me! I even bought skinny jeans, which I swore I would never EVER wear, and now they are my favorite pair of jeans.
If you are joining me on this journey I hope that you are reaching your goals! Don't be discouraged by the tough days. If your eating falls off the wagon, embrace it, have one more cookie, and start the next day fresh. Don't dwell on the small stumble just focus on the big picture and try again tomorrow!
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
My Weight Loss Journey - Simple Beginnings
Making the decision to lose weight is hard. Knowing what to do once you make that decision can be even harder. No carbs, protein powders, gluten free, paleo, whole foods; every week there is a new fad diet and the "experts" have a new opinion of how to live a healthy life. In the past I've tried to make massive changes to my life in a short time in order to lose weight. Cut out all sugar, run for 30 minutes a day, do 10 crunches every morning and night. I don't know about you but the thought of that makes me want to sit on the couch and have a piece of cake while watching The Biggest Loser. (I know I'm not the only person that has ever done that).
This time I knew I had to do things differently. I wanted to lose weight, keep it off, and still be able to live my life! Isn't that what everyone wants? The first thing I did was get the My Fitness Pal app on my phone. The app takes into consideration your height, age and activity level to determine how many calories you should be consuming in a day. I love this app because it tracks everything I put in my mouth. It also has a bar code feature which makes it super easy to add packaged foods. One of my favorite tools is the My Recipes tool. This allows you to create a recipe, add in the ingredients you use, and it calculates how many calories are in each serving. This takes all the guess work out of how many calories your meal has, which can be tricky if it's a recipe you've created yourself.
My theory for weight loss, which I stole from my brother who recently lost 50 pounds, is "eat whatever you want as long as you don't exceed your allotted calories for the day". Makes sense right? I mean it's the same thing we all learnt in high school Physical Education (not gym, right Amie!). So why don't we follow this already? Because it's hard that's why! The first few days I started paying attention to what I was eating were definitely the hardest. You don't realize how many calories you're eating until you start logging them.
Since Roman originally started this weight loss journey I decided to take my cues from him. I started eating 3 meals and 2 snacks a day, just like Roman. I tried to choose snacks that were satisfying and would keep me full. Here are some of my favorites:
- apple slices with 1T of peanut butter and a sprinkle of chocolate chips and coconut
- rice cake with 1T of dark chocolate almond butter, a sliced strawberry, coconut and chia seeds
- 2 slices of Melba toast with 1 Laughing Cow cheese triangle
- a few slices of deli chicken with 1oz of cheddar cheese
I always try to cook meals that contain whole ingredients and are good for my family. I try to limit the amount of packaged food we eat as much as possible but we do have a few staples like pasta, instant rice, canned soups and a few snacks. Freezer cooking is a great way to get healthy meals onto your table regardless of how busy you are. When your freezer is full of delicious healthy food that only needs to be reheated, you will greatly reduce the amount of times you are digging through the recycling looking for the pizza flyers to see what the specials are. Not that I've ever done that....
For the first four months portion control and snacking were the only changes I made. Shortly after I started this journey a Moms Facebook page started a biggest loser "competition". There are no prizes and no buy in fee, really it's just a way for us all to be held accountable. I highly recommend joining something like this, or even just sharing your progress with a friend, but make sure it isn't someone who is going to judge you every time they see you with a McChicken in your hands!
I normally have one day a week where I don't monitor my food as closely as I usually do. I guess you could call it a cheat day. This day is usually Saturday or Sunday for me since the weekends can get busy and it's hard to eat really well at restaurants. This doesn't mean that I go crazy and eat everything in sight but I do go over the calories I'm allotted for the day. The weekends also make good day for cheat days because I usually weight myself on Fridays and this gives me time to recover from that extra serving of mashed potatoes and gravy!
I know it's hard, but you have to stop weighing yourself after every pee! I understand the ultimate goal is to lose weight but being a slave to the scale is about as fun as being overweight. From personal experience you can fluctuate a few pounds day to day and you'll drive yourself batty wondering how you gained 3lbs in one day. Pick one day to be your weigh in day. My weigh in day is Friday and I like to weigh myself first thing in the morning before I eat breakfast. This allows you to track your real progress since the weights will be take at the same time each week. Don't get me wrong, I've been tempted to jump on the scale mid week to see how tings are going, and it usually ends up with me feeling a little discouraged, so just avoid it.
