Well hey, tomorrow is Halloween! Woo hoo! I love Halloween and think it’s such a fun holiday. There’s nothing better than watching my kid’s eyes light up as they get so excited about all of the Halloween stuff! Oh, how I love the innocence and joys of childhood. I also love that I get to relive my childhood through my kids each year too!
Tomorrow is going to be a busy day full of Halloween parades, school parties and holiday festivities. I know I’m gonna be tired, but I CAN’T WAIT! Yay!
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Well once again, life has been busy. Fun, but always busy! We went on a nice little get away a couple weeks ago with the fam. It was Fall Break for my kiddos, so they had Thursday and Friday off of school. It was awesome and just so nice. Ya know, it’s rare these days that we do anything as an entire family, so I was thrilled we were able to pull this off!
We just made a quick trip down to St. George, Utah (about a four hour drive) and it was wonderful!
My oldest son was only able to be with us for the first day of our trip and sadly I didn’t get too many pictures of all of us together (boo hoo), so he’s not even in this picture! I will do a separate post all about this trip and some other fun family outings we’ve been on soon.
In fact, FOLKS, I have SO MANY things to share on this dang blog! I love chatting with y’all and sharing, but dang it, I suck at executing these days. Yes, we’ve been busy (as always), but I think I just need to apply a little organization and structure and then I could keep up with all the things I want to share on here!
FYI, I do a pretty good job of keeping up with Instagram Stories. Quite frankly, I love that I can just hop on, share some thoughts or other random stuff so easily and BOOM, done. It definitely works as a busy mom. But, this blog definitely has my heart. I’ve shared so many things over the years, I’ve met so many wonderful people and I’ve actually learned so much from doing it.
I love it, but it definitely takes a lot more time, effort and uninterrupted brain power….which doesn’t come easily these days. But, once again I’m hoping to reorganize my life and become a legit blogger once again! **fingers crossed**
I also gotta share that I went to lunch last week with some very special people…
My mom and sister, my dear friends Kristen and Jen and Kristen’s mom. I’ve been friends with Kristen (she’s the one in the ball cap) for as long as I can remember…I seriously think since birth. Her mother was almost like a second mother to me growing up. Kristen and I were pretty much inseparable most of our teenage years!
Jen was one of my sister’s very best friends and by default was one of my good friends too, almost like a sister. I love her so much and feel so blessed to have so many wonderful people in my life. I loved seeing them all this week! Oh, and we ate a Blue Lemon, which is seriously such a yummy, healthy restaurant. Everything I’ve ever eaten there is so dang good and they definitely make an effort to make things healthy and high quality. I love good restaurants!
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Well I want to talk today about the current spot I’m in as far as health, fitness and particularly weight loss goes. I’ve talked to you guys a lot this year about how I’ve wanted to lose 10-15 pounds, but I have struggled!!
I have tried on and off pretty much this whole year to lose a little weight. I cut out all the crap from my diet, focused on getting good sleep, drank enough water, exercised consistently….the whole shebang. I did see some positive results a few times, but I still have 10+ pounds I’d like to lose. In all reality, I’d really like to lose 20 pounds (yikes!), but I think I’d be happy with 10 for now.
But, I gotta tell ya, when you work your butt off to lose weight and devote yourself mentally, physically and emotionally AND GET NOWHERE (or hardly anywhere), it is maddening, frustrating and burnout inducing!
However, I’m so happy to tell ya’ll that I had an epiphany a couple weeks ago and realized why in the world I’ve struggled so much this year! I’ve wondered if it was age, hormones, stress, something mega wrong with my body, etc. BUT NO, I figured it out and sadly, it’s not rocket science! Ha ha.
The reason I haven’t been losing the weight I would like to is………(drum roll)…………..
I’ve been eating too much food! Auggghhh!
Yes really. That is it.
Oh my gosh.
That’s like the #1 reason people struggle to lose weight!!!
Okay, lemme explain myself. First off, I love to read, study and learn about anything and everything. I especially love to learn about health, how the body works, fitness, nutrition, etc.
I’m also a rule follower. Sooooo, when I read about or learn something that resonates with me and makes sense, I take it to heart. I commit myself to that rule, put my stubborn cap on and stick to it!
I like to think I’m pretty careful about what I choose to believe and I try take everything I learn with a grain of salt. There is so much BS out there, especially when it comes to health and fitness. In fact, my sister showed me this quote the other day and I laughed and laughed and laughed. I’ve never read anything more true! 🙂
Sadly, this is SPOT ON in our world today.
