The Diary Of El.

E

ellebelle

0
I am a 25 year old and I have had issues with weight for as long as I can remember. The root cause of my weight issues is that I love food and I am lazy...! Infact I think I hate exercise more than I love food.

The last time I got back into shape was when I starved myself. I used to eat just one meal a day and nothing else. The pounds did come off but I had to deal with headaches and lack of energy. I quit the 'one meal a day' plan once I reached my goal weight and then maintained it by staying away from junk food.

The pounds started piling on when I started working and started going to 'all you can eat buffets'...!

Now, I am 10 kgs or 22 pounds overweight and this time around I am going to do it right. I am going to look at my exercise and diet plan as a lifestyle change and not as a temporary fix. I love food too much to stay away from it, so I have deicided to bring exercise into the picture and work out a nice little threesome. ;)

I have started on the C25K plan together with weights, mat exercises and dance cardio. I am sticking to a 1200 low carb, high protein diet.

I have promised myself that by the time my birthday comes around I would have reached my target weight and my gift to myself will be a new and improved me! :)

I have five and a half months to lose 20 pounds...! I better get cracking..!

Since I started my plan on the 1st of September and today is the 3rd, my next two posts are going to focus on my diet and exercise for the 1st and 2nd of September.
 
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September 1st 2009

Mmm...! So, I was supposed to have updated my journal a couple of days ago, but I got sidetracked ;) with my reading and then the net was down...! Okay so enough with the excuses...

My first day of counting my calorie intake. I need to keep my calorie intake at 1200 to lose weight. I think I did good for my first day, my calculations showed that I had consumed 1129 by EOD but I have rounded it off to 1200 to cover anything that I might have missed.

I feel quite proud of myself! :) I have never done this before and I thought that it would be really difficult but I did it in the end! Yay! :)

I am going to log in an hour of swimming as my exercise. :)
 
:) September 2nd

Started off the day with tea and an egg white omelette. I started the C25K plan today. I have started this plan twice in the past two months.

The first time I stopped it due to plain laziness...! :( The second time around I 'had to' stop because I injured my knee while jogging. Truth be told, I jogged with an injured knee, I foolishly thought that I could overcome my injury if I ingnored it. I did manage to jog through the pain but an hour later, I could barely move my knee! I had to wait for two weeks for the injury to heal and by then there was a dip in my motivation...I know! I know!

They say that third time is the charm...! :) I jogged/walked for 20 mins and I FELT GOOD! During the 20 mins, I could feel that my endurance had increased since when I started the C25K the first time. Yay! :)

Calorie intake today was at around 774-1000 cals.
 
:) September 3rd

I woke up with a knee ache! I am beginning to think that the old injury hasn't healed completely! :( I really hope it gets better by the EOD.

The knee ache persisted during the day so I did not go jogging or do any other exercise as I did not want to strain my knee and mess it up further. I felt extremely guilty for not exercising! I think my entire mindset towards exercise has changed! The old me would 'NOT' have felt guilty for skipping exercise!

Calorie intake was -horror of horrors-1476! :(

I hope tomorrow goes better!
 
:) September 4th

Today is my 'free day'. I did not wake up this morning wanting it to be my free day but dinner at a friend's place made it one!

I was doing fine with my calories until dinner. Even though I took quite a small helping of the pasta bake, the calories jumped to a whopping 2000-2255! Yikes! This experience has made be decide that if I am invited to dinner or lunch, I will take my dinner/lunch with me! :)

Today was my second day of my C25K. It was good as I could run for 60 seconds and not feel like I had run a mile! I experienced severe burning in my calves though! It was so bad that I had to stop after every 60 seconds and do stretches. Mmm...!
 
Hey El ... nice to see you started a diary.

There are other things you can do to exercise while your knee heals. Although squats and lunges might be out of the question, keep walking, do things like pushups, crunches, dips, presses, etc. Keep your heart rate up.

