Up To Date

Ok, so I wanted to start off by giving everyone a quick update on what I have been doing over the past month. My journey actually began a while back when I had met the lovely Nadine Dumas while working at a local gym in Calgary. For those of you that may not know her, I strongly recommend that you google her name...I am only saying this because any description I tried to write about her here would not due her justice! Back then she had sparked my interest in fitness competitions, but it wasn't until she and fellow friend Brandi Miskow launched the site www.whatittakes.com that my interest turned into a full boar goal. The site follows Brandi Miskow on her three month long journey towards a fitness competition as well as four weeks of post season (with Nadine Dumas as her coach of course!).
My first course of action was to get into contact with Nadine to work out a nutrition plan. I have always had what friends described as "the perfect body type". I could eat what I wanted, when I wanted and it would never show. However, over the past couple of years I have begun to notice some major changes (in particular I no longer had a super flat stomach and there were hints of love handles). I want to be clear off the bat and say that NO I never thought I was fat, but I became unhappy with my body. Another major reason for contacting Nadine was because of the way that I had begun feeling. I should warn you right now that when I set out to do this, I decided I would be brutally honest and shall not be censoring my comments ....so some of you are going to get to know me maybe a little too close :). So I am just going to come out and say it...I had TERRIBLE and UNCONTROLLABLE gas with all day bloating ( haha I think I re-wrote this sentence like 5 times!). Now, I am not just talking about the gas you get every once in a while because you ate too much, I am talking about "clear the room" type of gas EVERY DAY! Now, as a girl I am sure that you can all imagine how terrifying that was to live with (especially having to hold it back all the time, YIKES!). On a side note, I actually farted in front of my boyfriend on our second date..yeah I thought I was going to die! Imagine this, you are cuddled up watching a movie together in bed, you drift off to sleep to only be woken up to the sound of your own fart!!! I think I turned every shade of red that instant! He was a good sport about it and pretended not to hear it...well until I admitted it (then to my horror he ran off and told his roommates!). I decided I had had enough of this and it was time to break the silence. I had the courage to tell Nadine about my stomach issues and she took on the task of designing a nutrition plan for me.
My nutrition plan at the moment was based off of the fact that I wanted to lose about 10 pounds ( I was about 127lbs when I first started) and my goal was to be between 115lbs and 120lbs. I am happy to report that I have lost 8lbs in 30 days and my weight is now 119lbs! For me though it isn't really about the numbers on the scale. I can see huge changes in my body. For instance the majority of my pants don't fit anymore around the waist, my stomach is completely flat and best of all I no longer have any gas or bloating (that is probably my fav thing at the moment). Right now my diet is pretty restricted because we are trying to find out what kind of food sensitivities I have. I know now that I am lactose intolerant (which is too bad because I LOVE Dairy) and now I am trying to figure out if I am sensitive to wheat. I eat way more than I used to...6 times a day at around 6am, 9am, noon, 3pm, 6pm and 9pm (broken down into :breakfast, snack, lunch, snack, dinner, snack). Obviously, the protion sizes are a lot smaller but nonetheless I am not starving! The hardest thing for me was to give up candy! My obsession (and I truly mean that!) with chocolate has gotten out of control over the past year. It was no longer something that I wanted every so often, but something I NEEDED to have. The problem was, I would gorge myself on it. My motto was always "Eat till the milk is gone" referring to cereal of course, but really in the big picture it was my motto for anything sweet!I have always been terrible with self control when it comes to chocolate and candy! My sister could vouch for that one! She likes to tell people about the time that I had a chocolate craving so bad in the middle of the night that when searching the house yielded no sweets, I actually took to eating one of her 5 year old chocolate Easter bunnies (that's right...the chocolate was so old that it had started turning white!). The cravings for me would start right when I would get home from work. It was too early to eat dinner but I felt hungry and would raid the fridge and cupboards for things to snack on. For me, giving up the sweets was not as hard as I thought that it would be. Nadine asked me to go two weeks without cheating and I was able to do it no problem. I won't lie, I never would have thought that I could do it! After the two weeks, I had a Kit Kat as a reward and you know the funny thing is is that it didn't even really satisfy me. By this time my mind was made up, I would enter a fitness competition. I knew that if I could just get through the two weeks I could do anything...and since then things have gotten easier. Over time I developed a routine and it makes sticking to the plan so much easier. Since starting back at the gym I have allowed my a "cheat meal" on Sundays. So far, it has been tough because after eating so clean for 30 days my body is not handling "unclean" food as well. But I think it will just take some time getting used to it.
I also wanted to include my plans for the next few weeks now that I am back at the gym. I had help from my fantastic roommate Rhod in developing it. Even though I have a background in Kinesiology I have a hard time developing my own plans. I guess the problem lies more in sticking to them. I always look around at what people are doing in the gym and then think, "huh, that actually is a good idea...maybe I should be doing that instead". Another problem I have is that I read too much...I know sounds weird! To clarify, there is so much research available out there that I just want to read it all. I feel strongly about educating yourself before you begin any endeavor. Sometimes though, it is hard to decide what is accurate and what isn't. Everyone seems to have an opinion about everything. So I figured, leave it to a professional! Anyways, the following is my gym plan for the next 4 weeks:
I am at the gym Monday- Friday, Saturdays I do cardio (spin class) and Sunday is my day off
Monday- Chest, Upper Back and Abs
Tuesday-Shoulders, Calfs
Wednesday- Biceps, Triceps, Abs
Thursday-Chest, Lower Back
Friday- Legs, Abs