Health and Fitness Thread
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| sad savior; Wild Eyed Joker  Age: 28 Gender: Female Posts: 86309 | Also I just want to say that I'm not an expert or a professional at all. I read a lot and obsess over this kind of shit, but I'm in no position to tell you what to do or anything. So, read up for yourself as well. I'll put some useful links at the end. The concept of losing weight is simple, but actually doing it requires quite a bit of motivation. That's what this thread is for! Simply put, burning more calories than you consume is the key to losing weight. Of course, there are other factors that could come in to play, especially some medical conditions, in which case, I'm not a doctor so go get that taken care of by someone who is. Here is a link to a calculator which will tell you your Basic Metabolic Rate—or basically, how many calories your body burns by doing nothing. The link explains how that works as well. It's good to know this that way you can plan out how many calories you should consume in a day. It's widely believed (if not a fact) that losing weight is about 80% your diet and 20% exercise. Our bodies are made in the kitchen. One thing I tell myself that helps keep me eating healthily is that food is medicine. Nourish your body and give it what it needs and it will give back. This is some hippie shit, but our species evolved by living off the nature that's provided for us. Basically what I'm saying is fruits and veggies are your friends. This brings me to the subject of diet. It's eight million times easier to stick with a healthy eating plan if you don't call it “dieting.” Diet = fad / something done for a short period of time. Sure, you'll get results if you do a fad diet for 3 months, but as soon as you stop following those strict guidelines, you'll gain it back. It's water weight. If you want permanent results, this needs to become a lifestyle. So find something you can commit to. For me personally, it's a low carb vegetarian diet. I also avoid most dairy products. This isn't everyone's cup of tea, so don't stress if you're a hardcore meat eater or anything. You actually have many more options for healthy recipes and long term diets. But it's so important to make sure you're getting nutrients from vegetables as well, so keep that in mind. Meats = protein; veggies = nutrients. Here's a list of some diets that work for many people and some info on them: Low Carb Paleo Keto Vegan Vegetarian Slow Carb Other Useful Links: /r/loseit FAQ Intermittent Fasting Vegetarian Guide to Keto Progress Pics (reddit – occasionally NSFW) Blogilates What does 200 calories look like? My Fitness Pal If anyone has links they'd like added to this list, just let me know. It's also important to take all measurements and weigh yourself before starting this journey. This allows you to keep track of your progress to see if what you're going is working or not. Also it's really fucking great when you see just how far you've come. If you don't have a scale, no worries, I don't either. I focus mainly on measurements. So go buy a measuring tape. And don't forget to drink a shit ton of water. I hope this helped a bit! P.S. - Anyone being rude or hateful will be reported. Please keep this thread positive. |
| fire at will. Damned After All  Age: 35 Gender: - Posts: 105653 | Thanks for making this, Hollie! For those of you who don't know, I'm Jen. This year, I'm really trying to focus on getting healthy and losing weight. I've always struggled with my weight and have been made fun of constantly for it. Especially by my family. I have finally had enough of being overweight and feeling like I'll never be happy because of it since I have such low self-esteem. I have never had the motivation before to do anything about it because I had it ingrained in me from such a young age that I would never amount to anything. And I let it get to me, basically proving them right. This year, I have decided that I want to change it. Everyone is entitled to being happy and getting the future they want, not the one that others see for them. Now, it's my turn. Basically, what I want to accomplish this year is to become healthier, by eating better and exercising more, losing weight, starting to run more and eventually run a 5K. I also want to be able to focus on school and manage to get As in both Biology and Math. I got super emotional in this post, but I needed to let it out because that is what has been holding me back. |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous  Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | I'm Becca. I've been overweight most of my life. I've never really lost weight, only gained it. this year I want it to be different. I train Brazilian jiu jitsu six days a week, and if I want to keep doing that, I need to take better care of myself. I don't want to buy new gi's (at $100 each), I want to fit into the ones I have. but mostly, I want to save my knees. my dad told me and my mom for years that her knee problems were related to her weight. And to this day she won't listen. Now my knees make noise, and on bad days they hurt. I want to save my knees since I'm only 23. I want to reduce my cancer risk. And I want to look in the mirror and not hate myself. Obviously I train a lot, but I think my body has gotten used to that. I'm working on a fitness challenge with increasing crunches, push ups, and plank time. as for food, I'm taking baby steps. I used to eat popcorn almost every night, same with ice cream, and I've given them up. I gave up popcorn once in middle school for two months and supposedly lost weight. I'm also done with fast food and soda where possible. (Sometimes circumstances get in the way.) I've been forgetting to do my initial weighing, but I'll get that soon |
| sad savior; Wild Eyed Joker Age: 28 Gender: Female Posts: 86309 | I was always fine with my appearance until right before I hit puberty. I remember one day, at 11 years old, I saw a picture of myself from behind and I asked my mom who it was. It was me, and I was devastated. I was 11 years old and about 195 pounds. I'm also really short (5'1 now) and was shorter then. I found out a couple years later that I had PCOS, which attributed a lot to the weight I gained during those early puberty years. I was put on Metformin when I was 13 and within a year I dropped about 40 pounds by taking the medicine alone. I became a vegetarian when I was 11 for moral reasons but I ate like shit for a while. French fries and shit like that. As I've become more health conscious I've incorporated fruits and veggies so that they are the main staples of my diet. I've been a vegetarian for 8 years now and while eating meat would be convenient in terms of healthy recipes, I firmly believe that I can still get all of my nutrients without it, so it's not an option for me to go back. Anyway, I took Metformin for about 3 years and didn't exercise or anything. I wasn't as heavy, but still unhappy with my weight. I've always struggled with trying to accept it versus trying to change it. I've never been able to do either successfully. About a year ago I started getting very interested in a healthy lifestyle. This I attribute to finding Blogilates on YouTube. The way Cassey explains nutrition and exercise just made something click on my head. April of last year I started doing Pilates 6 days a week and eating really healthily all the time. The problem was I was still eating too much. I toned up a bit during that time and lost a little bit of weight, but not much. Recently the simplest idea of "consume less than you burn" just made so much sense to me, and I was like "why the fuck did I not realize this sooner" I was doing very well until the end of the summer, when I started not caring and eating junk food and I stopped doing Pilates. It caught up with me. I gained at least 10 pounds. Since november, I've been focusing on tracking my caloric intake more than anything. I eat 1200 calories a day. Veggies are my main squeeze, but if I have a day where I want to eat nothing but chocolate cake, then fuck it I'll eat my 1200 in chocolate cake. But 1200 calories in veggies is a lot more food than 1200 calories in cake. And I have noticed an immense difference. I've lost about 10 pounds since thanksgiving and 3 inches off my waist. My fitness pal is a lifesaver. This year, in terms of my health, I want to continue to follow this regimen and implement it as my permanent lifestyle. I want to start working out again. I basically just want to be the lean person I've always wanted to be. By this point next year I want to be at my goal of 130 pounds or damn close to it. I believe in myself, and I believe in all of yall too. |
| sad savior; Wild Eyed Joker Age: 28 Gender: Female Posts: 86309 | I made a meal plan for myself today through Friday. This is an awesome cooking blog with a lot of vegan options which I'm obviously totally into. Yesterday I had to work, and I ate a little there. There's no food in my house that's vegetarian friendly either, so I was WAY under my calorie limit. Like 700 calories under which isn't good but at least I wasn't over. |
| fire at will. Damned After All Age: 35 Gender: - Posts: 105653 | Today, I managed to not over eat, as I tend to do. But then again, I contribute that to the fact that I was feeling sick all day. But according to my Google Fit Step Tracker, I did a total of 41 minutes of walking today and that's not including the times that I did not have my phone on me. I was also thinking that we all could make our own motivational board? A friend of mine did it and it's worked for her. This past year, she's lost almost 80 lbs and every time she hit a certain amount lost, she would treat herself to a reward. But maybe do your own reward system and a motivational board? |
