Two years ago, on January 16th 2014 I started day one of a diet. My weight had ballooned up to 246 pounds and I finally decided it was time to get serious and lose some weight. One month into my endeavor I wrote a blog post called "
My Girlish Butt Gets Fit" and updated the blogisphere that I was down 11 pounds my first month and going strong trying to continue to make progress!
My original goal when I started to lose weight was to just get down to 190 pounds because it was a comfortable distance away from 200 pounds. I met that goal
9 months into my weight loss journey and decided that there was no way I should stop there! I hemmed and hawed for awhile about what my next goal should be. I wanted to weigh less than my husband for the first time in my life (met that) I wanted to wear a bikini in public and feel confident in it (did that) so after I reached some little goals like that and stayed committed long enough I really knew that I wanted to lose a solid 100 pounds. Seriously, how awesome does that sound??? 100 pounds is HUGE!!!!
Well, here we are in January of 2016 two years from when I first started this journey and I'm so excited to announce that I finally MET THAT GOAL!!!!!!!!!!!! I have officially lost 100 pounds which is completely insane for me to even process, but I'm so glad that I finally made it!!!
I've blogged before about how I lost the weight (check
this post out for more links) so I'm not going to repeat everything, but essentially the first year of my weight loss I worked out every day and started tracking my calories using the My Fitness Pal app. I starting cooking healthier meals and limiting how much alcohol I drank. I officially lost 78 pounds my first year and then I switched a few things up going into my second year. I still worked out every day but focused on cooking and prepping more whole and healthy foods. Instead of just worrying about calorie count I focused on eating more clean foods and less processed foods. For example: the first year of my weight loss every Monday night I would split a frozen pizza with my husband which I thought was fine because I fit it into my calories. Every Tuesday I would eat a whole box of mac and cheese because I saved enough room in my calories for it as well! I started eating more dinners full of protein and more veggies like a big salad topped with chicken, goat cheese and fruit or making a brussel sprout/sweet potato hash topped with chicken and cheese. Making those kinds of changes helped me get all the way down to 90 pounds lost: so a solid 156 pounds.
I stayed at 90 pounds down for awhile...and then I made it to 95 pounds down by cleaning up how much I "cheated" on the weekends. I've ALWAYS allowed myself some time off on the weekend and allow myself to indulge a little extra and not track calories so much because it helps keep me sane! But I got so sick of being stuck at 90 pounds down that I decided to try to limit the meals that I indulged in on the weekend. I stopped getting pizza and chik-fil-a on a Friday night if I knew Saturday night would be a cheat night too...just focused on not going crazy ALL weekend long.
Making that change helped to get me to 95 pounds down so a solid 151 pounds....and then I got stuck AGAIN. Do you want to know how frustrating it is to be 5 POUNDS AWAY from losing 100 pounds??? Very frustrating. So I started trying REALLY HARD.
I posted this on instagram when I was feeling really frustrated:
"REAL TALK TIME ✋🏻I'm seriously considering switching up my diet plan and trying something new. Let me preface this by saying that A: yes, I have made a TON of progress and am no where near the 246 pound girl I used to be, and B: do I love my body just as it is up there? Heck yeah. I've put a ton of work into getting to this point and I'm happy with what I've accomplished ❤️ However I still have goals I'm working towards and I have been so frustrated with progress lately I don't know if it's just a bad week but I had been hovering at about 95 pounds down at 151 pounds. Then randomly this week I got up to 154 and so everyday I've been completely on track with my food, no booze, pretty much clean eating sticking between 1400-1600 calories hitting under my goal on My Fitness Pal everyday AND I've been working out everyday for over an hour....and then I woke up today at 155! I wanted to be like to my scale...Bitch please. This isn't how this is supposed to work. What is the point in working out so hard and eating so little calories if it's not changing anything!! I made some changes to my diet plan after I hit my one year fitness anniversary and my second anniversary is right around the corner...I'm thinking its time to switch things up again. Stay tuned..."
