The Process: Slowly, But Surly
"I'm supposed to be setting an example for my clients. I'm supposed to look the part. I'm supposed to guide them and SHOW them how to lead a healthy lifestyle."
The fact that I was doing the complete opposite of what I was preaching to my clients on a daily basis was starting to eat at me. Up until recently I had absolutely no handle on it. I never used to be an emotional eater, but apparently I am now. Going through the extreme dieting that I endured during my first show prep definitely changed my relationship with food. I have to go about things a little bit differently than I used to. I've been able to utilize a technique known as intermittent fasting to help improve the issues I was having with binging. I'm going to give it a go and see if it consistently works for me. Like I've said before, everyone is different and we all respond to things in different ways. No one has the same body and nobody is the same. It's all trial and error.
Implementing My New Routine: Intermittent Fasting
First off, I'll explain what IF is. It's simply one of the many "styles" of food consumption that we have the option to utilize. You choose an 8 hour window during which you eat your caloric intake for the day. The remaining 16 hours are fasted. You can choose whatever window works best for you and your lifestyle. I've chosen to eat from 10am until 6pm. This window has proven to be the best one for my current schedule. I've been doing 30 mins of fasted early morning cardio 3 days a week and lifting 5-6 days. My cardio has recently consisted of a brisk 10 min incline walk immediately followed by 10 mins of interval running at an incline, immediately followed by another brisk 10 min incline walk. I've been trying to increase the speed of one, two, or all three of these each time. After this I walk my dog for anywhere between 20-60 mins (depending on what time I have my first client of the day), then I go to the gym for 1-2 hours. Again, this will depend the specific workout I have planned for that day.
Cold Showers & Cardioooooooooo
I typically wake up between 3:30 and 4:30 each morning. I take a dose of DTE first thing when I wake up. This is the thermogenic that I use from Run Everything Labs. Next I do my morning cardio! Then I lift and take a COLD shower. This routine has made me feel extremely refreshed and full of energy in the morning. I do all of this on an empty stomach.
I used to eat a pretty large meal immediately after I woke up each morning, so that has been a big change for me. But change has been good! The reasoning behind the cold shower I mentioned above is to increases muscle recovery and alertness, improves circulation and immunity, helps to stimulate weight loss, and helps to ease stress. I HIGHLY recommend giving this a try. Start with taking cooler shower and eventually working your way to cold. You can also start with 10-15 seconds at the coldest temp you can handle at the end of a regular shower then gradually increase as your body starts to adapt. Either way, break yourself in gradually. It's definitely a shock to the body at first, but yo will NOT regret it. Promise. Give it a try and let me know how you feel. I can honestly say that I feel like a million bucks every time I step out of one!
I remain fasted until 10am. Some days it has bee closer to 11, but I try not to go beyond that simply because I go to bed between 7 and 8 and I personally like to give my last meal a chance to settle and start digesting before I lay down for bed. I take a melatonin and a magnesium before bed each night. The melatonin to aid with quality of sleep and the magnesium to help with digestion while my body is at rest. As I said above, I typically wake up between 3:30 and 4:30 each morning. On days that I don't have my first client until the afternoon I do my designated cardio, walk my dog, then head to the gym for my lift. On days that I have clients early in the morning I'll do my cardio, walk my dog, then shower and head to work for the day. Pretty simple stuff my friends.
As I said above I'll eat my first meal around 10. It's always larger meal consisting of 600-700 calories. I've made these amazing little breakfast sandwiches the past two days. I day dream about them. That's how good they are. Just 562 calories for two! #winning. I can't stress enough that it's important to ENJOY the food that you eat. I recently had to take a step back and re evaluate what I was eating because I wasn't enjoying the foods that I was preparing ahead of time. I didn't realize it at first, but this was one of the main reasons that I had been over eating! Take the time to cook. Learn new techniques and recipes. You should enjoy the process of cooking your food. This is one of the thing that I've made a greater effort to start doing more. And I'll tell you what, it makes a HUGE difference. Another thing that most people don't realize is that you can make the most simple foods taste really good. Take these sandwiches for example. They literally consist of turkey, seasoned fried eggs, a slice of cheese, 2 slices of bacon, and 2 small dinner rolls. That's it. Nothing fancy here. Just damn good food. Meal one is typically one of the largest meals of the day since it's breaking the 16 hour fast.
