EXPLORE.

3.19.2016

Chicken Parmesan & A Fitness Update

So if I haven't mentioned it before, Shay knows how to cook and I don't mean he knows how to make eggs and cereal, he's practically a chef. I got lucky and the inner fat girl of my past celebrates every day. This past week was rough. I don't really mention it too often on my blog but I live a pretty interesting lifestyle when it comes to food and working out. Basically my journey from weighing two hundred and twenty pounds most of my life has brought me to where I am now, which is give or take in the one twenty five range. My irrational goal that I had set for my life was to one day be skinny. My dream size was to somehow fit into a size four and currently I fit into a size double zero which still sounds crazy to me. It did not happen over night and it took quite a while and in no way has it somehow made me confident or happier or any of the promises that we often believe a certain weight or size is meant to bring us. 

Getting this skinny was never a rational thought for me so when I achieved that goal, my fitness and food journey was kind of stuck at a stand still. I wanted to be like the 'normal' girls I'd admired growing up and I never thought past that. When I met Shay he introduced me to a completely different realm of fitness and it's something that's very important and evident in my every day life. I train to reduce body fat now and live by a body building type of lifestyle. The closest realm that I would consider my training to identify with at the moment is that of a bikini competitor. I in no way ever plan on competing but I do plan on working towards a similar physique goal that I in turn can maintain healthily and happily. 

We follow a IIFYM lifestyle which bases how I live my every day. IIFYM stands for if it fits your macros and macros are essentially your protein, carb, and fat intake each day. So by understanding the amount of grams of protein or carb or fat that each food has you are able to manipulate how your body will react to your caloric adjustment. Before I was eating a certain amount of calories and had plateaued physically because I didn't understand the ratio my body needed to strive. We track every gram of food that we eat which sounds completely absurd to people, I'm sure but it's incredible how much of a science your body is and how the amount of each macro nutrient can affect your physique. 

Anyway, there's a lot that goes into it but the point of this post is to update you on my current routine and as of last week I began my cutting stage. So in order to reduce body fat you are going to want to be in a deficit of calories. My maintain caloric stage was at twelve hundred calories and so as of last week I dropped down to eleven hundred. I also increased my cardio to fifteen thousand steps a day and continued my gym routine of going every day and resting on Thursdays with a higher cardio, low carb day. Fridays and the posts I usually share with ya'll are cheat days which are really just refeed days where we refeed our bodies with carbs that we use as energy for workouts throughout the week. 

The number on the scale really matters to me. Formerly being obese and finally reaching a specific weight means that whenever that number changes I tend to get really scared and anxious. Last week in my deficit I gained a total of five pounds. Clearly since my goal was to drop six pounds from the weight I started at, this weight increase was not ideal and it was rough watching that scale show a number I hadn't seen in a while. 

I have a problem with being self-destructive and a part of that is binge-eating. The last day I binged was March 2nd and even though that wasn't too long ago, I'm incredibly proud of myself. Last week I could have easily binged or given up and the thought crossed my mind every second of every day. However, today I'm still going to go to the gym and I adjusted my macros to see if this split will provide better results and I'm going to keep going. My cutting goal is meant to be achieved by the end of April and at this specific moment in time that doesn't seem likely but that's ok. 

I'm healthy and I'm taking care of my body and I'm listening to it tell me what it needs and it's incredible. The amount of control that we are able to have and to use is incredible and it's interesting and a learning process each day. I'll probably update with fitness info every week or so purely because it's something that really affects me and I want to look back at the end of April or even next year and see how far I've come. 

Friday night was refeed and I didn't binge. My chef cooked us Chicken Parmesan with Garlic Cheesy Bread and I was still able to be happy and enjoy food and life. If that's not an accomplishment then what is?
SHARE:

No comments:

Post a Comment

© casuallyawkward. All rights reserved.
Blogger Template by pipdig
09 10