I kept on trying to eat less and workout more to see if that would help me lose the last 5 pounds but it was NOT working. So, a week before my 2 year fitness anniversary I switched diet plans to IIFYM: If It Fits Your Macros. Instead of only tracking calories, IIFYM tracks how much of three macronutriets you eat: carbs, protein and fat. I realized that even though I had been eating a good amount of "calories" before, I was filling those calories with the best types of food. I needed a TON more protein and a TON less fat and carbs!
I will do another post specific about IIFYM sometime else, but I jumped RIGHT in and started tracking my macros and hitting my numbers on point that first week. I was eating MORE food than I had been before and totally loving it! I even fit wine into my macros so I could drink it and not feel bad about it! I started to see the scale move right away. It moved a whole last faster than I thought though because when I woke up Saturday morning of January 16th 2016, EXACTLY two years from the day I started trying to lose weight, this is what I saw:
I had did it! I lost 100 pounds! I seriously sat down on the bathroom floor after seeing that number and just...sat there. and processed. For TWO YEARS I had been trying to lose weight, giving up so many things and staying committed for so long, it was an overwhelming feeling. So, I felt overwhelmed a little bit...and then I had to announce it to the world haha. I posted on my personal facebook and instagram a few pictures and this caption:
"Today marks two years exactly from when I started my fitness journey,
and magically enough it is also the day that I HIT MY 100 POUND WEIGHT
LOSS GOAL!!!!!! I took those photos on the left at 246 pounds so unhappy
with how much I had let myself go but also so excited because I finally
decided enough was enough and it was time to change. What did I do to
lose 100 pounds? I worked my butt off. Plain and simple. I got up at 5AM
to workout when I didn't want to. I went to zumba classes.
I did workout DVDs. I did so many freaking burpees with Jillian
Michaels and Shaun T I wanted to punch them in the face. I went to barre
classes. I spent 60 grueling minutes on the stairmaster at a time. I
started weight lifting even though I had no idea (and still feel like I
don't) what I was doing. I got on my treadmill and I started running. I
ran and I jiggled and I ran some more and gradually I had less of me to
jiggle around and gradually I could go faster and longer. I RAN A HALF
MARATHON and I did it in an hour and 53 minutes which is an 8 minute 39
pace which I'm pretty freaking proud of for my first half. I stopped
eating crap. I tried new recipes and found new ways to cook and started
making fish and squash and all these random things I had never tried
before and found out that hey, you can actually make food taste good
without smothering it in cheese. I CUT UP SO MANY FREAKING SWEET
POTATOES every Sunday for meal prep to eat at lunch during the week.
Like, ask me to cut up a sweet potato. I will do it in two second
because that is how much practice I have. I turned down all the treats
and goodies that were always around the office and even when I got
bitter about everyone else eating the damn pizza I stuck to my plan.
BUT. You know what else I did? I went out and I ate pizza if I felt like
it. I had weekends off track where I drank whatever I felt like or ate
way too much because I am HUMAN but EVERY MONDAY started a new week and
no matter how many times I screwed up I just decided that I wouldn't
give up and kept trying. It has taken me two years to lose 100 pounds
but here I am today at 146 pounds and this has been the best use of
these two years. I NEVER thought I would lose 100 pounds when I first
started, I just knew I needed to make a change. Only after I started did
I begin to believe that I had the ability of making this big of a
change. YOU ARE CAPABLE OF MORE THAN YOU THINK if you just decide to
try."
It's been just over a week now since I hit my goal and I'm loving the IIFYM lifestyle and also loving continuing to workout and keeping consistent. I've truly made a LIFESTYLE change now and even now that I've met my weight loss goal I know not much will change because I really do enjoy working out and cooking healthy food! I am 100% more happy in life now that I have ever been before and while I don't think my weight should be the only reason for my happiness, getting healthy has definitely made me a more happy person in general!!!
So now my only question left is....what will my next goal be???? Hahah. For now I'm just fine with maintaining this 100 pound goal while still being able to drink as much wine as possible. THAT is the only goal I can think of ;)
