First time

Hi I'm Airraca (obviously), congratulations on taking the first step to your fitness journey. I've recently just re-committed to myself and start using MFP. I started my journey about two years ago and have had many successes and losses. For me, starting while in my senior year of high school seemed like a good idea until prom came along and I fell off. I graduated, moved out, started college, got a job, and found myself struggling to keep up. I want to start a new journey and I'm taking some tricks from the past and have decided to incorporate new ones in as well.

Now, I may have been doing this wrong but this is what I used to do when I actually did stay focused.
It takes 3500 calories to lose 1lb of fat. In order to drop the fat, you should calculate your BMR and deduct 500 calories from the number you recived. The number you received are how many calories you should be intaking daily.
For instance, if your number was 1,717 then your daily caloric intake should be around 1200. The other 500 should be either burned by exercising or cut out of your diet. Everyone has their own method but this one in particular worked for me.

My BMR is 2040. I'm no expert but I've been trying to experiment with eating 1500-1600 calories a day, cutting 200 from my diet and burning 300. As long as you're taking away 500 calories, from the initial number you had, daily then you can lose around 1lb per week. (Being 500cal x 7 DAYS = 3500 calories/week)


Since we're on the brink of talking about food, I'd always count calories and keep a log in my phone (that's what MFP is for as well). I'd clean eat, never "diet". I'd always snack-- on the good stuff. Good stuff consists of veggies, nuts, dried fruit, frozen fruit, yogo, tuna, smoothies, etc... I'd often look for ideas on Tumblr or other forms of social media. This is also where I'd get motivation.
I have no one else to go on the journey with but my friends/family support me. A lot of times I have to re-motivate myself and switch things up a bit.

One important thing to remember is to always mix cardio and strength training with working out.
I mean, it worked for me... I can only tell you what I know.
Again, I'm no professional-- just a gal with some tips.
Don't give up and stay strong!
GOOD LUCK!

Swimming is tough, haha! Well, for me... But it is a good workout! As for the weight training part, I started off light with about 5lb dumbbells and found various workouts for areas I wanted to hit via YouTube or instagram I found this really helpful site last night that you might like.

My family didn't want to convert their lifestyles either so I was kind of in it on my own. My mom had to deal with two separate shopping lists but I mean it helped. There were many times where she'd buy tons of junk food for the house and I had a very hard time staying strong but there were greater amounts of times where I knew what I wanted and kept going. This is all just one big mental challenge. You can do it and swimming is a good place to start. You don't have to kill yourself with exercise, your eating habits contribute the most to your journey.
Never skip a meal. Don't starve yourself, you won't get anywhere like that.


Keep in contact, I believe we can help each other.