| sad savior; Wild Eyed Joker Age: 28 Gender: Female Posts: 86309 | I think that's a good idea, Jenni. I have a folder on my computer that kind of serves as a motivational board. And as for rewards, I want to be in a good enough place by the summer to go get the tattoo I've wanted forever. I want it on my ribs so I've told myself for about a year now that once I hit my goal weight I'll go get that tattoo as reward to myself. |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | After I weighed myself this morning the thought of eating has made me nauseous. I know I can't just give up eating because that will hurt more than help, but I certainly need to make more changes, and I had a bad weekend since I wasn't home for most of it. How would this motivational board work? |
| fire at will. Damned After All Age: 35 Gender: - Posts: 105653 | I'll have to get pictures of my friend's board, basically, she just wrote uplifting things that helped keep get motivated. And note cards showing rewards she would get after losing a certain amount of weight. |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | So far today I ate breakfast: blueberry oatmeal and milk lunch: can of chicken noodle soup dinner: two small tilapia filets and some salad. I've also had a glass of iced tea, some v8 fruit juice, and a pickle. I look at that and I feel like that is a decent amount of food for the day but since I've started to pay more attention and make this serious effort to change, I look at that and I also think I've consumed too much. can I get a second opinion? |
| sad savior; Wild Eyed Joker Age: 28 Gender: Female Posts: 86309 | I dont think its too much, Becca. Do you have MyFitnessPal? You can enter what you eat and it will track your calories for you. It helps so much. |
| fire at will. Damned After All Age: 35 Gender: - Posts: 105653 | What Hollie said, MFP is great. I love it. And you can also track your exercise as well. I read somewhere that if you eat the same thing every day, like, M-F, you tend to consume less calories. Yeah, it may get boring and you may want to change things up a bit but you could always use the weekend to eat something different. That would also help you plan your food for the week. Just food for thought.  |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | I used to use the lose it app, which was supposed to track calories consumed and burned but every time it got to something complicated, I lost interest in using it because I hated trying to figure out how much mayonnaise the restaurant put on my sandwich or something like that. |
| fire at will. Damned After All Age: 35 Gender: - Posts: 105653 | MFP has a lot of restaurant dishes already in there from other users |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | Good news is, I have kept up so far on my 60 day challenge, I'm on day 16 bad new is, I don't have very exciting good news |
| sad savior; Wild Eyed Joker Age: 28 Gender: Female Posts: 86309 | Night Fury:That's great though! Keep at it! Alternatively, today I ate a donut for breakfast which was a good amount of calories and that meant I couldn't eat lunch. But I had to work tonight and I took over 12,000 steps and burned all those donut calories. I've logged my meals on MFP for at least 5, maybe 6 days in a row which I'm proud of because I'm so bad at that stuff sometimes. |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | I'm really bad at logging my food, especially measurements. Like trying to figure out exactly how much milk was in that glass, or deconstructing the French toast I made last night |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | Since I can't train tomorrow I went for a jog today. I ran down to the bike path, did two laps, and ran halfway back. I believe that's a mile but I have to check that. Then I walked around the neighborhood, which I believe is a mile. Again, I have to check |
| sad savior; Wild Eyed Joker Age: 28 Gender: Female Posts: 86309 | Just some things I've been thinking about: I've been wondering about incorporating a cheat day into my week? I eat clean about 90% of the time, but I'm wondering if I should let myself have Sundays to eat whatever I want. I kind of don't want to, I find that maybe one cheat meal a week would be alright for me. I don't feel like I'm depriving myself. I read through this thread and it seems that's the general consensus--if you need a cheat day, have it, but if not, don't. What are y'all's thoughts on cheat days? Also, so it's about safe to lose 1-2 pounds in a week right? I've always wondered about how long it would take for me to get to my goal weight. But if I'm losing a minimum of 1 pound a week and I want to lose about 30, if my progress is consistent it should take about 30 weeks so I could be there at the end of June. Obviously that's not like set in stone or anything but it was pretty cool to come up with an ETA on my future body lol |
| beaker; Ghostbuster Famous Age: - Gender: - Posts: 71107 | well both my fitness pal and lose it have it so that you can set your goal to no more than 2 pounds a week, so I would think that is probably the most you can lose while still being healthy, for most body types. obviously it may be different depending on your body type, etc. I was thinking about cheat days too. I think I inadvertently partook in that this weekend, but I don't think there's anything wrong with it, as long as you don't let it get out of hand. |
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