Changing My Mindset - Artful Eating

Hello everyone,

It's been a while. I know! I haven't updated on my fitness journal in around about five months, and while I haven't stopped trying to lose weight. My weight has remained at around the same number for months, and it is so frustrating.

If you've seen my previous posts, then you know that I've tried a lot of different tactics to lose weight. I've tried Weight Watchers, Slimming World, Rosemary Collins, Jane Plan, Exante, Detox, Gluten Free, Whole foods, Calorie Counting, 5:2 and so much more that I can't even think of right now. On top of that, I've been a member of a gym in the past, as well as doing various different exercise programs at home.

Despite all of this, today I weighed in at 11st 11 lbs. Which, is pretty much the weight I've been hovering around for a year now.

So, putting the failure of all the diet plans behind me. I'm tackling something new and approaching weight loss from a new angle.

I'm not going to diet.

Yeah, you heard that right. No restrictions, I can eat what I want when I want it and as much as I want. No calorie counting. No judging myself for eating that chocolate or for a Venti drink from Starbucks.

How am I going to do this and still expect to lose weight? Well, I'm going to change my mindset and follow the artful eating principals.

My mum first mentioned this approach to me after reading Artful Eating: The Psychology of Lasting Weight Loss by Karina Melvin and I was skeptical. Throughout all of my dieting, whenever I was fully sticking to any plan, I had one constant. I used MyFitnessPal to track my calories. On some of the plans, I was worried that I'd go over my calorie allowance, whilst on others, I was concerned I was going too low. So, I'd track everything and make sure my calories were looking good, rather than focusing on what those calories were going on. There were times when I'd cut down on my healthy dinner or skip it just so I could fit in a slice of cake! But, I'd eat the cake and track it so I felt like I should still be losing a bunch of weight. I didn't.

So, being the calorie counter that I was. I was nervous to follow a plan that was telling me I could eat anything I wanted, without counting calories, points, syns or anything else. I didn't have to log it anywhere. I just had to eat and enjoy it without attaching a number to it.

It took some convincing, but eventually, I decided to give it a try and then I got sick and couldn't keep any food down. So, today I am restarting properly now that I'm feeling better.

What does artful eating involve?

Well, I'm new to the idea and still learning, but the basics as I know them right now is that you can eat and enjoy the food you love. You don't count calories but you do need to follow some basic rules. Listen to your body, eat what you fancy and only eat when you're hungry and stop when you're full. This has also been an issue for me.

I got myself in the headspace where it would reach between midday and one thirty and I'd tell myself, it's lunchtime so it's time to eat and I'd make something and eat it, even if I wasn't hungry. I also, especially when it was a meal I particularly love (Indian Takeout) wouldn't stop eating when I was full. I didn't want to waste it so I'd cram myself full to the point of feeling unwell. But, recently I've been listening to my body more, and when I had Indian Takeout the other day, I genuinely felt full after eating about half, so I put the rest in the fridge and I had lunch for the next day sorted.

My focus now is going to be on nourishing my body with food that will make me feel good, but not restricting myself and telling myself I can't have something if I really want it. I just need to be mindful of how much of it my body really needs.

The only restrictions I have now, are gluten which I found I have a problem with so I've cut out completely, and dairy which affects my eczema so I have to limit my consumption of that. Beyond that, I'm going to eat and enjoy what I want and see where it takes me.

If you want to check out more about artful eating, there's more information on KarinaMelvin.com

Giving Up Gluten

Hi all,

I wanted to talk today about something new I've been trying for about a week now. I started suffering from a really bad virus a couple of weeks back. Intense headaches, stomach pains, rib pain, chest pain, nausea, and vomiting. It was bad and I'm still not feeling totally over it.

While I was feeling really unwell, I was finding that eating was making me feel so much worse. I'd be hungry, really hungry, but whenever I ate something it would make me feel terrible.

My mum, who's a trained nurse practitioner, suggested that I come off of gluten. She has a lot of health problems and food intolerances as well and she always sees benefits when she gives up gluten.

So, I've been giving it a go.

Giving up gluten is tough for me, a lot of my favorite foods are packed full of it. Like pizza, cakes, pasta, and bread. Now, these are mostly foods I'm supposed to be cutting out or limiting on my whole foods diet anyway, but on treat days these things would be my go-to. There are gluten-free options for all of these items, but I'm trying to go for more foods that are simply naturally gluten-free. Having said that, I am getting a gluten-free pizza today, but I'm going to try and limit the number of times I do things like that.

So far, it's hard to say if there have been any benefits. I haven't had my first weigh-in yet, so weight loss linked to it is yet to be seen. As for health benefits. I've just come down with a possible chest infection and I'm still getting intense headaches, but at this stage, it could be withdrawal from Gluten causing my headaches to be worse.

My first weigh-in is tomorrow, so we'll see how that goes and I'll keep you all posted on any health benefits I've been seeing.

Have you ever given up gluten? How did you find it? Let me know in the comments and please share and subscribe if you like this post.

Until next time,

H.

BooTea 14 Day TeaTox

Hi all,

Today I wanted to talk to you about a product I recently purchased. I've been hearing so much about tea tox's that I decided it was worth giving it a go. 

