Matty Bipolar II Journal: 02/26/2011

I haven't posted in my Bi-Polar II Journal for a while, because I have been able to take control of it for the most part. My vitamins, diet, and exercise has had me feeling great, even during my depression dips. I do have to say that it is weird (even to me) to say that I am happy during my depressions, but its true. I know I am in the depression because it becomes harder to find the motivation to exercise and I tend to be more quiet in general.

If you have been reading my Weight Loss Journals then you would know that I have been on a diet, created by me, and have been keeping track of my calorie burn/intake. I am finding that it is a lot harder to stay away from junk food when I am in my depression dip. Although I am not depressed or hate myself (quite the contrary, this is the first time in my life that I actually like myself), I am having a hard time avoiding the little things that make me happy like sugar and junk food. I am still keeping track of the calories, but it is hurting my diet even if I stay under my daily calorie intake of 1870.

I am not going to beat myself up over this though. I only lost 1 pound last week because of it, but at least it is a loss. I will just keep moving forward on my diet, because when I am normal and manic it is really easy to make healthy choices. With any diet, you need to give yourself some wiggle room to cheat from time to time. For me I know it will be during my depression dips. Since I am normal and manic more often then depressed during my Bi-Polar cycle, I know over all I will loose weight. I will never look like an underwear model, but at least I will be healthier then I am now and will be able to be active the way that I want to be.

With all choices we make in life, it is always more beneficial to look at things with a positive attitude and never give up. Although life is hard, it doesn't mean that you get to give up. Just because you slip, doesn't mean you're dead and as long as you can keep moving forward, then you will eventually reach your goals. Even if it takes longer then you expected. Everyone has their road blocks, one of mine just happens to be a chemical imbalance in my brain called Bi-Polar II. Learning to live with our road blocks and finding ways to get around them is what makes us strong individuals.

Keep an eye on my Weight Loss Journals and watch me shrink! Despite my road blocks! ;p

Weight Loss Journal: 2/25/2011

I only lost 1 pound this week. Although I have been keeping my calories under my burn amount, I have not been eating the best foods and my portions have been too big. This week I am going to decrease my portion size per meal and eat more often through out the day. I did work out 2 days this week, but I think that I ate too much food after the workout's and negated them. There is also a possibility that my body is in shock from the change and is trying to store fat to prepare which is in turn creating a plateau. Either way, I still need to work on eating healthier foods. Stay tuned for next week to see how things go!

Weight Loss Journal: 2/18/2011

I lost a little over 3 lbs, which is what I thought I would loose. My trainer gave me a tip to help me from hurting my knees, put the treadmill at an incline. It is working, I can get a great workout in and my knees feel fine. I worked myself too much yesterday and was on the treadmill for 2 hours. The time is not a problem, but I allowed my heart rate to hit 175 which is not good. I think in the future I will only do an hour or stop when my heart rate gets over 155, which ever is longer. That plus my weight lifting 3 days a week should give me a great workout and maximize my fat burning. I don't want to work my body too hard because it will freak out and start storing more fat to prepare. I need to make sure I keep to a happy medium of diet and exercise to promote fat burning but not shock my body into storing.

My diet is going well also, I could eat better foods and I am working on increasing my vegetable consumption. I have been making sure that I am eating whole grains, fiber, and protein before my workout and protein after the workout, which is good. That gives you the energy for the workout and also helps heal the muscles. IcyHot has become my friend lol.

The BodyBugg has also helped a lot. It acts like a constant reminder of what I need to do. Instead of a string on my finger, it is a sensor on my left triceps and a watch. When I feel hungry I can just look at it and decide if I need to eat or if I should just have some water for now.

The future is looking good and so will I. ;p

Weight loss Journal: Intro 2/11/2011

To start out, the first picture is me in 1999 when I weighed 450+ lbs and in the picture above I weigh 281.6 lbs. So far I have lost over 170 lbs. Although that is a great weight loss, I want to loose more weight and I am using it as my new before photo.

