KaraCooks
New member
When I first started this journal, I just jumped in. Now I'm getting a lot of questions, so I'm going to update this to have more information about me and my plan. I should have left a couple of blank / placeholder posts at the beginning here, but this will do.
My History
I was always the skinny tall kid right up until jr high, when I stopped growing up and started growing out. All through high school and most of college I was chubby but not fat. When I got out of college is when I started putting on real weight. I've also never been terribly athletic; my parents never really encouraged it and I was never interested. I also love to cook (and eat). So as a result, I got to my 39th birthday (2007) weighing in at 250 lbs.
Like many people, I spent most of my adult life going on and off diets - I've tried them all; low-fat, low-carb, fasting, low-calorie, magic pills .. you name it, I tried it. None of them ever really worked for me. Right around Christmas 2006 I joined a gym and was going with a friend, but just sort of half-heartedly working at cardio with no formal plan. I had somewhere in the back of my mind that by my 40th birthday, I'd have lost weight and gotten fit, but I didn't really do much about it.
In early 2007 my life kind of got turned upside down. I am not going to go into details, but suffice it to say that I made some huge life changes, (some of them voluntary, some of them not so much) including the ending of my 10-year marriage. At that point the gym became my refuge. For a while eating well and working out seemed the only things in my life that *I* could control and so I jumped into them 100% feet first. I started working with a trainer and I started reading everything I could get my hands on that had to do with weight loss, healthy eating, and fitness. I also started my cooking blog shortly after that; a way to stretch myself creatively while the rest of my world was in a bit of chaos.
In the space of a year I lost 80 lbs and went from a size 22/24 to a size 10/12. By the time mid-2008 rolled around, I weighed 165 lbs and felt great. I was still dealing with fallout from the previous year, though. It was then that I realized that exercise and diet was becoming more of an obsession than a joy and that I needed to take a break and get my act together. Shortly after that I met and started dating my guy ... and so I spent a year just "being" and learning to live with the new me ... and my new life.
I maintained my loss (within 10lbs) for over a year and then in the late spring of 2009, I decided that I really was ready to lose the final 30-40 lbs. I also had the added incentive of wanting to run in a 5k in the fall in order to support a friend who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. So I started moving out of "maintenance" territory and back into "losing" mode.
Getting back into the swing of it has been tough. I'm good at maintaining, I realized, which bodes well for after I get to my final goal. I just need to get there. So this journal will follow me through these last 40 lbs. Feel free to comment or just read along.
My Plan
Food: I currently eat a "whole foods" based diet as much as possible - limiting processed and packaged foods and eating real, whole foods.
I count calories and aim for around 1600 calories per day while trying to keep my macros around 40/35/25. I allow myself one free day a week in which I can indulge in things I wouldn't normally eat. It allows me to satisfy a craving or go out with friends w/out freaking out. That's it really - nothing fancy or detailed and nothing forbidden. Just healthy eating that I know I can sustain.
My exercise plan: My workouts have varied over the years, but on average I make it to the gym 3-5 times a week. I do a combination of weight lifting (real weight lifting, not barbie weights) and cardio. In June I started the Couch to 5k training program (for the 5k race I mentioned above).
My Philosophy on Dieting
Over the last 2+ years I've come to realize that I don't believe in "diets". A diet is something that you "go on" to lose weight - but no one thinks about what happens when you "go off" the diet. What usually happens is that people go right back to their old ways of eating and they gain all the weight back. Then, of course, they say (as I did) that "diets don't work for me". The truth is that the diet *did* work - but the maintenance of the lifestyle was impossible.
What I try to do now is live a healthy life. That includes eating reasonable amounts of real food and getting a reasonable amount of exercise at least 3x a week. I've learned that for me being healthy, losing weight, and keeping it off means always being aware of what I'm eating and what I'm doing - not in an obsessive way, but in a keeping accountable kind of way. It's just like driving - once you have been doing it a while, you can drive w/out being 100% focused on the details, but you still wouldn't drive somewhere without keeping your eyes on the road.
My Philosophy on Motivation, Commitment, and Keeping Going
A lot of people have problems staying motivated, especially when they don't see results immediately (or when they hit a stall or a dip). And a lot of people think that if they're not "motivated" all the time about weight loss and being healthy, then they're not doing it right. I used to be this way, which is why I dieted and failed for so many years.
