Lisa

Read This Before Trying a Low Carb Diet: A Helpful Read

February 28, 2019 By Lisa Leave a Comment

When it comes to dieting, I’ve pretty much done it all…low carb, no carb, keto, Weight Watchers, Atkins, Paleo, Whole 30…and a host of others. While there have been things I’ve loved about each, I find myself drawn back to a low carb diet or if I’m super specific, a keto diet. While I think almost everyone can benefit from keto or a low carb diet, it can be daunting at first. Read this for some easy tips and tricks and to decide if this is the right plan for you.

A low carb diet can help you lose weight and enjoy other potential health benefits. Many studies suggest that cutting back on carbs may contribute to stabilizing your blood sugar and reducing your risk for diabetes and certain heart conditions.

However, there can be pitfalls. For example, your body needs time to adapt to your new diet, and you may miss some of your favorite foods.

If you’re thinking about consuming fewer carbs, read this. You’ll learn whether a low carb diet can keep you healthy and satisfied.

Losing Weight on a Low Carb Diet

It’s possible to slim down by avoiding carbs, but it’s not guaranteed. Success depends on knowing how to make smart choices.

Try these strategies to help a low carb diet work for you:

Think long term. There is some evidence that low carb diets produce more weight loss within the first 6 months compared to low fat diets, but the difference declines over time. If you don’t need to reduce quickly, you may prefer a less restrictive diet.
Understand ketosis. That initial weight loss is based on ketosis, where your body responds to the lack of carbs by burning its own fat for fuel. As you eat more protein and fat, your appetite is reduced too.
Stay regular. A less pleasant side effect of ketosis is constipation. Rely on natural remedies like exercise and water rather than laxatives.
Drink water. Speaking of water, a low carb diet can be dehydrating. You may need to drink at least 2 quarts of water a day to keep your body running smoothly.
Freshen up. How’s your breath? Metabolic changes may leave your mouth with a stale odor, giving you an additional reason to drink more water.
Control portions. While many low carb foods are healthy, some of them are high in calories. That includes nuts, seeds, full fat dairy products, and meat. Ensure that you stay within sensible limits.
Take supplements. Any restrictive diet where you cut out many foods can create nutritional deficiencies. Your doctor may recommend supplements for folic acid and other vitamins and minerals.
Be flexible. Strict diets can also tempt you to cheat. If you’re having trouble sticking to a low carb diet, you may get the results you want with less discomfort by taking a more lenient approach.

Safety Considerations for a Low Carb Diet

Most experts agree that more research is needed to understand the long-term effects of low carb eating. While there are many different ways to interpret a low carb diet, some plans advocate getting as little as 10-20% of your total calories from carbohydrates compared to current US government guidelines that recommend 45 to 65%.

Follow these tips for safety while on a low carb diet:

1. 1. See your doctor. Your doctor can help you decide if a low carb diet is appropriate for you. Discuss your fitness goals and your options for reaching them.
  2. Protect your kidneys. High protein diets can place extra strain on the kidneys if you’re not careful.
  3. Increase your fiber. Eating too much meat and too little fiber can cause bloating and more serious gastrointestinal symptoms.
  4. Leave room for low carb vegetables and fruits like mushrooms, spinach, and berries.

Make it sustainable.

Overall, choose a healthy diet you can maintain for life. Daily habits produce greater results than following each new trend.

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Best Ways to Lose Weight: Small Daily Lifestyle Changes

January 5, 2019 By Lisa 10 Comments

Before I lost 100 pounds, I was constantly looking for the best ways to lose weight. And if I’m honest, I was hoping for a magic pill that would change my life. While I’m not at my goal weight yet, I have lost over 100 pounds, I’m the smallest I’ve been since Junior High and I’ve learned a lot along the way. Want to know what I think are the best ways to lose weight? Small daily lifestyle changes. Yep…while big changes are great and completely overhauling your diet can work for some people, it’s the small changes to your daily routine that can make the biggest difference. It’s these positive changes that make the biggest difference in the way you look, the way you feel, and the way you live your life. Here are a few healthy changes you can make right now to help improve your weight and life.

Best Ways to Lose Weight

Eat Breakfast Every Day

Breakfast isn’t called the most important meal of the day for no reason. It’s the meal that gets you going strong. If you skip breakfast, you’re more inclined to overeat the rest of the day to make up for the missing calories and the hunger you’re feeling. Even if you aren’t hungry, grab a hard-boiled egg, a cup of oatmeal, or a piece of string cheese. The only caveat to this is if you are doing intermittent fasting. If you are being intentional about intermittent fasting, it’s totally ok to skip breakfast. {I know… it sounds like I’m totally contradicting myself (and I am in a way), but intermittent fasting is the exception to this rule.

Drink Water

I’m sure this isn’t the first time you’ve heard this and you probably already know how important it is to drink water throughout the day, but do you do it? Do you find yourself reaching for yet another cup of coffee or something that’s not good for you? Skip those things and add water to your day. It helps you stay fuller longer, and it prevents you from becoming dehydrated. The glowing skin that comes from drinking plenty of water is just an added benefit.

