Emotional Eating

I've been thinking about this topic a lot lately.   Mostly because I have truly recognized my emotional eating habits.   It's a much tougher habit for someone to break than they might think.

Emotional eating happens when we are looking for comfort.  It typically is a fairly private event, and doesn't always happen in front of someone.   You aren't necessarily hiding what you are eating or sitting in a closet or behind close doors.  This is not like binge eating either.   You may not be eating non-stop for a period of time, but rather are reaching for food outside your eating plan or normal diet.

I would say there is a large percent of us who have emotional eating habits in this world of ours.   Recognizing that you have them is step one.  Figuring out how to deal with the issue or stress that is driving you to your emotional eating event can be tough.

Why is it tough?  Well if you normally reach for food when stress or anxiety is high, you have immediate comfort.  You may have extreme guilt after or perhaps the next day, from whatever it was that you ate, but you found comfort in that moment.

For all you emotional eaters, imagine having a stressful moment, day or situation.   Your instincts tell you to find comfort.  Let's say you have recognized that you want to eat something to make yourself feel better, feel less anxiety or stress.   What do you do?  There are many other things you can do.  We've all heard these before... Go on a walk, go workout, take a hot bath (I can't remember the last time I soaked in a bathtub), read a book, etc.   What works for one person, my not work for someone else.   You have to figure out what works for you.

I sit and listen to what it is that I really need and in most cases, it's someone to talk to, to be able to unload my stress or anxiety with.   So I either reach out to a friend or I write all my feelings down and believe it or not, I've found more comfort and less calories and guilt in that method, than food.

Seek to understand why you are stressed or feeling anxious and ask yourself what you need to feel better.  Food does not heal stress or anxiety.  In fact, it can sometimes add to those feelings if you are trying to maintain your weight.

Until next time...

High Carb Day

Wow, yesterday was an insane and stressful day.  It was a combo of back to back meetings at work and dealing with some personal things.

If alcohol didn't make me so tired the next day, I would have slugged a shot of something or grabbed a beer at some point in the day, to suck down.  Drinking is a nice method to lean on when you want to calm down.  Unfortunately, I've learned that drinking and Tamoxifen are not buddies.   I drag big time the day after having any drinks.  It became more and more apparent, that combo created so much fatigue the next day that I'm thinking it's not even worth the blow.  Unless, I have several days where I have nothing going on and can lay in bed....okay we all know you can only do that during vacations.

Anyway, I stuck to my macros and didn't give into the many things that I wanted to comfort myself with.  Yes, I am human and lean on food sometimes when the shit hits the fan.  

By the end of the workday, I needed an outlet, so my son and I went to see The Fault in Our Stars.   It was the perfect movie to see.  It took me away from all that happened during the day, it cracked open my heart and brought me back to the time when I was diagnosed with Cancer.  It's a love story about two young adults who are both fighting cancer.   I cried and laughed and cried and laughed.  It was an incredibly moving story and being able to cry, let out the anger I had felt throughout the day!   It hit the spot and so did the high carb intake of Popcorn.  We opted not to have the butter.  It's one thing to have a high-carb day, but to have a high fat day...hmmm makes no sense when you are trying to cut the fat off your body.  

I'm allowed one high carb meal per week.   This is not a blow out meal or time to eat as much junk food as possible.  You don't want to gain any weight from your high carb meal.  I'm not saying pop corn is healthy, but it's not like eating a cheeseburger and fries.   You have to calculate the numbers before you eat a high carb meal.  

The angst of yesterday is gone, I'm not tired because I got a decent nites sleep and I'm happy to say my weight is stable at 129.5   I didn't gain a pound after eating my high carb meal ;-)   My abs are flat and look much harder today from the increase in carbs.  

Until next time,

Body Fat Measurements

It's Friday and I made it an entire week keeping within my macros...I even had 30 grams of a chocolate chip cookie (yup that fits into my macros).

For the most part I haven't had any cravings or felt like I needed to binge on any particular food.  A lot of that has to do with the fact that when you follow a macro diet of carbs, protein and fats, you are able to open up the fridge and the cabinet doors all the way and eat off every shelf.   I typically like whole foods in general and am not a chips, donut, or over processed food kind of eater.

Those foods might seem appealing if I've been over served at the bar, and that's a story we'll save for another day.

Today I wanted to share my victories!!!!   It's okay to say that, right?   I'm just excited that I've completed 1 week out of 12 and have achieved success.  I had to put my mind into it and tell myself many times to stop some old habits.  It's about changing.

Okay so enough talk let's get down to the numbers.  I have a body fat caliper tool I use to keep an eye on my body fat.  The measurements are from 0-80.  You always want to be on closer to 0 if you are looking at dropping body chub.  There are several areas you can measure.  I measure my ribcage, tricep and the top of my thigh.  This is also the same areas my coaches measured...so why change it ;-)  My goal is to drop the chub...naturally I will lose weight along the way but at some point the weight will stop shedding and the body fat will continue to change.

On Monday June 9th I weighed in at 134
Body Fat Caliper Measurements: Rib=10 Arm=9 Thigh=15

Today, Friday June 13th I weighed in at 129.5
Body Fat Caliper Measurements: Rib=8 Arm=9 Thigh=12

I typically use the scale and the BFCM to measure my progress.   I could whip out the measuring tape to see how many inches I'm shedding but I don't want to over complicate this and have yet another thing to measure.  I'm already measuring every teeny bit of food I eat and keeping a daily food log.  It's necessary when you are tracking macros.

I'm totally jazzed my numbers are dropping and progress is happening.  BTW, the 2 hour workout days are no longer a part of my life.  I know lift for about 30ish minutes and do 30 minutes of cardio.  My body is happy, I'm not exhausted and it seems to be the path to hitting my goals.

