Well, yesterday I did better about tracking exactly what I ate, and I made it under my calorie goal for the day. Woohoo! One day down. It helps that I get a good number of extra calories allotted for the day through my exercise.
What about exercise? Is it helpful for weight loss or not? I know the experts say emphatically "YES!" And clearly I am on the exercise boat or I wouldn't be doing it. But I have my doubts as to whether or not exercise is a must. The first 20 pounds of my previous successful weight loss happened while I was not exercising at all. Literally. I was restricted to bed rest during my pregnancy and started losing weight like mad (even though normally you gain during pregnancy). It was 100% due to the diabetes diet I was on. This is important for me to keep in mind because sometimes exercise just isn't possible. Injuries and illness happen. (Boy, do they ever!) But lack of exercise won't derail me if I really make sure what I eat lines up with my non-activity status.
However, for the most part I am now a compulsive exerciser. On the whole it's a good thing. I average about 700 extra calories a day added to my food diary tracker because of my workouts. The tricky part is that exercise really increases my appetite. I don't know for whom it is an appetite suppressant but I am clearly not that lucky. When I finish a workout I am starving . . . and it is so tempting to feel like I get to "treat" myself for working so hard.
Those extra calories are my lifesaver though. They allow me to eat enough to feel full and still eat mostly the same stuff as the rest of my family. (I don't have the energy to cook myself something separate from everyone else, and my kids would howl at having to live off "rabbit food" all the time.)
More changes to come soon, but for right now I'm still going to keep working on making sure my food diary is super accurate!
No comments:
Post a Comment