It's been a frustrating two weeks as I've been completely stuck at one weight. I started exercising even more than I was before to get in a full hour every day so naturally, I expected the pounds to just come rolling off with no issue. Unfortunately, the pounds seem to enjoy their cushy places on my body. They have not been moving for anything no matter how hard I push myself in workouts.
So I set out to find the root of the problem as a standstill for more than a few days is not an option! I talked to several people who spend tons of time reading fitness magazines and books, googled information, and finally took advice from my mother. She'll be thrilled :-) All of this research led me to two answers.
1) I'm not eating enough calories. When you intensify your workouts but don't get enough calories in, your body thinks that you're starving and starts to store the fat to balance out what you're not getting. Eating 1,000-1,200 calories was fine at first but now my body has gotten used to those variations and thinks it's not enough. Based on the information from friends, the internet, and even a nutritionist, I learned that for my height and weight I should be eating 1,600 calories. If I want to vary my intake to maintain the meal plan I've been focusing on then I can maybe go down to 1,400 every few days but I need to stick at that main number until I drop to a lower weight.
2) Frozen meals. I complain constantly about how I have to eat frozen foods because I "never have time to cook", which is true... in a way. My time is spread kind of thin but mostly I'm just lazy. I could make time to cook if I wanted to. Or even if I'm short on time, it takes at least three minutes to heat up a lean pocket. Couldn't I make a sandwich in the same, if not less, amount of time? The answer, my friends, is yes. So I've made a new grocery list of food that I can plan out for the week to be able to cut back on the frozen stuff. Isn't the whole point of this to stop being lazy in all aspects of my life? I just have to take the first steps... again.
So hopefully making those changes will help me move past this nasty plateau. I'm not a fan of no motion whatsoever! But hey... at least I haven't gained. Gotta look at the bright side too!
I feel ya on the time crunch... I used to live off of frozen meals when I was at Disney, but once I realized that I wasn't getting any kind of nutritition from most of them and consuming a ridiculous amount of sodium, I stopped.
ReplyDeleteOn one of my days off every weekend, I make 1-2 Weight Watchers or Cooking Light meals in my crock pot. I eat a serving for dinner, then pack up the remaining food in portion controlled servings. I label them, pop 'em in my freezer and then have "frozen dinners" that are good for me AND the right amount of calories.
Crock pots are the way to go!