tips that work for you!

inskydiamonds

So I wanted to share some tips that have been making this possible for me for the last 5 weeks. Then you guys should post tips too and maybe we can all use each other's to keep everyone motivated!

I've never been able to consistently watch what I've been eating for long than a week because I get obsessed about it and then it drives me crazy and I completely stop and gain more weight. So here's what I've been doing that makes it different now:

- I meal plan the night before for all my meals throughout the day. I always found I'd obsess over what I was eating and how many calories it had in it and this constant thinking about it all the time made me just not want to log what I was eating. So now what I do is log the night before, and then the night of I make any changes that might have happened during the day. This allows me to know how many calories I have to spend at what parts of the day a lot easier because I can gauge how much I'm going to eat before I eat it.

- I don't have any foods I won't eat. I have a super sweet tooth and one of the things that's always made this hard is I try to give up the foods that I know are bad, but I love. I am limiting myself, obviously, or this wouldn't work and all I'd eat is ice cream and french fries, but basically.. if I want ice cream, I can only have it if by the end of the day my calorie intake is under a certain amount. If I'm craving french fries or fast food, I better have a super light breakfast and dinner, to make it work. Or I have to be willing to only eat half of my order of fries or something. But by not banning things from my diet, I'm not inclined to give up and pig out on the things that are bad, but delicious.

- I'm going about this as a lifestyle change as opposed to a diet. It isn't going to be something I stop doing. And because of that, I don't think I'll gain the weight back (fingers crossed at least).

- I've been trying to cook every night. When I know what's in my food and that it's fresh and whatnot, I feel healthier and have more energy. Eating out, the portions you get are so large and honestly hard to gauge how many calories are in what you're eating (unless of course you're going to a chain restaurant). Eating in also saves me money and I find I can cook a lot healthier than the restaurants I go to do.

- I drink a smoothie every morning for breakfast. One of the reasons I ate as much as I did was because I wouldn't eat breakfast. By lunchtime I was starving and would stuff myself. Eating breakfast leaves me not so hungry at lunchtime, so I'm not overeating.

authentic1

I was settling down, after reading my book, for my little meal on my little plate with my little fork. I looked down and my meal looked HUGE. I'd forgotten to take off my reading glasses. :-) With a little fork and spoon and big reading glasses I eat more slowly and it fills me up.

fullboost

I eat whenever i am hungry, i don't do 'meals' as such, if i'm hungry i eat.
That way i end up coming under / around my calorie goal everyday, i get less cravings and end up eating small amounts every 3 or so hours.

showers1989

I know how much i can have for the day so i dont waste cakirues eating when im not hungry bc i know if i wait i have another meal coming when i could actually use the calories to make something delicious

shintowa

I drink lots of tea. Drinking water before meals helps lower the amount that you eat during them, and also you can sometimes feel hungry when you are actually thirst. A nice hot cup of tea really helps to combat those things, and also makes sure you get antioxidants in your diet.

I also buy the smaller bags of chips and divide them when I eat. A grab bag can last me three meals, and is only ~100 calories or less per meal to have a treat. There's no way I'm cutting out chips from my diet, so this is a healthier, and cheap, compromise. I would do it with larger bags, but not only do I get sick of flavors quickly, but they also go stale before I finish them off, so no saved money with those.

Kefir as a post workout drink adds protein, and to me at least, tastes great.

Rynatat

I have had Celiac's Disease (gluten allergy) for the last 10 yrs. It's kind of kept me in check since there are a lot of places I can't eat at, a lot of foods I can't eat, etc. Although I did gain back a lot of weight since there are A LOT more GF choices than there used to be, and wanted to lose in time for my wedding later this year, I decided to take my last option: a promise. A promise is something that depends on honesty as well, and when that promise is to yourself, for yourself, it's a lot harder to break After all, you're only cheating yourself, no one else will get hurt except yourself, so it's up to you how you want to cheat yourself. I made a promise in December '09, that I would exercise at least 5 days per week for 50 minutes minimum. I made my promise to myself more specific than just exercise though: every work-day I will wake up at least 1 hour early to workout before I shower & get ready for work. On my day off (I have every other Friday off), I will still work out, but at the least, work out for 70+ minutes, since I have the time. On weekends, if we need to be somewhere or plan on doing something (even if it's a theme park!), I wake up at least 1 hour before I need to shower & get ready to leave the house and workout. And yes, even on holidays/vacation, I wake up extra early & still workout. In 9 months I've only lost 12lbs, however, since my focus was toning and strengthening, I've toned and strengthened so much I fit into the slacks, jeans and tops I wore when I was 10lbs thinner than I am now!
The moral of the story: persistence & consistence pay off in the long run. And this is "4-life", for me, for-ever. This is a permanent change that I will keep up, because it's a promise to myself & I'll be damned if I break a promise to myself!:flowerforyou: