Belly Bumps — (Another) Day One
One of the crappy things about working for yourself at home is that you get busy and don’t take care of yourself and put on weight. OK you don’t need to work at home for that to happen but it is easy to get demotivated.
I slipped into one of those about 12 months ago (more fascinating detail as to why below) and despite some brave attempts to get out of it (Hello Crossfit, Hello Occasional Jog) it was easier to become lazier and lazier (Hello Beer, Hello Bread, Hello Netflix).
So today in the open air of Medium I am starting a 60-day challenge to get rid of the belly, get healthy and tip my toes (OK I can tip my toes just about — its a metaphor folks).
I know exactly how to do it.
Eat less. Exercise more. Who knew?
Knowing how versus doing are not friends though.
I have read thousands of articles, magazines, and books on fitness and diet down through the years and I have distilled it into one rule really.
Its the 1000 calorie rule.
Simply put you need to eliminate approximately 1000 calories a day to lose approximately a pound per week (apologies to the metric guys I am still a pounds person). This is just a rule of thumb but it worked great for me.
I did this from Dec 2018 to June 2018 and lost 18 pounds relatively easily. I was running regularly, eating properly and had completely eliminated beer and bread.
Beer and bread were (see what I did there) my best buddies. I don’t drink a lot and you will never find me in a pub on a weekend or at night. My drinking buddy is my Dear Old Dad (DOD age 86) and we sip a couple of pints 2–3 times per week usually around early evening time in my local pub.
So that can tot up the beers and that is more or less 1800 calories (there are 180 calories in a pint of lager). Maths lesson part one over.
I also adore bread. I can walk past cakes and biscuits without blinking but bread and I have a love-love relationship.
I eat sandwiches for lunch (who knew) and that can be 4 slices of bread. It is also perfectly common for me to munch one more sandwich before going to bed (which is also a tragic idea as it sits in your tummy all night complaining).
So 7 days of even 4 slices bread at about 130 cals per slice can be approx 3600 calories.
So eliminating bread and beer alone gets rid of 3200 of the 7000 calories for a week to lose that pound.
Going for a 5K run which I try (and fail) to do twice a week will burn approximately 300 calories so if I do that 3 times a week then that is another 1000 calories.
So you see where I am going here. The maths is easy, the execution very hard.
During the 6 months above where I lost weight, the first 2 were awful, the last 4 easy. I wasn’t fanatically mad counting every calorie, I just kept the rough rule of no bread, no beer and get moving every day (jog, play tennis, walk Toby).
As I got fitter (of course), and lighter (yay) and upped the intensity of my exercise and got a little more forensic on the food. I felt great, was sleeping great and everyone commented on now well I looked (physically OK, Brad Pitt is safe!)
Then I tore my meniscus in a half marathon which killed ALL my progress (OK I killed it as I reverted to my bad habits pretty much instantly).
If you have read so far here is the mucky truth. I currently weigh 15 stone 4–5 pounds (depends on the day) and my target for Christmas day is to be 14 stone flat.
Its shit being sluggish and overweight (in that order). People also make assumptions when you have that little beer belly. Blazingly accurate assumptions of course.
The best thing of all of when I was at that 14 stone mark and knocking on 13 stone X was that I could wear clothes I hadn't worn in years. I could also wear my son’s clothes too (they steal enough of mine!) To be able to wear a large versus an extra large is a small but enjoyable thing.
So today is another day one, Wed 15th September. I plan to write a shorter note every day sharing how I am doing the wins, the losses and hopefully you will smile and join me or perhaps stop following me on Twitter.
