Category: cellulite

WWWOOOOHHHOOO!!! Winter Slim down goal achieved!!

After a very long battle with my weight…I’VE DONE IT!!

yeah-baby-yeah

This has really been some sort of journey! I started out at 76 kgs (168 lbs) and more than 2 yore than a year later, I’m now at 59,9 kgs (132 lbs)! I picked up on my attempt at shedding those last stubborn 20 lbs of weight while blogging. Those were absolutely the most impossible and stubborn to shed! But today, I’m here to celebrate meeting weightless goal! I’ve tried and failed, tried and succeeded with so many different things and I’d like to go over some of those now.

To recap some of the alternatives I tried:

  • No sugar
    • This actually helped a lot but I was astonished to discover that everything we eat has tons of sugar in it! I mean seriously! Take a look at your ketchup bottle. Now divide the grams by 4 and thats how many tablespoons of sugar are in 1 serving of ketchup! If you can curb the sugar, its a great feeling. You know your body is starting to get over it when you feel like someone has hit you head with a sledgehammer.
  • No booze
    • This was a no-brainer. Booze has tons of hidden calories in it, and I always get the munchies when I indulge. So, I limited my intake to 1 or 2 glasses of wine or a small cognac on only special occasions.
  • Dramatically limiting my calorie intake
    • Great in theory, horrendous in practice. No doubt. I was hungry all the time, and completely lost my senses – resulting in The Nacho Incident. If you scroll down to the bottom of the linked post, you’ll see a list of low calorie foods and their serving sizes in 100 Kcal increments.
  • Strict exercise regime
    • When I finally realized that I desperately needed some outside help, and someone that I trust to hold me accountable for my own failure or success, I was fortunate enough to get David from Chape Personal TrainerChape Personal Trainer to work me into shape! David has been awesome! He takes the time to explain things to me that defy logic, listen to me whine about my bad diet days, patiently listens to me bitch about muscle soreness, and has supported me with friendship, consistently updating new workouts for those  soft cushy spots on my body that are driving me mad and always adjusting whatever need be to make sure that I had a positive and successful experience with him as a personal trainer. Thank you, David! You pushed me to meet my weightless goal and I DID IT!!
  • A not so strict, gradually increased exercise of convenience regime
    • This was at the beginning and I…sucked at it. I’ve discovered in this process that I have zero will power if I allow myself even a millimeter of lee-way.
  • Diet soups and green teas
    • Green tea helps a lot, but really only by getting rid of water weight. Green tea is super healthy though, so I say go for it! The diet soups worked well…for awhile. But then I was just – HUNGRY! The lack of vital nutrients made me feel really run down and basically worthless. The hunger turned me into a monster.
  • Vegan and vegetarian
    • This, I highly suggest – if you make sure to have enough protein. Always have a backup though because when Chape suggested I lose the tofu, tempeh and cheese for a week – I lost my mind.
  • Only eating fresh fruit and veg
    • This, I loved! It was a bit more time consuming to cook and clean, but I felt really great, higher energy and less hunger!
  • Consulting Chape Personal Trainer
    • BEST MOVE I MADE!  I seriously could not have done this without David’s help! Super simple – All I had to do was consult daily. I kept a daily/hourly food and drink journal, David posted workout regimes, times, weigh in days, measurement days and scales for me and then would adjust the workouts to fit my needs as he saw fit. This took all the stress out of trying to figure out what was best. I just trusted him, and on occasion listened to him tell me things in a quite loud voice, and IT WORKED!
  • No fizzy drinks
    • This was easy, and I suggest it as a first move to anyone who’s trying to shed some weight. Fizzy drinks have TONS of sugar and other bad stuff for you and cutting back on just one a day can make a massive difference! I went to mineral water, hot teas, black coffee and the occasional juice. Also, shocker: cutting back on fizzy drinks actually reduces your thirst. Fizzy drinks dehydrate you – making you thirsty.
  • Eating my carbs in the morning
    • This was actually a great suggestion by a fellow blogger at Olivier fiction. And it actually worked out pretty well! At least when you eat your carbs in the morning, you have time to burn them off throughout the day and you don’t crave it so badly. Not exactly sure how it works body-wise, but it helped ease the pain of the carb and sauce cut down.
  • Cutting carbs completely
    • Oh Atkins, how you mutilate my mainly vegetarian diet! This just wasn’t for me. Granted, broccoli has tons of protein. Buuuttt, do you have any idea how frustrating it is to be a herbivore on a carnivores diet and still manage to find something yummy to eat? No fun…no fun at all.
  • Going yeast free for 1 week
    • This was actually something I did not share on the blog. I wanted to see if I could actually even pull it off. I did! Surprisingly, yeast is in lots of baked foods which one would not expect. After what I thought was a sly move on my part when I bought a weeks worth of tortilla wraps as a substitute, my fiancé took one look at me and said ‘you know thats made with yeast, don’t you?’. I didn’t believe him. I was wrong. Gggrrr…I hate being wrong. The yeast free week was a long one – especially when I got to watch everyone else enjoying my wraps. But you know what? At the end of the week, my belly looked pretty flat! I never realized how much yeast containing products contribute to belly bloat! So, if you’re working on that beach bod, I’d give this a shot!
  • Reducing portion sizes
    • This was quite easy. Stopping myself from getting seconds was the hard part.
  • Eating earlier in the day
    • Great in theory, virtually impossible when you are eating in a household setting and with others who actually have schedules to contend with.
  • Guzzling matcha and cutting back on the sauces
    • Matcha, I love you. Sauce, I love you too. Putting a few drops of salad or hot sauce on my food just didn’t cut it. Sorry.
  • Drinking more water
    • I’ve been told to do this on countless occasions. But I just don’t like it. I try, but I float. I’m a chic. I’m already running to the Loo every chance I get. Add a preliminary water consumption minimum and I might as well set up shop there. Tried, and failed. However Im drinking more than I was – so maybe not totally failed.
  • Eating more
    • When David suggested this, Thought he had lost his mind for sure. After he explained it to me, I thought – great, I’m going to go on an eat more diet and turn into a blueberry. But, I tried it. And you know what? IT WORKED! How the hell???
  • Drinking Yerba Mate before meals 
    • This is actually something a girlfriend of mine from Argentina suggested when I very first trying to shed the weight, weighing in at 76 kg or 168 lbs. I was desperate to lose some of the flab before I turned into a ball. She suggested drinking a full glass of heavily steeped yerba mate before every meal so as to reduce my appetite. It worked! I will never again have a home without this stuff in it.
  • Fasting
    • Intermittent fasting wasn’t actually bad at all and I managed t0 pull it off for like 2 weeks. However, eventually my body began to expect food at 4 and to not be hungry after 7, but the weight loss stopped. When I stopped fasting, I re-gained the weight.

