-
Subscribe via RSS
Get my updates in real time via your RSS reader
RSS Entries
RSS Comments
-
Search
-
Recently Written
- Another week, another update…
- Weekly Update: March 7th
- February Highlights
- My weight loss update: Feb 29th
- 5 Tips on How to Avoid Weight Loss Plateau
- My Weight Loss Update - Feb 22nd
- Ok, Elmo Live is just going to drive me nuts (but it is cute!)
- 5 Sites that will Help You Stay Motivated
- My Weight Loss Update - Feb 15th
- Weight Loss Tip: Eat a good breakfast
-
Categories
-
Quick Links
-
Archives
My Weight Loss Update - Feb 15th
Well, it’s Friday again, and time to jump on the scales.
I’ve been a little distracted this week (as you can probably guess since my post rate dropped down), and being distracted probably isn’t a good thing from a weight loss perspective… maintaining my focus and motivation is something I need to work on (so watch out for a post on that this week!).
It was my birthday earlier in the week, the years keep ticking over, but at least 33 sounds like a lucky number (doubles are always lucky aren’t they, lol), so here’s hoping that this will be a fantastic year, on all levels.
Anyway, to the scales - I wasn’t expecting much this week, in fact I was a little concerned that I had lost anything at all, so sucking up my tummy (surely that’s got to help, haha), I was pleasantly surprised at the reading of 128.7kg, a loss of 0.9kg for the week. That’s a loss of 2.3kg so far for the month, with another 1.7kg to go in the remaining two weeks to reach my monthly goal - right on track and I haven’t even broken a sweat yet (literally, lol).
Until next time, I hope you all are doing well and maintaining those weight loss goals.
Share this article, I appreciate your support.Weight Loss Tip: Eat a good breakfast
photo by Lex in the City.
Getting the day off to a good start with a hearty breakfast is more important than you might think.
Another big change I’ve made to my eating habits is to focus a lot more attention on my breakfast. Typically I would start the day with a couple of slices of toast (usually with Vegemite… non-Aussies probably wouldn’t understand!) and a cup of coffee. For the past couple of weeks I’ve tried to focus on making them a bit more substantial, healthier and longer lasting.
My main ‘goto’ breakfast that doesn’t require much effort or thought is: muesli, fruit (usually banana), a splash of milk and some yoghurt… mix it all together and yum!
I do mix it up a little, my aim is for two days a week to have a high protein breakfast (although keep an eye on the fat content). Scrambled eggs will be the main choice, but throw in a lean sausage or two, or maybe a small piece of steak and it’ll round it off to a wonderful breakfast that should get you right through to lunch with only a piece of fruit or two to kick you along mid-morning…. and that’s my goal for breakfast - eat something healthy and wholesome that will get me through to lunch with only a snack of fruit in between.
What do you have for breakfast? do you feel hungry again mid-morning?
Share this article, I appreciate your support.My Weight Loss Update - Feb 8th 2008
Well, the first week has flown by and I don’t think I have really set into my rhythm just yet - I haven’t been quite as ruthless with cutting out all the bad foods, but I have still made some… pretty big changes.
Bread is definitely out, and I’ve cut back on the portion sizes for pasta and rice, and only had a small amount of potatoes once this week. The amount of fruit that I eat has gone up quite dramatically though, and so to has my water consumption. Instead of the diet cola I had been drinking daily, I’ve just had the occasional soda water with a splash of cordial for my fizzy drink hit, and with the amount of lemons, limes and oranges almost ripe on our fruit trees I’ll probably start flavouring it with them soon… overall a good change I think.
So what’s the verdict, what do the nasty scales have to say about my performance?
They were quite kind to me this week actually, my weight is now 129.6 kg, a loss of 1.4kg for the week and well on target for my goal of losing 4kg this month.
Overall I’ve got to be happy with that result, there’s still plenty of room to tighten my belt and that gives me a few more things to concentrate on this week… I still need to get my portion sizes down at dinner time, I haven’t quite reigned them in as much as I would have liked just yet, so that’s my next project.