About a month ago I decided to sign up for a DanceFit class that is offered at the Yara Centre here in Moose Jaw. I used to dance as a kid and I thought this would be a super fun activity. The exercise thing was secondary to me just wanting to get out and bust a move like old times. I posted on the local Mom Facebook page that I was signing up if anyone wanted to join me. I was quite happy to go by myself but why not make some new friends in the process. Turns out the class was a little harder than I remember dance being but I absolutely LOVE it! One night a week Roman gets to hang out with John for the evening while I go out and get my butt kicked. Whatever type of exercise you decide to incorporate make it something you like/love doing or take a friend with you so it's more of a social thing. If you dread the thought of hauling your butt out the door to work out then you're not going to keep it up. This is just the beginning so you don't have to sign up for some crazy spin class that you hate. Start with something as simple as walking the dog or jogging on some trails with some killer tunes. You don't want to freak yourself out and send your body running for the cake the TV so start slow.
These small changes and 6 months earned me 21 pounds lost so far! Is the weight melting off? No. Do I wish it was faster? Yes. Is losing around 1 pound a week something I can maintain over a long period of time and keep the weight off? Absolutely! And so can you!
This time I knew I had to do things differently. I wanted to lose weight, keep it off, and still be able to live my life! Isn't that what everyone wants? The first thing I did was get the My Fitness Pal app on my phone. The app takes into consideration your height, age and activity level to determine how many calories you should be consuming in a day. I love this app because it tracks everything I put in my mouth. It also has a bar code feature which makes it super easy to add packaged foods. One of my favorite tools is the My Recipes tool. This allows you to create a recipe, add in the ingredients you use, and it calculates how many calories are in each serving. This takes all the guess work out of how many calories your meal has, which can be tricky if it's a recipe you've created yourself.
My theory for weight loss, which I stole from my brother who recently lost 50 pounds, is "eat whatever you want as long as you don't exceed your allotted calories for the day". Makes sense right? I mean it's the same thing we all learnt in high school Physical Education (not gym, right Amie!). So why don't we follow this already? Because it's hard that's why! The first few days I started paying attention to what I was eating were definitely the hardest. You don't realize how many calories you're eating until you start logging them.
Since Roman originally started this weight loss journey I decided to take my cues from him. I started eating 3 meals and 2 snacks a day, just like Roman. I tried to choose snacks that were satisfying and would keep me full. Here are some of my favorites:
- apple slices with 1T of peanut butter and a sprinkle of chocolate chips and coconut
- rice cake with 1T of dark chocolate almond butter, a sliced strawberry, coconut and chia seeds
- 2 slices of Melba toast with 1 Laughing Cow cheese triangle
- a few slices of deli chicken with 1oz of cheddar cheese
I always try to cook meals that contain whole ingredients and are good for my family. I try to limit the amount of packaged food we eat as much as possible but we do have a few staples like pasta, instant rice, canned soups and a few snacks. Freezer cooking is a great way to get healthy meals onto your table regardless of how busy you are. When your freezer is full of delicious healthy food that only needs to be reheated, you will greatly reduce the amount of times you are digging through the recycling looking for the pizza flyers to see what the specials are. Not that I've ever done that....
For the first four months portion control and snacking were the only changes I made. Shortly after I started this journey a Moms Facebook page started a biggest loser "competition". There are no prizes and no buy in fee, really it's just a way for us all to be held accountable. I highly recommend joining something like this, or even just sharing your progress with a friend, but make sure it isn't someone who is going to judge you every time they see you with a McChicken in your hands!
I normally have one day a week where I don't monitor my food as closely as I usually do. I guess you could call it a cheat day. This day is usually Saturday or Sunday for me since the weekends can get busy and it's hard to eat really well at restaurants. This doesn't mean that I go crazy and eat everything in sight but I do go over the calories I'm allotted for the day. The weekends also make good day for cheat days because I usually weight myself on Fridays and this gives me time to recover from that extra serving of mashed potatoes and gravy!