I typically eat my second meal around 1:30/2:00. This meal is usually between 300 and 400 calories. Below is an example of a pretty simple, yet damn good meal that consisted of a coconut crusted black bean burger, 2 oz of aged cheddar cheese, 3 tbsp roasted pine nut hummus, and sautéed veggies sprinkled with a little parmesan and seasoned with Trader Joe's Everyday seasoning.
Meal 3 and 4's size and timing tend to vary. Sometimes I'll consume them both at the same time when I get home from work if it's a long day and other times I'll eat them separately if it's a less hectic day and I'm abel to sit down and eat two separate times. Lately meal 3 has consisted of a salad with some sort of protein mixied in and meal 4 has simply been my protein pudding concoction. There have also been days where I just eat 3 meals an make the last one a larger one. When I do this, the meal will look a little something like this!
I used to eat a pretty large meal immediately after I woke up each morning, so that has been a big change for me. But change has been good! The reasoning behind the cold shower I mentioned above is to increases muscle recovery and alertness, improves circulation and immunity, helps to stimulate weight loss, and helps to ease stress. I HIGHLY recommend giving this a try. Start with taking cooler shower and eventually working your way to cold. You can also start with 10-15 seconds at the coldest temp you can handle at the end of a regular shower then gradually increase as your body starts to adapt. Either way, break yourself in gradually. It's definitely a shock to the body at first, but yo will NOT regret it. Promise. Give it a try and let me know how you feel. I can honestly say that I feel like a million bucks every time I step out of one!
I remain fasted until 10am. Some days it has bee closer to 11, but I try not to go beyond that simply because I go to bed between 7 and 8 and I personally like to give my last meal a chance to settle and start digesting before I lay down for bed. I take a melatonin and a magnesium before bed each night. The melatonin to aid with quality of sleep and the magnesium to help with digestion while my body is at rest. As I said above, I typically wake up between 3:30 and 4:30 each morning. On days that I don't have my first client until the afternoon I do my designated cardio, walk my dog, then head to the gym for my lift. On days that I have clients early in the morning I'll do my cardio, walk my dog, then shower and head to work for the day. Pretty simple stuff my friends.
As I said above I'll eat my first meal around 10. It's always larger meal consisting of 600-700 calories. I've made these amazing little breakfast sandwiches the past two days. I day dream about them. That's how good they are. Just 562 calories for two! #winning. I can't stress enough that it's important to ENJOY the food that you eat. I recently had to take a step back and re evaluate what I was eating because I wasn't enjoying the foods that I was preparing ahead of time. I didn't realize it at first, but this was one of the main reasons that I had been over eating! Take the time to cook. Learn new techniques and recipes. You should enjoy the process of cooking your food. This is one of the thing that I've made a greater effort to start doing more. And I'll tell you what, it makes a HUGE difference. Another thing that most people don't realize is that you can make the most simple foods taste really good. Take these sandwiches for example. They literally consist of turkey, seasoned fried eggs, a slice of cheese, 2 slices of bacon, and 2 small dinner rolls. That's it. Nothing fancy here. Just damn good food. Meal one is typically one of the largest meals of the day since it's breaking the 16 hour fast.
I typically eat my second meal around 1:30/2:00. This meal is usually between 300 and 400 calories. Below is an example of a pretty simple, yet damn good meal that consisted of a coconut crusted black bean burger, 2 oz of aged cheddar cheese, 3 tbsp roasted pine nut hummus, and sautéed veggies sprinkled with a little parmesan and seasoned with Trader Joe's Everyday seasoning.
Small Victories: Setting Daily Goals
I think it's important to set small goals for ourselves that we can achieve on a daily basis. The cool thing about these is that they start out as goals, but they eventually become second nature as part of your daily routine. When this happens, you come up with new goals and become an even bigger badass. Simple. Here are my current six:
1) Go to bed 100% satisfied with what I accomplished that day. No regrets.2) Do NOT hit snooze.
3) Stick to the fasting schedule.
4) Take a cold shower each morning.
5) Read or listen to something that is self improvement oriented.
6) Do 15-20 mins of yoga.
It doesn't matter how long the list is, just make one. Give yourself little things to work on and always focus on the small victories. This is what's going to get you to the finish line. Continue to take things one day at a time.
Until next time,
Kelsey
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