Sunday, June 30, 2013

Sunday.

Well my scales have gone crazy! LOL...91.1 kilos this morning...eek! I was up friday morning (fluid I think courtesy of wednesday nights session) then friday night i went out for dinner...i ordered pasta and bruschetta....problem was...the bruschetta was actually baguettes! Slathered in butter then you add the tomato mix too it :( Needless to say the scales went up...plus TOM is due any day now. But no matter still eating good....my big focus now needs to be exercise. My plan is weights monday-wednesday-friday (some fridays i have social occassions so when i cannot make it i will go on saturdays) Then i wanna do cardio tuesday and thursday. Prolly the cardio will be cross trainer and RPM class and maybe the odd run. Sundays will be days off.

Today is a lazy day...im off work this week...my sister will be down at the end of the week. Tomorrow will be a big housework day and then tomorrow night i have PT.

Hope everyone has a good sunday!

Friday, June 28, 2013

Ahhhhhhhhhh those scales ;)

Im very sore currently...thighs, upper arms, back, chest courtesy of wednesday nights sessiion, the scales were up 900 grams as of this morning but that i am sure is just my muscles retaining fluid or possibly because TOM is approaching. Tonight we had a work dinner...we went to hogs breath cafe...i ended up having bruschetta and pasta....so way too much carbs...im still hoping for a loss come wednesday morning...but time will tell. I was reading who magazine today and the story on kate ritchie...she is so slim....but what i really liked is how she said "i do some form of exercise even if its just walking my dog". I need to get into that mentality cos im lucky to exercise 3 times a week at the moment! Exciting news i booked flights to Sydney today!! Going for 3 nights in september...looking at going seeing south pacific at the opera house one night...ooh la la....as everyone knows i love Sydney so cannot wait, just gotta book the accomodation which i will prolly do this coming week...looking at staying at the same hotel as last time which was in Pitt St. Was super cheap and the hotel was really quite good....i can get the 3 nights for $312 and lets face it...i wont be at the hotel a lot! So the plans for this week....keep up with my good eating :) Focus on exercise...and not let the scales deter me...cos i know once exercise increases can affect the scales for a bit. I am working tomorrow...then got a week off (yes again! lol) looking forward to my downtime...enjoy your weekend all!

Tuesday, June 25, 2013

A belated weigh in...ooops!

I weighed in yesterday...was down to 89.5 kilos....so a 1.1 kilos loss...gotta love that. Yesterday was my first day on higher calories...i will be increasing them 20 calories a day till i start to gain...so yesterday was 1820 calories...and overnight I dropped another 500 grams! woo!

Tomorrow night I have PT...I am coming to love how much she just pushes me to do things I didnt think i could do...I mean single rows in push up position? Yeh I can do them amazingly lol Here is a link of a pushup row http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JJEH95783mI I do feel my nutrition is pretty down pat at the moment....i think the next step will be focusing on my exercise. While im not hugely keen on weight programs I do think I will get the results from them....and I think I have to kinda suck it up! LOL. Most weeks ill be doing one weight session with my trainer Candice...and if i can do 2 sessions by myself...that should work...the next 2 weeks tho I am going to do 2 sessions a week with Candice...monday and wednesday nights....so i will just need to do one session by myself (either friday or saturday) im really at this stage just going to aim to do that 3 times a week....I kinda feel like i need to give it a full 12 weeks and then assess how its going. I dont really think (from all i read) on a pile of cardio...I go out walking in my breaks at work...im not gonna fuss more then that unless i WANT to go to a class.

Not much else going on...today I had off...was kinda lazy (ok a lot lazy lol) but was nice...good to have some relaxation.

Despite my cals going up slowly this week....I am still going to hope i can be under 88.5 kilos by next monday :)

Monday, June 24, 2013

Calorie cycling

So another thing I get a lot of questions over is calorie cycling....so heres some info on it:

Once you have your daily calorie goal. We can now work out your calorie cycle. Now Day 1 is weigh in day if you weigh in in the morning, if you weigh in in the evening the day after will be day 1. So you work it out like this:

Day 1 : moderate-high calorie day
Day 2 : low calorie day
Day 3 : moderate calorie day
Day 4 : highest calorie day
Day 5 : low calorie day
Day 6 : moderate calorie day
Day 7 : lowest calorie day

So if my calorie range is 1800 calories for example it will work something like this:

Day 1 : 2100
Day 2 : 1700
Day 3 : 1900
Day 4 : 2500
Day 5 : 1400
Day 6 : 1600
Day 7 : 1300

Now this works out to 1785 calories. There are big swings so your body will not get use to things. If after 2 weeks you are not losing....deduct 100 calories from each day...if you feel you are losing too much add 100 calories per day.

