Advice,  Lifestyle,  Mental Health

Let’s Talk Mental Health – My Weight Loss & Body Toning Tips

 

For a very long time, my weight has constantly fluctuated. I’ve always believed in being positive about my body, even as an obese child but a couple of years ago I found that I’d go through periods of time where I’d just pile on the weight, not realising that they were linked to my mental health. Either I would be going through a really happy time, in which case, I’d eat better or, I’d be going through a really crappy time, in which, I’d find myself comfort eating and surprise, surprise, I’d pile the weight on. Having an office job didn’t help either!

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One of my school friends Patterson (Link To His Instagram) is a PT and for as long as I can remember, he’s talked about consistency. Through my mental health highs and lows, I tried different things like taking up different forms of exercise and different diets (like the Keto diet – bloody hell that nearly finished me off…) but one thing I’ve also learned from Pat is that, different things work for different people.

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Around February this year, me and Sean went through a bad patch where I decided to really work on being a constant positive for myself before the weight piled on. I started getting my eyelashes done every month and I looked at the life style I led. At the time, I was going to karate every week which ticked the exercise box, but I had to be honest to myself, I have and will always love food, so I did a little research and decided to try intermittent fasting (eating between an 8 hour window) and planking for a minute in the morning and a minute at night.

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I’ll be the first to admit, I can be lazy when trying to stick to healthy eating, so I need to trick myself. I have always believed in a balanced diet as it is, but that means as well as trying to eat healthier, I also don’t stop myself from eating cake because I simply can’t and won’t survive without cake… As I’ve also said on my Instagram, I don’t believe in weighing myself because although I am the heaviest I have been, in years, I’m back to wearing size 8/10 clothes so, it’s all about how I feel when I look in the mirror!

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Why the planking? Well, I’ve never had abs but I’ve always wanted to be more toned around my belly. I always put on weight on my boobs (which I love) it also goes straight to my belly which I hate. My old work pal Chris, who also happens to be a trainer, showed me that high intensity training can make the world of difference so, between my lashes, trying to watch what I eat (but not being stupidly strict) for 8 hours in the day, 2 minutes worth of planking and a few pull ups a day, both my mental and physical health improved.

 

When  I really look at it, I have realised that I’ve been on this journey since the end of 2017 and this is where consistency comes back into it. I started by taking a look at the foods I love to eat as well as The British Nutrition Foundation, which gives lots of advice on things like nutrition and portion control. Instead of making myself each chicken, broccoli and rice (which I hate), I make salads with additions like eggs and chicken, which I loveeee! I don’t weigh my food, but I loosely know what my portions should look like so I try to stick to that as well. To me, diet is 80% of the battle so by having a consistently balanced diet has helped me both physically and mentally because I’ve found, when I eat well, my mind works better and I see things in a positive way. The more positive and consistent I stay, the easier it is even when I have my mental health dips. At the end of the day, I know I can be lazy and I also know lumps and bumps are part of life so there’s no point in me trying to get a body even models don’t have when I should be proud of my own!

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As you can see from my pictures at the top going into 2018, it’s not happened overnight. It’s a process that has turned into a lifestyle I’m happy with, which is the most important thing. I’m sure we all have things we’d change about ourselves so a part of it is being realistic with yourself an accepting that you will never have a perfect body because no one will.

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