I know it's hard, but you have to stop weighing yourself after every pee! I understand the ultimate goal is to lose weight but being a slave to the scale is about as fun as being overweight. From personal experience you can fluctuate a few pounds day to day and you'll drive yourself batty wondering how you gained 3lbs in one day. Pick one day to be your weigh in day. My weigh in day is Friday and I like to weigh myself first thing in the morning before I eat breakfast. This allows you to track your real progress since the weights will be take at the same time each week. Don't get me wrong, I've been tempted to jump on the scale mid week to see how tings are going, and it usually ends up with me feeling a little discouraged, so just avoid it.
About a month ago I decided to sign up for a DanceFit class that is offered at the Yara Centre here in Moose Jaw. I used to dance as a kid and I thought this would be a super fun activity. The exercise thing was secondary to me just wanting to get out and bust a move like old times. I posted on the local Mom Facebook page that I was signing up if anyone wanted to join me. I was quite happy to go by myself but why not make some new friends in the process. Turns out the class was a little harder than I remember dance being but I absolutely LOVE it! One night a week Roman gets to hang out with John for the evening while I go out and get my butt kicked. Whatever type of exercise you decide to incorporate make it something you like/love doing or take a friend with you so it's more of a social thing. If you dread the thought of hauling your butt out the door to work out then you're not going to keep it up. This is just the beginning so you don't have to sign up for some crazy spin class that you hate. Start with something as simple as walking the dog or jogging on some trails with some killer tunes. You don't want to freak yourself out and send your body running for the cake the TV so start slow.
These small changes and 6 months earned me 21 pounds lost so far! Is the weight melting off? No. Do I wish it was faster? Yes. Is losing around 1 pound a week something I can maintain over a long period of time and keep the weight off? Absolutely! And so can you!
Tuesday, September 30, 2014
The Base Line - The starting point for my weight loss
This is a tough post to write, just putting this all out there, but here it goes!
As a kid I was always on the heavier side, or at least I thought I was until I saw these photos. Amazing what a few years worth of perspective will do and how much teasing can convince you of something! My Mom says I wasn't but I think that's because that's what Mom's say. It could also be that I just had a bunch of smaller than average friends. Either way, my perception was that I was the chubby girl growing up. I was always very active as a child; involved in soccer, dance, riding my bike, not to mention running around our town for hours on end each day. Even with all that activity I still thought I was a heavier kid. Granted I also remember a day when I ate an entire can of cherry pie filling as a snack... Throughout elementary school I was teased about being "fat". I was called horrendous names and even had my hair lit on fire at the bus stop. Kids can to so cruel! Because of the teasing I didn't join the fun groups I wanted to or play as many sports as I wanted to. I kept to my small group of friends and my school work. Luckily back in this day once I was home I escaped most of the teasing since social media wasn't a thing yet. Heck, texting wasn't a thing yet. Man I sound old... When it came to food, I wanted to eat the chicken burgers and chocolate milk for lunch every day just like everyone else did. As you can imagine that doesn't do much for your health. I remember being in grade 7 or 8 and hitting the 100 pound mark and being so sad. I often thought to myself "maybe in high school the weight will go away".
In high school I was never teased. Thank heavens for small blessings! Either the girls that had teased me had grown out of it and didn't care anymore, went to another high school, or ended up pregnant and weren't in school at all anymore. I was now one small fish in an ocean of about 300 fish. I didn't change much during high school. I was still super self conscious and kept to my few good friends and kept my nose in my books. I didn't play sports, even though I love volleyball, and I didn't join any groups. Luckily I had an awesome friend, and Siamese twin, who I spent almost every waking minute of the day with. We had all the same classes, worked at the same place, and spent whatever free time we had together. Without Trellyn my high school experience probably would have been very different. We did our thing and if people thought we were strange, weird, or stupid, at least we were strange, weird and stupid together! (I know your hormonal with your new baby Trellyn but try not to cry!!). I left high school a little bigger than I entered thanks to the easy access to chocolate working at a gas station and the delicious cafeteria cheese fries (I can already taste them already!!!), and I thought "I'll probably lose the weight when I move out to go to college". I'm going to guess that I was 130 pounds.
