For me, no matter what I do, without exercise I cannot stay fit for very long. I hate food restrictions and I hate going to fitness centers and waiting in line or just having someone run after me to tell me how I should do things.
I also feel I'm wasting time when I exercises - unless I play sports, which is different. So I either need to watch TV or read a book while exercising, not thinking about burnt calories. If I use the bike 30 minutes, out of those 10 are those I use thinking about what I am doing (5, for warm-up, at the beginning, and 5 minutes to reach my kilometers, calories, or minutes count, at the end). I use the other 20 watching TV or reading.
This week, even though I am low on money, I went to buy an indoor bike (magnetic is what i wanted) and I bought a Kettler Vento for 250 bucks. It's worth it. Actually, I wanted a bike (similar to the elliptical below) that works out your arms too but those had no seat so the chances of reading and working out were dim.
30 minutes on such a bike can help you burn 300 calories, medium difficulty, medium pace. It's not only the calories you burn, it's working out the muscles. You can see the results the next day. Honestly.
For the upper body I do push-ups and I have my own weights so I exercisea few times a week, a few minutes and all's going well. As for stomach - I don't have a problem with losing weight there - I have built muscles there in the past so a few pillates plus crunches plus other funny exercises, 5 minutes a day, 4 times a week, help me enough to be stay satisfied.
Exercise. I know many dread what the word implies. There's a catch though: having fun.
Well, I've been walking a lot lately. I've been climbing stairs at work instead of taking the elevator. And last weekend I went out with a few friends to play some volleyball. Started as volleyball for one hour and ended with soccer, for another 30 minutes. I like volleyball but I love soccer. And it's extremely good exercise for your legs if you play lots of high balls. It's almost like running hurdles.
I got home with my muscles sore but feeling great! I've been also doing some exercise for my legs. Stretchings, mostly. Also, my back is a bit sore from a lot of seating and work and then driving, so I needed other exercises - out of which many involve the legs again - to rid myself of my back pains.
Oh - for the past two weeks I did not have crazy sugar cravings, even though I had my period. However, I am a huge fan of forest fruits - wild berries mostly, so I went to the market place and bought half a kilo of them. And I had every night, when I wanted something. I replaced sweets of any kind with this. I've fallen in love again with peaches so I have one every night. Before, I needed some kind of food two hours after dinner. Now I simply have a peach or some berries and I feel great.
I've also returned to an old habit of drinking plenty of yogurt - more than 4 glasses a day. One - it fills you up; two - it's dairy so it helps you shed off those extra pounds.
I feel great. I even feel motivated.
Now I need to reach 110-112 by the end of September and I think it is possible. That little extra exercise, the fruits and the yogurt saved me. And for extra energy - a multivitamin pill or spirulina (with the multivitamins you have to be careful because they increase your appetite).
So your diet has been giving great results. You've worked your ass out every single day. You have 1,000 calories a day. But all of a sudden your body refuses to lose weight anymore.
This is the tricky moment. Your body has built a defence wall around this weight and, no matter what, it will not let you lose those pounds. I kow it because a few years ago my weight was at 108-110 pounds and there was no way whatsoever in which I could get rid of that weight. I was slim but not skinny (between you and me my muscles would never allow me to be skinny, but that's something else).
For me 108 pounds is thr lowest and no matter how slim I get and even though I look slimmer than the previous week when I was still 108, I am still at 108! Obviously.
I had another blockage at 114 or something that I had managed to pass afew times. How do you deblock your system? Gracefully. Carefully. Reducing calories is not the solution. And if you are working out like I was, half the day or even more, then you cannot increase exercise either.
So then how to convince your body to let you get over that 'defence wall'? It's simple. You change the routine. You don't have a routine? You make one first then. Your body is already used to low calories and work-out.
Eat an extra something a day and work out every third day - intensive everyday work-out does NOT work. I swear it doesn't in the long run. I have myself and a few friends as witnesses.
About the eating habits, every third day - preferably the day you work out, skip a meal or replace it with something with less calories. The perfect way to shock your body is to change the routine - and that means that you should have one.
How are your muscles? Do you have flappy arms? Well, you can always change that. Losing weight on your upper arms and raising your breasts is a lot easier than losing fat off your bum or upper legs.
How doyou do it? Push-ups and crunches help. So does Winsor pilates or swimming. But if you want something very quick and painless, buy dumbbells. I prefer the neoprene dumbbells.
Here is an example found on FitnessGiant.com. I suggest 3 and 5 lb sets.
How to do it?
1. Standing up, let your arms rest near your body, normally, then lift them horizontally, to your side, until they are a continuation of your shoulders. Do as many as you can, until your muscle hurts a bit. Alternative: bend your torso forward while standing up, looking forward, until your chest is parallel with the ground. Your arms are hanging down holding the weight. Now lift your arms horizontally again, as if you were trying to hug someone.
2. Arms bent at your chest, holding the weights towards you, in front of you neck. Now simulate this: imagine you reach up for a branch and try pulling yourself up. With this image in mind, practice this move with the weights.