YOU GUYS, I study so much about this crap and I’ve learned so much over the years. I’ve also experimented with so many things myself and have definitely learned what works and doesn’t work for me!
In fact, one of the biggest things I’ve learned recently is to CHUCK most of the crap I read on the internet OUT THE WINDOW and focus on good ol’ fashioned health and fitness. Focus on what I KNOW works for me and also PAY ATTENTION to my body and how it feels.
With that being said, I told you guys that I gained some weight last DECEMBER! I was so sick for several weeks and consequently I sat on my butt way too much and ate waaaaay too much crap. For some reason I really didn’t think I would gain weight (I’d stayed at a nice healthy weight range for a long time before that), but alas I did….to the tune of about 10 pounds! That might not sound like a lot, but oh my word it definitely is!
Soooo, after I started to feel better, I got back to my typical healthy lifestyle and I assumed the weight would just slowly fall off and I would get back to my normal self in no time.
IT DID NOT and I DID NOT.
No, the weight STUCK. It was crazy. It had been a long time since I’d gained that much weight; probably since I was pregnant 4+ years ago! It was foreign to me. I was used to having my body respond and getting the results I worked hard for!
Soooo, I started researching stuff to see if I could find out what in the world could possibly be wrong with my body! I wondered if my hormones were off, or if I’d finally reached the “magic age” when weight piles on and refuses to leave, I wondered if my body was stressed out, inflamed, sleep deprived, etc. I also wondered if maybe I exercised too much, didn’t eat enough and messed up my body somehow.
During this same time when I was wondering what in the world could be wrong, it seemed like I kept reading more and more “health professionals” out there telling people to “make sure you eat enough food!” I read that if you under eat, your body will essentially go into starvation mode, get stressed out, become inflamed and essentially get all messed up, pile on the pounds and make it impossible to lose weight!
Yup, that sounded just like me!!!
So, in April of this year, I signed up for the The Faster Way to Fat Loss. It is such a great program and I learned so much! The concepts and strategies in that program were nothing new to me, but the way those strategies were implemented was life changing to me!
Small tangent, but I’d messed around with Intermittent Fasting a lot, but I’d never committed to it 100% for a long period of time until The Faster Way to Fat Loss. That alone was a huge game changer for me and I’m hooked on Intermittent Fasting now! I was also amazed with this program because it recommended we follow the default macros on My Fitness Pal which are 50% carbs, 30% fat and 20% protein!
Crazy!
That was completely different than what I’d been doing! I had been focused on eating ALL THE PROTEIN and keeping the carbs lower (note: I felt like crap doing that!) During this program, I ate about 1700 calories most days, but dropped the calories down to 1300-1400 one to two days a week. I saw and felt some great results during this time, but again I was afraid to under eat because that’s what was stuck in my head. I was actually worried about those lower calorie days. I didn’t want my body to self-destruct again!
So, I committed to The Faster Way to Fat Loss for about a month (it’s a two month program), saw some decent results, but then got off track because we went out of town and then the next week, I ran a relay race.
I should have got right back to The Faster Way to Fat Loss, but I just didn’t. It was about a month later when I got excited to start this year’s Oxygen Challenge. It was the third one I’d done and I always got great results and learned so much. I thought for sure this was the time I was finally going to lose the weight I wanted to lose!
So, I started that challenge in July. I loved the workouts so much, but I struggled with figuring out a good nutrition plan for myself (which is the KEY to weight loss!) My coach was Jen Widerstrom and she was fabulous. However, one of the biggest things she promoted was to MAKE SURE YOU EAT ENOUGH! DO NOT UNDER EAT!
So, I was like once again, Oh yes, that is my problem….so I gotta make sure I eat enough! Sadly, the little “rule follower” inside my head wanted to make sure I was doing the right thing, so I made sure to eat plenty and often! Jen told us to figure out our BMI (Basal Metabolic Rate), add a couple hundred calories to that and then DO NOT go lower than that calorie amount!
So, I figured mine out. I think it was like 1500-ish calories without the couple hundred added on. SO, I tried to not drop below 1700 or so AND THEN for good measure I probably overate on top of that! Because, ya know, I didn’t want my body to go into starvation mode and get all messed up again, right?
Well folks, it’s taken me a while (way longer than it should have!) to figure out that I’ve just been eating waaaaaay too much most of this year!!!
It’s super weird and I don’t know why in the world it has stuck in my head for so long!
Quite frankly, I know better!
