You're going to be seeing less of me...
Jun. 26th, 2010 11:59 am![[personal profile]](http://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shirleymarquez... in a good way, that is!
15 days ago I started a new diet and exercise program. I'll admit that doing that so I'll look better when I dress as my avatar in RL is a slightly odd reason, but I'm really excited about SLCC and I'll take my motivation where I can find it! Even if I'm doing it so Shirley will be hot I still get the health benefits. And that's important; my family history means that I'm a walking time bomb for diabetes, so staying fit and keeping my weight down are crucial if I hope to avoid that fate.
So, the progress reports...
Day 0: a distressingly tubular body. Bust, waist, and hip measurements all the same - ick!
Day 5: Down 1.5 pounds. No progress is showing on the measuring tape yet; I feel as if I have not so much shrunk but deflated. All the flesh is looser, under less pressure.
Day 10: Down 5.5 pounds. The first measurable results -- but not where I'm expecting them, it's my upper arms and calves that have tightened up, half an inch off each.
Day 15: Down 8 pounds. I can actually see that I have a waist now... it's down about 4 inches from the day 0 measurement, but I realized I didn't do the day 0 measurement in the right place since it was so hard to see that I actually HAD a waist. So the amount of change is suspect, but the fact that there is some is undeniable. A bigger surprise is that my legs have gotten noticeably smaller and tighter; an inch off each thigh and 1.5" off each calf. I'd better got some short skirts; I'm going to have fabulous legs, darlings!
The belly is being stubborn; the peak measurement still hasn't dropped at all, though the size of the area of bigness has decreased noticeably. The muscles are getting stronger, and eventually any further fat losses are going to HAVE to come from there, so I'm looking forward to progress someday; my genes may not let me ever got to model-flat but I'd certainly like to be flatter.
So, you ask, what am I doing? The diet is something I found online; you do a rotation of eating differently over a 5 day period. The first day is cheat day; you can eat whatever you like. (Though it turns out that there is a trick; although you can eat anything, after the other days of such moderated eating you just can't handle very MUCH food, or at least I haven't been able to!). Day two is fast day; you eat no food at all but take large quantities of BCAA (branched chain amino acids) supplements. Day three is shake day; you have five shakes, each with protein. The first three also have plenty of carbohydrates (i.e., fruit; I've been using a mix of strawberries, blueberries, and banana); the last two have fat (I've been using almond butter). Day four is moderate day; it's a low calorie day with 30% protein, 40% carbohydrate, and 30% fat calories. Day five is protein day where you eat 90% of your calories as protein, plus taking more BCAA.
It's intended as a 25 day program (it's not a plan you could live on permanently) so I have ten more days to go. Surprisingly, I've never been more than mildly hungry; I expected to be ravenous, especially on the fast days, but it hasn't worked out that way. (But I did find that I needed to add a bit of salt on the fast and shake days or else I got headaches.) I've even managed to stick with it under two difficult social situations; a party on a moderate day (I had nothing there but a couple of burgers, which I planned for, and some raw vegetables (many of which are free in the diet). The other was going to a computer seminar which fell on another moderate day; I had a Clif Builder bar for breakfast (which I brought with me, they didn't have any suitable breakfast choices), and a lunch of half a sandwich with only one piece of bread, salad greens, and some fruit. (I obviously couldn't weigh those but I knew approximate portions from my experiences on the previous days; I was certainly close enough not to endanger my progress.) I ate the rest of the day's meals after I got home.
As for the exercise, I've been doing daily Callanetics, a program meant to tighten your body but not bulk it up. (It's certainly doing that for my legs and waist; I'm waiting for the belly to follow.) Most days I get in some cardio as well, largely in my normal life; walking large distances, bicycling, and dancing. I might be losing even more weight if I were doing all the resistance training that is in the diet plan, but that would require going to a gym. And I don't want bulky muscles anyway; got those male testosterone levels going on after all, so if I did a lot of strength work I'd get bigger than most women would. The look I want is sleek, not ripped.
After the 25 days I'll return to a more moderate eating plan; I think I'll stick with the five small meals a day since that seems to be working well for me. I really felt I needed the jump start of a more extreme program to show myself that I could do this, and make enough progress to make a real difference in how I look and feel. I'll probably cut back the Callanetics to three days a week and find some other exercises for the other days to keep from getting too bored. And I'll keep on walking, cycling, and dancing! My ongoing goal will be to try to continue to move in the right direction, but slow it down to about a pound a week for a while. I don't know exactly where the end point is; I'll judge that by the way I look and feel about my body, and make sure to stop well short of anorexia.
