January's Results Are In!

This month has had a lot of ups and downs for me. And while I was not very good about posting regularly, and it may even have seemed that I had given up completely after my last pathetic post written on a very down day, I didn't. I kept going, never letting a day go by without exercising (except for rest days, of course, which are a very important part of any exercise program). And I did surprisingly well with my nutrition to the tune of 5 lbs. lost over the month! Yes, you read that right. I lost 5 lbs. in January! And I'm even happier to report that I shrunk 1.5 inches around my waist! So while I definitely had my setbacks over the course of the month and felt some days like for every step forward I was moving 2 steps backward, the persistence paid off. What a great lesson for me this has been. In the past I have gotten discouraged after 2 or 3 weeks when it didn't appear that I was making any progress, and with the discouragement came a huge hit to my motivation to the point that I stopped exercising or eating right or both. So what has made the difference this time? Well, I think there are a lot of factors involved, but here are just a few things I have recognized as making a difference this time around.

1) Weighing myself every day. I have always been strongly against this in the past because people tend to get too emotionally attached to the number on the scale. But what I found with myself is that weighing every day has actually helped me to decrease my emotional attachment to that number. Instead it serves to provide me with information about what/how/when I ate the previous day, and I no longer fear what number might appear when I step on that scale each morning.

2) Eating 3 meals a day with no snacking in between. I know this seems counter-intuitive because of what every personal trainer out there seems to be teaching, but this has helped me tremendously. I don't think we realize how many calories we are actually consuming in those in-between-meal snacks. Even though I definitely eat bigger meals now, my total caloric intake is lower, and my weight is dropping as a result.

3) A strong support system. Notice the word "strong." I love my twin sister dearly, and we have made dozens of goals together in the past several years. But despite how much we love each other, I would not necessarily say that we have been a strong support for each other--until now, that is. This time we have stopped having binges together when one of us is down, and we have set up small reward systems to help motivate us to keep going. We share our triumphs and setbacks with each other on a regular basis. I'm sure I would not have made it this far without my sis. So thank you, dear Sis.

4)Reviewing my goals. While I have set a million and one goals in the past, I often completely forget about them within a few weeks. But this time I have been reviewing them every single day, deciding what I can do each day to progress toward each goal, and finding small ways to reward myself every time I make a little bit of progress.

I can't say this is the formula for everybody out there, but for me these have made the difference. Will it make a permanent difference? I can't answer that yet, but I can say that I am optimistic about my future.