"I can't do that," turned into, "Holy sh...I did that."

Hello!

When I shared my weight loss story on fb a while ago, a friend told me I should post my progress here. I came and lurked around for a few months and didn't even make an account until like last week because I'm just far too nervous to put myself out there to a bunch of strangers...however, I feel like if I can help anyone in any way whatsoever it's worth it.

Here's my before and after - 230 > 169

Over the last 10 years I was incredibly destructive. I did things because of self-hatred and I wanted to punish myself for being...me, I guess. I stuffed myself until it was painful, I became an alcoholic, was suicidal at various points and my self-talk was ALL negative and seriously hurtful. I would look at myself in the mirror and say, "You are disgusting." Just like that. Nearly every day I did that.

In 2016 I decided I wanted to hike the Appalachian Trail in its entirety. I wanted it to be my savior and change my life. I wanted to find myself and figure out who I was. Lol. Anyway. My before picture up there was April 9th, my first day on the trail (the after picture was last night btw). I made it about a week before I got physically ill and then was holed up in a shitty hotel room crying for three days experiencing what I can only describe as a mental breakdown, it was really somethin'. I flew home after those three days and my boyfriend broke up with me the next day (he's not the bad guy here, we're actually back together and ridiculously in love, like...it's crazy).

For some reason, something clicked. I made a decision to change my life. I didn't want to be miserable anymore, I didn't want to rely on another person for my happiness, I didn't want to blame anyone else for what I'd done to myself. I needed to love me, and I needed to show me just how much.

The first thing I did was cut out all my negative self-talk and instead started looking in the mirror and telling myself how awesome I am, how beautiful I am, how important I am (to me). It sounds insane, I know it does, but god it helped. I decided to start Whole30 on May 1st. After that first month I'd lost 21lbs! Then I did the paleo diet as I'd done it before and just really enjoyed it. After that I counted calories, tried vegetarianism, and am now in the middle of my second full round of Whole30.

I don't follow any one thing religiously. I find that with my personality being what it is, I NEED change. I can't stick with one thing for the rest of my life. But one thing is for sure, the base of my diet is meats and vegetables, and I don't really get tired of that for now.

At this point in my life I am a positive, happy, excitable, and FAR more loving person than I used to be. I have learned to take responsibility for my words and actions and not blame others for my shortcomings (which was my MO back in the day, nothing was my fault, especially my weight), I've learned to truly love myself and in so doing learned to love others. That cliche really has stuck with me. I never understood it until I felt it myself.

Anyway, I digress. I just wanted to share with you all my progress and if anyone has any questions I'd be happy to answer!

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10 Simple Hacks to Help You Drink More Water

Water is required by each cell of your body in order to function normally and help you become the “healthiest you.” While your body will also obtain water from other fluids you drink, water is far-and-away the best choice. Water has so many benefits from increasing energy and relieving fatigue to boosting your immune system and of course, also promoting weight loss. One way that water helps with your weight loss journey is by fueling your workouts. If you’re dehydrated, your workouts will not be as effective. But water also helps you feel full and potentially eat less. Sometimes a glass of water is enough to curb what you thought was hunger.

While you probably already knew the importance of water, you still might struggle with fitting in all that extra hydration. Sometimes it’s even just a matter of getting so busy that you forget to keep up with drinking. We know you’ve heard a lot of tips before, but we did some research and have come up with 10 more water-drinking-hacks that you can add to your arsenal. Try these easy ways to drink more water:

1. Set an Alarm

If you’re like most people you probably always have your phone on you. Well now you can use that alarm for more than your early morning wake-up call. Set an alarm to go off every hour to remind you to drink up. It’s so easy to get caught up with what you’re doing and fail to drink as much as you should but this will help provide an easy reminder.

2. Band It

If you’re more of a visual person, this hack is for you. Start your day with at least eight rubber bands around your wrist. Each time you drink about a cup of water, remove one rubber band. Make sure you’ve removed them all by the end of the day and you’ll know you fit in your eight (or more) cups that day.

How Much Water Do You Really Need? How to Know

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3. Hashmark your Bottle

Another visual reminder, by using a permanent marker to add hashmarks to your water bottle, you can know exactly where you stand with water consumption for the day. Next to each hashmark write a time which corresponds with the time you plan to drink up. When the clock strikes that time, drink until you’ve hit the next hashmark.

