Short weight loss progress report

Just a real short one. Anyway, I’ll be posting photos and measurements soon. Not sure though I’ve made much difference… yet lol. Boyfriend says that I have lost a little bit of weight and even my stomach isn’t as poochy :D. Also ordered body fat calipers off the internet, so I can be a bit more precise with my goals instead of just relying on whole body weight loss. Hopefully they should be in this week. I’ve also been taking daily walks, doing my aikido and eating mostly right.

However, in the last two days I’ve been dipping into processed/wheat junk as I only get paid once a fortnight, so by the last few days of each fortnight I’m usually dipping into junk because I can’t afford much else It has made me rethink my shopping habits, and I do know there’ s a bit of waste going-on especially with fruit and veges. I’m thinking I’ll buy as much fruit/vege as I need for a few days only, instead of projecting two weeks worth of fruit/vege and obviously wasting some by the end of it. I’m not a fan of grocery shopping (but I don’t think anyone is lol), but I’d rather do a few trips and ensure I always have something healthy on hand, and not packaged junk with 5000 different artificial colours/preservatives and who knows what else. I might also have to consider expanding my food budget, in order to set aside money for extra fruit, vege, eggs and sometimes meat.

Fell off the boat today…

Just a shortish entry. Had a bit of bread and some sugary chocolate today. I’m a bit annoyed by this, but I know I can do better tomorrow. Just one day at a time. I have such a sweet tooth 😛

PROFIT!! $$$
Or just happy tastebuds.

As for what lead me into dipping into some chocolate was because I was making chocolate mousse for a friend’s dinner tomorrow. Although the nomming on the chocolate mousse (hey had to make sure it was edible!) was enjoyable, what was more enjoyable was the actually process of making chocolate mousse from scratch. Yes, whipping the cream and eggs with my not-so good electric blender. I’m pretty sure it took me almost 20 minutes to get the egg whites to that point-of-rightness. But anyway, I digress.

Even just recently, I disliked and didn’t know how to cook. However, for a number of reasons, mainly to keep things cheap but also to have the ability to cook healthy meals for myself (and occasionally the bread-loving boyfriend lol)… I bucked up and taught myself how to cook. So far, I’ve been going surprisingly well and even enjoying myself. The mousse made me a bit nervous because it does need that light, fluffy quality about it and I hoped I could pick it when it happened.

But all went well and after setting a small sample in the fridge for a taste test, out it came and it was delicious! Relief. The boyfriend enjoyed it too. It was a bit rich but still a good success in my eyes. I’m feeling that bit more confident now about my little cooking skillset 🙂

I should probably apply this lesson on any future failures in changing my eating and exercise habits. Instead of worrying and getting down about my mistakes, I will look at the big picture and see if I’m really going all that wrong/is it really that bad? As long I don’t make a habit of making certain mistakes repetitively, it’s going to be okay.

The other thing I’ve learnt was actually watching the cream and eggs get whipped. Because they take so long, it’s frustrating and I start to panic I’ve failed and wasted a carton of cream, etc. I remember the first time I got whipped cream. It was taking foooorever. I started to panic. Blame myself. I know, pretty neurotic about a meal, but that’s me! I was about to give up, destined to make only watery, bubbly cream forever… and then it happened. The whipped cream happened and I was ecstatic. Haha. Dancing around like a fool. I remembered then, the saying that success often comes at your lowest point, the point of giving up and you just have to hold on that bit longer to reach whipped cream utopia.

One last lesson… time to buy a new electric blender. Cream shouldn’t take 15 minutes to whip, and my birthday is coming up soon. Hmmm…

IUD + weight loss

As an addendum to my previous post of my weight loss plans, another reason of why I’m recording my weight loss is because I have the sneaking suspicion that my IUD (which I’ve had for about 5-6 months) could stall weight loss. I’m not gaining anything but I’m not losing either. I’ve done aikido for a number of months before deciding to start this plan… and I just thought it was a little odd that I didn’t lose even a little bit but stayed a steady 134-136 pounds/61-61 kg. Of course, it could of been my diet through the last months, lots of bread, many sugary treats, other fast food type junk. Plus the stress of uni in the last few weeks probably didn’t help much either.

