This is just a short one about my thoughts on dieting. As I mentioned in my previous post that I have been susceptible to a number of different diets. The one I did for years was low fat/low carb. I’m not going to sit here and say it didn’t help me lose weight, because at the beginning it did. I was eating rubbish, processed foods and I basically cut them all out and I started to see the weight fall off. However, as time went by I realized that this diet was not sustainable especially if you were training hard at the gym…but did I stop, no.
I have tried every detox, every fad diet, just to see if it could help me drop a few more pounds. One of the most ridiculous I did was the ‘lemon detox’ where you just drank water with lemon and some special tree syrup…I last about 3 days before I started fainting, literally, all I did was sleep.
Your body is a machine and in order to function properly, your body needs fuel. I have spent my whole entire life trying to find the perfect formula for weight loss, it is keto because the body only burns fat when it’s carb source is depleted…is it low fat because fat is high calorie and causes us to gain weight easily. No.
The secret is to live a happy, healthy life, whatever that means for you.
I am not going to preach to you and say that weight loss is easy because it’s not. But I implore you not to take the ‘easy’ route by going on low-calorie diets or drinking meal replacement shakes. Fat loss is a process and along the way it can teach you valuable lessons, like how to cook, how to avoid processed foods (not all the time, we are only human) and how to fuel yourself for the gym/exercise. Every body is completely different and we will all gain/lose weight at different rates.
One of the most important things is to reduce stress, and I tend to find that dieting causes a great amount of stress ‘should I be eating this’, ‘is this too high calorie’ and so on. I spent my life looking at the fat/carb content of food and all I can say was that I ended up eating barely any foods. I missed out on so much just to be skinny.
I want to be toned, I want to be healthy but most importantly now I want to be happy.
It is so hard to find balance in life, I still stress about food and exercise. ‘Am I lifting right?’, ‘Should I eat this..?’ and of course the inevitable comments you get about your weight…whether that’s being too fat, too thin, you’re bound to get someone expressing their opinion. Please try not to listen, and I am also saying this for myself as well, it is SO HARD to brush it off, but please do and carry on being you.
Life is always changing and as humans, we need to be adaptable to different situations like birthday parties, eating out or going on holiday (making memories is the best).
We need to trust ourselves and our bodies. Trust that you will stop when you are full, trust that you will not have that extra piece of cake when you don’t need it, trust that you will want to move your body every single day, whether that’s a walk or a weights session.
Listen to your body, it can tell you an awful lot. When it’s tired when it needs food when it wants to expend some energy. Honestly, listen.
I am tired of listening to people telling me how to eat. If you want to eat meat, do, if you want to be Vegan, go for it. Do what YOU want, not because someone else told you to.
If you want a piece of cake, eat it, you’re more likely to eat a WHOLE cake later on if you resist that temptation, what are you going to regret more, a piece or the whole thing?
Don’t worry about anyone else, worry about you. Because, in the end, that’s the one person that will always be there.