Tuesday, July 30, 2013

Vacation vacation vacation

Maybe one day I will be able to write a blog about how I went on vacation and ate healthy all week... This how ever is not that day! I spent a wonderful week with my family in Sea Isle City NJ last week, and boy did I eat and drink my way threw vacation! Every time I am on vacation I over indulge, which is fun at first, but ends with me feeling nauseous and bloated. But the good thing about stuffing my face for a week, is that when the week is over, I am recharged and remotivated!  All my food cravings are satisfied and I'm ready to feel healthy again! And I plan on stepping things up from my normal routine, on Wednesday I will be going to my first crossfit class, which I am extremely nervous/excited about. 

After having lost a large amount of weight  I am curious to see how toned my body is even capable of getting. My sister told me about the blogger "Skinny Meg" and I saw she posted a before weight training and after weight training picture. This picture motivated me so much! It's amazing what toning can do to your body.


I can't believe I'm posting this... But maybe it will give me motivation to stick with it and one day be able to post my after picture, but for now, this is my before picture.


Thursday, July 18, 2013

The awesomeness of UP by Jawbone.

Sometimes the hardest part of dieting is not seeing results as quickly as you would like.  There has to be patients involved and a clear mindset of the BIG picture.  Just remember, the days are going to go by no matter what, so a little progress each day will eventually add up to a lot of progress.  That being said, there IS a way to track your progress and every day feel like you are making a difference.

UP by Jawbone is this cool bracelet, that tracks your steps and sleep, but it does a whole lot more than that! UP is designed for people who want to get to know their body better.  Based on your age, the program will recommend the amount of sleep and steps you should get per day.  For my age (28) it recommends I get 8 hours of sleep and 10,000 steps a day.  I have reach my sleep goal often but my step goal only once.  Its summer time and I have been lazy/busy doing fun stuff.  BUT seeing my steps has put me in such a different mindset. I am definitely one of those people who go and work out at the gym, but am lazy the rest of the day.  Recently though, I have been trying to get my steps in, by doing things other than working out.  Taking the train into the city and walking around, I live 10 minutes outside of Philadelphia.  Going for walks outside, or a walk on the beach.  Even at work, I have noticed I will be volunteering to take deliveries down the hall, anything to get my steps up.  It also helps that my sister has one as well, which creates a little friendly competition.   UP is made to work with weight loss apps that are already in existence, so it syncs with my Lose it app.  All the food I enter into Lose it will show up on my UP news feed, and on my Lose it news feed, it will tell me how many calories I need to burn to get more calories to eat for the day.

The program doesn’t just tell you the number of steps it tells you all kinds of stuff about the steps you take.


It also gives you information regarding your sleep patterns… I need more deep sleep!






Wednesday, July 17, 2013

The last "5lbs"

In my first blog post I mentioned that I am current 10 pounds away from my goal weight of losing 100lbs.  So why not call my blogLeanas Last 10lbs?  Well, its because of this, I WILL NEVER BE HAPPY WITH MY WEIGHT!.  I would like to sit here and type otherwise, but the truth is even when I hit my goal weight I’m sure I will think, I wonder what I will look like 5lbs thinner?  Im not worried about this becoming a problem and me getting too thin, because who am I kidding, I like to eat! And I know the rest of my life I will lose and gain 5lbs over and over again.  This is not something I’m sad or upset about, it’s just a fact of life.  That’s why it’simportant to me to always mix up my eating habits.  Being stuck in the same routine can be BORING!  When people ask me how I lost so much weight I find myself confused on how to answer.  Weight Watchers? Yes.  Lowcarb diet? Yes. Counting calories? Yes.  A juice cleanse? Yep did that too! I have tried it all, and in a way they all worked for me, Iwent for one to the next losing a bit on eachdiet and eventually they all added up to a lot because I was constantly working towards losing weight.  But what really has to matter is what works best for you.

For me I found I am the most comfortable with counting calories. No foods are off limits by doing this, which makes it easy to mixthings up.  It’s a very simple theory, if you consume less calories than your body is use to then you will lose weight.  Obviously this is something that is easier said, then done.   I started counting calories before I had a smart phone. Now that was a pain in the ass!  But with a smart phone and all the apps they have now it makes things soooo much easier.  My app of choice is the “Lose it! app and the best part about it, its free! Lose it does all the work for you, all you do is enter your information, weight, sex, age, how much you want to lose (max 2lbs per week) and Lose it will calculate how many calories you can have per day.  Once your all set, you enter in all the foods you eat. The app includes a list of restaurants, brand name food, and allows you to search different generic foods.  My favorite part is the bar code scanner, anything with a bar code, you can scan and all the information goes right into you phone! God I love technology. 

I still find myself looking up foods on websites of restaurants that I cant find listed on the app. When that’s the case, I choose “Create food on the app and enter in the informationI found on the website.  I find myself doing this often for Saladworks, every time I go Iget a different create your own salad.  Lucky for me the website has a nutrition page that always you to create your own and it will calculate the calories for you. Best. Thing. 

The app... I will explain the coolness of The UP app in my next blog

Tuesday, July 16, 2013

My story.

have struggled with weight for as long as I can remember.  Even though I was an active child always running around and playing, I was still the “chubby” kid.  As a teenager, I would think how unfair it was that my friends could eat junk food and stay skinny, yet I would eat it and see the scale climb up.  I first started dieting when I was 17, and for the next 6 years I would try every diet I could think of.  My weight would go down 20-30lbsand then back up 40-50lbs. But on March 17, 2009, age 23, weighing in at 259lbs,  I decided to take control of my life. 

I started to focus on small changes in my diet, like not eating carbs at dinner time, and trying to eat a lean cuisine everyday at lunch.  I went to the gym more frequently, and working harder when I was there.  I love the way going to the gym and eating healthymakes you feel, but despite how great that feeling is, it’s still easy to fall into a slump.  Iwould work out consistently and eat right, then all of a sudden fall off the wagon.  That cycle repeats its self often, it’s been 4 years and I still do this.  Weight control is something that will always be a battle for me.  But when I started this journey, I came up with a theory, and it has been something I have lived by for the past 4 years, “You'll never fail if you never give up.”  Every time I go off track, that saying gets me right back on track. 

When I started my weight loss journey I thought I would lose a 100lbs in a year.  Its over 4 years later and I weigh, 169lbs, exactly 90lbs loss since the start.  I still haven’t reached that weight, but I still haven’t given up and now I am closer than ever, and look and feel better than I ever have.  I will be the first to admit I am not the healthiest Icould be.  I love greasy takeout food, sweets, beer, wine all the foods that our “unhealthyfor you, but somewhere along the way I have learned to manage it.   This blog will be about the ways I have learned to manage my weight, try and find ways to be healthy and most importantly maintain happiness through it all. 

Here are some pictures that will show all the process I have made. It's been a slow progress but I've come far.

Weight about 245lbs (I couldn't even find a pic from my heaviest!)


Weight about 230lbs

Weight abt 215lbs

Weight about 205lbs

Weight about 200lbs

Weight about 195lbs

Weight about 190lbs

Weight about 180lbs

Weight about 170lbs

Again about 170lbs 

Weight about 165lbs, yep iv gained about 4lbs since this pics, like I said before, it will always be a battle for me!