Also doing squats and lunges (with proper form) will really help strengthen those knee muscles, if your knee feels well enough. :) Also be sure to stretch AFTER your runs - it's far more important to stretch after than it is before. It will really help with any lingering soreness. :)

Good luck this weekend. I know for me, it's going to be tough to keep control of calories with all the barbecues and parties and so forth, but I'm working on it ... I know that the holidays will be here before long and I have to get myself in the right frame of mind to handle THAT. :)
 
:( :) September 5th

The day started off badly... I went jogging the day before and I woke up with an aching knee. It got progressively worse, by afternoon I could not put any pressure on it. So, I decided to stay at home and give the knee much needed rest.

Towards the evening I went out with Chaach (husband) to pick up an ice pack and to stock up on groceries. I realised that I hadn't been eating a lot of fruit and veggies so I stocked up on that.

We picked up lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, cucumbers, plums, nectarines and kiwis. I am quite happy with the prospect of getting to eat all those fruits! :)

I managed to keep the calorie intake at 1300.

I saw Kara's post late at night, so there wasn't enough time to exercise.

I went to bed hoping and praying that my knee would be alright in the morning.

P.S. Massive feelings of guilt about not exercising! :(
 
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:( September 6th

What an awful day! Woke up to gloomy, overcast skies and a mild knee ache...! Aaaaaaaaaarrrrrrrggggggggghhhhh! :( I hate such days!

I decided not to strain the knee so pretty much spent the day with the cold pack. I did nothing productive or particularly interesting today.

My calorie intake for today has been around 1000 calories. I am pretty happy with that but I am beginning to feel hungry now so I might get a tea and a couple of low fat digestives.

Aaaaahh! Also feel the begnnings of a migraine in the making so I am going to take a pill and get to bed ASAP! Anyone who has got migraines must know how terrible they are.

Thanks for the post Kara. I did not know that lunges and squats if done properly can increase the strenght of the knee muscles. My knee is doing loads better now so I will start off tomorrow's jog with a series of lunges and squats.

Feeling so totally bleaaaaagggggghhh! Mmmmm...!
 
Ellski said:
The day started off badly... I went jogging the day before and I woke up with an aching knee. It got progressively worse, by afternoon I could not put any pressure on it. So, I decided to stay at home and give the knee much needed rest.
Click to expand...

Pain is your body's way of protecting you from further injury. So don't ignore it. I'd suggest laying off the running until you get it properly assessed by a Dr. or physical therapist. While you're waiting for a proper assessment - if there's any inflammation make sure to ice it (i see you've bought an ice pack).

In my years of training clients , the most common culprit to knee pain in running that I've seen is not overuse - but a lack of preparation. Even something as simple as shoe choice can affect the impact placed on the knee.

In the meantime, as Kara suggested, you can still get in a good workout in! If you've got a bike - I'd highly recommend cycling several times per week at a moderate pace.

In addition to that ... look at incorporating some quad, calves, glutes, hip flexor and hamstring strengthening exercises as well as some knee stability exercises. And of course, stretching is vital to preserve good flexibility of the muscles and range of motion with joints. I'd suggest wall slides or wall sits at a 45 degree angle (partial squat) instead of the full squats or lunges to prevent or eliminate any stress put on the knee at this point.

Don't be too bummed out about not being able to run .. there's lots more for you to do!
 
:) September 7th

Today has been good so far. The knee ache has gone, so I have decided to start off with a few mat exercises, go for a walk and if the knee holds up then continue with the C25K.

Earlier I used to get by drinking around 2-3 glasses of water the entire day now, I drink around 1.5 litres a water a day and I have noticed that my body craves for water. I crave for water more than I crave for tea or coffee. I used to struggle to get down 2-3 glasses of water a couple of weeks back, not anymore! :)

A week of counting calories and I can tell where I was going wrong. Rice and fruit juice contributed most to my high calorie intake. I used to drink around 2-3 glasses of fruit juice thinking that it was healthy to do so, now I realise that the high sugar content in the jucies helped to increase my calories. Mmm...!

I checked my weight this morning and noticed that it was around 52 kgs so that got me thinking that 'maybe' the 55kgs that i weighed a week ago was water weight. Then again I used a bathroom scale this morning, so maybe it is a lot less acurate than the one at the pharmacy. Whatever the case may be, those 55kgs have provided the impetus needed to stick with my weight loss program so I am not going to think too much about it. :)

Core, I am going to take your advice and Kara's and do everything else apart from running to get a good workout! :) Thanks for the advice! :)
 
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