If you are wanting a good calorie counting application...I highly reccomend http://www.myfitnesspal.com - feel free to add my username kazsjourney as a friend on your list - I am happy to look at any calorie cycle plans and make any suggestions :)

Sunday, June 23, 2013

And the scales go down...wo0ot!!

Ive had problems with very noisy neighbours but last nite managed a decent nights sleep thankfully! At work today....and tomorrow then off tuesday and wednesday - cannot wait! The scales had dropped down to 89.4 kilos overnight :) So im back sitting at a loss of 1.2 kilos so far this week...pretty happy with that...specially as i have been eating 1800 calories a day. Starting tuesday i will be adding 20 calories a day, basically to test my metabolism and then to work out at which calorie range i maintain my weight at. I am suspecting it will only manage to get to 1950-2000 at the most before i gain....but it will be interesting to see. Once we know how much I can eat without gaining i will do a cut of somewhere between 10-20%...the person helping with this process will decide on that :) Not much else to say...windy and cold as hell here...i am ready to go home and get snug in front of my heater!!

Saturday, June 22, 2013

What I eat, what exercise I do and about my calorie limits :)

I have been asked by many people how I lost the weight, what exercises, what food I ate etc So I will share here!

Primarily I always ate 1800 calories. I followed a system that I called "calorie cycling", what this means is over the week my average daily calories is 1800 but I had a mix of high and low calories days, I felt that this really kept my body guessing and adjusting to anything. At the moment tho as I am closer to I am sticking to a static daily goal of 1800. I also had a couple of "rules" when it came to eating:
1. I eat what I enjoy....if I dont like something I am not going to force myself to eat it otherwise I will never stick to things, but I also ensure I am open to new foods.
2. I try and avoid "starchy carbohydrates" most nights at my evening meal. I prolly eat a starchy carbs 1-2 times per week....but I need one starchy carb meal per day most days.
3. I eat as little processed foods as possible...but DO still eat some processed foods (I am not giving up chocolate for no one! lol)

Below is a list of foods I commonly eat broken up into meals:
Breakfast:
1.2 ingredient pancakes (1 egg + 1 banana and mix)
2.1 crumpet with 1 slice of cheese grilled
3.1 protein shake and a banana
4.2 slices of shortcut bacon with 1 slice of toast

Lunch:
1.A sandwich with salad and cheese or roast pork or tuna or ham (nothing too exciting)
2.Vegetarian Sausage rolls (Linda McCartney brand)
3.Very occassionally Sumo Salad

Dinner:
1.1/4 chicken and small greek salad (This is a takeout meal)
2.Yiros (Kebab) (This is a takeout meal)
3.Chicken salad made of: Roast chicken breasts, baby spinach, feta cheese, semi dried tomatoes, avocado
4.Mince with taco seasoning, tomatoes, lettuce, sour cream (basically a taco without the shell...Don't do this the day or two before weigh in as the taco seasoning is quite high in sodium)
5.Lemon Pepper chicken breast steak with roast vegies (capsicum, mushrooms, cherry tomatoes etc) and maybe some feta cheese
6.Marinated Steak, dry fried egg, grilled tomatoes

Snacks:
1.25-40 grams Tahini or Peanut Butter (depending on how many calories I have left for the day) sometimes I will also add half a banana or a banana too it
2.Homemade muffins
3.Greek yohurt (Chobani) and honey
4.Bega stringers (string cheese)
5.Chocolate (Often Lindt dark chocolate...usually I will have 20grams-35grams)
6.Cashews
7.3 pack of mini oreos (140 calories)
8. Fruit - strawberries or bananas)

Exercise wise I have always been a big fan of Les Mills classes. My favourites are: Body pump, body balance, RPM, body combat,boxing classes. I also did 3 PT sessions a week (I realise most don't have this luxury) Now I do only 1 PT session per week. I have always done resistance work in my PT sessions and still do. I think boxing is BRILLIANT for toning your arms and upper body. I also did lots of things like lots of stair climbing (my gym had 7 flights of stairs and I would walk or run up them...brilliant cardio workouts) So overall I exercised at least 4 times a week (I feel 4 times is a nice balance of exercising without exercising too much), predominantly cardio but with some resistance work involved, I also did a lot of body weight work (pushups, planks, crab crawls etc) which helped with building definition in my upper body too.