I picked out the Bootea 14-day teatox. I'm starting today and I'll be doing a week one update within my weigh in post next week and then a final thoughts post after the two weeks.

Now, I know that this isn't going to be some weight-loss wonder product, but what the website says is that I should feel more energized and motivated, which would be fantastic. I've also heard that it helps a lot with bloating, which I could use.

Above all else, I picked this up because I feel like I needed the cleansing. So, the plan is to follow this for the two weeks, coupled with sticking to calories, giving up gluten, hydrating a lot and doing some exercise. All of that together, I'm hoping will leave me feeling more energized and of course get me some weight loss.

Here's what you get in the 14-day box. I paid £9.99 at Boots and this was on a half-price sale. Other retailers have it at different prices.

For your money, you get 14-day time teas and 7 bedtime teas, one every other day. Which, I felt was pretty good for the price, considering I'd happily spend £3 or more on a tea at Starbucks.

I'm optimistic about how the two weeks will go and I'll check in soon.

Until next time,

H.

Quick Little Update

Hi all,

It has been a while since I wrote anything on here, and I am so sorry for that. I honestly don't have much of an excuse, I just haven't been blogging even though I have a bunch of posts to do, not just here but on all of my sites.

Anyway, I wanted to post a quick update, because things have moved along since my last post. I was sort of in a bad place when I last wrote. I was feeling unwell with my health condition, and it wound up with me having a virus for almost two weeks, which made my POTS symptoms so much worse.

I'm all over that now, though, and I'm back to having a good mix of good and bad days with my health. I am still collapsing a lot, but some days, like today, I make it through the whole day without a collapse. Yay.

I've been stepping up the exercise more. Specifically, I've been doing a lot of blogilates on YouTube. I love these videos because they provide great toning, they're really challenging, and I can pick the areas to target. They're also great, because most of the exercises are done on a mat, and it's always best for my health when I can workout in a sitting or lying position.

I've also been doing cardio with my treadmill whenever I'm up to it, and using the bike machine too.

I'm getting a lot stronger, which I love. Exercises I couldn't even do one of a few months ago (lower leg lifts, cheerleader L's, push ups, etc...) I can now manage to get through the whole section of them in the videos. 

Last week, I lost 4lbs, which was incredible. I was aiming for 3, because that was what I needed to lose to get into the 8st's, and getting 4 was just so unexpected and exciting. So I'm currently sitting at 8st12lbs, just 7lbs left to go to hit goal, and my aim is to reach that by the end of November.

As far as November is concerned. I'm going to be keeping up with the pilates, by following the Blogilates workout calendar for the month (arm days are tough!), and I'm also going to keep up with the cardio, and to the Journey to Splits Challenge by Blogilates, which gives you stretches to do each day, to work your way towards being able to do the splits at the end of the challenge. I'm pretty excited to increase my flexibility.

So, that's where I'm at right now. In a pretty good place, even if my diet could be better. I'm sticking to calories, but not always with the best kinds of foods. My health, is as always up and down and unpredictable, but it's good to be back to just dealing with POTS, and not having a virus on top of it.

Hopefully I'll have another positive update for you after my weigh in on Saturday. Until then, I hope whatever fitness goals you have, are going well. I'd love to hear about your weight loss/fitness journeys, so please leave a comment, and don't forget to subscribe to my site for updates on my journey, and if you like what you're reading, please share. 

Bad Health Days

Hi guys,

I'm kind of having a bad day today with my health. I've had a pretty good run recently, a few days in a row where I had no collapses, or only collapsed late in the evening after a full day of doing stuff. After a run like this, it's easy to trick yourself into thinking you're healthier than you really are. Then it all sort of hits you again.

Last night, I had a bad fall while cooking dinner. I hit the ground hard and hurt my shoulder. Then this morning, it's not a good day.

I haven't had a collapse yet today, but I wouldn't be surprised if I did. What I'm dealing with this morning, is some of my other symptoms I get with my Postural Orthistatic Tachycardia Syndrome. 

I woke up feeling tired, and as the day has progressed, I'm getting more and more exhausted. It's not just a normal tired, it's kind of hard to explain. It just feels like every muscle in your body is tired, you can hardly keep your head up and your eyes open. You feel completely wiped out, and if you try and do anything, even small things like walking to the front door to get the post, you feel exhausted.

On top of this, I've been getting chest pain all morning, the kind that doesn't go away with my inhaler. I've had a bad headache that's increasingly getting worse, and my shoulder still hurts from the fall yesterday.

I think with my condition, it's easy on good days, to want to push yourself to do more because you know that you may not be able to do anything the next day. This comes at a price though, because maybe doing more yesterday, has resulted in me feeling so much worse today.

All I can say, is that today I am truly feeling the limitations of my illness. There's so much that I'd like to get done, but I can't get up and do anything, and even sitting down and writing is hard. I've been trying to write the novel I'm working on, but I can't concentrate because I'm just so tired.

I'm hoping that I'll feel more energetic tomorrow. For now, I think I need to go back to bed.