It's all about balance....

The discipline muscle delivers results!

Day 2:

I'm feeling pretty lite today...ya know why?  I LOST 2 pounds :-)    AND I'm on my period.  That never happens.  It's time to break out a song....Celebrate good times come on!!!

Okay, I'm slightly happy I wore my discipline muscle yesterday and didn't give in to the pizza and chocolate chunk cookies my kids had at 9:15pm last nite.  Man it was tough.  I had so much internal chatter happening with the basement committee.  They really wanted me to eat the pizza and cookies.  I had to tell them no over and over.  Thankfully, the stronger chatter said "you ain't gonna get any smaller by eating that", so I didn't give in.  I'm here to work towards a goal and it felt good to say no!

It paid off on the scale this morning too!

Until next time...

12 weeks to dropping the chub

I know how hard it is to lose weight.  I used to compete in the body building sport and dieting is not an easy task.  You want to quit if you don't see results fast enough, or you give in and binge on something really bad, only to be pissed off the next day when you hop on the scale and you've gained weight, UGH!  Yo-Yo dieting is not the answer.  Most people gain even more weight when they diet that way.

It's a challenge to stick to the eating plan no doubt.   I've taken the last year and really relaxed my eating plan.  I've been celebrating life as a result of having had breast cancer.   The celebrating has to stop somewhere right.  If I keep going, I'll be heading to the retail shops to replace my clothes.   I'd rather not spend money on buying a bigger size because I couldn't control my eating.

I started back on a 12 week program that is focused on macros and not so much on caloric intake.  This diet allows me to have more flexibility with what I enjoy eating, while dropping a few pounds and getting the body chub down to a lower %.  I was on a very restrictive diet when I competed and that throws you into the opposite mode when you aren't competing which is to eat more of the stuff you aren't supposed to eat.  I'm looking for a life balance here and am ready for the challenge.

I thought I'd log my daily experiences as motivation to help others stick to it.  We are all people with the same desire...to look smoking hot!!!!

Day 1 - Monday June 9th Weight 134 pounds:

So here's what's been going on so far today.  I woke up exhausted.  I had a cup of coffee and slammed an amino energy with my breakfast.   I felt pretty shitty all morning...I think it's cuz my eye is half way shut and it really interferes with feeling stable and fresh ;-)

Anyway, I was debating on going to the gym and said f'it I'm going.   I thought even if I can do 15 min it's better than nothing.  I opted to work my legs because I was feeling dizzy and unstable and didn't want to put any weight above my head. I've been to the ER enough times in the past 14 months.  I certainly didn't want to make a scene at the gym and be hauled off in a stretcher.  

I started with hamcurls and by the 3rd and final set I started to feel okay.  After doing 3 exercises I felt sooooo much more alert and with it.   I was saying to myself "I was born to workout..it has always brought me positive energy and has been a place of therapy for me".   So I didn't push too hard but did enough to give me some umf in my day!  I did 20 min of interval running after.  I ate my protein coconut pancake after my workout since it was a nice carb meal to replenish the body and keep me alert after the workout.   

I think I may be one of those individuals that has to carb up in the am and slowly lower the carbs as the day goes on.  

I used to take vitamins when I was competing but I haven't taken them in a few years.  I may get some iron with b12 to help with the low energy I'm having as a result of taking Tamoxifen.  I loved taking B12.  It's good stuff.

Let's just say I'm a work in progress ;-).  I'm working on balancing my life with work, working out and sticking to a macro diet that doesn't restrict me from food I enjoy.

Until next time...

Transformation to Bikini Competition

I'm a little over 2 weeks out from my 3rd breast reconstruction surgery.   2 weeks prior to the surgery I joined my bikini bodybuilding team to get back in shape and prep for stepping on stage in 2014.  We are aiming for a March show.

When I was diagnosed with breast cancer in January of 2013, I chose to let go of competing, working out and the diet that came with it and focused on making it through all the I was going to endure over the coarse of this year.  I am on the home stretch and have one more procedure to go.

During the past 10 months I was not concerned all that much with what I ate.  I was sipping on 1-2 glasses of wine per nite and indulging in rich delicious cheeses, breads and hearty meals.   My starting weight was 126.   I made it all the way up to 140 pounds.  That was not an overnite jump in weight.   I reached 140 pounds by July.  I knew that was a peak weight for my frame.  Fortunately, my weight is evenly distributed so I carried it well and lived in sundresses all summer long.   

At the end of September I told myself it was time to get back on a competing team and to start cleaning up my diet.   I was ready to commit and knew by this time that missing a few weeks of working out would not be the end of the world, as a result of my latest surgery.   

I started the diet and begin hitting the gym on October 4th.    I weighed in at 137, but my body fat was at an amazing 18%!  I was shocked to have learned this from my coach.  I thought for sure I would have been well into the 20th percentile.   

I had to halt my workouts on 10/14 because I broke my toe two days before surgery...go figure.   I continued to stick to the diet and meet with my coach.   It's November 3rd and I now weigh 128 pounds.  I am only two pounds away from the 126 pounds I was weighing in at in January 2013.   I have about 17 weeks to prep for the show and get down to 12% bodyfat.   This is a VERY obtainable goal.   It is likely my bodyfat will be where it needs to be before that point, it's building buns of steel that will be where the hard work is.

I wanted to post the progress I've made.  The above picture shows improvement in my abs, hips, thighs and glutes.  As you can see, the pocket of cellulite on my thighs has completely smoothed out and this is with diet!  I'm EXCITED about the transformation so far.  I'll be back to my competing physique in no time.

To those of you out there that feel like you can't achieve a leaner, stronger and tighter physique, I beg to differ.  YOU can!   It takes 100% dedication and you have to want it bad enough to make the commitment.

Until next time...