I think classes are brilliant, just try and get varied workouts....some cardio classes (combat, RPM, boxing, attack,zumba etc), some flexibility classes (pilates, body balance, yoga etc) and some resistance work(either get a trainer to write you a program, do body pump, or if wanting to lift heavy look into new rules of lifting for women or stronglifts, if you want to do body weight work look into convict conditioning)

I hope this answers most of the questions  But if anyone has any other questions don't hesitate to ask! 

Friday, June 21, 2013

Oops...

The scales were up 600 grams today. They are still showing a loss for the week tho so thats not the end of the world.

Am very sore today in the abs :( It feels like all my organs are pushing against each other especially when i bend over to pick up something. Oh well! A day or so and they will be fine. Im also a lil sore in my thighs and ribcage area...but thats pretty mild.

I am working this weekend...so day one today...am off tuesday and wednesday. So 3pm monday (when I finish) can just hurry up and come! I bought more stuff on catch of the day yesterday...bloody hell! lol So a everlast tank top and a everlast tshirt...now to wait for them to be delivered!

Not too much else going on. Have a good day all!

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Dizzy spells and more ;)

Well yesterdays workout was a struggle! I did 50 mins on just some steady state cardio on the bike and cross trainer before my PT session (nothing too hard) but I did have a bit of a dizzy spell in the PT session which I am putting on to the metformin. I am sure my body is just adjusting to it. But in the words of my trainer....regardless of the dizzy spell i was "smashing it". This trainer completely pushes me...but I unbelievably cope better then I think...Ive not said once "i can't do that" even tho somethings i have had to modify them to be "kazzs version" lol but she is very good...she said for example i have pain in my ankle in one specific exercise and she was like yes you are twisting your foot we need to watch that...so i feel very confident she knows what she is doing....Im pretty "personal trainer" savvy lol and she is definitely a good one.....and I need someone who pushes me to the level she pushes me :) I actually did leg press at 150 kilos last nite (330 pounds) it was insane LOL. I also did planks where I rocked backwards and forwards on my toes....and she also had me doing a plank position where im holding on to some dumbells and then while in the plank position lifting one hand at a time with the weight hah gawd she showed me and i thought no way i can do that but amazingly i could....so it was a row of the weight with each hand...then a pushup then jump up to standing position (she seems to like burpee variances! lol) But when on the assisted chin up machine i had my dizzy spell...oh well....i still worked bloody hard!

Today I am having a rest...im not very sore (yay) but some stomach pains (im guessing just my body adjusting to the metformin). I decided last nite as my free PT sessions were up...to do one PT session a week with candice....one 45 minute session....so that will be a bit hard core. She has then said those sessions we will focus on weights and then the rest of the week I can do my classes. She wants on the days I am not sore to do 5 minutes of HIIT before my classes...and when I am sore just to do either RPM or slow steady state cardio (so for example level 10 on cross trainer...or hills on the bike)

Scale wise the scales dropped again this morning! YAY so happy. So I was down to 89.4 kilos....so since I started 1800 calories on tuesday I have dropped 1.2 kilos. So I am surely not eating too much ;)

Catch of the day is going to be the end of me! LOL. I bought 2 pairs of new balance shoes of it over the weekend...and today 2 bloody everlast tops...the prices are just too good to not buy LOL...my bank account isnt so keen tho! LOL

Right .... my day off....time to go watch some rubbish tv (also known as cooking shows and repeat sitcoms! lol) Enjoy ur day all!

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

New Plan.

I am still recovering from my migraine. I actually woke and my eyeball was still very painful. Last night it had seemed to be improving but it got worse. But today I have rested and taken a total of 4 panadeine forte thruout the day and altho it is very slightly there (and I mean really slight) its 99% gone :) Its been a year or more since I have had a migraine. But I am confident tomorrow I will be fine for work.

