April Target Hit!

I was a bit worried about this target, I was away for the weekend a week ago and I think I lost my tiny mind a little bit!


We go away with friends every now and again and I go with every good intention in the world of behaving myself and just drinking wine in the evenings and going out during the day and working some nice exercise calories up and sticking within my targets. Then everyone buys chocolates and cakes and crisps and leaves them open in front of me!


I swear, I'm like a crack addict set down in front of a mountain of top grade charlie!  I even brought back 2 hot cross buns that they don't sell where I live so that I could savour them!!


I am a sick puppy.


Malteasers are alright though right? Right??


Anyhoo.


Got home and back onto the wagon big style.  Got into Jillian Michaels 30 day shred again - finished level 2 and did day 1 of level 3. Ouch. Back to that tomorrow *shudder*.


Have had a nice swim (learning butterfly stroke at the minute! I know!), did some exercise biking and am in the process of (with dearly beloved) doing up an old bicycle in order to start learning to ride!! I am incredibly excited by this prospect :D  I know there's going to be a bit of falling down and some scraped knees and stuff, but I don't care, I *want* to be able to ride a bike. I *will* learn to ride a bike!!


So! Weighin!  I set a target of 12 stone 7 pounds for monday and when I stepped on the scales I was pleasantly surprised by:

12 Stone 5.25 Pounds

Which was very nice indeed.

So I'm hereby setting a new target for 30th April of 12 Stone 2 Pounds.  That will get me to the threshold of a new decade of lbs (170) just in time for my 31st birthday (yikes)!

Oh, also, my leisure centre membership has changed. Which means I'm going to be able to go to the fitness suite as well as the pool. This opens up the possibility of my starting jogging.....  Interesting developments abounds!


Till next time!!


xx

Breaking the Plateau

Hello!

It has been a while since I've had anything to say, but I can quite happily say that I think I have broken through the plateau!!

Thank goodness!!

My last post here was on the 30th January, and my graph was distinctly flatlining. It wasn't a terrible thing, I can honestly say that I am quite happy with my body the shape that it is now (apart from the bewbs, but that's a post for another day).  

I do want to be able to get to a healthy BMI though, so I decided to mix things up a little bit to see if I could bust through.

So! Using myfitnesspal.com settings I reset all my goals to change the way that I eat!!!

I've boosted the amount of protein I eat in a day and lowered my carbohydrates (note, I am still eating Carbs. Just not quite as many as before).  I'm still eating around 1750 calories (net) per day - a 250 calorie deficit - just in a different way!

So, I've been doing that for about a month now - some days more successful than others! (Protein is kinda hard to eat without being totally across every mouthful of food you eat all day - I really don't want to think about my food that much. Also I don't want to have to resort to bars and protein powder shakes). And it seems to be going ok!!

Before I give you the weighins though I also want to say that I've shaken my exercise routine up a little as well.

I had a week in the middle of February where I was so ill. I mean really, a flu the likes of which I hope I will not see again for a very long time.  Myself and dearly beloved were totally floored and in bed for 3 whole days (and not in a good way). When we finally emerged at the other end of it I can honestly say that my body felt as weak as a kitten. It's amazing how quickly you can lose your stamina if you don't stay on top of everything.  Having said that, I have been pleased at my recovery time, I think I am back on form now! I need to continue with my swimming endurance, but that is a post for another day too!


Anyhoo, to get myself back on track, I have finally given in and am having a go at Jillian Michaels 30 Day Shred.  So many people have told me (on forums) how great this DVD is and after hearing a friend of mine tell me how good and convenient it is for a working person, plus how you really feel it even though you're only doing a 27 minute workout a day.  Well, let me tell you.  You really *really* feel it!  

There are 3 levels that you do for 10 days at a time. I'm on day 8 today of level 1. 

I upped the weight that I use for my bicep curls last night.  Ouch.

Anyhoo, I'm doing that on days that I'm at work (as long as dearly beloved doesn't mind doing the cooking - he's a wonderful man really, no matter what anyone says about him ;) )  and continuing with my swimming on days that I am off. 

TO THE WEIGHINS!!

• 30th January - 12 Stone 12.5 Pounds -   180.25lbs

• 6th February - 12 Stone 11.75 Pounds - 179.75lbs

• 13th February - 12 Stone 6.5 Pounds -   174.5lbs

• 20th February - 12 Stone 9 Pounds  -   177lbs

• 27th February - 12 Stone 8.75 Pounds - 176.75lbs

• 5th March - 12 Stone 7.75 Pounds -      175.5lbs

Aren't they lovely numbers? :)


So glad to be down around the 175/next half stone level! That 9 stone barrier is well and truly trampled! 

So for my next mini target, I'm hoping to get below and stay below 12 stone 7 by the start of April!


Looking forward to seeing the results of this 30 Day Shred DVD!

Enough of this!

Right, it's a day early for coming off my 1200 calorie kick, but I have been feeling sluggish and lethargic for the past 3 days and I don't really want to keep going with it anymore.


I don't have an awful lot of weight left to lose and I don't want to do my workouts harm by not taking in enough fuel to keep it going at maximum.


So, going back to the old BMR Calculations:



655+(781.9125)+(324.3)-141=1620.2125 = BMR
*1.2


=1944.255 = Total Daily Calorie Expenditure


So that gives me a maintenance number of 1944 calories.