I’ve lived a healthy lifestyle for a long time now. I’ve lost weight many times successfully. I gained quite a bit of weight with each of my pregnancies and I had to work so hard to lose that weight every time! I also found myself a little overweight (back in 2006-2007), which is what started my mega journey with health and fitness….which led to it becoming a huge passion of mine!
YOU GUYS, I know what I’m doing! I know my body! I somehow got lost along the way, lost faith in my own knowledge and in my own body and got off on the wrong track!
I’ve done this a few other times in my life. Back in the day when it was hugely popular to “eat 5-6 small meals a day”, I took this to heart and stuck to it! Well in my efforts to fit all those dang meals in, I ate entirely too much food and found my health and weight loss at a standstill. It took me a while to figure that one out too, but once I cut back to 3-4 meals a day and let go of “checking all of the boxes,” hey, my body responded once again and I lost the weight I wanted to!
Also, the past couple of years I’ve gotten a lot more into macro counting. I really love macro counting for the learning aspect and organization, but it can become very tedious and life consuming. Anyway, as I learned more about macro counting, I kept hearing people talk about increasing protein and decreasing carbs…so that’s what I did! I mistakenly thought that “the more protein the better” and I should cut carbs any chance I got.
This essentially caused me to gain weight, be tired and sluggish and my workouts felt like crap. Once again, I learned the hard way that I need to listen to MY body and not get caught up in all the hype out there!!! Gah!
I’m sorry I’m going ON and ON and ON, but it’s been a LONG and frustrating journey! I’m hoping that some of ya’ll can learn from my mistakes and not struggle like I have!
Soooo, what made me figure out I’d been doing it all wrong most of this year? Well, a couple things. First off, Kev and I sort of started a challenge that his gym (my old gym), F45 was putting on a few weeks ago. Just an FYI, we haven’t stuck to the actual plan 100% (IMO, the nutrition plan is just way too gourmet and time consuming), but we’ve decided to stick to a similar healthy diet that is easier to live with.
SO, when the challenge first started about a month ago, Kev went to a kick-off meeting to learn about the challenge. The owner of our gym, who is also a friend and an amazingly fit guy who knows his stuff, recommended that women stay right around 1200-1500 calories and men around 1800-1900.
When Kev told me that, I was like, REALLY!? I was kind of surprised because I’d made up my mind that that calorie range was too low and would mess up my body EVEN THOUGH that is the very calorie range I’ve stuck to many, many, many times over the years to lose weight and have ALWAYS gotten good results because of it! Good results like weight loss, but ALSO good energy and just feeling awesome too!
So, that kind of stuck in my head.
THEN, a couple weeks ago my sister asked if I wanted to do a FREE challenge that First Phorm was putting on with her. I looked into it and it looked great AND I love to learn and challenge myself AND hey, it’s free so why not? So, I signed up! I will talk more about that in another post.
Anyway, as I’ve been researching all the information about that challenge (there is a TON of great information!) I also realized that I should be eating around 1400-1500 calories. One thing that was a huge “aha moment” for me was as I was watching one of the First Phorm videos, they were talking about how to figure out the correct calorie and macro range for yourself. They have their own calculator you can use, but I also re-figured my numbers on My Fitness Pal as well.
Anyway, there is a place on both of those calculators where you click a button choosing how active you are. It’s typically Sedentary, Lightly Active, Active or Very Active. Well, I have always been checking “Active” because I workout consistently several times a week, right? Sounded right to me!
Well, the guys on this video were saying that most people overestimate how active they are! They said most people base it on how much they workout, not their day to day lives. They actually recommended that most people select “Sedentary” because sadly most of us live sedentary lives outside of our exercise lives.
I think I could probably justify “lightly active” as a busy mom because I’m always running around, BUT these guys recommended most people choose sedentary to get better results. So, after hearing that, I recalculated my calories and macros on their site and on My Fitness Pal and SURPRISE, SURPRISE, I’d been eating too much and really should be eating around 1400-ish calories!
That means that I miscalculated my calories when I was doing The Faster Way to Fat Loss and my Oxygen Challenge because I had myself as “Active” back then too. It was just really, really interesting and eye-opening to me!!!
The sad thing is I ALREADY knew this! I guess I just had to relearn it once again.
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On a brighter note, I’ve spent most of this year trying to lose weight by eating well, cutting out sugar and crap, trying to get more sleep, control my stress levels, etc. It’s actually been really good for me! I’ve hardly lost any weight, but I haven’t gained any either! I also think I’ve put on some muscle this year. You have to EAT MORE to gain muscle! I can actually see more muscle on my body even though I feel fluffy, so I think I’ve definitely gained some.
