The bigger question should be how did you get healthy…I’ll explain

So at this point I’ve lost about 17 pounds since end of December – I’m not completely at my goal – I’m 5lbs from my initial goal – but honestly I’m already on to goal #2 which is about 15 lbs away – when I get to that one we’ll see what I’ll do. Why do I do that? Well honestly I’ve never been an adult at this low of weight – so I don’t know what I’ll look like and feel like at these bench marks. So I’m just taking it inch by inch – literally.  Speaking of inches – did you know your waist size should be half of your height – yeah I was about 4-5 inches too big in that dept – now I’m about two inches too big in that dept – huge victory! (So if you are 5 foot 6 inches then your waist size should be 66 divided by 2 which is 33)

Ok so now I’ve been getting the question, how did you loose your weight?

You would think this is super easy to answer, but it really isn’t and I find myself searching for a good way to answer this person where in the end I don’t sound like a broccoli huger. The thing is what I do NOW isn’t what I started out doing, not 100%. As cliche as it sounds it really has been a journey, what I do now I honestly wouldn’t have been able to stick with back in December much less before December. It’s kind of like asking someone that just finished a race what they did race day without taking into consideration the year long training process. THIS IS WHY DIETS FAIL I repeat this is why diets fail. You look at a diet and it tells you do this don’t do that – and you jump in feet first instead of phasing things in and out, instead of changing the inner you and your surroundings- within two weeks you’re miserable, you have enough gas to fill a balloon and all you can think about is what you wish you could eat.

So I tell people the first thing I did was on December 23rd -
I tell them if they can make it through that then the rest is a breeze!

December 23rd 2011 what did I do?

I addressed a huge issue in my life – my food and how it was affecting my health and bank account.

I cut OUT ALL fast food! No I didn’t go cold turkey, the earlier part of the year I found myself in my new home cooking a lot more, eating out a lot less and thought you know I really don’t miss it. Here’s the thing, a few years ago my doctor discovered I have insanely high cholesterol. I’ve basically been that idiot that’s been ignoring it because I added oatmeal, I added fish oil, more salmon yep I did it and NOTHING changed – so I said EFF it!

What was really going on was I was a damn dog chasing her tail – I was adding healthy foods in and exercising but still eating out a lot, I mean my debit card statement was just a long line of $6′s here $10′s there. What was I eating? Taco Deli, Mangias, Zocolo (the “healthy” fast food) etc – lot’s of local spots and such that weren’t as bad as McDonalds right??? Wrong.

So I decided it’s time to get this cholesterol thing in check and focus on my health – I made December 23rd my last eat out fast food day – PTerrys – and decided I was going to go for 30 days straight. At thirty days I just naturally went 60 and so on. I decided after 60 days it was time to get my blood work done. I was excited it had gone down quite a bit but it was still a little too high, so the journey there continues – I’m supposed to get it checked again in August. So initially it wasn’t a focus on weight loss it was a focus on my health. I think this really set me up for success because now I see the health aspect of things before I see the weight loss of things. Yeah that Lean Cusine has less calories and may help you in weight loss but it has very little nutrients and has a lot of crap in it that isn’t going to help you in your health. (I’ll get into that in another post)

I also added in juicing after seeing Fat Sick and Nearly Dead – and add in other great whole foods after seeing Food Matters. (both I highly recommend) I wanted to do both of these things anyway, the films were just a good nudge.

So here I was no fast food and lots of good nutrients pumping through my body – the result I FELT AMAZING – no – I FELT EFFING AMAZING – keepin it PG here. I really did, I felt awake, not sluggish. I had a ton of energy and just felt alive! A coworker asked, “do you have a new boyfriend” uhhh no just feelin good! The weight loss just naturally happened- I lost 10lbs by the middle or end of February – I forget when.

It’s no wonder – I compared my calorie intake on a daily basis – I was eating around 800 calorie meals – that’s ONE meal. Between however the food is cooked and the amount the portions are served in no wonder we are a fat nation! Lord!!

Meh, I’ll just work out more

Yeah that’s what I thought too – but remember this isn’t just about loosing weight it’s about being healthy, happy and feeling damn good! It’s about not being another statistic, about your kids not walking in your footsteps. It’s about being able to do more in life than you are right now!! And besides when you feel better you move more, when you’re eating crap you tend to not move as much – and what are you going to do to burn that #3 combo off? Stay on the elliptical all day?

So I’m calling bull shit on this one!

So that’s phase one: No fast food – want to do it?

If you want to make a difference this really is step one, you just can’t do it any other way. I see people that say they are going to try, then the week ends and they look up and realize they ate out 4 times this week. Try is not an option, you just have to commit to do it – you have to change to see change – cheesy huh – but true. You have to want to be healthy.

Why is it so hard? Because it’s convenient, we let time slip away from us – I’m not going to say we’re too busy because the success of Twitter and Facebook have proven we really aren’t! We just let time get away from us. We let ourselves get too hungry, famished is not the time to figure out what you are going to eat – oops getting ahead of myself.

Ok so what do I do to keep myself out of the drive through – after all no I don’t have kids but I am a realtor and sometimes in the car all day and usually my schedule changes in a second!

I carry food around like an effing crazy person and I stash snacks – yep – I leave the house with a big bag of food. And I plan and prepare, I have to, eating fast food isn’t an option so what else am I supposed to do, wait for the magic fairy to feed me? If I screw up and don’t, guess what, where is the nearest grocery store. Yep, that’s my solution the grocery store. You can buy nuts, fruit, string cheese, Larabar or Kind bar (the only ones I’ll eat for various reasons I’ll get into later). Sometimes you can even find a little snack plate already prepared, like HEB sells these Mediterranean snack plates from a local spot, it has a cup of hummus, tabouli , some pita bread etc – great little meal! You learn how to navigate the grocery store – oops that’s phase two of the journey I’ll get into that later.

Anyway – try it! Start with allowing yourself ONE meal a week, then after two or three weeks see if you can go 30 days with NO fast food – then kick it up to 60. After 60 I’m betting you’ll never want to go back. Also your one meal a week, make the most of it. Why waste it on McDonalds find a really really good hamburger place, you get my drift!

Phase two will be next, embracing real food!

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