Moments when I went totally off the rails:

  • Christmas and New Years
    • I decided I would allow myself some holiday indulgence. What a terrible idea this was…I actually gained back all the weight I’d lost (while trying to shed this last bit) + 2kgs/5lbs! Nothing like starting all over again 😦
  • The Nacho incident
    • I don’t even know what happened on this day. It’s like I was being a nice normal chic in the supermarket and then…insanity struck. I kid you not when I say that I barely even remember grabbing all requirements for an amazing set (or 2 – YES, 2!) of nachos! Including a solid weeks worth of my calorie intake. Boy did I ever regret that move!

Some of the exercises that worked really well for me:

  • I used forearm planks and flute bridges as warm ups and to tone my core:
    • Forearm plank – I find myself doing extra of these randomly and mixing with ->
    • Glute bridge – Doing flute bridges feels like a bit of a break after planks. Mixing these is awesome and its really simple to just jump off the sofa and do a set!
    • Bird Dog
    • Dumbbell Shrug – I love this one! Simple and really effective 🙂
    • Reverse fly – Great for arms, shoulders and back. You get used to it, but at first = Ow ow ow! However, it’s a REALLY important exercise so I suggest you try it if you are doing any for of weights.

Some of the exercises that were difficult:

  • This reverse crunch is a great exercise, but hard, hard, hard!!
  • This Alternating Shoulder Tap Plank made me feel like I was going to land on my face. But its super effective, and to tell you the truth, I was incredibly proud of myself when I finally nailed it!