Ahh the fresh start of college! Nobody knew who I was or how I had been teased in the past. I'm a pretty shy person but I recognized a girl from my high school (who was a few years older than me and really didn't know me) and we immediately became friends. Sometimes it's nice to have someone familiar to you when you're in a whole new town. In no time flat our entire class became great friends. No need to be self conscious which was an amazing change for me! At the time I thought I ate pretty healthy. For supper I used my George Foreman grill to cook chicken, beef or pork and sometimes I'd switch it up with some frozen fish. I always had Lipton Sidekicks or Rice-A-Roni and steamed veggies with some sort of store bought sauce as a side. I ate these exact things every single night for 2 years. It was a good attempt at being healthy but looking back now, the thought of how much salt I was ingesting flat out terrifies me! It's amazing what a few years can do to your perspective. Short of slow pitch, volley ball, and walking around town with friends, I wasn't very active at all. By the end of college I was probably 160 pounds.
After college I started working at the YMCA. I worked the night shift (1:00pm-10:00pm) at the front desk. This shift came with a great perk; I got to use the gym after closing and was completely alone other than the cleaning staff! Isn't that every woman's dream, to go to the gym without anyone there to see her? Being around people that ate healthy and having access to the gym made a good change in me. I became more active and started to notice that my shape was changing. Unfortunately it was short lived. I took a job in an office and quickly put any weight I had lost back on. Around that same time John and I moved in together. Bring on the weight! We LOVE food! I especially love sweets! I would go so far as to call it an intense love or addiction. I could honestly eat sweets from the moment I wake up until the moment I go to sleep. We both love cooking so we made delicious, but not so healthy, meals all the time. By the time our wedding came around in 2011 I was 180-190 pounds. This is when I started freaking out! I know, it took me this long to realize I had a problem. Like a lot of people I wanted a quick fix with as little effort as possible. Oh how much I had yet to learn. I decided to give Herbal Magic a shot. A cousin of mine had great success with it so I figured maybe I could too. At first I was overwhelmed with the amount of food I had to eat and had a hard time eating it all, and I did manage to lose about 10 pounds. But it didn't take long for the novelty of the plan to wear off, plus it was very expensive. In no time flat I gained back all the weight I had lost.
For the next while I plugged along, overweight but happy. Until I became pregnant. I was so sick in the first trimester that I lost close to 10 pounds. Eating nothing but Cheerios is a great way to lose weight! Of course that didn't last long (nor should it have), and by the end of the pregnancy I had gained a healthy 30 pounds and was a whopping 213. I was never really concerned because this is the one time when some weight gain is good. Why stress about it when it was healthy for Roman? I knew after I had Roman that I HAD to get rid of the weight once and for all. Roman was born July 31st and by March I was back to my pre-pregnancy weight of 195. This is what I consider my starting point.
This weight loss journey was triggered by a typical lunch for Roman and I. I was going to have some leftovers but had to make Roman something else to eat because what I was eating wasn't good for him. Then it hit me, if it wasn't good for him, then why on earth was I eating it? This is when I started to make some real changes in the things I ate. I made small and gradual changes so that they were easy to maintain over the long haul. This time I'm not dieting, I'm changing my lifestyle to a much healthier one. Let the journey begin!
As a kid I was always on the heavier side, or at least I thought I was until I saw these photos. Amazing what a few years worth of perspective will do and how much teasing can convince you of something! My Mom says I wasn't but I think that's because that's what Mom's say. It could also be that I just had a bunch of smaller than average friends. Either way, my perception was that I was the chubby girl growing up. I was always very active as a child; involved in soccer, dance, riding my bike, not to mention running around our town for hours on end each day. Even with all that activity I still thought I was a heavier kid. Granted I also remember a day when I ate an entire can of cherry pie filling as a snack... Throughout elementary school I was teased about being "fat". I was called horrendous names and even had my hair lit on fire at the bus stop. Kids can to so cruel! Because of the teasing I didn't join the fun groups I wanted to or play as many sports as I wanted to. I kept to my small group of friends and my school work. Luckily back in this day once I was home I escaped most of the teasing since social media wasn't a thing yet. Heck, texting wasn't a thing yet. Man I sound old... When it came to food, I wanted to eat the chicken burgers and chocolate milk for lunch every day just like everyone else did. As you can imagine that doesn't do much for your health. I remember being in grade 7 or 8 and hitting the 100 pound mark and being so sad. I often thought to myself "maybe in high school the weight will go away".
