One day I woke and admitted to myself that I was fat and that I needed to do something about that.
Now it wasn’t that I was unaware of myself, after all, I do have mirrors and I do own clothes with sizes on them. It is just that when you are something that you wish you are not, you tend to lie to yourself. I didn’t go on the scale that often as a matter of fact, I avoided the scale. The scale told me something I didn’t want to admit to, so I just avoided them, simple enough. Clothes, as they got old, tended to shrink and get all out of shape. As I would replace clothes, the manufacturers had obviously changed how they sized their clothes.
These are all little lies that we tend to tell ourselves to avoid the cold hard truth that the food we are eating, drinks we are consuming, walks we are not taking are starting to pile up on our hips, thighs, butt and belly. Admitting to ourselves without self-loathing, that we are not taking care of the one body we have, is truly a difficult thing. BUT, four and a half years ago I finally, once and for all did something about my weight gain. The mind was the hardest thing to change but after years of hard work, hours upon hours of working out, litres of sweat, so much sweaty laundry, tonnes of hours of food planning and lots of tears I should be at my goal weight and size, but I am not.
The secret thing that nobody told me about when I started on this journey is that it was actually the never ending story. If I had known some of the things that I would encounter, I don’t know whether I would have started it. Well, that is the real reason that I hadn’t done this sooner, the fear of the unknown. I don’t regret anything about my new found food and fitness knowledge, it is just so much more than I thought. One of the big things that I was totally unaware of was the evil ‘plateau’. When I started working out and eating clean, I started losing weight. It was great. It was a lot slower than Doug’s weight loss and that was a little frustrating but at least it was still moving the scale and tape measure in the right direction. I actually lost 30 lbs. But then it stopped. I mean completely stopped. Doug met his goal weight, set a new goal in inches, met that, and there I was still in the same place. Sure I was still working hard. I was still eating clean. I was lifting heavier, but that did not reflect in my jeans. BOO.
After a couple of years at the plateau weight, yes that right, I said and couple of years, I got serious again. I had looked into all sorts of things that could be causing this plateau. I had my hormones tested after all I am a menopausal woman, or at least I am at that age for this to be an issue. We upped my weights in the gym. We added more cardio, we took away cardio, we looked at supplements, we looked at amounts of protein, and then we tried something new.
After pure exhaustion of ideas, we have tried a carb cycling program. Guess what? It seems to be working. Finally!! I had reduced my carbs a lot anyway, but apparently we needed to shake things up some more. We have been on this new program for several weeks now and BAM, 12 lbs have left for good.
I wanted to share this with you not to scare you about how restrictive you need to be but to let you know that sometimes keeping focused means changing the path from time to time. My goals haven’t changed, well maybe they have a little, but that is ok too. This is working for me. I am really happy to see that I am once again losing weight and will keep working to my goal. My goal is to a very healthy, active, inshape Grandma.
My carb cycling plan is 3 days of low carbs and 2 days of moderate carbs.
Meal 1 protein powder, steel cut oats, ½ grapefruit
Meal 2 rice cakes, egg whites, veggies, 10 almonds
Meal 3 4oz chicken, veggies, ½ avocado
Meal 4 fish, sweet potato, veggies, almonds
Meal 5 chicken, salad, almonds
Meal 6 protein powder, almond butter
Twice a week I add quinoa and other extra carbs to my day. We call these my “refeed days”
This program isn’t for everybody, but it is working for me. Don't be afraid to try new things. Every body is unique just like everyone else. Do what works for you! Just do something!
The only thing I like better than talking about Food is eating. – John Walters
