Stop Chasing A Number

I know exactly how it feels to be over weight and badly out of shape.  My weight loss journey began over five years ago when I topped out at 215.  After almost four years I had gotten down to my lowest, 167.  Today I'm around 180.  The three pictures below reflect me at approximately those weights.
 

When I began my journey, it was all about hitting 190 on my 30th birthday.  That was all I thought about from the day I set that goal, six months before my 30th, until the morning of my birthday when I got on the scale and it read 185.  It was a fantastic feeling to know that I was capable of setting a goal and then surpassing it.  I spent a couple months enjoying what I had accomplished before setting a goal to reach 175.  After I got down to 175, my goal became 170.  When I hit 170 I was completely satisfied, or so I thought.  My weight teetered from 167 to 172 for about a year or so before I realized that all I was, was a bag of bones and belly fat.

I had lost 45 pounds but had hardly anything to show for it.  I had a bit more confidence but for the most part I still walked into a room doubting my every move.  Yes, I had lost 45 pounds but I had the muscle mass of a fifteen year old.  Yeah, I had lost 45 pounds but I was still unable to be completely happy with who I had become.  Losing a lot of weight, or finally reaching what you feel to be your ultimate number on the scale, doesn't always mean you'll feel as happy and perfect as you thought you would.

What I have realized over the past year is, it's not about a number on the scale.  It's about hard work, challenging your body, sweating your butt off and doing things you never thought possible.  My confidence level when I was at 170 was probably a two out of ten; today my confidence is probably at an eight or nine. At 170 my overall happiness was probably a six or seven and today it is a ten every single day of my life.

Are you ready to stop chasing a number and start chasing a greater you?  

Throw away your scale and never look back.  I promise, if you start training to become a greater you: your stress levels will decrease, you energy levels will increase, you self-confidence will increase and inevitably your body fat will decrease.  Your journey should be about feeling the greatest you have ever felt, not just about a number on the scale.

So how do you start chasing a greater you?  You push yourself to accomplish things you never thought possible.  You don't even need a gym to become a greater you; if you can move your own body weight, you can start there.  Push ups, pull ups and squats can all be done with out weights and are a great measure of total body strength.  If you do have a gym at your disposal, the options are limitless as to how you can achieve a greater you.

My keys to success: find a training system that excites you, don't limit yourself, train with someone, don't join a gym without a week trial membership, lift heavy, don't be afraid of what others think.  ~jason b.

How Under Eating and Stress Effect Weight Loss | Part 2

In Part 1 we discussed how under eating can effect weight loss and even lead to weight gain.  In Part 2 we will discuss the ways that stress can effect your weight loss.  We will go over Cortisol, Acute stress, Chronic stress and how it all relates to weight loss or lack there of.

First thing we need to talk about is Cortisol.  Cortisol is a steroid hormone that's functions include: blood pressure regulation, metabolism of glucose, maintenance of blood sugar and maintenance of the immune system.  Cortisol is often called the stress hormone because it is also released in response to stress.  Cortisol released during acute stress gives you a sudden burst of energy, a higher pain threshold, increased immunity and improved memory.  This is called the fight or flight response and our bodies were designed to handle such acute stress as being chased by, or hunting, wild animals.

Are bodies however are not designed to handle the chronic stress in our lives such as: high pressure/hectic jobs, social commitments, your child's future, being caught in traffic daily and even stepping on your scale can be a chronic stress.  Chronic stress can be the cause of headaches, high blood pressure, heart problems, diabetes, asthma, arthritis, depression and anxiety.  Both depression and anxiety can cause an individual to turn to food as a way to comfort themselves.  Having a high pressure/hectic job can lead to eating on the go (likely fast food) or they may even begin under eating.  Those are just a few ways that chronic stress can effect weight loss by effecting our eating habits.

Now let's discuss how chronic stress and Cortisol can effect weight loss from within.  When Cortisol is released during chronic stress, it stimulates the production of glucose in the liver; at the same time it signals the body to conserve glucose in the blood stream.  What is glucose?  Glucose is your body's fuel; produced when your body breaks down all the nutrients you ingest or when your liver produces it during chronic stress.  As we know, your body through your BMR and your activity levels we can burn 'X' amount of glucose (calories) as fuel.  When we don't burn the amount of glucose we have available for energy, the remaining glucose will be stored as fat.    

I'll try to make it a little simpler: chronic stress releases Cortisol which stimulates our body to not only conserve glucose but produce more of it; not taking into consideration the glucose that is broken down from our ingested nutrients.  Since we can only burn so much glucose as energy through our day, the glucose that is not burned as energy is stored as body fat.  