In high school I was never teased. Thank heavens for small blessings! Either the girls that had teased me had grown out of it and didn't care anymore, went to another high school, or ended up pregnant and weren't in school at all anymore. I was now one small fish in an ocean of about 300 fish. I didn't change much during high school. I was still super self conscious and kept to my few good friends and kept my nose in my books. I didn't play sports, even though I love volleyball, and I didn't join any groups. Luckily I had an awesome friend, and Siamese twin, who I spent almost every waking minute of the day with. We had all the same classes, worked at the same place, and spent whatever free time we had together. Without Trellyn my high school experience probably would have been very different. We did our thing and if people thought we were strange, weird, or stupid, at least we were strange, weird and stupid together! (I know your hormonal with your new baby Trellyn but try not to cry!!). I left high school a little bigger than I entered thanks to the easy access to chocolate working at a gas station and the delicious cafeteria cheese fries (I can already taste them already!!!), and I thought "I'll probably lose the weight when I move out to go to college". I'm going to guess that I was 130 pounds.
Ahh the fresh start of college! Nobody knew who I was or how I had been teased in the past. I'm a pretty shy person but I recognized a girl from my high school (who was a few years older than me and really didn't know me) and we immediately became friends. Sometimes it's nice to have someone familiar to you when you're in a whole new town. In no time flat our entire class became great friends. No need to be self conscious which was an amazing change for me! At the time I thought I ate pretty healthy. For supper I used my George Foreman grill to cook chicken, beef or pork and sometimes I'd switch it up with some frozen fish. I always had Lipton Sidekicks or Rice-A-Roni and steamed veggies with some sort of store bought sauce as a side. I ate these exact things every single night for 2 years. It was a good attempt at being healthy but looking back now, the thought of how much salt I was ingesting flat out terrifies me! It's amazing what a few years can do to your perspective. Short of slow pitch, volley ball, and walking around town with friends, I wasn't very active at all. By the end of college I was probably 160 pounds.
After college I started working at the YMCA. I worked the night shift (1:00pm-10:00pm) at the front desk. This shift came with a great perk; I got to use the gym after closing and was completely alone other than the cleaning staff! Isn't that every woman's dream, to go to the gym without anyone there to see her? Being around people that ate healthy and having access to the gym made a good change in me. I became more active and started to notice that my shape was changing. Unfortunately it was short lived. I took a job in an office and quickly put any weight I had lost back on. Around that same time John and I moved in together. Bring on the weight! We LOVE food! I especially love sweets! I would go so far as to call it an intense love or addiction. I could honestly eat sweets from the moment I wake up until the moment I go to sleep. We both love cooking so we made delicious, but not so healthy, meals all the time. By the time our wedding came around in 2011 I was 180-190 pounds. This is when I started freaking out! I know, it took me this long to realize I had a problem. Like a lot of people I wanted a quick fix with as little effort as possible. Oh how much I had yet to learn. I decided to give Herbal Magic a shot. A cousin of mine had great success with it so I figured maybe I could too. At first I was overwhelmed with the amount of food I had to eat and had a hard time eating it all, and I did manage to lose about 10 pounds. But it didn't take long for the novelty of the plan to wear off, plus it was very expensive. In no time flat I gained back all the weight I had lost.
For the next while I plugged along, overweight but happy. Until I became pregnant. I was so sick in the first trimester that I lost close to 10 pounds. Eating nothing but Cheerios is a great way to lose weight! Of course that didn't last long (nor should it have), and by the end of the pregnancy I had gained a healthy 30 pounds and was a whopping 213. I was never really concerned because this is the one time when some weight gain is good. Why stress about it when it was healthy for Roman? I knew after I had Roman that I HAD to get rid of the weight once and for all. Roman was born July 31st and by March I was back to my pre-pregnancy weight of 195. This is what I consider my starting point.
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