Recent Pictures

Since the pictures I have on here are from a few years ago, here are some pics of me from a month ago on vacation with my boyfriend in Jamaica. Even though I was about 125lbs when I went, I was feeling pretty flabby since I hadn't been working out for almost two months. My boyfriend was looking really good though! I lent him my copy of P90X when we first started dating and he had finished two rounds of it by the time we went on vacation. Jamaica is beautiful, I definitely recommend it!

New Start

It's been almost three years since I've blogged and oh, how things have changed. While I may have not documented my fitness journey online, I did not stop working towards my fitness goals. It took close to two years to meet and then surpass my goal weight of 130lbs. I set a new goal to reach my "happy" weight of 125 by January 1st, 2011. On that New Years Day, I weighed in at 123lb, beating my original goal. It was incredible to start a new year without having one of my resolutions be to lose weight. That changed my mind set and I was able to focus all my attention on other personal goals that had nothing to do with my body. I switched from casual dating to trying to find a meaningful relationship. I went back to school to work on a career in the medical field.

Seven months ago, I met my boyfriend and because of him I've been the happiest I ever have been. But like most women who enter serious relationships and fall in love, my eating habits started to change. Instead of making my own meals, we would go out to dinner or order a pizza. The weight I worked so hard to lose was slowly starting to creep back on. After four months of dating, I had gained back 8 pounds and was at 130lbs. I did manage to lose five of those pounds in time for a trip to Jamaica at the beginning of January this year, but barely a month later I'm up to 132lbs.

It's time to change my lifestyle again, which is why I'm back on my blog. Even if no one ever reads my posts, this is a way to keep myself accountable and hopefully stick to the good habits I know work. Tomorrow I start my new workout schedule and am going back to my gluten-free, semi-low carb diet. I know it will be very tough at times but I'm excited for this change.

Erin Vs. Insanity

Well, I've taken the plunge and made the decision to stop P90X and start Insanity. I started my first day on August 2nd and have been keeping up with the workout schedule. I'll admit, I was more nervous to start this program than the X. But I decided I would do as much as I could do and then modify moves until I was ready for them. So I put a smile on my face and pushed play! Here's my day one pic right before doing the fit test:

The fit test was incredibly intense and my final numbers are pretty pathetic compared to the people in the video. But it gives me hope and motivation that the next time I take the fit test I will do much better! Here's my numbers:

Looking forward to what results this program will bring me!

To happy life & good health!

Erin

My Weight in Pictures

My heaviest: 148lbs

Eww flabby arms @ 144lbs

A respectable 135lbs

Fit at 123lbs

Too skinny at 102 lbs

Nutrition: The Real Key to Success

I'm sure most people have heard this or something similar: "Weight loss is 90% diet, 10% exercise". Honestly, I have found this to be quite true. If you are trying to lose weight, you absolutely have to adjust your eating habits. It is just not possible to lose weight in a healthy way by eating a box of doughnuts and exercising like crazy. Who would really want to? I've learned the most efficient way to lose weight is to eat a proper diet full of fresh, whole foods. GET RID OF PROCESSED FOODS! Seriously, I cannot emphasize that enough. Also beware of fat-fee foods, these are sometimes pumped full of sweetners to make the product taste better. Always read food labels! A good rule of thumb is if you can't pronounce any of the ingredients or there are more than five ingredients, put it back! Joining a food tracking site was extremely helpful to me. You need to make sure you are eating enough calories (starvation does not equal weight loss, sometimes it's the opposite!) and keeping the right balance between your carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. Play with your ratios until you find one that makes you feel best! Most people seem to prefer 50% carbs, 30% protein, 20% fat while others prefer higher protein levels.

Finding the right combination of foods has been extremely difficult for me. Starting in high school, I began to have stomach/intestine problems. I often had strong pains (like cramps) in my abdomen and had no idea what was causing it. My mom and I came to the conclusion that perhaps I was lactose intolerant. I still believe I am lactose intolerant but not all dairy affects me the same. I handle skim milk pretty well, but I get really sick after having a milkshake. Perhaps it's nature's way of keeping me away from those fatty drinks. In college, I was still having digestion issues. I thought perhaps I had IBS, which seems to have evolved into a blanket term for a bunch of symptoms with not a lot of options for treatment except diet restriction. When I first adopted my healthy lifestyle, I relied heavily on whole grains. Every one of my five small meals a day had some form of wheat in it. Toast, cereal, & pasta were all staples of my new diet. It baffled me that my digestion issues increased enormously when I started eating better. I thought it was just my body adjusting and so I gave it time. But when three months went by and I still wasn't getting better, I knew I had to look into other possible causes. It was only recently that it occurred to me that I might have a gluten sensitivity. These past few weeks, I decided to test my theory by cutting out all wheat products and replaced them with other sources of natural carbs, like fruit and quinoa. I feel so much better and no longer have any digestion issues, which is so so so amazing to me! My new gluten-free & eating-clean diet combined with Beachbody's Shakeology meal replacement (yummy and fills my nutritional gaps!) have helped me quit my need to depend on caffeine to get me through the day. Anyone who knows me know that I have an addiction to Pepsi. Seriously, that stuff is like cigarettes to me. When I was in high school, I would drink a 20 oz bottle to get me through the school day and then drink three cans when I came home. But when I cut Pepsi out of my diet, I went through serious caffeine withdrawal and started to drink large amounts of coffee to compensate for it. Now after adjusting my diet I am so happy to say I wake up earlier, stay awake longer (no naps!), and sleep better at night. Finding the right nutrition for your body will make you want to do your own little happy dance because it makes you realize how slow and tired your body felt before you made the change!