4. Buy a Water Bottle You Love

It sounds silly but investing in a bottle that you really love just may help you drink more. There are a lot of bottles on the market. In fact, if you’re not much of a DIY type of person, they even sell water bottles that are already hashmarked (per the suggestion above). There are water bottles that allow you to easily infuse fruit and others that advertise keeping your drink cold all day long. Or you could even just buy a cup with a straw that has a favorite saying or character on it. Something as simple as a cup you love just may be the motivation you need.

How to Buy the Best Water Bottle

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5. Set a Rule

Another way to remind yourself is to set a rule based around a regular occurrence. For instance, you could decide that every time you go to the bathroom you have to drink one more cup of water. If you have another ongoing occurrence throughout the day, you can set your cup drinking to that. It just serves as an easy reminder to tie it to something you’re already regularly doing.

6. Eat Your Water

There’s no rule that says you must drink all your water. If you really struggle with water consumption try adding more water-packed foods to your day such as watermelon, cantaloupe or cucumber. This will help boost your intake even if you’re struggling with drinking it all down.

Trouble Drinking Enough Water? 10 Hydrating Foods You Need to Be Eating

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7. Switch your Brand

You’ve probably already heard the tip about adding flavor to your water to make it tastier but maybe just switching your brand could make a difference. Or maybe you prefer mineral water. If you’re currently drinking unfiltered water, invest in a filter and see if that makes it more appealing. If you make your water more enjoyable, you’ll likely drink more of it.

8. Add a Straw

Some people find that drinking from a straw is easier. It’s a simple switch but might be worth trying if it will help you drink more water. Whether you drink from a straw or not, sipping water—as opposed to gulping it down—is always much more pleasant so focus on taking it slow and you just may find you can fit more in.

Bloated Belly? Address These 7 Causes to Get Rid of It for Good

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9. Start Early

If you’re like a lot of people you might kick off your morning with a glass of juice or a cup of coffee. Why not try drinking a glass of water before anything else? One of the biggest issues with fitting in eight cups a day is that most people don’t start their water consumption until late morning as they’re typically drinking something else first. But if you make water your first drink of the day you’re setting yourself up for success. In fact, you might even find you don’t need that glass of juice now that you’re fully hydrated on healthy H20.

10. Add Ice

Again, simple but effective. Adding ice may make your water more appealing—particularly on a hot day or after a work-out. You can even take it a step further and use ice as the way to add flavor to your drink. Freeze ice cube trays full of fruits or herbs and plunk them in your drink for both a boost of flavor and a temperature cool down.

 

The post 10 Simple Hacks to Help You Drink More Water appeared first on The Leaf.

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Day 1? Starting your weight loss journey on Tuesday, 16 October 2018? Start here!

Today is your Day 1?

Welcome to r/Loseit!

So you aren’t sure of how to start? Don’t worry! “How do I get started?” is our most asked question. r/Loseit has helped our users lose over 1,000,000 recorded pounds and these are the steps that we’ve found most useful for getting started.

Why you’re overweight

Our bodies are amazing (yes, yours too!). In order to survive before supermarkets, we had to be able to store energy to get us through lean times, we store this energy as adipose fat tissue. If you put more energy into your body than it needs, it stores it, for (potential) later use. When you put in less than it needs, it uses the stored energy. The more energy you have stored, the more overweight you are. The trick is to get your body to use the stored energy, which can only be done if you give it less energy than it needs, consistently.

Before You Start

The very first step is calculating your calorie needs. You can do that HERE. This will give you an approximation of your calorie needs for the day. The next step is to figure how quickly you want to lose the fat. One pound of fat is equal to 3500 calories. So to lose 1 pound of fat per week you will need to consume 500 calories less than your TDEE (daily calorie needs from the link above). 750 calories less will result in 1.5 pounds and 1000 calories is an aggressive 2 pounds per week.

Tracking

Here is where it begins to resemble work. The most efficient way to lose the weight you desire is to track your calorie intake. This has gotten much simpler over the years and today it can be done right from your smartphone or computer. r/loseit recommends an app like MyFitnessPal, Loseit! (unaffiliated), or Cronometer. Create an account and be honest with it about your current stats, activities, and goals. This is your tracker and no one else needs to see it so don’t cheat the numbers. You’ll find large user created databases that make logging and tracking your food and drinks easy with just the tap of the screen or the push of a button. We also highly recommend the use of a digital kitchen scale for accuracy. Knowing how much of what you're eating is more important than what you're eating. Why? This may explain it.