Did weigh myself this morning....down to 90.6 kilos which was a 900 gram drop overnight. Slight change to my calorie plans. I messaged someone I had on my MFP friendlist for a long time (helloitsdan for those MFP users). I explained I was at my wits end ;) that I still need to lose another 10-15 kilos...my weight loss journey todate and my PCOS. I also explained that yesterday the doctor put me on metformin. So this was the response I got:



Well the good news on metformin is it works.The bad news is it doesn't have the other capabilities or antioxidant recycling as R-ALA.Trouble with R-ALA is you cannot take it with metformin so we will store that idea in the back of our head till you get to the last 10lbs or so.
Metformin is a gluco disposal agent that lowers the glucose in the blood.
This is great post large carb meal because it stops the body from spiking blood sugar and storing the carbs as fat.A way to turn this into a positive effect ill advise 2 things:
1) 12 hour fasting.You stop eating at night and won't eat till at least 12 hours is up.
2) fasted resistance training.So you wake up 60 mins earlier than usual. If you have access the free weights then I can send you a simple 3 day lifting program that delivers great results.If you don't have free weights ill advise you to purchase either Convict Conditioning by Paul Wade or Dinosaur Bodyweight training by Brooks Kubit.
Continue using the 1800 Cale a day for the next week then we want to test your metabolism.
A week from now I want you to start adding 20cals to every day of quality fat or protein.This slow introduction if calories counted with your cardio and a little resistance training will start training the body that food is available and the need for excess fat isn't necessary.The resistance training also blasts through any future PCOS issues, friend xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx on this subject.
Once you notice slight weight gains daily, dial it back a little.The metformin should stop you from gaining fat.
Once we have base TDEE determined then the sky is the limit.
The long and the short of that message is...to take the advantage of the metformin if I last eat at 8pm at night I dont eat until at least 8am the next day, Im not sure the early morning workouts will happen except on maybe days off lol. The point about the calories is to help find my "maintenance level" as well as teach my body that I can eat under maintenance without it worrying that I am about to "starve" So this week I will eat the 1800 calories, and then slowly start to increase the calories...I somehow suspect I wont even get up to 1900 calories before I start to gain LOL. Ive always said I want to eat the most calories I can and still lose weight and hopefully this will support my workouts well to enable me not only to get to goal but also be strong. I have not tried anything like this before so this should be interesting and hopefully it helps my metabolism and doesn't force me at 80 kilos to eat only 1200 calories...cos thats no way to live! LOL Macro wise my protein requirement is now to eat 180 grams of protein! LOL holy crap....thats a heck of a lot of protein, I previously struggled to hit 135 grams of protein when eating 1800 calories. Today I managed to get to 141 grams of protein...my fat ended up a lil over....so thats something I need to focus on...I really need to try and get the protein to between 165-180 grams (hitting 180 grams exactly per day wont happen lol) but I feel good about this, and good it will support my workouts. Its going to be strange to think in a week or so I will be waiting for when I gain weight. A different way to do things...but I understand why and will just need to be patient.

Obviously with my sore eye no workout today....but tomorrow I will be back at work....and tomorrow night gonna jump on the cross trainer (if i can nab one!) otherwise will be the bike...followed by my PT session.

The other interesting thing is....I started the metformin today....I have for monthsssssssss been daily having carb cravings and whilst I am still hungry I haven't craved carbs today....just been wanting healthy foods (like cottage cheese and nut butters etc!) so not gonna get too excited yet...it could be from having the panadeine forte and feeling sleepy but I suspect its from the metformin which is a good sign...fingers crossed!!






Monday, June 17, 2013

Back!!!

Well, well, look whose back! :) Let me explain for all of those thinking...didnt you have a new site? Yep I do. And I love the site...it looks brilliant, and i am SO appreciative of the Fiona and her partner for designing it for me and all the time they spent on it. But...I have wanted to come back here for a long time. The new site had some security issues, and we had to tighten that up which meant part of the increased security was that it timed out...and so more often then not I would type a blog...save it..and half was gone... :( previously it was still okay cos I could type it up in notepad....but I have a new laptop now with windows 8 which doesnt have notepad on it. I think also its too complicated for me lol..i just dont really understand the configuration of it and while I was shown about it...im really not a good technical person and I struggled with it and just ended up avoiding writing in the journal. So i am hoping no one is annoyed with me over this...but i am glad to be back here...writing in my journal has always been a important part of my journey and I NEED this!