To happy life and good health,

Erin

Who is Erin?

Here’s a little background of who I am and what I plan on becoming professionally:

I am currently finishing up my last year at Loyola University and will graduate with a degree in psychology. After graduation, I plan on enrolling in nursing school. After attaining a nursing degree, I will work as a psychiatric nurse while continuing graduate nursing studies. My dream is to eventually work in the field of pediatric nursing, perhaps even in neonatal care.

My Fitness & Nutrition History:

I have always been thin and mentally, I still envision myself the way I was in high school. I started dancing ballet when I was three years old and was very active in it until I had to quit due to scheduling conflicts when I was 15. I have never been a “sporty” girl. I played softball very briefly when in elementary school but quit because I was bored in the outfield and kept getting hit in the head when I was up to bat. I never had to worry about what I ate because I always stayed thin due to my high activity level from ballet. After hitting puberty in high school, I grew to my adult height of 5’3 ½ “. After finishing my growth spurt, I weighed only 102 pounds and looked anorexic. By the time I graduated high school, I was a healthy 125 and everyone agreed I looked much better with some curves on me. When I entered college, I was well aware of the “freshman fifteen” warning, which I tried hard to avoid. I worked out and ate fairly well and only gained about five pounds. Then the summer before my sophmore year, I fell into a deep depression. I attributed the source of my depression to my recent conclusion that I was giving up on my lifelong dream of becoming a doctor. I had realized I wasn’t cut out for the kind of life and time commitment medical school and subsequent residency would require. I am not a competitive person and didn’t think I would even be admitted to medical school. Letting go of my dream was extremely hard because I had no idea what I would do with the rest of my life. I always knew healthcare was where I was supposed to be and couldn’t even think to consider other possibilities. I, like many others, fed my feelings. I would buy pints of chocolate peanut butter hagen daaz (often three to four times a week) and eat it all in one sitting. I would eat McDonald’s almost every day on my way to work. I rarely went to my classes and for the first time in my academic career, I failed a class and received only passing grades in others. Work was the only thing I would get out of bed to do but my job performance was poor due to my sour attitude. I retreated from my friends and family. Even though I am a psychology major, I never really thought I was in a depression. I had no feelings of sadness or suicidal thoughts. I was instead filled with an intense and overwhelming feeling of apathy. I no longer cared about my grades, my appearance, or my future. Nothing seemed worth working for in my mind. In the summer of 2008, I finally broke out of my depression by setting new life goals. I took a nursing assistant class and discovered how much I would enjoy nursing, perhaps even more than I would enjoy being a doctor. But my depression had caused major damage to both my academic grade point average and to my body. At the end of my depression, I had gained about eighteen pounds. At 148 pounds, I felt extremely uncomfortable and unhappy. At my adult height, I’ve seen what my body looks like at a variety of weights, from being too skinny at 102 pounds to being too flabby and round at 148 pounds. To me, I feel I looked my best when I was in the 120-125 pound range. I made the decision at the start of my junior year to start living healthier and to lose twenty-three pounds to reach my ideal weight. Unfortunately, I would only make it through a few weeks of walking and dieting before breaking down and eating unhealthy food for two or more weeks. It wasn’t until February 2009 when I started to get serious. I had joined an online food tracker site, called myfitnesspal.com, and after logging all my food for a few days, I become aware of just how low my calorie intake was. I was generally eating around 900 calories a day, which anyone versed in nutrition will tell you is an absolute no-no. After surfing the message boards and reading everyone’s diet and exercise tips, a few things kept coming up again and again. The first was everyone kept raving about something called P90X. I had never heard of it before and thought it was some type of gym equipment! I had asked my mother about it and she informed that she actually owned it, but never really stuck with the plan for longer than a couple of weeks. She quickly told me about how it was a series of workouts intended for people who are already in decent athletic shape. I watched her do some of the workouts and knew that I wasn’t quite ready for the X yet. The other exercise program people raved about on myfitnesspal.com was called Turbo Jam. Members loved that it was fun and energizing. Having a strong dance background, I thought I’d give it a try. I was SO excited when my Turbo Jam set of six different workouts arrived in the mail and instantly loved it. I even followed the diet plan the best I could. As much as I loved doing Turbo Jam , I felt like I wasn’t working out enough. Then I heard of Chalene’s other program, Chalean Extreme, that had been released a few months earlier. I immediately ordered it and was really happy with the intensity of the weight-lifting workouts. But I hit a bump about two months in to the three month program. I went on a two week vacation to North Carolina and Florida. I ate somewhat well the first week in North Carolina but when I arrived in Florida and started going to all the theme parks of Disney and Seaworld, I was extremely naughty with my eating. At the end of the vacation, I gained back all of the weight I had lost with Chalean Extreme and Turbo Jam. I was so disappointed with myself and unhappy with how my body felt. I knew it was time for a major change. I made the decision to change my workout plan and also my diet. Now, I've started doing P90X & Turbo Jam and am so excited with the results I've already started to see! This is one step forward on a very long road and I can't wait to see where it will lead.

To happy life & good health,

Erin