I began my renewed weight loss mission a little after I began this blog. On May 7th I posted “It’s Not Easy Getting Skinny” and it’s been a long, hard road to get to say that I’ve lost 9lbs and can comfortably fit in a size down from where I began. 
Me earlier this year.
Me today
If you’ve followed my journey, you’ve seen me go through variations of My “Skinny” Mantra - and trust me, the variations continue. It’s about trying everything and adjusting until you start seeing results. Trust me, the first month was about losing and gaining the same 5 lbs over and over again. But after lots of hard work, it’s all starting to come together and pay off. Let me tell you what I’ve been doing lately.
Everyday I log in my meals on my Lose It app. You may have another favorite app or prefer to write everything in a food diary. Whatever your preferred method is, do it! You’ll be amazed at how often food you thought was lean and healthy, is, only when you eat 1/2 to 2/3′s of it. While I have gotten used to logging in my food, I have stopped logging in any exercising. Why you ask? Because most apps over estimate the amount of calories burned through exercise, which fooled me into thinking I could eat more, which resulted in me not loosing weight. (Get a heart rate monitor instead to log your actual calorie burn and factor that into your calorie intake for the day.) Once I stopped factoring in my exercising, but kept to my calorie goal for the day, the weight started to come off!
I have also become very in tune with Intuitive Eating. I now, for the most part, tend to eat when I’m truly hungry and not because I’m trying to mask some other emotion. I have to say a lot of it is due to brining the awareness into my eating patterns, but I also have to credit Oprah’s Life Class for helping me get more in tune with my emotions and how they relate to me and the world around me. 
The other thing I know most of you will not like hearing is that I work out 5 days a week for 1.5-2 hrs each day. My days of rest are Fridays and Sundays. I’m single and a member at Gold’s Gym, which can explain why I have the luxury of working out so much. Lately, it’s been the highlight of my day because work has been particularly stressful and working out helps me destress. I do everything from Zumba, to BodyCombat, BodyPump, CXWorks and BodyAttack. Yes it’s exhausting, but I haven’t felt this strong in a while.
Needless to say, although I don’t have the magic pill to get you to your “skinny” self, I do have the proof that if you work long and hard at it, eventually it does pay off. Now to keep it off as I head for the 2nd half of my weight loss journey!
What lifestyle changes are you willing to make to get healthy and drop a dress size? What suggestions to you have to keep the weight off?
Awesome job! I love that you figured out that logging exercise was actually detrimental for you. That’s a great tip to share. Thanks!
Thanks! I think I knew it when I started to see the calories burned numbers, but at the time I was excited to “think” I was burning all those calories and happy about being able to “reward my hard work with extra food.” All things that go against Intuitive Eating. Once I made the connection, letting go of needing to track calories burned for the food reward was easy.