Hiya guys!
I know I have been away for a while, but I am back now and I will be blogging much more frequently as now I feel positive enough to do so without feeling like I am boring everyone!
So, as you can tell by the title of this post, this post is going to be about losing weight. If you guys follow me on any other forms of social media, such as my Twitter or Instagram, you would know that I've lost a bit of weight since September/October 2013.
I lost 9 stone and upon revealing a side by side before and after photo on Instagram sometime last year, I received TONS of messages on my social media platforms asking me one major question:
"HOW DID YOU LOSE SO MUCH WEIGHT?!"
And I have kind of put off answering this question, not because I don't want you guys to know my secrets or anything, because they're not secrets, but because I am not where I want to be yet and also because these are things that worked specifically for me. I still am not where I want to be yet, but I gave it some thought, and thought maybe if I shared my weight-loss tips and tricks with people, we could be a community of girls (and boys) trying to lose weight together, motivating each other along to way, right?
Now, as you all know, I am not a nutritionist or dietician, I am just a girl that got tired of being obese, and yes, I was obese. I had all of the typical health problems that obese people would have, as well as all of the physical problems as well. I would get out of breath just walking up flights of stairs, I would sweat more than others doing menial tasks like walking around my university campus.
I used to be a really good long distance runner and was actually picked for the athletics team when I was in secondary school, but it got to the point where at 20 stone, I could not be bothered to run for anything. If I had to catch the last bus home and it meant that I had to run to catch it, I would rather miss it, than run. It was THAT bad. I got to the point where I was causing myself more harm than good being obese and I wasn't ok with that anymore, and if I am honest, no one should be.
I started off at 21st. Yes, TWENTY ONE STONE. I was huge, but I didn't even realise how big I was until someone called me fat. It sounds so stupid and you would think that someone being 21 stone would know that they were fat, right? Don't get me wrong, I knew I was fat, but I didn't know I was THAT fat. Fat to the point where someone would call me fat, you know? I had done a good job at avoiding scales, and mirrors, avoiding stores like Topshop and Zara because I knew pretty darn well I couldn't fit in their clothes and wouldn't bother even going into those stores because I was in denial. Everyone knew it, I knew it. I was in denial. As they say, ignorance is bliss.
So, I was called fat and it final dawned on me that other people could see that I was fat. I couldn't kid myself and others any longer by taking Myspace angled selfies, and only taking shots of my face because it was becoming common knowledge that I was fat. I didn't want to be the catfish I was becoming. Having to take pictures from the highest angle ever to disguise my triple chin and never taking mirror selfies because that meant seeing my body. I didn't want to have to do that anymore. I would be called the "big girl" and people used that as an identifying factor for me and I hated that. I didn't want that anymore.
I was ruining my body. I was ruining the only thing in this world that I have control over. I was wrecking my body by filling it with awful food and being lazy. I was destroying myself one mouthful of fatty food at a time. It got to a point where I would look at myself in the mirror and burst into tears because I was so disgusted at what I was doing to myself and that's when I knew I'd had enough. I needed to make some decisions and I needed to change and pronto, so here's what I did.
Now obviously, like I said, I am not a nutritionist, nor am I a dietician, and this is what worked FOR ME. Everybody is different, our bodies all require different things and you come to discover what those things are as you explore yourself more (LOL) so needless to say, what worked for me; may not work for you. I took things to a drastic level, and went hardcore with lifestyle change. I refrained from using the word diet because diets are things that you do over a short period of time. Diets are things that you give up on, and I was sure that I was NOT going to give up on this, so I called this my lifestyle change instead. I was going to make this my lifestyle. Cutting out unhealthy food and exercising as much as I could, would become my lifestyle whether I liked it or not.
WHAT I DID:
I cut down from eating 2,500+ calories a day, to eating 1000*
I exercised three times a day (Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred & the 7 Minute Workout app)
Now I know this doesn't sound too crazy, but imagine going from eating whatever you want, whenever you want and doing minimal exercise, and I mean MINIMAL, to eating less than half of your previous daily intake and exercising three times a day intensively? Believe me, it was hard.
*I didn't want my body to go into starvation mode, so I made sure I ate 1000 calories. We all know what happens to our bodies when it goes into starvation mode, right?
MY STARTING ROUTINE:
-Wake up at 7am and go for a walk. Walk anywhere. I walked around a park that was a few minutes away from my house. I did that for about an hour, and when I felt confident enough, these walks turned into power walks, then into runs (trust me, it gets easier with a bit of confidence)
- Go home and do then 7MWC app.
