Hello Everybody,
I am new here.
I started LAWL back in March 2007. I lost 16.2lb, went on a month-long vacation, gained 5lb back, and since then I seem to be unable to lose anything permanently After this Christmas I gained back another couple pounds and I am 4lb away from my start weight! I was switched between purple, gold and red plans after my infamous vacations, and then I was put on plan 2. I do Lites. I swim 3 times a week (45 minutes of front crawl) and do cardio on the elliptical at least twice a week (45 minutes, burning on average 600 calories). I drink water but seem to have problems with feeling full. I must have stretched my stomach I guess...
Can you tell me you tricks/secrets to go back to the losing-mode?
How do you prepare hot lemon water (I saw lots of people mentioning it as a life-saver)?
I don't have a one size fits all answer for you, but I think you need to get back down to basics..
Be very vigilant about getting your right number of portions in, and don't stray from the plan.. Vary your diet and switch meals around (breakfast for dinner and such)... Make sure you get your starches in and done by lunch...
You also are working out a LOT and you must help your body recover afterward. After a workout, your body craves protein and carbs. In this case, instead of ingesting starches to get your carbs, save a fruit for post-workout. Also save some lean protein for post workout.. Ingesting protein after your workout continues the calorie burning...
Use your lites as a workout boost. I typically eat a starch and a fruit an hour before I work-out then eat the lite or some other form of protein after it. Also if you're working out, have you been losing sizes without dropping pounds that's exactly what I went through.
My starting weight was 172 wearing a size 14. At my six month maintence mark (which was my last WI with COD closing) I was 164 wearing a size 8. Obviously the pounds didn't really matter at that point.
Just hang in there, I definitely gained some pudge over the holidays, so I'm juicing Monday/Tuesday then becoming diligent as if I'm starting over. I figured a month of that will definitley get my body back on track.
Apple, boy can I relate! First of all some of what you put on may be muscle if you were not working out previously. So even if you have seen the scale go up, it is not always a fat gain. You know your own body and I can always tell what kind of a gain I am having just based on how I look and how my clothes feel. After my vacation I was up a little bit, but the worked out like a demon and lost some of the weight, but not all of it... turns out I had gained 2 pounds, 4 of them of muscle... so in fact I had lost a few pounds of fat and did feel leaner, only not lighter at all.. So now I've put on a few Christmas pounds, and they do NOT feel like muscle to me, but that which cheese cake turns into (fat). So anyway, it is back to plan.
I did try several different plans, and I'm now on BLUE, as plan 2 and gold were just too few calories for me (not entirely convinced that BLUE is enough). I do know that the weight loss just instantly stalls if I'm too low on it... So you may be experiencing that. I'd try the Plan 2 for a few weeks and see how you do. If you find yourself feeling always cold and tired and run down, that is a sign that you are just not getting enough calories, as your body will shut down systems due to thinking it is starving. My body has gotten rather fast at doing this little trick! Anyway, going up a plan is better than starving and not losing, losing slowly may be all that you can manage to do...
Anyway, I'm hoping the Christmas weight does not turn out to be as stuck on me as the vacation weight (and to be truthful most of the vacation weight went away fairly quickly).
I would be leery of doing too many take offs, they can just intensify the whole starvation response of your body.
Myself I have been doing 3-4 hour long spin classes a week and 1-2 hours on the elliptical often burns over 900 calories, so you'd think that the weight would just fall off, but no... I tend to get stuck and not see the scale move.
I did try something recently that I might go back to, which was calorie cycling, and I was doing maintenance calories a few days a week and then weight loss the rest. This is designed to keep your body from going into starvation mode. Of course the COD does not tend to approve of these things, but in maintenance, well I feel free to do what I want when I want to.
On the days that I had the very heaviest work outs (and was STARVING the rest of the day anyway) I would do the maintenance calories...
So anyway, don't give up, since I bet with all the exercise you are a much better looking and healthier than you were before you started. I know I am.
Hi Apple,
You asked about lemon water. It is useful to get rid of excess fluid retention especially if you have eaten out or had food with too much sodium (frozen meals). It helps to push water out of your system. Just cut a lemon in half and put one half into a cup of water and boil it in your microwave. Boiling it releases the essential oils in the lemon so it is better than just squeezing the lemon juice into a glass of water. What I like to do when I am home, is to take a pyrex glass measuring bowl and put in the half of lemon and my favorite tea bag and brew up a large serving to drink.
I am on plan 2 also. I really like this plan. I am an early riser and I get my food in early. I use my starches up by lunch and I quit eating for the day between 5-6 pm sometimes earlier than that. I find that this helps me to lose weight. I also get my fruits in early. So by dinner time, I typically have just a protein and my 3 veggies left to eat. For my fats, I almost always use almonds - 6 are 1 fat so I eat 12 a day. If I go out to eat, I skip my fat servings because I know that I probably have had fats during the meal out. Lastly, I use fitday.com to track my calories. This is entirely voluntary on my part, but it helps me to focus better and I can see that I am not dropping too low with my daily intake. I can also zip zag the calories up and down to keep my body guessing. I exercise 7 days a week at least 30 minutes a day and I vary my exercise - elliptical, treadmill, recumbent crosstrainer and water aerobics.
Lynn
LAWL franchise center
total lost 61.5 lbs.
Current weight
Original goal of 50 lbs lost – achieved
New goal to lose total of 65 lbs
Weight crawling back up - HELP!
After this Christmas I gained back another couple pounds and I am 4lb away from my start weight! I was switched between purple, gold and red plans after my infamous vacations, and then I was put on plan 2. I do Lites. I swim 3 times a week (45 minutes of front crawl) and do cardio on the elliptical at least twice a week (45 minutes, burning on average 600 calories). I drink water but seem to have problems with feeling full. I must have stretched my stomach I guess...