3. Punching an imaginary punchbag. Imagine you are a boxer and you are punching someone. Do the moves slowly, one hand at a time. Doing it fast is dangerous for your wrists and for the elbows.
4. Remember the classical move you see in movies when a guy is working out its biceps? Standing up, arm hanging down, the eight in your hand facing opposite of your body. Bend you arm from the elbow, so the weight reaches your shoulder. 15 for each arm is enough. This is good for your breasts as well.
5. Standing up, place your arms in front of you, straight, palms facing each other and holding the dumbbells. Now, imagine something is pushing your palms appart. Bring them slowly back until they become the continuation of your shoulders, horizontally.
5. Let's take care of the back of your arms, the flappy part. Standing up or bending forwards, arms next to your body, palsm with weights towards your body. Bend them completely and unbend them until straight. You should feel the back of you arms being worked out.
How often do I workout? Once every 2-3 days. It's enough.
If you want to keep your muscles and build any new ones, do some of the moves faster. But be extra careful about some of them.
Or try pushups. Fast ones. Or semi-pushups, where you push up only the upper part of your body, lower part remaining on the ground. 30 like this every 2 days should do the trick. However, these moves work out only a part of the muscles in your arms. They are good however for raising your breasts (if you lost the sustaing muscle there) and they are very good as well for your tummy, because it builds lean long mucle.
There are two kinds of exercises: the ones you do to build muscle, and the ones you do to strengthen muscles. The difference? The intensity of your work-out.
When you want to build muscle, you work out slowly and hard. If you want to lose weight and you don't have any muscle built, you should, in addition to the fast-paced one, consider slow exercising. Why? Because muscles burn fat faster and because a body looks better when it has a bit of muscle on.
If you have already built your muscles and you just want to tonify them, make them lean and strong, and also lose weight, then you need a very intense and fast-paced exercise. This also increases your cardio and according to studies, if you work fast, you continue to lose weight even after you have ceased your work-out.
However, any of the above is better and will help you lose weight faster than sitting in bed and being a couch-potato.
If you don't like working out, get yourself a bicycle for the inside and ride every 2-3 days, for 30mins. If you do it slowly, you also decrease the risk of breast cancer, studies show. Increse the pace now and then, paddle backwards, do funny stuff on a bike. Are you getting bored while paddling? Paddle at a slower rate for 30 mins and read a book or a magazine in the meantime. Or watch TV. It works.
Some say it doesn't work, some say it does. For me, swimming has always done miracles. Besides, I love swimming.
Now I can't wait for the outside Olympic Pool to open so I can go swimming.
According to some, you cannot lose weight when swimming if you are not already quite fit. I am quite fit but my resistence is not great: I have a problem completing the length of the pool, and I am a smoker. But one needs to build resistence and for some - like me - one of the most enjoyable ways to do it is by swimming.
When you swim - on your back and front - you use all the muscles in your body and you definetely feel the way swimming exercises your muscles when, after one hour of swimming, you get out and you realize your legs feel very funny. However, you will not feel the pain in the water; you will only feel that you get very tired.
Swimming is an incredible cardio as well.
If you have a problem with your resistence to exercise or are nervous about not being able to complete one length of the pool or are just scared of water or drowning, do what I used to do: always pick the lane close to the side. This way, when you are tired, you can stop and grab the side and then you can continue.
Another way to exercise your legs is by holding the side of the pool and kicking your legs, as if pretending to be swimming. It works.
When you are tired, just float on your back in order to rest.
For some reason, water helps you lose weight. I don't know exactly why, but it does.
If your weight is about 130 lbs, you might be burning around 350 calories in an hour, when swimming slowly, at your own pace. The fatter you are, the more calories you burn. You can reach 550 calories per hour. Backstroke makes you burn in between 470 calories - 700 calories in an hour.
To conclude: if you want to pick a sport and have fun and lose weight or just stay fit and eat more, go for swimming.
We have already mentioned exercises, but we have never got into details.
My favorite is, by far, Winsor Pilates. A few years ago I had a problem with my knee and I am still not fully recovered. This is one reason why I like pilates so much. Besides, if you check some of the programs, you will see that you don't need any special equipment to lose weight. Use your floor or a bed which is not too soft. As for the results - they are instant.
Even if you are in a good physical condition, the 30-minutes work-out for the lower part of the body or for the abs is fantastic. There is pain - I like pain because I know I lose weight when I my muscle hurts.
Unlike some other exercises, Winsor Pilates helps you build lean supple muscles; you will look fit and good, keeping your 'girlish' look. It is also a perfect cardio.
I know I know... Tae Bo is also good and so is yoga. I like them both and it's only a question of preference. While I like Tae Bo because I used to do karate and I like contact sports, my knee cannot take it anymore.
I say give Pilates a try. If I am right, like in most women, your most problematic area should be from the waist down. So try their program for building a great butt and get rid of that disgusting cellulite once and for all.
- you watch the series or the movie or the show, standing, and performing a stair-stepping exercise. There are no stairs but you pretend there are. Trust me, a couple of minutes into the show you will forget that you aren't sitting; besides, you get to exercise and watch something fun.