Creating Your Deficit

How do you create a deficit? This is up to you. r/loseit has a few recommendations but ultimately that decision is yours. There is no perfect diet for everyone. There is a perfect diet for you and you can create it. You can eat less of exactly what you eat now. If you like pizza you can have pizza. Have 2 slices instead of 4. You can try lower calorie replacements for calorie dense foods. Some of the communities favorites are cauliflower rice, zucchini noodles, spaghetti squash in place of their more calorie rich cousins. If it appeals to you an entire dietary change like Keto, Paleo, Vegetarian.

The most important thing to remember is that this selection of foods works for you. Sustainability is the key to long term weight management success. If you hate what you’re eating you won’t stick to it.

Exercise

Is NOT mandatory. You can lose fat and create a deficit through diet alone. There is no requirement of exercise to lose weight.

It has it’s own benefits though. You will burn extra calories. Exercise is shown to be beneficial to mental health and creates an endorphin rush as well. It makes people feel awesome and has been linked to higher rates of long term success when physical activity is included in lifestyle changes.

Crawl, Walk, Run

It can seem like one needs to make a 180 degree course correction to find success. That isn’t necessarily true. Many of our users find that creating small initial changes that build a foundation allows them to progress forward in even, sustained, increments.

Acceptance

You will struggle. We have all struggled. This is natural. There is no tip or trick to get through this though. We encourage you to recognize why you are struggling and forgive yourself for whatever reason that may be. If you overindulged at your last meal that is ok. You can resolve to make the next meal better.

Do not let the pursuit of perfect get in the way of progress. We don’t need perfect. We just want better.

Additional resources

Now you’re ready to do this. Here are more details, that may help you refine your plan.

• Quick Start Guide - Build your foundation!
• Loseit Compendium - Frame it out!
• FAQ - Answers to our most Frequently Asked Questions!

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It’s Soup Season! 5 Simple Soups for Your Fall Menu

The air is getting crisper, the leaves are getting redder, which means it’s time for all kinds of awesome things: Tailgate parties, apple cider, sweaters, pumpkin spice everything and our favorite—soup. Soup season means a delicious bowl of warmth on a brisk day. And soup can do much more than fill your seasonal cravings. It may help you eat less at your next meal and stay fuller for longer.

In one study, researchers had study participants eat a low-calorie broth before having a lunch entree. Those who ate the soup ate 20 percent fewer calories at the meal compared to when they’d had the same meal without the pre-entree broth. And other studies have shown that slow the time of “gastric emptying”—that is, soup stays in your stomach longer than other foods, so you feel fuller for longer than when eating a solid meal.

Pumpkin Palooza! 10 Pumpkin Recipes You Need in Your Life

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So fill your bowl and start with these five favorites for soup season: They’re simple to make, they’ll fill you up, and best of all—they’re delicious.

1. Zuppa Toscana Soup >

Calories per serving: 184

Counts as: One SmartCarb, one PowerFuel and half a Vegetable

One of our soup season favorites: This soup has all the flavors of the Italian restaurant favorite—sausage, garlic and creamy broth—with fewer gut-busting calories. But the best part: It makes six servings, so if you prepare this hearty, chunky dish once, you can eat lunch all week. So break out the crockpot, chop some potatoes and kale, and make it!

2. Chicken Parm Soup >

Calories per serving: 227

Counts as: One SmartCarb, two PowerFuels and one Vegetable

If you love the flavors of chicken parm—and who doesn’t—you’ll love this soup season classic: All that mouth-watering chicken-cheese-tomato flavor packed into a low-calorie, belly-filling soup that takes just four simple steps to prepare. If you can saute an onion, you can make this soup in less than 20 minutes and have six servings of hearty lunch to last all week.

Our Top 6 Fall Produce Picks

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3. Loaded Potato Soup >

Calories per serving: 315

Counts as: One Nutrisystem Lunch, one PowerFuel and half a Vegetable

This isn’t some thin, flavorless, unsatisfying “diet” soup: It’s a creamy, hearty, flavor-packed and satiating soup that’s worthy of being called a meal. Using the Nutrisystem Loaded Potato, one of our most popular lunches, the recipe thickens things up with milk, adds flavor from chicken broth and spinach, and a delicious garlic kick. It takes just five minutes to make, but you’ll enjoy the meal—and feeling comfortably satisfied and full—long into the afternoon.

4. Creamy Sweet Potato Soup >

Calories per serving: 259

Counts as: One PowerFuel, one SmartCarb and two Extras

A study published in the European Journal of Clinical Nutrition suggested that soup empties out of your system slower than solid meals, keeping you fuller for longer, one result was extra-surprising: Thinner, creamier soups actually stayed in the gastric system longer than chunkier broth-based foods. So while you might think a more liquid-based soup wouldn’t fill you up, it may actually fill you up—and keep you full—better than other lunch options.

