How Did I Start My Fitness Journey?

Hey world 🌎

I’ve been thinking about publicly sharing a snippet of my personal weight loss journey since I’ve had a lot of people ask, “How do you do it?” “How do I start?” If you would like to know how I began my health and fitness journey and what I did to lose weight/gain muscle within 7 months, keep reading on. I also attached links to some of the strategies I used from people and the web if you are interested in learning more.

Are You Mentally Prepared?

Having a strong mental space is key. Without being mentally prepared to embark on your health and fitness goals, you will see major inconsistencies. First, you have to acknowledge the problem of your relationship with food and why you want to change old habits. For me, I have always struggled with being overweight and my body image. I developed underlying health issues (high cholesterol, pre-diabetes, precancerous cervical cells) and I was also struggling mentally.

I was at my heaviest when I weighed around 183 lb back in the beginning of March 2020. Right when quarantine went into effect, I began my health and fitness journey to lose weight. A heartbreak during that time encouraged me to push myself to do better for my life, and I knew that for the longest, I've always wanted to lose weight and improve the quality of my life.

Knowledge is Power; Unlearn Old Habits and Misinformation About Health and Fitness

It takes the ability and willingness to unlearn old habits before you completely understand the importance of health and fitness as a lifestyle. Before I started my journey, I knew that being healthy was important for my life, but I didn't understand how my habits were pushing me back from reaching my health goals. I also did not understand the meaning behind nutritional facts when buying groceries or serving sizes (I hate numbers). I would eat more than 1 serving size indicated, such as an entire bag of flaming hot cheetos and two ramen pacakges when 1 pacakge= 530 calories. Now that I understand serving sizes and what foods are considered high calorie, it's much easier to weigh my options. I used to think my weight gain was due to my slow metabolism and at a certain point, I started to think that I was just "thick." Every body is different and we are built differently, however, weight gain from having a slow metabolism is a myth. Check this out from an article from Vox:

"There are several predictors of how fast or slow a person’s metabolic rate will be. These include the amount of lean muscle and fat tissue in the body, age, and genetics. Women tend to burn fewer calories than men. Having a higher metabolic rate means your body uses food for fuel (instead of storing it as fat) more quickly. But you can still gain weight if you consume more calories than your body needs. Counterintuitively, heavier people generally have higher metabolic rates than skinny folks to meet the fuel demands of their larger bodies." - Julia Belluz

Key point here is that if you consume more calories than your body needs, you will gain weight, regardless of how fast or slow your metabolism is. An athlete may be consuming much more calories and still stay lean because they are constantly active and training hard, versus an overweight person who isn't as active and consumes about the same amount of calories as an athlete, will see more weight gain. Or, you can be working out a lot but if your diet is trash, and you consume more calories than your body needs, you will gain weight or remain in the same weight range. Women typically consume 1,400-1,500 calories in order to lose weight, which is what I started with too.

Strategies; Diet, Exercise

I began by doing a bunch of cardio all in the comfort of my home— mainly on the stationary bike twice a day and 30 mins each. Not once have I been to the gym throughout my weight loss journey. So if you can't access a gym, no worries. Walk up the stairs for 30 mins or more, take an hour walk at the park, do cardio exercise videos at home (like I did) and make sure you stay in a caloric deficit. When it came to my diet, I pushed myself to cut down meal portions while I was still eating 3 meals and healthier snack options (Stacey's Pita Chips + hummus dip, popcorn, fruits, Halo Top ice cream). I then learned about the amazing Chloe Ting, where I began doing her free workout programs on YouTube. I started noticing my weight going down from 183 to 178 lb just by changing and shifting my diet and adding more exercise to my day, but I wanted more results. I discovered the ketogenic diet and made my first burger buns from scratch (low carb). Keto was cool and all, I noticed a huge drop in my weight at first, then realized it might’ve just been water weight because I bounced back up to the higher 170’s. Carbs are also important to consume and I didn't like that I had to cut something out of my diet. I also wasn't focusing on calorie intake as much when I was on keto. I did keto for about a month or 2 and missed pizza and noodles, so I decided to try intermittent fasting. That’s when I saw the most progress in my weight loss.

I have been following a lot of Chloe Ting’s home workouts in these past few months and have been sticking to intermittent fasting which has been so beneficial to my weight loss. At first, I was very strict — I religiously did the 16/8 method where I would start my first meal at 11am, fasted for 8 hours, had my last meal at 7pm and fasted for 16 hours until my next meal the next day. I would eat pretty much anything I wanted but always made sure to include veggies and stick to the plan. Some days, I did the OMAD method ( One Meal A Day) which I don’t highly recommend for a sustainable diet, but very effective for fast weight loss. Intermittent fasting helped me have less cravings and I started to get used to not having to snack throughout the day when it wasn’t my eating hour window. Intermittent fasting is not for everyone, but it was quite of an easy transition for me since I didn’t care much for breakfast and eating only two meals a day helped me save money and budget better💰.

Present Time

Fast forwarding to the present time, I currently weight around 139–140 lb. I’ve lost around 45 pounds since March from doing what I’ve been doing. I am still intermittent fasting, but am more flexible and lenient when needed or when I feel like it. I learned that being mindful of calories in and calories out is crucial, whether I was fasting or not or having 2 meals or more. Staying in a caloric deficit is key to weight loss. Social media makes weight loss look more difficult than it seems. Granted, losing weight is hard because everyone is different, but everyone has the ability to achieve weight loss. You do not need to go on extreme crash diets, you do not need to do hit workouts. It's as simple as consuming less calories, and talking an hour walk. Some great fitness coaches/public figures I have been learning so much from, are Greg Doucette, ObesetoBeast, and Chloe Ting. There are also some really great videos from other people who are also on a health and fitness journey on Youtube to check out for inspiration and knowledge.

Right now, I am trying to gain muscle because I’ve noticed a decrease in my muscle growth because I was losing weight from a lot of cardio. I've realized that not only do I want to be more lean, but I want to feel strong and see gains 💪🏼 I’ve been doing resistance training, beginners weight lifting as well as getting in my cardio daily (5–6 days a week). Having a balance of both cardio and weight training is what I am focusing on right now ! My weight goal is to be around 130–135 lb.

I hope you enjoyed learning about some of my methods to lose weight and how I’ve been doing in this fitness journey. I’m still a work in progress, but I’m so happy at how far I’ve come. I feel so much happier and confident in my body and I no longer have high cholesterol, pre-diabetes or cancerous cells. I’ll admit I do have body dysmorphia, but this is way before my weight loss. I’m still working on my mental health, some days are better than others and I try to stay as productive and active to keep myself going ! Please let me know if you have any questions about my journey, I know there a few things I didn’t get to touch on for the sake of the length of this post, but I’d be more than happy to share my time management with exercise and work, mental health, challenges, food recipes etc. I’d also love to hear your health and fitness journeys too ❤️