So now my philosophy has changed. It's more of a life-plan type of philosophy instead of a rah-rah one. Here it is:
Some mornings when you get up, you feel great and you're excited to go to work or get on with your daily routine and you're energized and motivated, right? And some mornings you get up and you didn't sleep well and you feel bad or you're upset about something or you've got cramps and feel bloated ... and you really just want to go back to bed and hide under the covers. But .. you don't. And it has nothing to do with being motivated. You get up and go to work or care for the kids or go to school or whatever because that's what we do. That's what a responsible, mature adult does.
And that's how I look at the whole process of eating well, losing weight, and exercising. Some days I feel really good about it. Some days I have great ideas for what to fix for dinner and I enjoy the challenge and the gym is fun and .. it all is just GREAT. And some days I look at the yogurt in my bowl in the morning and think "Bleah." Some days I get in my car after work and think "I just want to go home" and then I drive to the gym and do my workout.
It's not always fun. It's not always what you WANT to do. But if you are honest with yourself and if you are responsible and sensible ... you do it. Just like everything in life.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ok that's the end of that section. From here on out I'm going to keep tidbits of posts I've made, links to resources, and a list of things that I buy or use on a regular basis to help with my loss and maintenance. This will be a work in progress, so feel free to check back periodically.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Things I Buy / Use
The protein powders I use: Syntrax Roadside Lemonade Protein Isolate and Body Fortress Vanilla Whey Protein Powder (2pk)
The heart rate monitor that I use: Polar F6 Heart Rate Monitor
The body fat monitor I use: Omron HBF-306C Fat Loss Monitor
The food scale I use: Soehnle Digital Kitchen Scale, Silver
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Articles of Interest
How quickly can you gain muscle: http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/muscle-gain/whats-my-genetic-muscular-potential.html
Measuring food video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVjWPclrWVY
My post on free days: http://weight-loss.fitness.com/nutrition/33510-losing-weight-free-days.html
The Carrot Train to Crazytown: http://www.byersgetsdiesel.com/2009/06/carrot-train-to-crazytown.html
My post on the sugar content of juice: http://weight-loss.fitness.com/635841-post12.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
For easy access for the postcard challenge:
(SW - CW) x 100 / SW )
Aug. 01 - 175.6
Aug. 08 - 175.4
Aug. 15 - 173.1
Aug. 22 - 171.4
Aug. 29
.
My History
I was always the skinny tall kid right up until jr high, when I stopped growing up and started growing out. All through high school and most of college I was chubby but not fat. When I got out of college is when I started putting on real weight. I've also never been terribly athletic; my parents never really encouraged it and I was never interested. I also love to cook (and eat). So as a result, I got to my 39th birthday (2007) weighing in at 250 lbs.
Like many people, I spent most of my adult life going on and off diets - I've tried them all; low-fat, low-carb, fasting, low-calorie, magic pills .. you name it, I tried it. None of them ever really worked for me. Right around Christmas 2006 I joined a gym and was going with a friend, but just sort of half-heartedly working at cardio with no formal plan. I had somewhere in the back of my mind that by my 40th birthday, I'd have lost weight and gotten fit, but I didn't really do much about it.
In early 2007 my life kind of got turned upside down. I am not going to go into details, but suffice it to say that I made some huge life changes, (some of them voluntary, some of them not so much) including the ending of my 10-year marriage. At that point the gym became my refuge. For a while eating well and working out seemed the only things in my life that *I* could control and so I jumped into them 100% feet first. I started working with a trainer and I started reading everything I could get my hands on that had to do with weight loss, healthy eating, and fitness. I also started my cooking blog shortly after that; a way to stretch myself creatively while the rest of my world was in a bit of chaos.
In the space of a year I lost 80 lbs and went from a size 22/24 to a size 10/12. By the time mid-2008 rolled around, I weighed 165 lbs and felt great. I was still dealing with fallout from the previous year, though. It was then that I realized that exercise and diet was becoming more of an obsession than a joy and that I needed to take a break and get my act together. Shortly after that I met and started dating my guy ... and so I spent a year just "being" and learning to live with the new me ... and my new life.
I maintained my loss (within 10lbs) for over a year and then in the late spring of 2009, I decided that I really was ready to lose the final 30-40 lbs. I also had the added incentive of wanting to run in a 5k in the fall in order to support a friend who was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. So I started moving out of "maintenance" territory and back into "losing" mode.
Getting back into the swing of it has been tough. I'm good at maintaining, I realized, which bodes well for after I get to my final goal. I just need to get there. So this journal will follow me through these last 40 lbs. Feel free to comment or just read along.