This week I weighed in at 276.6 lbs for a weight loss of 4.8 lbs. Not bad for a week and taking into account that I could not work out because I am still healing from my car accident 2 weeks ago. Next week I am going to start working out again, only cardio though, I don't think I should be lifting heavy weight with my bruised ribs. In future entries I will be posting part of my spreadsheet that shows my daily calorie intake/burn so you can see what I am doing day to day for my weight loss.

I have tried many diets in the past and every diet pill imaginable. I have found that every diet has two things in common.
1)  I always crash and gain the weight back
2)  They all are made to do the same thing, burn more calories then you intake.
Looking at the first one. Why do I crash and gain all the weight back? Because all of these diets exclude foods that I enjoy and after a while my cravings become to great and I give up and crash. Looking at the second one. Why are there so many different diet fads? Because people do not want to have to think about their weight loss and just want to be told what to do. All of these diets take advantage of one simple truth, one pound of fat has 3500 calories and if you burn more calories in a day then you intake then you will loose weight.

An average male needs to eat 2500 calories a day to maintain their weight because they burn 2500 calories a day just doing their normal activities. An average female needs to eat 2000 calories a day to maintain their weight. Of course, these numbers change depending on your age and current weight, but you get the idea. To loose weight you need to make a deficit between your calorie intake and burn amounts. So, if you want to loose 1 lbs a week then you will want to make a deficit of 500 calories a day (500 * 7 = 3500). To do that you can either eat 500 less calories or burn 500 more calories per day. So, it doesn't matter what diet you are on, you will loose weight if your burn amount is higher then your intake amount.

To keep track of my calorie intake I have an app on my phone, "My Fitness Pal", that I enter the foods and amount I am eating and it keeps track of the calories. To keep track of my calorie burn I bought a Bodybugg with a digital watch (http://my.apexfitness.com/products/product_details.php?item=6009-BBPKG&isbb=Y). It is 90% accurate and uses my height, age, heart rate, body temperature, and a step counter to figure out my current calorie burn. I use this information and plug it into a spreadsheet I created to keep track of my calorie burn and intake for the day and estimate how many lbs I should loose. I also enter in my current weight once a week to figure out my actual weight loss for the week. Starting next week I will be posting those results.

To keep me on my diet I am allowing myself to eat foods I enjoy, I just find lower calorie alternatives and not in the amount that it hurts me. This way I don't crash because I feel deprived of something I like. I love diet coke, but I need to drink much more water, so I am allowing myself to have one or two soda's a day. That way I get what I like but I am also drinking a lot of water otherwise. I also love rice, meat, cheese, and carbo's. I am allowing myself to eat those meals, but in smaller amounts. I am also working on eating healthier, not just smaller amounts of the same foods I use to eat. I have added more salads and raw fruits. But, if you are the person like me that loves salad and puts a lot of dressing on it, be careful. I use a low calorie natural dressing (Annie's Natural Honey Mustard Vinaigrette Light, only 40 calories per serving). I like to make sure my dressings have under 50 calories per serving and I will only use one, maybe two, servings on my salads. I keep my meals around 200 to 400 calories per meal and allow snacks as long as I don't go over 1870 calories a day for the days that I am not active. For the days that I am working out (depending on the amount I work out) I will not go over 2000 to 2500 calories a day.

Thanks to everyone that has been supporting me in my weight loss. It is nice to know what people think and also that my story has inspired some people to also loose weight.

Healthy Recipes: Turkey Wrap

I have been struggling with getting healthy. Although I have lost a lot of weight, I don't feel that I am as healthy as I should be. Today I started working on healthy recipes that I can easily make that will taste good and help get me to my goals. Here is my first recipe, the Turkey Wrap with a total amount of 150 calories.

Ingredients:

1 slice of deli Turkey  (60 calories)
3 oz of shredded Broccoli Cole Slaw Mix  (25 calories)
1 tbl of Litehouse Toasted Sesame Ginger Dressing  (20 calories)
1/4 oz of Sliced Almonds (45 calories)

Directions:

- Lay out the slice of deli turkey.
- Put broccoli cole slaw mix, sliced almonds, and sesame ginger dressing inside the turkey slice.
-  Roll up the deli turkey.
- Enjoy!