So, even though I was trying so hard to do a cut and lose some fat, I essentially did a non-intentional bulk instead. Ha ha.
I also think that because I’ve been eating a steady “maintenance” diet (instead of a weight loss diet) most of this year, my body will respond well as I cut the calories! I’ve really only started cutting back on my calories this week, so I haven’t really seen any results yet, but I DO feel good!
Oh, I also want to mention (so many tangents, sorry!) that I have never, ever, like not at all ever, ever struggled with an eating disorder! Obviously, ha ha. In all reality, I love food too much and I have confidence in myself no matter what size I am! I would never ever sacrifice my health, well-being, happiness and life just to lose weight.
I would much rather carry around a few pounds or feel fluffy than put my health and happiness in jeopardy. With that being said, I have a lot of compassion for those of you who do struggle with an eating disorder. I know it is a very real thing and very, very hard to control and figure out. My heart goes out to you and I sincerely hope any of you out there who are struggling can find a way to overcome it.
I mention eating disorders because I think if you are someone who struggles with that, you must be very careful when dropping calories. It can trigger things and cause you to revert to unhealthy habits. I also want to quickly mention that I’ve discovered over the years that SO MANY people in the health and fitness industry struggle with eating disorders!
In fact, almost every lady I’ve followed over the years that I have looked to as “goals” and someone I’d like to look like have admitted to having some type of eating disorder. That has been so eye opening and sobering to me. I could write a whole post about that, but for now I will just sum it up, by saying BE CAREFUL. There is so much pressure out there to look a certain way….don’t get sucked in by it!
You just DO YOU!
Do the best you can, but make sure to love yourself through it all and live a life full of meaning and happiness! That is what is most important.
Sooooooo, with all that being said, I’m going to keep doing all the things I’ve been doing this whole dang year, but I’m also going to drop my calories! AND, I know I will see results this time and I will feel great! I also plan to listen to my body through it all. My body is smart and I know it will tell me if I’m not eating enough.
If my body likes what I’m doing, I will sleep well, I will feel happy, I will have good energy, my appetite will regulate and my workouts will feel awesome. If my body doesn’t like what I’m doing, I will feel crappy, my workouts will feel so hard, I will feel starving all the time (slight hunger is expected, starving is not), I will have low energy….my body will essentially scream at me to change what I’m doing!
Our bodies are smart and if we learn to listen to them, we will be so much better off! So, that’s what I’m going to do!
I also want to mention that 1400-1500-ish calories is quite tough. It’s not terrible, but I know I will definitely feel hungry from time to time. I won’t feel famished, but I will just feel a low level of hunger at times. I will definitely need to stay mindful and committed to my goals.
It is not easy, but once you start seeing results it is so rewarding! It IS worth it! I also think when losing weight, it’s “easier” to be 100% all in, do the hard things, work your butt of AND get the results you’re looking for! Trust me, it’s SOOOOO frustrating and much “harder” to THINK you’re doing all the things you need to do to lose weight, to still work your butt off, but not see any results!
It’s not rocket science. To lose weight, you have to be in a calorie deficit and you have to be consistent…you can’t just work hard 5 days a week and then give it all back on the weekend. You have to show up every dang day!
Well, I’m sorry this post is so long! I have so many thoughts about this going on in my head; in fact this post could have been 3 times this long! I just want to share with y’all what I’ve learned so you guys don’t make the same mistakes!
Weight loss is freaking hard. That’s all there is to it! BUT, I’m sick of feeling fluffy. Quite frankly, I don’t feel comfortable in my own skin, my clothes don’t fit like I want them to and I just don’t feel like me!
Also, I recently got my cholesterol tested at a health fair and it was high (I think it was 210!) GUYS, that was huge to me! The past several times I’ve had my blood tested, my numbers have been awesome! This was a huge reality check to me that I NEED to lose some weight! It is so much more than just aesthetics. It’s so much more than being skinny. Quite frankly, I don’t care about that all that much. I just know I OWE it to myself to take care of my body, do the hard things and LOSE this DANG weight and then KEEP it off!
Okay, I think I’m going to stop talking now. Just know that it’s definitely been a year of growth for me, in more than one way! Ha ha. I’m happy that I’m back on track again, trusting what I know and trusting my body….and not all the conflicting crap I read on the internet!!!
I will keep you guys posted, of course! I’m hoping to have some great results these next few months; and it will not only be in the weight loss department! I’m hoping to strengthen my immune system, rock my workouts, improve my mood and happiness and just OWN my life!
Sooooo, here I go! Talk to y’all soon! Happy Halloween!
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