In addition to all the exercises I received from Chape (there are many), I also go on several dog walks daily, which aids in burning some calories. I have been intermittently trying to conquer the kettle bell swing. I look like Mr Magoo trying to do it, but I will nail it down eventually.

Although I have met my weight loss goal – YYYYEEEESSSS!!! – I do plan to continue eating well and utilizing these exercises. I would like to at least maintain my weight and would be very happy to take up more! Besides, I want to look fantastic in that bikini and I have a wedding dress to fit into! I will, of course keep you updated on my progress and pitfalls.

I am SSSSOOOOOO HAPPY! I was seriously starting to doubt that this milestone day would ever come! Just consider me living proof that a woman metabolism does not come to a screeching halt in her 30’s 😉 Thank you all so much for following me and my journey, for all the support and ideas, suggestions, encouragement and motivation! Thank you David, for all the time, effort and energy you put into getting me into good shape! And a special Thank you to my fiancé for putting up with my whining about sore muscles, midnight rampages about being hungry and not having suitable food, and for laughing at me when I’m acting like a total psycho.  We did it!!! 🙂

Thanks for reading!

-Mliae

Winter slim down week 23

Hi all! Sorry I wasn’t able to post this earlier this week. Apparently I needed to do an operating system update on my PC before I was able to post a new entry. All taken care of now…thanks 🙂

Good news this week! As you all know, I started this whole thing weighing in at 64 kilos (or 141 lbs). I did great the first few weeks. And then…the holidays hit. And they hit hard! I gained all the weight back, plus some and then managed to yo-yo back and forth over the same 3 kilos or so. At my highest point, I reached just over 66 kilos (146 lbs). At this point, I whimpered, whined and complained so much that I actually got some really good advice.

Then…I called in the big guns. I’ve been blessed with some awesome friends on this blog and one of them is David, from Chape. This guy has given me so much help, a few lengthy explanations as to why everything I thought I was doing correctly was actually dead wrong …and some seriously effective exercise ideas. By the way, if you are looking for some of these, he now has his own youtube vlog where you can get some good ideas for stretching at the office, at home or in the gym. You can check those out here.

I am, I’m thrilled to say, now back under my starting weight.  But this week, I managed to melt down a surprising 63,8 kilos (or 140.5 lbs). Since I started so close to this weight, it may not seem like much. But you must keep in mind that I spent the past few months trying to get back down to anywhere close to this weight and now that I have, I have a renewed energy and motivation to keep up the pace! This week alone, I manage to drop 1,8 kg (or 4 lbs)! It took about 2 solid weeks before this one to get my body used to a new regime of tons of water, eating more often & dropping the dairy plus an every-other-day exercise routine. I had my doubts, but…IT’S WORKING! And I couldn’t be happier!

This week, I’m sticking to the same. 3 solid meals per day + 2 small snacks of fruit or protein. No cheese, no tofu, no tempeh, no milk, no fizzy drinks. 1 coffee in the mornings (black if I can manage), matcha or green tea during the day and tons of water. Lots of green leafy stuff, protein shakes and chlorella smoothies. 3 times weekly workouts and exercising a bit of willpower when it comes to the holiday. Easter is great, but watching myself turn into food baby belly barbie over Christmas is still fresh in mind and I’ll just ‘no, thank you’ to all those goodie this time around.

Looks like this lady will be rocking bikini season after all!

Hope you all have a lovely holiday!

Mlle

 

Winter slim-down week 4

Three weeks down, and embarking on the last week of a month. The mysterious ‘they’ say that any habit can be changed (or at least dramatically altered) in 21 days. Well, here we are…day 21. I’ve lost exactly 3 kg (about 7 lbs) and have 6+ kg to go yet. My starting weight was 64,1 kg, my current weight is 61,1 kg this week and my goal weight is 55 kg. (Unless I can manage another way to fit into my fabulous clothing items…in which case, the scale can say whatever it well wants!) So, 10 kg total (or the plus side of 20 lbs) which really sounds like a ton of weight.

