Well hello there! Sad to say I didn’t end up keeping up with the blog when I first started it back in 2016 and I deleted so many posts because I wasn’t sure where I wanted to take this blog. Until now…

Fast forward and we are now in May 2019! Almost 3 years after my last post. Seems like not too long ago I was working on this and then life hit hard. I lost inspiration and motivation to do a lot of things.  But this year I am determined to make it a regular thing and to see where it goes.

On April 15, 2019 I successfully started my Keto/Low Carb journey and dropped 10 pounds by April 30th.  I tried to start this last year but only kept it up for 1 week. Things were stressful and hectic and honestly I was not motivated to do it.  So what brought me here? I joined one of those 16 week weight loss challenges at a local CrossFit gym back in November. I knew it would be challenging but I wanted to do something for myself. I was tired of the way I looked and wanted to get healthy again. I started to go 3x a week as was required for the challenge and a few weeks in I re-injured my knee. It was an old injury that I never had checked out but knew I did something to it.  The injury derailed my diet but I continued to try and make it when I could. I lost 5 pounds but gained muscle during the time. The more I went the more pain I had in my knee to where I had to get an MRI done. Final diagnosis, I had a meniscus tear-medial, posterior loin. Also level 3 Osteoporosis in both knees. With this sad reality, something has to change. I’m too young to be walking around like an old lady with bad knees. I want to live life and be mobile. For this reason I jumped right in to a new diet.

I don’t know about you, but for me, I have to dive right in to something otherwise I will not go through with it. On April 15, 2019, I decided, I’m cutting carbs and sugar that week. This was the week before Easter, I thought, “hey this would be a good trial week. See how I do.” Honestly the first 3 days weren’t so bad, then I hit the “keto flu” when you start feeling run down and had a huge headache for 2 days, stick to it though, it’s definitely worth it. After that I had energy and started to see the scale numbers move down. I made smoothies for breakfast incorporating collagen for my knees. Ate salads for lunch and avoided the cookie/chips cabinet at work. Dinner was easy too, made some delicious meals for the family and didn’t mention a word to anyone that I was starting this journey.

Things I did to be successful in starting and keeping up with my new way of eating:

1. Have a purpose! Seriously, write it down! What is the purpose, what is your goal? Then create a mantra that you can say everyday to keep you on goal and write it down. I would read this everyday private out loud so I could hear myself say it.  “I am strong and I can do this, it is for my health and nothing will keep me from achieving this goal. I know it will be worth it at the end.” 
2. Log all meals– Plan ahead and pre-log. This was really helpful because I set my macros in the app I use and allowed myself 1600 calories with Fats 75%/Carbs 5%/ Protein 20%. This way I could plan the meals that I knew for sure I was going to have like my breakfast smoothie and lunch and to make sure that your meals were balanced. I also liked to see how eating a certain food would effect my macros and what I had left.
3. Have snacks on hand. I had cheese sticks, Genoa salami, and macadamia nuts stashed in the office fridge just in case I got hungry.
4. Get a digital scale. I highly suggest you get one and weigh your proteins, non packaged cheeses, and veggies. Somethings make sure to measure like your fats. Then before you eat take a look at your plate. Eventually you will get a feel for the portion sizes of your meal.
5. Make sure to stay hydrated!!! I can not stress this enough. It’s really important you drink enough water and incorporate an electrolyte supplement and I recommend you take it in the morning. You will pee a lot!  When drinking water try not to drink too much at once because your body can only replenish so much at a time and this will cause you to flush out excess water.
6. Optional-Ketone test strips or ketone meter- get the ketone test strips or a ketone meter. Amazon has a lot of options under $10 for the test strips. I found these useful in the first 3 weeks. I’m still on the fence on getting a ketone meter but satisfied with the strips. This helped me to keep going, being able to see that dark purple on the strip lets me know I’m on track.

I’ll be posting more info on my weight loss journey on my next post.  Also going to start posting on Instagram again. I hope you follow me and if you are on a journey as well,  I hope to encourage you to keep at it!

 

XOXO

 

Michelle