A few things happened all around the same time:
My son could no longer touch his fingers around me when he hugged me around my waist.
Someone took a photo of me and it was gross - I avoided that usually!
A friend my age trained for and ran the City to Surf.
An old old boyfriend delighted in telling me how fit he had become. (revenge is a great motivator
)and a girl in my area lost weight and looked great.
So I set a date a week away in August last year and read as much as I could and armed myself with knowledge about what the best way to do this was. I'm basically a bit of a tightarse when it comes to money so I wasn't going to pay to go on a plan and I have never liked taking medications so I decided to go it on my own.
I started a food and exercise journal and would record every morsel of food and every sit up I would do. It really makes you think about what you're eating if you have to write it down.
I took a photo of myself just in my underwear. Ugh. That wasn't easy to do but I knew it would motivate me along the way and I took photos every couple of months.
I enlisted my husband and son to encourage me along the way. My son would come along for a walk with me now and then and my husband would tell me just how great I was going. It was probably cheesy but it really helped.
At the start there were no treats. None. Not one. I had given up smoking a few years ago and when you give up smoking you don't reward yourself with a smoke so I was treating food the same way. As my goal became closer and closer I would allow myself a treat or two a week. Maybe a packet of chips but I would spend some extra time exercising
I found a site called fat2fitradio.com that produce a podcast every week or so and it's basically just two blokes talking common sense when it comes to being healthy. As common sense as it is sometimes you just need to hear someone say it. I would listen to them usually when I was exercising and their philsophy on weight loss really struck a chord with me. There were two tips in particular that I stuck to.
1) eat from the fridge and not from the cupboard. The fresh whole foods are going to be in the fridge against the processed high salt/fat foods in the cupboard.
2) eat like a thinner person. A thin size 8 person doesn't have ice cream for dessert or a mars bar for a mid afternoon sugar hit! If you start eating like that thinner person then you will become that thinner person.
People seem to like to find excuses as to why they're the size they are but I had none and had no desire to go and find some. I was lazy and I like to eat crap. Simple as that and that is what I had to change. Previously I would have cocopops for breakfast every. single. morning. usually followed by a couple pieces of honey on toast. I moved to fruit/yoghurt and found it to be just as satisfying and one morning, a few months, later when I was running short on time and I had a plate of cocpops to get out of the house in a hurry and my god it was sickly sweet. Disgusting even. My taste buds had had a taste of what proper healthy food was like and wanted to stay that way!
FOOD:
I stopped eating white breads/rice/pasta and other highly processed things like that and switched to brown rice/bread.
For breakfast each morning I would have {fruit and low fat yoghurt } or {allbran, berries, yoghurt and skim milk}. or things along those lines.
Lunch was a cold meat and salad wholemeal wrap. I changed around the salads and meat to have some variety but it would usually be along those lines.
Dinner: Since the rest of my family wasn't on a diet I would just modify my portion. If I was cooking stirfry I would take mine out before adding the sauce. Not put any chips on my plate but put on extra veges. And practise portion control!
Snacks would be things like fruit (mostly) or things like a boiled egg on wholemeal bread. There are a bazillion sites out there with lots of great snack ideas.
I'm the chief cook/food buyer in my house so it made it easy to choose my own meals. We live in a remote area which also made it easy as eating takeaway or gonig to restaurants just wasn't an option.
EXERCISE:
I found a really cheap elliptical trainer on dealsdirect 9ABOUT $150) and, at the start, would use it every day for about 10 minutes. That was all I could do but I built it up pretty quick and I would go for a walk each day too. It started out at just 1km and again it built up over time. I do five km now in forty minutes Every now and then I would catch an exercise show on TV and would do that instead. But I made sure that I did something every day.
I now try to do an hour a day of exercise at least. I will do a walk or elliptical for half an hour and have now started doing strength training with a set of weights I bought and do different exercises each day. There's lots of smartphone apps out there and millions of websites and books that can help.
Michelle Bridges has good common sense books that can lead you through different circuts to do each day over a 12 week programme. I started a couch to five k run programme and use a ipod app called "get running" for that ... I could walk 5km easily but running was a whole different story.
I won't say that I really enjoy exercising - even now - but I know I miss it if I don't do anything in a given day! Once upon a time I would go and have a half hour nap on the lounge in the mid arvo if I was feeling tired now I exercise and it really perks you up and a much better use of that time than sleeping!
There is no gyms in my area but I would love to go to one. When we go to town I try and pop in to the YMCA gym and do a class. Don't be scared of them .. you're trying to do something positive about your body so don't be intimidated by the fit bodies .. use them to your advantage. Imagine yourself being one of them soon.
Initially I picked 65kg to be my goal but have since worked it down to 60kg which is only a few kg away and there's still some flab to get rid of which is why I have moved to the strength/weight exercises. I have no doubts that the last few kgs aren't going to come off in a hurry but as long as I'm honest with myself that I am eating healthy foods and enough of it and exercising each day then I'm okay with that. I hope that with the weights I am doing that I am replacing fat with muscle too.
I have lost 32kg and am now 64kg and feel great. My 40th birthday went by and I bought myself a couple new pairs of jeans that were size 10. SIZE 10!! Jesus. I was probably ten years old the last time I wore a size ten.
I can see muscles rippling when I move then. I have collar bones!! Hadn't seen them for a while! People do a double take if they hadn't seen me for a while and I have had such lovely comments. Living remotly means we don't see people often so when we did catch up with friends there would be a noticeable change and people would give such positive comments. and be very encouraging. I'm not going to pretend I have done it all perfectly and what I have done might not work for everyone but I just wanted to put it all out there for my own benefit as much as anyone else's and hope that I've given some good tips. We don't put weight on overnight and it's not going to come off overnight either. It will take time and we just have to accept it and stop making excuses. Find the time to exercise, or to cook instead of going to a takeout ... stop making excuses as to why you are eating a piece of cake instead of a piece of fruit. But just do it. And soon.
It is a great feeling when you fit into your size 10 jeans! I too was surprised to see collar bones, how funny!!