This creamy sweet potato soup combines that smooth, belly-filling property with other satisfying features: There’s the hearty flavor of sweet potato, of course, but also fiber from both the tubers and cannellini beans. Insoluble fiber, the kind found in both of these foods, slows the rate of digestion so you feel fuller, longer. So fill up on this orange bowl—perfect for fall.

5 Veggies You Have to Try Roasted

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5. Easy French Onion Soup >

Calories per serving: 240

Counts as: One PowerFuel, one SmartCarb, one Vegetable and one Extra

A salty, beefy, onion-flavored soup topped with melted cheese for just 240 calories? Seems impossible, but it’s not. The granddaddy of decadent soups can be yours in less than an hour with this simple recipe—six ingredients simmered together and topped with two slices of light Swiss. It’s a classic flavor that you can feel great about all fall—and winter—long.

The post It’s Soup Season! 5 Simple Soups for Your Fall Menu appeared first on The Leaf.

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[Challenge] European Accountability Challenge: October 16th

Good day accountability friends, how are you all doing? I was thinking about how many of us have more than one weight loss attempt before we successfully reach our GW and stay there (I think I had like 5-6 total, maybe 3 serious ones before this one, which will hopefully be the final one). It's annoying, but I don't think it's a bad thing. Because the failed attempts give us data on what didn't work before and allow us to try again with a new strategy to combat what went wrong. This weight loss thing is hard. There are a zillion different ways to do it, but finding the one you can do every day is tricky. I wish I'd known about this sub years ago, I feel like understanding CICO at the start could have saved me lots of time and agony and given me better tools to assess all the weight loss advice out there. Past attempts for me included everything from eating a salad for lunch every day (I think I lost 5-10 lbs but I didn't know anything about calories then so it was just luck really), to following a diet that some researchers in the UK developed (it worked but involved crazy spreadsheets to calculate how many servings of different things I had to eat, and I hated almost all of the recipes. It was basically the opposite of sustainable for me but I did lost up to 20 lbs with it, twice). That last one taught me that if I can't eat things I like, I will never lose weight. Even now that things are going well, I'm expecting that there will be some challenges in my future when I start to maintain. So anyway, that was basically a really long way of saying, don't give up, there is value even in our failures, and this is learning experience and a journey!

For anyone new who wants to join today, this is a daily post where you can track your goals, keep yourself accountable, get support and have a chat with friendly people at times that are convenient for European time zones. Check in daily, weekly, or whatever works best for you. Anyone and everyone is welcome! Tell us about yourself and your goals and join us already :) And it's all more fun when you comment on each other's posts, so let's encourage each other too!

 

And on to the accountability part...how's your day going? Let us know how you're getting on with your goals, if you have any questions, need to vent, have a SV or NSV to share, etc. And feel free to just have a chat about how your day went! We got this :D

 

I’ll start: I'm prepping my food then heading to the allotment for the day. I hope I'll be planting winter garlics & onions (I watched lots of videos on this yesterday), building some raised beds & paths, and continuing with my clearing and manuring. I also have a ride home so I will bring back some things to cook with this week (winter squash, kale, chard, tomatoes probably). This evening I'll be cooking, browsing job adverts and online courses to take, and Skyping with a friend. Have a great day everyone!

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Tantrum Tuesday - The Day to Rant!

I Rant, Therefore I Am

Well bla-de-da-da! What's making your blood boil? What's under your skin? What's making you see red? What's up in your craw? Let's hear your weight loss related rants!
The rant post is a /u/bladedada production.

Please consider saving your next rant for this weekly thread every Tuesday.

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[Daily Directory] Find your quests for the day here! - Tuesday, 16 October 2018

Welcome adventurer! Whether you're new on this quest or are towards the end of your journey there should be something below for you.

Daily journal.

• [Q&A] "I have a question."
• [Day 1] "I am starting my weight loss journey."
• [SV/NSV] "I have an accomplishment to share."
• [24hr Pledge] "Today I am going to..."

Interested in some side quests?

• [Motivation Monday] Share some motivation, get some motivation.
• [Tantrum Tuesday] Need to vent? People getting on your nerves?
• [Weigh-In Wednesday]
• [Track with Me Thursday] Did we just become best friends?!
• [Free Talk Friday] What's on your mind?

Community bulletin board!

• [Running with Loseit] Run with losers. Avoid arrows.
• [Wecipe Wednesday] Swap and discuss recipies!

If you are new to the sub, click here for our posting guidelines

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