So a brief recap for those who never made it over to the new site....Currently as of this morning i was 91.5 kilos. I have been fluctuating for the last 12 months or so between 87 kilos and 92 kilos. I really want to get out of this rut. Personally the last 12 months has certainly had some hard moments,,,,its nearly a year ago that my mum got sick and then she unexpectedly passed away in September. That was a huge struggle for me, and I honestly still feel I am in a sense of denial. And I guess thats my way of coping. I still haven't been to the cementry. I was going to go on Mums birthday on June 7 but I had some nightmares the night before and just couldn't do it. So its still something on the agenda I need to do at some point when I feel for me the time is right. Then sadly in April my friend Jody (who many may have seen her post on my facebook and my journal regularly) passed away from Ovarian Cancer, its certainly been a sad year.

So I feel I am now ready to get back on track properly. I have tried lots of things over the last 12 months but what I havent tried is WHAT I PREVIOUSLY DID. So after much dillydallying around I am back to calorie cycling and eating 1600 calories. I will give that a few weeks and if the scales are not consistantly moving I will lower to 1500 calories. I really am not the exercise bunny these days i was 2 years ago :( and the more I read about HOW important exercise is when you have PCOS I know I need to attack that again. What I read is its recommended 4 sessions at least per week 60-90 mins at least. I want to aim for 90 minutes 5 days a week. And in relation to exercise I no longer go to Fernwood! I quit there about 7 weeks ago....and joined the local goodlife. I also don't train with Fiona or Sarah. And actually was not planning to have a personal trainer anymore. But when I joined Goodlife they gave me 4 free PT sessions and must admit the trainer has worked out great. I think a fresh look was a good thing (And still think the world of Fiona and she was DEFINITELY the perfect trainer for me 5 years ago,,,but I do need a trainer with access to a gym) Anyway her name is Candice...she is this cute lil thing *rolls eyes* lol but man she is MEAN! Our sessions are full on...non stop...its like straight from one exercise to another...After the first intro session I have done two sessions with her first one was a all over body weight session....the second was a mix of cardio and weights...so I also like the variability. I feel her sessions are really what I need and I always walk out feeling pumped so those I will keep up. When doing well before my "big" exercise days were monday, thursday and saturday....as I work as many saturdays as I have off...I am going to change that too monday, thursday, and sunday. So at this stage I want my weeks to look like this (this may change as we are going to work out a plan on wednesday night but I am envisaging it like this)

monday: RPM + Bodypump
tuesday: Bodypump/RPM + Bodybalance
wednesday: 30 mins cardio equipment + 30 mins PT session
thursday: shbam + body pump
friday: rest day
saturday: rest day
sunday: Body pump + Body balance

I am thinking this will work...I have always done much better with classes...I will also jump on cardio equipment here and there as I get time...and Candice may say she wants me to do a program once or twice a week....but I have already told her I want to focus on classes and cardio equipment.

Foodwise anyone who followed my journal years ago know I focused heavily on unprocessed foods and organic where possible. A lot of processed foods have snuck in, a LOT of chocolate...so im going to focus on cutting out the processed foods. As i said i will be eating 1600 calories but the cycling of calories will look like this:

monday : 1400
tuesday : 1500 (weigh in day)
wednesday : 1400
thursday : 1800
friday : 1400
saturday : 2000
sunday : 1700

I will weigh in tomorrow morning...altho I am not expecting a huge drop....but by tuesday the following week (June 25th) my aim will be to be under 90 kilos. I always do better with short term goals. I also have noticed I am much more hungry between 3pm to about 9pm. I am hoping by increasing the exercise this will help as I will be too busy to eat! But definitely on days I am not exercising I am going to try and save a few more calories for the evenings. I have done it today (as i am home with a migraine) and after dinner tonight I am planning to have some stewed apples, sultanas and greek yoghurt...so yummy food that feels "treatish" but is good for me (yes I realise sultanas arent GREAT but they arent horrid in my opinion either)

I think thats enough to post today! LOL I will ensure the comments are open....so feel free to let me know you are still reading! LOL I will be back much more regularly!!

Also I will add people to my fitness pal who aren't going to tell me to just lift heavy and eat more! ;) If you wanna add me my username is 76kilos