My Plan
Food: I currently eat a "whole foods" based diet as much as possible - limiting processed and packaged foods and eating real, whole foods.
I count calories and aim for around 1600 calories per day while trying to keep my macros around 40/35/25. I allow myself one free day a week in which I can indulge in things I wouldn't normally eat. It allows me to satisfy a craving or go out with friends w/out freaking out. That's it really - nothing fancy or detailed and nothing forbidden. Just healthy eating that I know I can sustain.
My exercise plan: My workouts have varied over the years, but on average I make it to the gym 3-5 times a week. I do a combination of weight lifting (real weight lifting, not barbie weights) and cardio. In June I started the Couch to 5k training program (for the 5k race I mentioned above).
My Philosophy on Dieting
Over the last 2+ years I've come to realize that I don't believe in "diets". A diet is something that you "go on" to lose weight - but no one thinks about what happens when you "go off" the diet. What usually happens is that people go right back to their old ways of eating and they gain all the weight back. Then, of course, they say (as I did) that "diets don't work for me". The truth is that the diet *did* work - but the maintenance of the lifestyle was impossible.
What I try to do now is live a healthy life. That includes eating reasonable amounts of real food and getting a reasonable amount of exercise at least 3x a week. I've learned that for me being healthy, losing weight, and keeping it off means always being aware of what I'm eating and what I'm doing - not in an obsessive way, but in a keeping accountable kind of way. It's just like driving - once you have been doing it a while, you can drive w/out being 100% focused on the details, but you still wouldn't drive somewhere without keeping your eyes on the road.
My Philosophy on Motivation, Commitment, and Keeping Going
A lot of people have problems staying motivated, especially when they don't see results immediately (or when they hit a stall or a dip). And a lot of people think that if they're not "motivated" all the time about weight loss and being healthy, then they're not doing it right. I used to be this way, which is why I dieted and failed for so many years.
So now my philosophy has changed. It's more of a life-plan type of philosophy instead of a rah-rah one. Here it is:
Some mornings when you get up, you feel great and you're excited to go to work or get on with your daily routine and you're energized and motivated, right? And some mornings you get up and you didn't sleep well and you feel bad or you're upset about something or you've got cramps and feel bloated ... and you really just want to go back to bed and hide under the covers. But .. you don't. And it has nothing to do with being motivated. You get up and go to work or care for the kids or go to school or whatever because that's what we do. That's what a responsible, mature adult does.
And that's how I look at the whole process of eating well, losing weight, and exercising. Some days I feel really good about it. Some days I have great ideas for what to fix for dinner and I enjoy the challenge and the gym is fun and .. it all is just GREAT. And some days I look at the yogurt in my bowl in the morning and think "Bleah." Some days I get in my car after work and think "I just want to go home" and then I drive to the gym and do my workout.
It's not always fun. It's not always what you WANT to do. But if you are honest with yourself and if you are responsible and sensible ... you do it. Just like everything in life.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Ok that's the end of that section. From here on out I'm going to keep tidbits of posts I've made, links to resources, and a list of things that I buy or use on a regular basis to help with my loss and maintenance. This will be a work in progress, so feel free to check back periodically.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Things I Buy / Use
The protein powders I use: Syntrax Roadside Lemonade Protein Isolate and Body Fortress Vanilla Whey Protein Powder (2pk)
The heart rate monitor that I use: Polar F6 Heart Rate Monitor
The body fat monitor I use: Omron HBF-306C Fat Loss Monitor
The food scale I use: Soehnle Digital Kitchen Scale, Silver
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Articles of Interest
How quickly can you gain muscle: http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/muscle-gain/whats-my-genetic-muscular-potential.html
Measuring food video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVjWPclrWVY
My post on free days: http://weight-loss.fitness.com/nutrition/33510-losing-weight-free-days.html
The Carrot Train to Crazytown: http://www.byersgetsdiesel.com/2009/06/carrot-train-to-crazytown.html
My post on the sugar content of juice: http://weight-loss.fitness.com/635841-post12.html
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
For easy access for the postcard challenge:
(SW - CW) x 100 / SW )
Aug. 01 - 175.6
Aug. 08 - 175.4
Aug. 15 - 173.1
Aug. 22 - 171.4
Aug. 29
.
Last edited:
I would love some more low cal healthy things in the repetoire! I have some recipes in my journal scattered throughout!