Get Moving

You need to walk more during the day. Skip the elevator and take the stairs. Stop driving your car a few blocks to get lunch walk to your intended destination instead. The more movement you get throughout the day the better you feel. Need a reminder? Set a timer to go off on your phone or watch every hour and get up and do a lap around the office or house. My timer goes off multiple times throughout the day to remind me to get off my butt and do something. 🙂 Sometimes I do a few pushups, sometimes it’s jumping jacks, sometimes it’s a plank and sometimes it’s a quick walk. Even if you only spent 1 minute every hour doing some sort of exercise, you could probably end up with 10-15 minutes of additional movement.

Minimize Stress

Did you know your stress level is directly related to how you feel overall? It’s related to how you respond to situations in your life, how you feel about your life, and what you eat. If you’re stressed, you’re more likely to make food choices based on emotions rather than health…hello Oreos and Ben & Jerry’s. When your body is under too much stress, you also feel more exhausted, you don’t sleep well, and you might even find you don’t have the stamina or desire to work out. And all of those things can contribute to weight gain. So do your best to minimize stress!

Weigh Every Day… or Skip the Scale

Here’s another one of those things where I’m going to be a little contradictory. While I believe the scale is a helpful indicator of what’s going on in your body, it’s not nearly as accurate as the way you feel and the way your clothes fit. While I was on my weight loss journey, it was helpful for me to weigh daily. I didn’t obsess over the number, I just used it as a barometer to see how different things (food, exercise, sleep) affected my weight. I have other friends who obsess over the number on the scale. If you’re one of those people, ditch the scale. There is no magic number. You could weigh less than someone else and still not be as fit or thin as that person. While I’m not at my lowest weight as an adult, I’m smaller than I’ve been since junior high. Here’s my encouragement…whether you weigh daily or skip the scale completely, put the emphasis on how your body feels, looks, and fits into your clothes.

You have to make your health a priority. Life is so much more fun when you’re living it the right way and taking care of your body. Eat well, move your body, and focus on how good you feel instead of what your scale tells you.

Do you have suggestions on the best ways to lose weight? What did I miss? Leave me a comment!

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Best Way Lose Weight: Stop Making Excuses

December 20, 2018 By Lisa Leave a Comment

My weight loss has been quite the journey. I struggled for years and year, but I finally had enough I knew I needed to stop making excuses. People always want to know the best way lose weight but the reality is, most people have a good idea what to do, they just need to actually do it…consistently!

Best Way Lose Weight: Stop Making Excuses

If you want to get down to a healthy weight, you have to stop making excuses. You know what I’m talking about. It’s that little voice in the back of your head that tells you that you deserve to eat that doughnut because you’ve head a rough morning. Or the one that tells you that it’s too cold to go out for your nightly walk. We all have that little voice in our head. We also all have a choice each time that voice speaks up. We can listen to it, or we can choose to ignore it.

Ignoring that little voice and not making excuses isn’t easy, particularly in the beginning. But here’s the good news. As you start to ignore it more and more often and go work out or say no to the high-sugar, high-calorie treat, the softer that little voice gets.

Don’t Let Yourself Down

Here’s what it comes down to. Anytime you listen to that little voice or are making an excuse, you’re letting yourself down. In Girl, Wash Your Face, Rachel Hollis tells women to keep their commitments to themselves. I love this! It’s time to stop letting yourself down. Now is the time to honest with yourself. Realize what you’re doing is sabotaging your success and Stop It! You’re important and so is your health and well-being. If you haven’t believed that yet, now is the time to start putting yourself first because no one else will.

Whenever you’re tempted to skip a workout or indulge in an extra treat tell yourself that you won’t let yourself down. Put on those walking shoes and head out for a workout. Make a smart choice about the food you eat. Skip the soda and reach for a bottle of water instead. Don’t let yourself down.

You Are Worth It

You are worth the effort and hard work it is going to take to get down to a healthy weight. You are worth a healthy body that will support you in all endeavors for years and years to come.

We often focus on getting thin and more attractive for other people. Instead, do this for you, because you know deep down that you are worth it. It’s a much stronger motivator and no matter what happens with relationships along the way, your goal won’t change.

You Deserve The Best

You deserve a long and happy life. You deserve being able to go to any store in the mall and find a cute outfit that fits. You deserve being able to go on that beautiful hike in the mountains. You deserve having a fun game of tag with the kids in the park. You deserve to be the person you already see inside yourself.

Stop making excuses and remember that you are worth it, you deserve the best and don’t even think about letting yourself down.