With allowances for my exercise, I will set my loss at half a pound a week.  This gives me about 1694 calories for a day.


Much nicer.


So that's where I'm going to be from now on.


Myfitnesspal has given me about 1750 cals so I'll use that as a nice guide to stick within:


1694 - 1750 cals


This past week I  have been eating way under my number, which is probably part of why I've been feeling so rubbish.  I've got to the point today where I really want to binge like a crazy person to make up for the unders this week!


SUNDAY ROUND UP


231
384
140
1
64
(-140)  +
-------------
680


1200*6=7200-680 = 6520 for a week. Which really is not very much at all.


So, I've had enough of that :)


CALORIE ++ :)


The only thing that I've started to wonder about, is if I'm calculating my activity level correctly. I count my daily activity level as sedentary as when I'm in work I tend to spend the entire day sat down.  I do know though, that I'm a heck of a lot more active than I used to be at the beginning of this. So should I set my activity level slightly higher? It's a bit hard. Will stick with sedentary for now I suppose, I just want to be able to eat more food :)


I have three days this week in order to go to the swimmers and indeed do some DVD work (really could do with a bit of strength training).


Then I have some friends visiting for a few days.  I hope to get out for a nice long walk one of those days with them, but it may end up being a bit of a diet disaster! Thankfully the girl that's visiting is also on a January health kick, so she will be able to keep me in check :)


Ok that'll do for now!


Buh bye!

weighin 26/09/2011

Good morning world! I gots me my 8 stone lost award this morning :D


Totally thrilled about it. Just hope it isn't a fluke or something that's going to kick me in the teeth next monday. 


(Stop it LRD, enjoy the success, don't try to cut your legs out from under yourself already)


Ok, ok, I'm sorry. So yeah! 8 stone gone forever!  

13 Stone 7.75 Pounds

2.25lbs this week, which is pretty darn funky.


Calorie deficits from tracking this week are:


Monday - 553
Tuesday - 26
Wednesday - 131
Thursday - 573
Friday - 334
Saturday - 45
Sunday - 173


Grand Total of - 1835


That's deficits below my goal of 1570 per day which is already a deficit of approx 500 per day, so if I tot that up over 7 days that's 3500 calories 


3500+1835 = 5335 weekly calorie deficit.


To be fair that doesn't add up to 2.25lbs as 1lb is 3500 calories. So I'm maybe burning more than I think I am or my body is still in overdrive from a few weeks holiday. Nonetheless I'm pretty sure it'll slow back down to a pound a week pretty soon. Fun to do the sums though right? :D


(Ain't myfitnesspal great? :D)


To the week ahead then. I have a couple of pretty good weeks coming up, I will be able to do some good exercise today, Thursday and Friday as well as Monday - Thursday all next week. So that's cool. Hope to get plenty of swimming practice in over those few days too.


I really hope the enthusiasm doesn't go off me. I just need to keep imagining myself swimming off the shores of Queensland! 


Next swimming lesson is tonight and sadly I haven't been able to get to the pool between then and now, so I will not have improved one iota. I don't like not getting some practice in-between lessons, but this was the only time that she could fit me in this week, so I'll have to make do with it.  Will make sure that there's plenty of practising between tonight and the next lesson. *shakes finger at self sternly*


Anyhoo, enough rambling.  Time to go and do a DVD. Or the exercise bike....I do have the last ever episode of the Gilmore Girls to watch.......

Re-evaluate

I'm having to change my way of thinking a bit.


For the last year I've been losing weight fairly steadily at an average of about 2 pounds per week (possibly less than that if I also include my weeks of holidays), but at a bmi of obese (and indeed morbidly obese) 2 pounds per week seems to be a very healthy average.  Now though I'm merely "overweight" -  granted, only by about 4 pounds, but still, for about 4 weeks now - which means that my caloric needs to lose 2lbs per week would be 1200 a day. Now, I know that I have done quite well on 1200 calories in the past (see the majority of the side bar), but, it now seems like that's going to cause my poor abused bod to think that I'm trying to starve it. So I need to change my ways.


Having done a bit of reading around the interwebs it seems to be that 1 pound per week is about the right level once you're under the magic bmi number of 30. Which is about 500 more than I have aimed for for the past year. The thought of that number of calories frightens the life out of me, the control that I exercise over my food these days is a little bit iron fisted. I know I have eaten that in the past, but the majority of the time I've been eating around 1200 - 1600 so it's not that big a deal really. I guess this is just the next step to intuitive eating and "normality".  So lets do the sum:


BMR = 655 + (4.3 x 197.5) + (4.7 x 69) - (4.7 x 30) +20% = 1687.55+20% = 2025.06 
To lose a pound a week now will be 1525.06 calories per day.


So there we go.
That will be my new daily target. And I'm not allowed to be disappointed by small losses anymore.  It doesn't take a quick amount of time to lose weight. Remember missy, it took you 29 years to put it all on, It will be ok if it take 3 years or more to take it off.


*sigh* 
I'm completely freaked out by this, really annoyed that I don't have anyone that I can talk to about it here "Oh boo hoo you, you have to eat more food than you used to waa waa waa" but hey, lets give it a couple of months and see how it goes.


Head melt