Week 1 - Beginning Tips and Advice

The first week of any new diet or lifestyle change can often be the hardest, but knowing this helps motivate me to keep pushing forward. The first day of the new year marked me finally trying to stick to the ever famous resolution of "losing weight". Mind you I had to spend a week or two prior to New Years just preparing myself mentally and gutting out all the junk food around the house for the possible struggles that would be ahead of me with this resolution. As it generally turns out my fellow housemates who were the ones who initially wanted to do this resolution ended up stocking up on more junk and not attempting to lose weight with me. I suppose that means I'm just going to be stocking up on plenty of salad and putting away any snacks lingering in front of me on the counter tops ("outta sight outta mind", right?).

I've been trying to eat salads almost everyday.

My first day of dieting basically consisted of Progresso beef vegetable soup with some added canned green beans and thyme, drinking water, eating salad with some blue cheese dressing, a slice of toast, and some Nature Valley granola bars as a snack. It allowed me to lose 2.2LB by the next day and after a week of dieting my weight didn't budge from there, which is fine it just means I'll be more tone later. You'll probably want to aim to lose 1-2LB a week, anymore and you may risk starving your body to an extreme and/or losing too much water weight, losing more than just fat, and often I find your biggest weight loss usually happens within the first week or two of dieting so, don't get discouraged if you don't lose as much weight or any in the week/s to follow (your body is adjusting to change so just remain calm and keep working toward your goal). Keep in mind that soups may be low in calories but can be full of sodium; fresh vegetables are always going to be more nutritious than canned, frozen, dried, etc; creamy dressings aren't going to be as healthy as vinaigrette's generally; granola bars can often be full of sugar. That being said there are almost always ways to try and improve your diet, but take baby steps to reach your goals. Don't overwhelm yourself with too drastic of changes and a ton of things you don't even like to eat (find healthy foods that you actually enjoy), or you're probably going to feel pretty miserable, irritable, and deprived really quick.

There will be days where you're probably going to want some of that chocolate candy on your kitchen counter, or a nice burger and some fries. This is where you have to be mindful of what you're consuming, don't overdue it, ask yourself if it's worth your weight-loss success, and watch your proportions if you do cheat a little. Maybe just eat 1 piece of that chocolate candy and then walk away, maybe opt for a nice healthy veggie burger and eat only a few french fries. Don't make your new healthy lifestyle a miserable experience for yourself, and keep in mind how great you're going to feel and possibly look down the road. If you do fall off the healthy bandwagon (and you possibly will here and there) then just pick yourself up, dust your booty off, and get back on-board.

Sport Train setting done at 3.2 MPH

When it comes to exercise I'd rather not tell myself that I have to workout everyday; or even several times a week; or that I have to do a ton of different and complex exercises to achieve weight-loss success, especially when working out was not a real ritual for me before. For myself just accomplishing 35 minutes at least once a week was a start, but often when you're cutting back on food and working out you can often start feeling extremely hungry or feel like you deserve that glazed doughnut (ditch that doughnut mindset!). A healthy diet is about 80% of losing weight, while exercise is about 20% (or so I've read), and honestly it's the eating that helps me lose weight the most while the exercising helps gain muscle to burn more calories down the road, feel more physically fit, and get toned up. This first week I actually managed to do my 35 minute walk 3 times, which added up to me burning 777 calories and walking a total of 5.9 miles, and lets not forget that muscle weighs more than fat so don't fret about the scale too much.

You will probably have aches and pains with exercise so be sure to stretch (you don't want to hurt yourself or feel really sore and stiff), go easy on yourself, and know that some muscle pain is normal especially when you haven't been working out. Pain generally starts to become a bit less overtime if you workout regularly, although harder or new exercises may cause new pains, but some pain is good pain ("no pain no gain"). If you question if you're getting all the nutrition you need seek medical advice, and try taking some multivitamins or possibly get a blood test (it helps identify the vitamins your body may require, which changes all the time). Be sure to drink plenty of water (it helps hydrate you and flush your body out) and try to get a full 8 hours of beauty sleep (which is often hard on new diets from my experience).

Don't be discouraged if no one around you is on your healthy lifestyle bandwagon, this is your life, your dream, and only you can make it happen.