It seems that ‘they’ must be correct, as many of my habits have changed. In the lifestyle kind of way, not the diet rules kind of way. For example; I have been lectured repeatedly about the necessity of not eating after 6 in the evening, and giving your body at least 12 hours to properly process the food and begin to burn fat. No problemo. My body starts screaming at me by 3:30 in the afternoon, so I’m done eating by 6 in the evening. 12 hours after that is before 6 in the morning, so the closest thing I’ll be getting to actual nutrition at that time of day is chugging coffee and perhaps a protein shake. It no longer seems like such a task to do some squats and handweights. Usually, I even get a bit carried away once I’ve found a corner of solitude…I mean the heart rate is already up, right?

I have apparently set a pattern regardless of what I am or am not doing properly, that I’m shedding an average of 1 kg weekly. Slow, but reliable so it works just fine for me.

Eating healthy: Yes, please! Sunday was a celebration day for us, so all food rules went straight out the window. We gorged ourselves on whatever was available…and it was AWESOME! (Especially after deciding to try a veg smoothie fast the day before…hello hungry belly) All involved knew the scale would reflect our indulgence the next day. And it did, but we expected it so there were no major meltdowns 🙂 Thanks to all the vegan food-porn instagrammers (*evil eye: you know who you are, and I’m now following you…thanks for the veg choc pancake blueberry, Dear God I cant even guess whats in it – recipe, but I want it so badly right now…*drool, drool, drool….) I have stayed hungry. Even when I’m not hungry, I really want to run to a bakery and buy just everything so I can bring it home and stare at it. Seriously, self torture but sooo worth it because it looks so good! This week I will try to continue to intermittent fasting and eating only between  4-6 in the evening. However, if my belly is rumbling, I’ve decided not to torture myself totally. Snacking on a celery or carrot stick will do like zero harm.

Exercise: I’m pretty much in the habit at this point, but I will be increasing my reps this week. And that’s basically the plan….just to stick to what I’m doing. I definitely do NOT want to pack on all the weight once I’ve invested this much time into losing it! Besides, when cravings hit – 25 squats done where you stand makes those cravings subside quickly!

No-No’s: Fast food, anything not fruit or veggie (sans cheese and maaayyyybe fish, but probably not), tea or honey. No mass produced food. (Seriously, boxed/frozen/freeze dried meals are totally NOT HEALTHY!) And no more cakes on an empty stomach! Blech!

I welcome your advice, opinions and experiences!

Thanks for reading!

-mliae

Dreading the scale? Me too….It’s THAT time! Winter slim-down…oh boy.

Oh yes, I did it…

Months after the move and I am still finding long-lost treasures in boxes thrown carelessly and temporarily into the attic. Today, I found this little treasure. I was wondering where it went. So what’s the first thing I do? Step on it…of course. And then I stepped off. Totally disappointed in my metabolism, I might add. It wasn’t that much…not a bubble gum swallowing experience. Enough however, to completely demolish my denial and my theory that somehow all my pants had merely shrunk in the wash. And so it begins….

I had just yesterday decided that I would commit to an experiment with cellulite cupping in late winter  in order to be bikini ready by summer. Which I will be doing at Alkeisvoima in Finland. All 3×10 of the treatments. (This girl is determined to look awesome in the sun, sand and surf!) Sooo….because of this, I for-sure have to get working on it. Like, now. BTW- I will be blogging about my progress with that.

So, today is the day. I figure (OK, the procrastinator in me figures) that I can do a step-a-week situation. Meaning that I either take something out of my normal regime, or add something to it. Each step adds up to a whole bunch of steps (I’m sure) all going simultaneously. Enter lifestyle change for the better 🙂

Step 1 for this week is to cut out all sugary drinks.  And late-night snacking…that’s out too.

Step 2 for next week is to start a regular exercise regime. No excuses. Apparently, running up and down stairs, moving boxes, doing the day-to-day and walking is not enough.

Step 3 – week 3; we’ll burn that bridge when we get there. I’ve heard that there are quite good diet teas, supplements and super-foods that will keep me from wanting to eat the couch. Maybe I’ll try something of those?

Wish me luck and let me know your thoughts!

Thank you for reading

-mliae