"What are you doing for your Weight Loss?"

Many ask me what I am doing for my weight loss. I recently started following this plan recommended by trainer Brett Hoebel:

http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/brett-hoebels-30day-flat-belly-plan

Combine this diet with at least 30 minutes of exercise for 5 days a week, (the more you can do the better of course!) plus one-two cups of dieters tea a night. FIBER FIBER FIBER. PROTEIN PROTEIN PROTEIN!

  Shopping List

By eating these foods, you’ll avoid the simple sugars and processed foods that lead to belly fat.
Protein

Chicken
Turkey
Eggs
Note: Substitute one of these with other forms of protein like seafood, red meat, pork etc.

Complex Carbs

Sweet Potato
Brown Rice Cakes
Oatmeal
Leafy Greens (broccoli, spinach, asparagus, lettuce, kale, chard etc.)

Simple Carbs
Apples
Berries
Fat

Raw Nuts & Nut Butter (almonds, cashews, walnuts, almond butter, peanut butter)
Bonus Food: Beans. Legumes are a great source of protein, carbs, good fats and fiber.

Anti-Bloat Smoothie
Start your day off with this anti-bloat smoothie. It’s high in fiber, which prevents constipation. Additionally, it contains natural digestive enzymes that help to breakdown hard-to-digest foods that can cause bloating.

Ingredients
3/4 cup papaya
3/4 cup pineapple
1/2 pear, sliced
1 tsp ginger, fresh
1 tbsp flaxseed, ground
2 mint leaves (garnish)
1 cup water
1/2 cup ice

Directions
Blend all ingredients. Drink with probiotic straws to maximize the benefits of a healthy diet and support normal absorption and assimilation of nutrients in the gut.

MEAL PLAN #2

Upon Rising: Water and Fresh Lemon Juice
8 oz room temperature water
1/2 fresh lemon squeezed

Breakfast: Egg White Omelet and Sweet Potato Hash
4 egg whites
Spinach
Mushroom
Garlic
Salsa (tomato, onion, cilantro, sea salt)
1/2 small sweet potato, cut into squares or grated
1 onion, diced
Tip: Add 2 oz chicken or turkey for flavor and lightly coat pan with extra virgin olive oil using a paper towel.

Snack: Kale Chips
2 cups fresh kale, bake in preheated oven until crisp
Tip: Flavor kale with low sugar, low-salt substitutes like cinnamon, vanilla, raw cacao chocolate, curry, garlic powder or garlic salt.

Lunch: Lettuce Wrap Turkey Burger & Quinoa Salad
4-6 oz lean ground turkey
Onion and garlic, mixed into burger to taste
Tomato slices
Mushroom garnish
Large lettuce wrap, instead of bun
1/4 cup cooked quinoa
Mesclun salad greens
Onion and parsley garnish
Tip: Flavor meat with herbs and spices, mix an egg into the burger to moisten, and use low-sugar, low-salt dressing like extra virgin olive oil, lemon juice and apple rice vinegar for the salad.

Snack: Hummus With Raw Veggies
1/2 cup cooked garbanzo beans
1 tsp tahini paste
1/4 tsp sea salt
1 tsp extra virgin olive oil
Raw broccoli, cauliflower, asparagus, carrot, cucumber, tomato, pepper
Tip: Flavor hummus with different things like garlic, hot sauce, curry and cilantro.

Dinner: Fish and Chips
4-6 oz white fish (flounder, cod, halibut etc.)
Tip: broil the fish in fresh cut garlic, lemon slices and spices like rosemary to add flavor
1/2 sweet potato, thinly sliced
Tip: Flavor chips with spices like sea salt or garlic powder.

Bedtime Supplements
Tonalin CLA (1,000 mg)
L-Glutamine (5-10 g)

A great website for recipes is www.emlybites.com as well!


Besides eating right, your exercises and intensity levels will be key to your success. I have recently started Pilates, as well as intense walking and jump roping. Mountain Climbing [walking up incline] has also been effective. IT IS NOT EASY! Try to get activity in for at least 30-45 minutes into your day.

Plus Model Lizzie Miller for Glamour Magazine

Had to share this

Plus Size Model Lizzie Miller for Glamour Magazine

The American Glamour magazine featured this photo of Lizzie Miller, who is a radiant woman naturally smiling. The problem that many people saw in the photo: Her stomach wasn’t airbrushed to look perfect. This year, a new advertisement for Chanel shows Kiera Knightley scantily clad in just suspenders, with a significant change to her figure. Retouching women to make them thinner, sexier, and more appealing even happens to talented actors and musicians. Celebrities, although their looks are often coveted, are also not beautiful enough for our advertisements and magazines. Showing women without airbrushing not only empowers the individual subject, but also helps all women realize that there is no such thing as a perfect body. All of us age and have differences, and even the best models are still airbrushed and made up so that they’re not their real selves.

Weight Loss Journey, Diary 1

Hi there! Thanks for visiting. I wanted to create a blog to keep track of my weight loss goals and to inspire other men and women out there to make a change.
Making a change in YOURSELF, is the best kind of change anyone can ever do for themselves. Yes, you may say "Oh, I'm unhappy here (in whatever city you're living in), but is that because you are unhappy there or with YOURSELF?" That is what I have battled with for so long for so many years of my life. Am I unhappy in the city where I live, or just with myself? I found the answer. It is with myself.

I have always been overweight as long as I can remember. I was not raised in a healthy, organic, active family (No offense Mom you know you're a great cook!). I was raised on fast food, processed food, and not being too active.
I have also been a photographer for 7 years and 5 years professionally, always capturing someone else's external beauty, which will mess with your head for awhile to not focus on yourself.
Last year, I went to visit my best friend in the MidWest. He inspired me to begin this weight loss journey, which I am happy to say I have started. I have lost over 50 pounds. If it was not for him, I would probably still feel like I have no hope and always going to be fat. My work (photography) was my distraction from reality and focusing on someone else's beauty was a distraction as well.

I joined Weight Watchers last June. The support group was phenomenal. I do not credit them however for the diet part of it. I did non processed foods, occasional sweets to not feel deprived, two cups of dieters green tea a night, and worked out twice a day in the gym. I stopped going to WW in October, maintained the loss, and started doing my own routine again in April 2012. I now am trying to focus on muscle building, etc and still eating healthy. Start Weight: 307.6
Size 24 Pants

Start Weight photos:


Current Size 16


Goal Weight: 175 pounds, Size 6/8

First step into starting your weight loss goals:
1. Eat Organic
2. Make the gym/cardio machines your best friend
3. Accept your body type for what it is. If you're curvy like myself, accept it! Say you're beautiful. You are unique.
4. Support Groups always help
5. As WW always says "Eat Right, Stay Active, Repeat."
6. LOVE YOURSELF!



xoxox,
Jenn

I will be doing new entries weekly or bi-weekly, so be sure to Subscribe to my blog! Next Entry is about the gym routines and foods I eat!