- You can actually survive on 800-1000 cal/day and not starve…I’m here to tell you it’s not only possible, I actually had days where I had to double up on meals to get it all in. And when you are eating every 2-3 hours, you are never far away from your next meal.
- Eating so many times a day means no blood sugar drop – that yucky feeling when you hit the wall and find yourself starving. Otherwise known as hangry (hungry + angry).
- I needed to adjust my caloric intake UP to lose weight while working out. Seems counterintuitive, right? But when the scale wasn’t moving, I started to eat 100-200 more calories than on non-workout days and the scale slid downward!
- I finally understand what a portion size is for myself – and it is not the same size as my boyfriend! Eating man-sized portions makes me too full and sick to my stomach. I don’t need 12 oz of chicken to be full, I’m satiated with 6 oz of chicken. Consequently, I also now understand what a portion size is for the kids too and surprise, surprise, it’s not the same size as the adults!
- Water, water, water. You probably need more than you are drinking right now. I found that when I drank 60 oz of water, I didn’t lose as much as when I drank 100oz of water. My magic number still to this day is between 100-120 oz/day. I remember the days when I would have a coffee (a latte actually) in the morning, a diet coke (cuz I was being good, right?) at lunch and another one at dinner and that would be my total liquid intake for the day. Did you see a cup of water in that list somewhere? Me neither. No wonder I had trouble losing weight!
- I chose to power through to lose the weight – I figured it was better to be strict for several months and take the weight off in one fell swoop than to go off the rails every weekend and take a year to take the weight off. It doesn’t take a year to lose 30 lbs. It took me 4 months.
- And while I wanted to take the weight off quickly – no one is perfect. It’s ok to get off track and then get back on plan. Don’t beat yourself up. Take it one day, one meal at a time. If you get off track, get back on it for the next meal.
- I can be a little obsessive. I don’t think that’s a good or bad thing. But it’s something I became aware of as I diligently weighed every serving of food.
- Turns out I actually like zucchini! And spaghetti squash! And mushrooms! I discovered so many veggies that were never in my repertoire before. Still unsure of brussel sprouts though.
- Finally, I needed to learn to trust the process. Follow the program and you will lose weight. We all have good weeks and not-so-great weeks. Even on not-so-great weeks, I still lost weight. Might not be much, but I lost weight. And when I followed the plan, I felt good and lost weight. You can too!
If you want more information about Take Shape For Life – check out my website: http://reinventedyou.tsfl.com or email me: reinventedyou@gmail.com.