-Eat breakfast which was usually a slice of brown toast with NO BUTTER and half a grapefruit. If I was feeling rather peckish, I would have some Greek yogurt with a tiny bit of honey, or some fruit as a sweetener (everyone knows how bitter-tasting Greek yogurt can be without anything added to it)
-Do what I needed to do for the day, which at that time was nothing but argue with my ex-boyfriend (not Jonny and if you can, I suggest you try leaving the arguing out of your lifestyle change, it'll only make things harder, especially if you were an emotional eater like me)
-Eat a light lunch of HALF a grilled chicken breast and lettuce. I know half a chicken breast doesn't sound like a lot, but ASDA do these HUGE chicken breasts and I mean HUGE, so I would just cut it in half. Just because it's a "portion" doesn't mean you've got to eat all of it.
-Have a snack and I LOVE grapes and pears, so it was either one of those or a combination, but obviously you can have whatever you like as long as it's healthy/
-Have dinner, which was the other half of the grilled chicken breast with a small cup or rice or pasta.
-Do the 30 Day Shred once everyone was asleep, because I didn't want to be responsible for people thinking there was an earthquake, also because I found it less embarrassing, shower, then bed.
I did this for about a month, and I lost almost 3 stone.
HOW I KEPT MOTIVATED:
A lot of the reason why people give up on losing weight, is because they lose motivation, and it's so easy to do when you're pushing yourself super hard. It's even easier to do when you step on a scale and realise you haven't lost any weight in a week. You wonder why you bother, and I went through that plenty of times, so I would look at pictures of the body type I would like to have. I would think about how much "happier" I would be if I had a slimmer figure, but obviously sometimes that still doesn't seem to motivate enough, so I went a step further. I went out and bought a dress in my ideal size. The size I hoped to get down to, and for me, that was a 12/14. I was a size 20, and I bought myself the prettiest most flattering size 12/14 dress to work my way into. I made sure it wasn't too cheap too, because if I didn't lose weight to fit into it, when I've lost out on money as well, which would be another bummer.
I planned on wearing the dress on the day of my 21st birthday (that was my target goal weight date) so I made sure I worked my butt off to fit into that dress.
I know I have been away for a while, but I am back now and I will be blogging much more frequently as now I feel positive enough to do so without feeling like I am boring everyone!
So, as you can tell by the title of this post, this post is going to be about losing weight. If you guys follow me on any other forms of social media, such as my Twitter or Instagram, you would know that I've lost a bit of weight since September/October 2013.
I lost 9 stone and upon revealing a side by side before and after photo on Instagram sometime last year, I received TONS of messages on my social media platforms asking me one major question:
"HOW DID YOU LOSE SO MUCH WEIGHT?!"
And I have kind of put off answering this question, not because I don't want you guys to know my secrets or anything, because they're not secrets, but because I am not where I want to be yet and also because these are things that worked specifically for me. I still am not where I want to be yet, but I gave it some thought, and thought maybe if I shared my weight-loss tips and tricks with people, we could be a community of girls (and boys) trying to lose weight together, motivating each other along to way, right?
Now, as you all know, I am not a nutritionist or dietician, I am just a girl that got tired of being obese, and yes, I was obese. I had all of the typical health problems that obese people would have, as well as all of the physical problems as well. I would get out of breath just walking up flights of stairs, I would sweat more than others doing menial tasks like walking around my university campus.
I used to be a really good long distance runner and was actually picked for the athletics team when I was in secondary school, but it got to the point where at 20 stone, I could not be bothered to run for anything. If I had to catch the last bus home and it meant that I had to run to catch it, I would rather miss it, than run. It was THAT bad. I got to the point where I was causing myself more harm than good being obese and I wasn't ok with that anymore, and if I am honest, no one should be.
I started off at 21st. Yes, TWENTY ONE STONE. I was huge, but I didn't even realise how big I was until someone called me fat. It sounds so stupid and you would think that someone being 21 stone would know that they were fat, right? Don't get me wrong, I knew I was fat, but I didn't know I was THAT fat. Fat to the point where someone would call me fat, you know? I had done a good job at avoiding scales, and mirrors, avoiding stores like Topshop and Zara because I knew pretty darn well I couldn't fit in their clothes and wouldn't bother even going into those stores because I was in denial. Everyone knew it, I knew it. I was in denial. As they say, ignorance is bliss.