But I’ve been reading a lot of anecdotes from other women who claimed to have gained weight or had a difficult time losing the weight on an IUD. A few even said they lost quite a bit once they were off the IUD. Of course, this worried me a bit but at the same time I wasn’t going to assume my IUD was completely at fault.

Anyway besides that tidbit, I’ve have been doing 45-60 min walks almost everyday. I’ve been doing it for a week and a half now, and even now it’s becoming a little bit addictive to go on these walks. It’s interesting exploring the neighbourhood and everyday I usually take a different route to prevent boredom. It’s also good that where I live it’s very hilly. Lots of real steep hills with great views of the city at the top 🙂

I’ve also been reading more of ‘The Primal Blueprint’. Interesting stuff on the perils of excessive insulin and mishandled cholesterol. However, I admit I’m pretty keen to get into the chapters about food and exercise. Sisson, the author, also makes occasional references to the link mind and body and that’s something I hope he expounds upon later in the book.

Finally, a quick product recommendation. After trudging up all those hills today, it’s nice to soak my feet into a warm bowl of water with the Milk Bath from The Body Shop. It’s about $15.00 and it’s great. You add probably about tablespoon or so of this powder into the water, and it all turns all milky white. Smells good, but better yet my feet come out all clean, soft and relaxed. I also add a bit of coconut oil just to make it a bit more moisturizing too.

Well, that’s all for tonight, I’ll see you guys again soon 🙂

Cold Showers + coconut oil for the hair

Recently I’ve been having cold showers. Perhaps it is easy during our hot summer months in Australia, but I still find it a shock (but an oddly pleasant one) when I jump under the cold water. Even though I’m gasping for air, at the same time I feel invigorated, alive and just more energetic and cleaner. I decided to start having cold showers after reading up on the benefits of them, plus having no air conditioner where I live — a cold shower is always welcome 🙂

The first few things I noticed is that my eyes look less bloodshot and dull. I’ve heard cold water constricts blood vessels — so who knows, perhaps it’s vanishing the bloodshot look out of my eyes. My eyes look brighter. However, I’m guessing due to the heat/fatigue my eyes tend to go back to dull and bloodshot within a few hours. Secondly, my hair looks a bit shinier and that’s always welcome 🙂 I have hair that can be quite temperamental (think 2A waves, thick and fine hair that can be given to being frizzy, dull and a puff ball at times) and it’s nice seeing that shine. I also put in a bit of oil (argan or coconut oil) at the ends or even along the length and that makes my hair smooth and shinier too.

Finally, I also feel more pepped up in general. More energetic, cleaner and ready to take on the day. I’m not sure I’ll be returning to hot/warm showers anytime soon, although I admit when winter comes I might be thinking differently 😉

Another thing I’ve started to try is adding coconut oil to my shampoo. I’m not sure where I read this tip — I think it might have been Pinterest, but it sounded like something I’d like to try as I find shampoos quite stripping but my few times with bicarb soda haven’t been too successful either. So the way to do this is add like 3 parts shampoo to 1 part coconut oil, obviously 1:1 or 2:1 is too heavy for me, so I thought 3:1 would be okay. Unfortunately no, it left my hair a grease pit! Looks like I might have to dilute my oil a fair bit more, my fine stranded hair gets pretty grumpy easily 😛

Weight loss plan with some eye-opening photos :/

Tonight I’ll be discussing my plans for losing weight. Currently I’m at 136 pounds (62 kg), and my measurements are hips (40″), waist (34″), bust (37″). I plan to lose 6 inches off my waist (aka the dreaded belly) and get down to 30″. Other measurements will most likely follow suit. As for actual weight, I plan to lose between 15-26 pounds (so I’d be around 110-121 pounds/50-55kg). Somewhere 50-55 kg and I’ll be happy. But to start off, I’ll work to 55 kg/121 lb.

As for how I’ll be doing it. I’ll be following Mark Sisson’s plan as mentioned in my previous post. I’ve had some prior success with his principles, but just didn’t follow it that closely or seriously. So I’ll be reading his book, taking notes and following it properly this time 🙂

As for recording my weekly efforts (basically 8 weeks) I’ll devote two posts with measurements, photos, details on my food and exercise. I’ve also considered my efforts could go longer than 8 weeks but I’m okay with going longer if need be.