15 days ago I started a new diet and exercise program. I'll admit that doing that so I'll look better when I dress as my avatar in RL is a slightly odd reason, but I'm really excited about SLCC and I'll take my motivation where I can find it! Even if I'm doing it so Shirley will be hot I still get the health benefits. And that's important; my family history means that I'm a walking time bomb for diabetes, so staying fit and keeping my weight down are crucial if I hope to avoid that fate.
So, the progress reports...
Day 0: a distressingly tubular body. Bust, waist, and hip measurements all the same - ick!
Day 5: Down 1.5 pounds. No progress is showing on the measuring tape yet; I feel as if I have not so much shrunk but deflated. All the flesh is looser, under less pressure.
Day 10: Down 5.5 pounds. The first measurable results -- but not where I'm expecting them, it's my upper arms and calves that have tightened up, half an inch off each.
Day 15: Down 8 pounds. I can actually see that I have a waist now... it's down about 4 inches from the day 0 measurement, but I realized I didn't do the day 0 measurement in the right place since it was so hard to see that I actually HAD a waist. So the amount of change is suspect, but the fact that there is some is undeniable. A bigger surprise is that my legs have gotten noticeably smaller and tighter; an inch off each thigh and 1.5" off each calf. I'd better got some short skirts; I'm going to have fabulous legs, darlings!
The belly is being stubborn; the peak measurement still hasn't dropped at all, though the size of the area of bigness has decreased noticeably. The muscles are getting stronger, and eventually any further fat losses are going to HAVE to come from there, so I'm looking forward to progress someday; my genes may not let me ever got to model-flat but I'd certainly like to be flatter.
So, you ask, what am I doing? The diet is something I found online; you do a rotation of eating differently over a 5 day period. The first day is cheat day; you can eat whatever you like. (Though it turns out that there is a trick; although you can eat anything, after the other days of such moderated eating you just can't handle very MUCH food, or at least I haven't been able to!). Day two is fast day; you eat no food at all but take large quantities of BCAA (branched chain amino acids) supplements. Day three is shake day; you have five shakes, each with protein. The first three also have plenty of carbohydrates (i.e., fruit; I've been using a mix of strawberries, blueberries, and banana); the last two have fat (I've been using almond butter). Day four is moderate day; it's a low calorie day with 30% protein, 40% carbohydrate, and 30% fat calories. Day five is protein day where you eat 90% of your calories as protein, plus taking more BCAA.
It's intended as a 25 day program (it's not a plan you could live on permanently) so I have ten more days to go. Surprisingly, I've never been more than mildly hungry; I expected to be ravenous, especially on the fast days, but it hasn't worked out that way. (But I did find that I needed to add a bit of salt on the fast and shake days or else I got headaches.) I've even managed to stick with it under two difficult social situations; a party on a moderate day (I had nothing there but a couple of burgers, which I planned for, and some raw vegetables (many of which are free in the diet). The other was going to a computer seminar which fell on another moderate day; I had a Clif Builder bar for breakfast (which I brought with me, they didn't have any suitable breakfast choices), and a lunch of half a sandwich with only one piece of bread, salad greens, and some fruit. (I obviously couldn't weigh those but I knew approximate portions from my experiences on the previous days; I was certainly close enough not to endanger my progress.) I ate the rest of the day's meals after I got home.
As for the exercise, I've been doing daily Callanetics, a program meant to tighten your body but not bulk it up. (It's certainly doing that for my legs and waist; I'm waiting for the belly to follow.) Most days I get in some cardio as well, largely in my normal life; walking large distances, bicycling, and dancing. I might be losing even more weight if I were doing all the resistance training that is in the diet plan, but that would require going to a gym. And I don't want bulky muscles anyway; got those male testosterone levels going on after all, so if I did a lot of strength work I'd get bigger than most women would. The look I want is sleek, not ripped.
After the 25 days I'll return to a more moderate eating plan; I think I'll stick with the five small meals a day since that seems to be working well for me. I really felt I needed the jump start of a more extreme program to show myself that I could do this, and make enough progress to make a real difference in how I look and feel. I'll probably cut back the Callanetics to three days a week and find some other exercises for the other days to keep from getting too bored. And I'll keep on walking, cycling, and dancing! My ongoing goal will be to try to continue to move in the right direction, but slow it down to about a pound a week for a while. I don't know exactly where the end point is; I'll judge that by the way I look and feel about my body, and make sure to stop well short of anorexia.