Stress can not only effect your weight loss by you turning to food as comfort for depression or anxiety, it can cause you to make bad food choices / under eat and it can also slow your weight loss due to hormonal imbalances.

Keys to success:  schedule lunch breaks away from work, minimize social commitments, take the road less traveled, meditate, take deep relaxing breaths, eat nutritionally dense foods, follow a sleep schedule, exercise regularly, exercise with a purpose, lift weights, punch a punching bag, do what you love, smile, laugh and high five.  -jason b.

How Under Eating and Stress Effect Weight Loss | Part 1

If burning more calories then you consume is the key to weight loss; wouldn't it then make sense that consuming fewer calories would then result in greater weight loss?  And then it would also seem to hold true that once one is no longer constantly hungry, one would be able to consume even fewer calories and then even greater weight loss would be the result.  Mathematically it makes complete sense but that's not how this works.

As you consume fewer and fewer calories, your body will go into 'starvation mode'; your body's response to starvation where your metabolism slows to conserve calories.  The longer your body is in 'starvation mode' the slower your metabolism and we all know, the slower your metabolism the harder it is to lose weight.  

This is an obstacle that I dealt with first hand during my weight loss journey.  It's was a very, very hard idea to grasp because after all it was eating that got me fat, right?  Well, kind of.  It was crap like: frozen pizza, macaroni and cheese, heavily buttered popcorn, fast food and high daily alcohol consumption that got me fat.  

Weight loss isn't a diet, it's a life style change!  What we should be doing is trading our "crap" in for nutrient dense foods.  Here is a fantastic way of thinking about it: If it grows on a plant, eat it.  If it was made in a plant, leave it.  The closer to raw your food is, the better it is for you.  

Now for the tricky business; figuring out our calorie deficit and the number of calories we should be consuming.  Since everybody and every body is different, every calorie deficit is different.  In studies it has been proven that your body can extract 31.4 calories per pound of body fat daily for energy.  After that your body will begin to burn lean muscle mass as fuel (this is how you get skinny fat!).  So your calorie deficit each day will be 31.4 cal./lb of body fat.  

Calculating Your Calorie Deficit = 31.4 calories / lb of body fat

(your weight x % of body fat = pounds of body fat)   |   (lbs of body x 31.4 = calorie deficit)

example: 185 x .14 = 25.9   |   25.9 x 31.4 = 813 (my calorie deficit)

Now that we've figured our calorie deficit we need to figure how many calorie we are burning each day.  Step one is to calculate our Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR).  Our BMR is the number of calories we burn daily by simply being alive.

Basal Metabolic Rate (BMR) Equation

Female: 655 + (4.35 x weight in lbs) + (4.7 x height in inches) - (4.7 x age in years) = BMR

Male: 65 + (6.23 x wight in lbs) + (12.7 x height in inches) - (6.8 x age in years) = BMR

example: 65 + (6.23 x 185) + (12.7 x 65) - (6.8 x 33) = 1837 (my Basal Metabolic Rate)

Step two is taking our activity factor and multiplying it by our BMR.

Activity Factors

1.2  Sedentary (Little or no exercise and a desk job)

1.375  Lightly Active (Little exercise, 1-3 days / week)

1.55  Moderately Active (Moderate exercise, 3-5 days / week)

1.725  Very Active (Hard exercise, 6-7 days / week)

1.9  Extremely Active (Daily exercise and a demanding job)

example: 1837 BMR x 1.725 = 3168 (total number of calories I burn daily)

Now that we have figured our calorie deficit (calories burnt from our body fat per day) and our total number of calories burnt daily, we can figure how many calories we should be consuming to meet our energy demands. 

Calories Needed to Meet Energy Demands

Calories Burnt per Day - Calorie Deficit = Calories Needed

example: 3168 - 813 = 2310 (calories I need to consume)

One thing I really want to drive home: weight loss is a lifestyle change and not a diet.  The weight you are trying to lose was not gained in days or a few months, so you should not expect to lose this weight in days or a few months.  You will have set backs.  You will have days where you just don't feel like exercising.  You will have days where it is impossible to stay on track nutritionally.  You must accept that as a part of life and remember they are set backs, not failures.  If life was perfect and easy, no one would be over weight and we'd all have six packs.  

Keys to success:  eat nutritionally dense foods, follow a sleep schedule, limit stress, exercise regularly, exercise with a purpose, lift weights, do what you love, smile, laugh and high five.  -jason b.