So before wrapping this post up, these are photos of me as I currently am (*sigh* will be replaced in the future by more flattering ones):

Well, I thought I looked slimmer in the mirror. Damn

Oh lord.

I didn’t think I looked that bad, but the harsh objectivity of these photos remind me of the work I have to do. Well that’s all for now guys 🙂

Hi there – what this blog is about and more :)

Hi guys,

I’ve started this blog as a challenge to myself. I’ve decided to blog my efforts of weight loss and skincare over a period of 60 days and planning to post 4 to 5 times a week. The main goals/topics of this blog is recording my weight loss/shape up efforts, skincare (I’m an oily skinned girl who used have blackheads a-visitin’!), discussing the placebo effect/motivation/all that pop-pysch stuff, and finally maybe the odd product review too.

I wanted this blog as a public record to hopefully help others out with similar struggles, but also as a way of being publicly accountable for my actions (so there’s less chance for me to be nomming away on chocolate mousse and somehow thinking it’s okay). Finally, I’m doing this blog as a way of facing my weak spots as a person and growing from this experience.

So with that done, let me introduce myself; I’m a twenty something woman from Australia. I’m obviously into health, skincare and ‘inner mental game’ (confidence, motivation, etc) and believe the three are all related and reflect upon each other. I also enjoy reading, drawing, aikido, cooking (baking in particular) and hanging out with friends. I’m currently doing a degree in graphic design and am in my 3rd year.

I’d also like to talk about my plans to lose weight. Though generally slender for most of my life, I’ve always had a belly. It’s something about myself I’ve never liked and despite trying to mentally to reconcile with it (and that proved mostly fruitless), I realized the only way to deal with this discontent was to make a concerted effort to lose that belly weight through diet and exercise.

I’m currently reading through Mark Sisson’s book ‘The Primal Blueprint’ and taking a lot of notes. It’s a good read. Last year, I did have a brief experience with eating ‘primally’ and I did lose a fair bit of weight. This got me pretty excited, however, my belly even then was quite a stubborn little thing and though smaller was still hanging around. BUT, I didn’t take the exercise component too seriously as I was trying to get a handle on the eating part before bothering with the exercise part. Unfortunately, this weight loss came to an end when I went home; land of bread, carbs and endless sugary treats.

Anyway, not this time! Hopefully with this blog I’ll be at least motivated to cough up results (as base as that sounds), if not doing it for my long-term health and happiness annnd achieving that forever lusted for flat stomach.

Secondly, my skincare plans. As a teenager I had a perfect skin. Looking back I didn’t realize how lucky I was and how I took my great skin completely for granted. As I got older, this was not the case. My face became oily (mainly T-zone) and I got lots of blackheads, tons in my forehead and pimples. Occasionally I’d get pretty bad pimples too. My skin also became blotchy and just ‘messy’ looking. It was dull, greasy and always suffering from something.

Sure compared to others my skin condition wasn’t that bad, but again it was something that really bugged me and I wanted to change. After fiddling around with some store bought cleansers, etc. and even just washing my face with soap (eek!), I still had nothing to show for it until I had a bit of revelation when I went to the beach oneday. After splashing around for an hour or so I went home and noticed how my skin looked and felt. It looked good and felt soft.

My boyfriend had the idea of washing my face in warm water with lots of salt. I was a little hesitant about this. At the time I was a firm subscriber to man-made stuff and I kept thinking what could a little old bowl of salt water do for my skin but I went ahead with his suggestion anyway and well I can say my skin is looking pretty good these days. A lot less blackheads and pimples, skin looks clearer in general. I know some people say that salt dries out your face, but I’m going to say that perhaps my skin is so oily it could probably take the salt water.

After a while, I added apple vinegar cider as a toner. I just use it straight on a cotton ball and I’ve noticed my skins a little less oily in general. Finally and most recently, I use coconut oil as a moisturizer. This one works good too. My skin feels lovely and soft but not all dried out or too oily either.

I do feel my skincare is largely down pat, but I’m still working on how to get rid of the dark blemishes/spots left by my blackhead days plus I’m also working on ways of minimizing my dark circles. They’re probably genetic, but I’m not really a fan of walking around with these dark circles and why look/be okay, when you can be better?

Anyway, that’s all for now and will be posting on my weight loss plans in more detail tomorrow.