Share this article, I appreciate your support.Why cutting bread from your diet can get you off to a good start
If you’re like me and a typical day usually involves a couple of slices of toast for breakfast plus a couple of sandwiches for lunch, then it might be time to have a good think about changing your habits when it comes to bread..
Two slices of white bread tips the scales at about 170 calories (that’s just the bread, not everything else on it too!), so the six slices a day I used to have made up 510 calories of my daily diet. According to this weight loss calculator, given my current weight of 131kg, with a lightly active lifestyle, I should be eating around 2380 calories per day in order to lose about 1kg a week. Six slices of bread would represent 21% of that target… not only are there many ‘dead’ calories in white bread, they are pretty light on nutrients too, so wasting over a fifth of your diet on something as bland as mass produced cooked flour is not really something I would recommend.
What are the alternatives?
I think having toast for breakfast was more of a convenience thing than anything else, it’s quite easy to grab a couple of slices, throw them in the toaster and by the time you’ve got your coffee cup ready it’s time to start eating. But there are far more convenient foods out there that will give you a much healthier breakfast: fruit, yoghurt, muesli – all exceptionally quick and simple to prepare and you’ll get far more benefit, and keep off the hunger pains for longer than with toast.
For lunch, you’ve got plenty of choices too. For starters you could just eat what you regularly put on your sandwiches but leave off the bread, stack your plate up with a bit of extra salad and you’ll be good to go. Personally I’ve switched over to rye crispbread, has less than half the calories of white bread (although the slices are smaller), and it actually promotes healthier eating (at least it does for me), I usually top them with a little cream cheese, tinned tuna, tomato and lettuce or sprouts, it’s a really tasty meal.
Share this article, I appreciate your support.5 Weight Loss Tips for counting Calories (or should you even bother?)
Photo by Sister72
Last year when I lost 20kg (44 lb), I initially spent a lot of time counting calories – I do like to look at things from a technical point of view, so at the time, it was a comforting distraction. What I soon found though was that as long as you eat the right foods, it generally tended to work things out for itself.
Now, I do have quite a bit of weight to lose, at 131kg (289 lb) it’s pretty easy to lose weight by just eating the right foods, as I get closer to my goal weight, then a closer look at my exact calorie intake will be far more useful. For now, apart from a quick glance at the nutrition labels of foods I’m not that familiar with, I’m not going to stress about Calories all that much.
My tips for making sure you avoid the Calorific Overload:
1. Check out the nutrition labels for foods you eat regularly. Learn to compare the number of calories for a constant weight of food. For example, in Australia, all our Nutrition labels have Kilojoules/100g (4 KJ’s is approximately 1 Calorie), so this makes most food easy to compare and you’ll soon be able to tell at a glance if something is a bit too ‘Calorie heavy’.
2. Think about what you’re getting for the cost. It’s not enough just to look at the number of Calories, but you also need to consider the benefits you’ll get from the foods. Some ‘low fat’ snacks for example can also be very low on Calories, but they also have a nutritional value of next to nothing (meaning you’ll need to eat something else soon after anyway), whereas most nuts can have fairly high Calorie contents, but contain many essential oils and other goodness, are low GI and a small handful can stop those hunger pains and get you through to your next meal.
3. Cut out the ‘dead’ Calories. Similar to the above point, pay extra attention to cutting out foods that are high in Calories and have a high GI. Not only will these foods take up a large proportion of your daily Calorie intake, but they will also give that energy to you in a quick burst and leave you wanting more sooner than you should need it.
4. Have ‘pre-screened’ snacks that you can reach for when needed. It always helps to have some sort of plan, and having a list of snacks (and meals) handy that you enjoy and know won’t derail your weight loss efforts can be a godsend. Try to make sure you always have a few of them handy for times when you need that extra snack.
5. Above all, enjoy what you eat. There’s no need to limit yourself to low Calorie ‘cardboard snacks’. Just because lettuce leaves are virtually Calorie free doesn’t mean you need to force them down your throat if you can’t stand the taste. There is virtually a limitless supply of great healthy foods out there, find ones that work for you.
Share this article, I appreciate your support.