Losing weight

Since the latest info surely links obesity and EC, I suppose this fits here. I didn't want to hijack the thread the question was asked in--especially since it is a celebratory thread and we need to celebrate all we can!

Layne and I realized a few years ago we were overweight...and it was affecting our health. We needed to get that under control. Layne tried everything, atkins, salads, whatever. Then we both had an opportunity to be involved in biggest loser events--me through my homeschool group online and him at work. It gave us great motivation. We realized that we had to do two things: control our calories and move.

So we began walking. At first, I could barely make it to the end of the block. I couldn't believe I was so out of shape! We used to hike all the time up until about five years ago! But we walked anyway, going a bit further each day. Then, we started counting our calories. We decided a safe amount for our bodies to lose, and we targeted that amount of calories. If we wanted more, we could have it, but we had to offset with calorie burn (walking, running, working out.)

I started working with small weights, and doing Jillian's work out (which by the way is cruel.)

We did not say "Oh I can't eat that" to anything. We just knew we had to divide our calories to not be hungry all day, choose more wisely...we looked on food like you would your checkbook. Eating out of reserves we had for the day, not borrowing into the future. This way, if we wanted to have the bread with our pasta at Macaroni Grill, we could...but we had to jog a lot farther that night. OR we ate our sandwich for lunch with no bread!

We were doing really well, which is why when Layne's acid reflux went away, we thought it was due to lifestyle change.

Sigh wrong.....

We also began to eat mostly organic. We cut down our meat to servings only the size of a pack of cards (all you should have anyway) and increased our veggies. Everyone said "oh eating organic is expensive but no, if you eat less meat and buy more veggies it evens out! We also, by the way, saw huge change in our kids after this. Behavior improved, complexions improved...it was great.

That's how we did it.

Betty