This past Sunday was day 21 of our 21 Day Fix. However, we did cheat the last day and ordered heart shaped pizza for Valentine’s Day dinner and then had a whole bottle of wine in the hot tub that night. Whoops! So we didn’t finish strong (even though I ate way less pizza than I normally would have), but I was pretty impressed with our results. I lost 9.2 lbs and almost 12 inches! My husband lost 13.4 lbs and 14 inches! Our before and after pictures were shocking! I couldn’t believe the difference just 3 weeks made! I’m a little hesitant to show you these pictures because I still have quite a ways to go and holy crap those before pictures make me cringe a little. But I am proud of us and feel even more motivated to keep going.
The best part is how I feel. My back doesn’t hurt anymore like it used to and I feel stronger. My arms feel stronger and you can even see muscle tone. My clothes fit a little better and I am eating less, but I still feel satisfied. The most valuable thing we picked up from the program are better exercise habits. We’ve done our daily exercises even after the 21 days and we are going to keep going. We are eating way more fruits and vegetables and drinking more water. I have been eating breakfast regularly – which I never did before. This week we have been kind of slack on following the meal plan – but plan to go back at it hardcore next week. You can read about some of our healthy dinners here.
Last night, I made whole wheat spaghetti with ground turkey meat sauce, garlic bread, and a spinach salad. I made the same amount I always do (except only half a loaf of garlic bread instead of the whole thing) and we usually eat almost all of it with maybe one small serving left over for lunch the next day. This time – there was more than half left! I have two big servings left, and enough sauce to make 2 pizzas with. I couldn’t believe that! I was actually kind of disturbed that we were eating that much! Not only are our waists slimming but we are really saving money and food! Meal planning has helped a lot with food waste. We are planning to use leftovers as meals and leftover ingredients in the next days meals. I have hardly thrown out any food these past 3 weeks…and we were unfortunately really bad about that before.
Here are my top 10 tips that helped us succeed over the past 3 weeks:
- Meal plan. Exact meals with exact ingredients. “In failing to plan, you are planning to fail.”
- Use a water bottle with a measuring system on it. I had a hard time drinking all the water I supposed to in a day – and when I didn’t use a bottle it was game over and I wouldn’t even get close to enough.
- Keep hard boiled eggs in the refrigerator. Super easy protein for breakfast. And very filling. Also keeping washed/cut up fruits and vegetables in serving size storage bags or containers was extremely helpful and made grabbing a snack a lot easier.
- Get a comfortable/supportive pair of workout clothes. I only wore a random pair of yoga pants once or twice and spent the whole time picking my wedgie. Sorry for the visual. But how annoying.
- Use a set of weights that challenge you. I had a pair of 4lbs and a pair of 10lbs.
- Try not to weigh yourself everyday. Weight fluctuates and can really affect your mindset and motivation if you’ve been working hard and the next day the scale says you gained 2 lbs.
- Find a healthy salad dressing that you like. Because salads are a really easy way to get all those veggies in. I used this “ranch dressing” I found on Pinterest a lot.
- Go to bed early! Whenever we stayed up late – it was impossible to get up on time to work out the next day. We got really thrown off last week and ended up doing a lot of night time workouts. It’s so much better working out in the morning – plus it helps get your metabolism going to burn more calories throughout the day!
- I had a hard time giving up pop mostly because of the carbonation. Seltzer water/sparkling water with fruit or lemon juice can be a good replacement. We did try some flavored bottled water – but that has sucralose (Splenda) in it – an artificial sweetner, which we try to stay away from as much as possible.
- Find support! Whether it be a spouse or family member or from an online community. Someone to keep you accountable can be very helpful!
My workout buddy when I didn’t get up early enough!