The second trick, for the back of you legs: if you have a table in the middle of the house or something similar, lean over and place your elbows on it. Then continue stepping and watching TV. You will feel the muscles in the back of your legs strech. 30 minutes to one hour a day is better than nothing.
Besides, everyone knows that the main cause of obesity is lack of exercise. And that's also one of the causes of putting on weight.
Well, like many others, I am obsessed with what the scale shows.
But today we will play with your mind. We will program it to motivate you in your weight loss.
The best moment to get on the scale is the day you start your weight loss program. Why? Because what you see on the scale will freak you out and will determine you to take action. If you have a scale with 'memory', save your current weight.
The next thing to do is to put on one of your pair of pants that is still fitting you, but barely. Something you can wear but is so tight on your legs that you cannot move. Watch the buttons or the zipper ready to explode on your tummy. Take a few steps around dressed like this. You did put some weight on, didn't you? Now that you know how you feel and look in this pair of pants, take it off and put it aside.
You have two standars of measurement now. They are better than normal measuring and watching the inches drop, at least for now.
Grab a bit of your inner thighs between your fingers and see how much of fat there is. Do the same for your tummy. Good. Feel that fat! Don't worry, it will start melting once you want it to go away!
I asked you to measure yourself against pants for two reasons: scales are highly sensitive and might not record your little weight loss during the first 4-5 days and even if they do, the difference is small and not encouraging. Two - I bet you want to fit in those pants more than you want to lose 3 pounds without fitting.
Fat melts slowly. If you go on strict diets - which I do not recommend - you will lose water and the scale will show the difference. But it's water that goes, not fat. Fat is extremely light and shows less on the scale at the beginning. Muscles weigh a lot, however, and if you do exercise, at the beginning the scale will not show as if you lost weight, because you built muscle. But trust me, you did lose fat! Also, right after intense exercise, the muscle tends to swell and retain the milky substance that creates the muscle. That is a good sign however, because when the situation goes away, your newly built muscles will start eating a lot of fat from your body.
Also, I made you feel the fat because the first thing that happens when you lose weight is that the fat becomes less dense. On your inner thighs for example, where you can feel it better, the fat will start disappearing, but to your eye it will look the same. Only grabbing and feeling its density at the beginning will make you understand that you *did* lose weight.
About the pants: try them on again in a week - don't do the mistake of trying them on every day - and feel the difference around your legs and tummy. Also, don't start with a pair of pants that don't fit you at all, because you cannot measure yourself weekly against them. After the pants fit you perfectly, grab another pair that is very tight on you. Follow the same routine with this new pair. Go also in shops and try clothes on. Try your old measure and your new measure. Now, doesn't THAT feel good?
As for the scale, you can get on it again in a few days, but don't bring yourself down if there is no significant loss. You want to look good for others and yourself, not for the scale, right?
Anyway, start exercising now. Start with fun exercises like winsor pilates or yoga. Download them online if you can't find them otherwise. Personally, I hate routine exercise and I hate aerobics and fitness. But pilates is fun. Same is yoga.
Good luck with your losing weight program.
If you have any questions, let me know. Post a comment and I'll answer for sure.
Not only water will help you lose weight but also tea, if you don't put any sugar in it.
First, water boosts up your metabolism so you burn fat faster.
Second, water cleans your body of toxins. It helps your body fight against cellulite as well.
Try not to drink too much water all at once though because excesses do not help your kidneys. In other words, have a full glass every one hour or so. Eight to ten glasses a day should do the trick.
If you like tea, try the green tea with jasmine. It has a cleansing effect on the body - which you should know if you're a Chinese food fan.
Another trick I've heard and tested is lots of hot cups of tea. If you are on an Atkins diet or if you ate lots of proteins and fats, the hot tea will help you eliminate the fat. I don't know if it is scientifically proved or not, but I know it works. Couple these mugs of tea with a bit of exercise and you are in for a big surprise.
I was at 110 pounds, which is about 50 kilos, and I was exercising all day and not eating a thing. However, I had a little residue left on my belly. No matter how much I exercised that thing wouldn't go away. Then I heard this tip from a lady that was on something similar to an Atkins diet, plus she had hot tea after each meal. She was also doing 3 kinds of exercises every day: 30 semi-push-ups, 50 sit-ups, and a funny exercise with her legs, where she would be lying on her back, feet two palms from the ground and she would spell in the air with her feet brought together the names of her family members. So I thought to myself: 30 push-ups and 50 sit-ups? For God's sake: I am doing 100 at least each day. I don't know what happened, but the thing worked for me and the belly residue was gone. So if you want, try this technique too.
Losing weight and staying healthy is easy, when you care. Forget famishing yourself: there are other ways.
Since I was 15 I've been obsessed with healthy diets, losing weight, sports, and everything included. I read books after books and I collected articles on staying fit and healthy. Even now, 12 years later, I am still reading everything I find on the subject.
I will share with you, step by step, everything I know. Free advice.
About Me
Name: Andreea Home: Bucharest, Romania About Me: Post graduate student, happily married, who has found the perfect job in a perfect company. :) See my complete profile