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Weight Loss Wednesday: December 19, 2018

December 19, 2018 By Lisa Leave a Comment

This was a really good week when it comes to weight loss…which is awesome since it’s so close to Christmas. This is normally the time of year when I gain. Last week I shared that I read Anyway You Can and that it made me want to start Keto sooner rather than later. When I finished the book, my husband and I made the decision to start keto right away. I started keto on Sunday and I feel really good. I’m not doing keto for weight loss, I’m doing it for inflammation, but the weight loss is an awesome benefit.

If I keep it up, I just might hit 100 pounds lost before the end of the year!!!! I’m also noticing that while the scale hasn’t moved much over the last month, my clothes are definitely fitting better!

Since I didn’t post much on Instagram this past week, I’ll have to make do with this photo I sent to my mom. 🙂 We always watch Muppet Christmas Carol together over Christmas and earlier this year I bought her a Muppets outfit to wear while we watched the movie this year. I ordered this shirt for myself last week and sent my mom a pic when it arrived to tell her I was ready to watch the Muppets when I visit her next week! 🙂

Last Week’s Weight: 185.0
Today’s Weight: 183.4
Weight Lost This Week: -1.6
Total Weight Loss: 93.6 pounds

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How To Lose Weight: Tips From Someone Who Has Lost Over 90 Pounds

December 16, 2018 By Lisa 12 Comments

Losing weight isn’t easy. There…I said it! Losing weight is stinking hard! The truth is that no matter what the advertising for the latest and greatest diet product promises, it’s hard work. And it’ll take you a while. That sounds pretty discouraging, doesn’t it? After struggling to lose weight for a long time, I’m here to offer some help on how to lose weight. The single most effective “tool” I’ve found for sustainable weight loss is to set smart weight loss goals. What makes a goal smart? Read on to find out.

Find Your Focus

Losing weight won’t happen overnight. We probaby all know how to lose weight…developing better eating habits and moving more. And while we all know how to lose weight, it’s easier said than done. Eating better and moving more are lifestyle changes and it will take a while before they become habits for you. In the meantime, you will need to focus on practicing your new habits daily while focusing on your goal at the same time. If you have a concrete reason of why you want to lose weight you’ll find that focus easier. Here are a few questions to ask yourself. Do I want to live a long, healthy life? Do I want to set a good example for my kids? Will I have a better quality of life if I make these changes? Find your focus and use it to reach your goals before this new lean lifestyle becomes a habit.

Speaking of habits, check out this book on habits! It’s so powerful! As is this one!

Be Specific

Saying “I need to lose some weight” just doesn’t cut it. Sorry to be so harsh, but it’s the truth. You need to be more specific. Set a weight loss goal. Pick a number. How many pounds do you want to lose? How many inches do you want to whittle from your waist? Be specific. The only way you’ll know when you’ve reached your goal is to have a number in mind to reach. Otherwise, while you might make progress, you’ll never reach your goal. I set a goal to lose 100 pounds.

Set A Deadline For Yourself

Someone smart once told me that goals without deadlines are just dreams. There’s a lot of truth in that statement. Without a deadline, you have no frame of reference. As specific as wanting to lose 25 pounds is, without a deadline it could take you a year or a decade. Smart goals have a realistic deadline. Losing a pound per week is an ambitious but realistic goal. Losing 25 pounds in the next 6 months is a smart goal with a deadline. I set a goal to lose 100 pounds by the end of 2018. I broke it down into smaller goals and wrote those numbers in my planner. And while I’m not sure that I’ll hit my goal, I’m way closer than I would have been if I hadn’t set a goal and a deadline!

Celebrate Your Victories…but Don’t Use Food

Changing your eating habits and getting your body moving isn’t easy, especially if you’ve been a couch potato until now. Stay motivated by breaking your big goal into little mini goals and celebrating your victories along the way. If your end goal is to lose 25 pounds in 6 months, break it down into 5 pound increments. Give yourself a pat on the back and do something nice or fun to celebrate each 5 pound loss. Just try not to use food as a reward.

Get Real

Don’t set your goals so high you’ll get discouraged when you don’t meet them. Losing 100 pounds in 3 months just isn’t going to happen. You don’t want to set yourself up for failure. Instead, set yourself up for success with goals that you can reach … but don’t be afraid to have to stretch a bit to reach them.

And don’t get discouraged if you fall off the wagon every now and again. Life happens and sometimes there’s just no way to say no to that slice of pizza (or two, or three). The important thing is to pick yourself right back up and keep working towards your goals. Don’t let a cheat meal become a cheat week…or a cheat month!

Stay Accountable

It’s nice to have someone that has your back. Find an accountability partner or a group of them. I am part of a group of ladies that encourage each other. We are all on a journey to lose weight. We check in with each other on Marco Polo. We share recipes and encouragement! Find people that are on a weight loss journey as well. You can support and encourage each other. You can call each other out when you’re binging on junk food or skipping your walk yet again. Share your goals with your accountability partner and have him or her hold you to them.

Now it’s your turn. You know how to lose weight! Ready to set some smart weight loss goals?

I’ll be sharing more tips for weight loss between now and the first of the year! Let’s actually make those resolutions stick!

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