So, I was called fat and it final dawned on me that other people could see that I was fat. I couldn't kid myself and others any longer by taking Myspace angled selfies, and only taking shots of my face because it was becoming common knowledge that I was fat. I didn't want to be the catfish I was becoming. Having to take pictures from the highest angle ever to disguise my triple chin and never taking mirror selfies because that meant seeing my body. I didn't want to have to do that anymore. I would be called the "big girl" and people used that as an identifying factor for me and I hated that. I didn't want that anymore.
I was ruining my body. I was ruining the only thing in this world that I have control over. I was wrecking my body by filling it with awful food and being lazy. I was destroying myself one mouthful of fatty food at a time. It got to a point where I would look at myself in the mirror and burst into tears because I was so disgusted at what I was doing to myself and that's when I knew I'd had enough. I needed to make some decisions and I needed to change and pronto, so here's what I did.
Now obviously, like I said, I am not a nutritionist, nor am I a dietician, and this is what worked FOR ME. Everybody is different, our bodies all require different things and you come to discover what those things are as you explore yourself more (LOL) so needless to say, what worked for me; may not work for you. I took things to a drastic level, and went hardcore with lifestyle change. I refrained from using the word diet because diets are things that you do over a short period of time. Diets are things that you give up on, and I was sure that I was NOT going to give up on this, so I called this my lifestyle change instead. I was going to make this my lifestyle. Cutting out unhealthy food and exercising as much as I could, would become my lifestyle whether I liked it or not.
WHAT I DID:
I cut down from eating 2,500+ calories a day, to eating 1000*
I exercised three times a day (Jillian Michaels' 30 Day Shred & the 7 Minute Workout app)
Now I know this doesn't sound too crazy, but imagine going from eating whatever you want, whenever you want and doing minimal exercise, and I mean MINIMAL, to eating less than half of your previous daily intake and exercising three times a day intensively? Believe me, it was hard.
*I didn't want my body to go into starvation mode, so I made sure I ate 1000 calories. We all know what happens to our bodies when it goes into starvation mode, right?
MY STARTING ROUTINE:
-Wake up at 7am and go for a walk. Walk anywhere. I walked around a park that was a few minutes away from my house. I did that for about an hour, and when I felt confident enough, these walks turned into power walks, then into runs (trust me, it gets easier with a bit of confidence)
- Go home and do then 7MWC app.
-Eat breakfast which was usually a slice of brown toast with NO BUTTER and half a grapefruit. If I was feeling rather peckish, I would have some Greek yogurt with a tiny bit of honey, or some fruit as a sweetener (everyone knows how bitter-tasting Greek yogurt can be without anything added to it)
-Do what I needed to do for the day, which at that time was nothing but argue with my ex-boyfriend (not Jonny and if you can, I suggest you try leaving the arguing out of your lifestyle change, it'll only make things harder, especially if you were an emotional eater like me)
-Eat a light lunch of HALF a grilled chicken breast and lettuce. I know half a chicken breast doesn't sound like a lot, but ASDA do these HUGE chicken breasts and I mean HUGE, so I would just cut it in half. Just because it's a "portion" doesn't mean you've got to eat all of it.
-Have a snack and I LOVE grapes and pears, so it was either one of those or a combination, but obviously you can have whatever you like as long as it's healthy/
-Have dinner, which was the other half of the grilled chicken breast with a small cup or rice or pasta.
-Do the 30 Day Shred once everyone was asleep, because I didn't want to be responsible for people thinking there was an earthquake, also because I found it less embarrassing, shower, then bed.
I did this for about a month, and I lost almost 3 stone.
HOW I KEPT MOTIVATED:
A lot of the reason why people give up on losing weight, is because they lose motivation, and it's so easy to do when you're pushing yourself super hard. It's even easier to do when you step on a scale and realise you haven't lost any weight in a week. You wonder why you bother, and I went through that plenty of times, so I would look at pictures of the body type I would like to have. I would think about how much "happier" I would be if I had a slimmer figure, but obviously sometimes that still doesn't seem to motivate enough, so I went a step further. I went out and bought a dress in my ideal size. The size I hoped to get down to, and for me, that was a 12/14. I was a size 20, and I bought myself the prettiest most flattering size 12/14 dress to work my way into. I made sure it wasn't too cheap too, because if I didn't lose weight to fit into it, when I've lost out on money as well, which would be another bummer.
I planned on wearing the dress on the day of my 21st birthday (that was my target goal weight date) so I made sure I worked my butt off to fit into that dress.
