Before I sat down to write this, I heard a familiar springtime sound – the ice cream truck. First of all, I would just like to point out that an ice cream truck coming this close to where I live in a college town is a wonderful thing. Secondly, I resisted the ice cream urge. Being that everyone here is a collegiette ยฉ, I’m going to assume we all understand that resisting ice cream cravings on a warm day while you’re sitting on your porch is something to be proud of. Instead I went inside and made myself a healthy snack โ fat free vanilla yogurt and granola.
Resisting the food cravings has probably be the hardest part of this whole experiment for me, but I think it’s what I’ve been best at. More often than not,working or doing schoolwork gets in the way of time to go to the gym, but I have to eat. Honestly, no one here wants to see me when I’ve been food deprived – it’s terrifying.
I still haven’t given up my awful eating out habit, but I’ve worked to ensure that this habit is only bad for my wallet and not my waistline. For instance, I adore Panera Bread Company. So I went to their website and found out what my normal meal there was costing me in calories. To say I’m less than happy to find out one of my favorite meals is 700 calories would be an understatement. Needless to say, I renovated my Panera order โ French onion soup (without croutons and cheese) and a fuji apple salad for only 370 calories.
At home, I’m eating a lot of frozen meals because I don’t have much time to cook. Surprisingly, the Healthy Choice meals are pretty delicious, and often times I get to eat some of my favorite foods for very few calories. When those don’t fill me up (which is essentially every time I eat them) I go ahead and add a salad using only balsamic vinegar (no oil) for dressing.
Also, side note, with a show of hands, who here has tried artichoke hearts? They were in my salad at a sorority luncheon this afternoon and, good lord, I already went to the store and bought some to put on my salads and sandwiches. The best part about them is that they have so much flavor that they make anything – even almost flavorless turkey or lettuce – taste amazing. While I was at the store, I tried to make sure I didn’t buy anything that would tempt me too much since I fell into that trap last week.
Publix had these huge strawberry muffins that were 400 calories โ each. My plan was to eat half of them for either breakfast or dessert. The problem is they taste like strawberry cupcakes, and if you understand how delicious strawberry cupcakes are, you understand why I’m in a circumstance to need to do a weight loss blog.
Anyway, this morning I finally saw some rewards from all of this eating better. When I looked into the mirror, the first thing I thought was, “I’ve lost weight in my stomach.” I immediately felt a huge sense of satisfaction because I know it’s solely based on my diet โ I haven’t been making it to the gym.
This motivated me to start going to start going to the gym on top of my eating healthy. I’ve always heard that workout is only about 30 percent of weight loss, but this is the first time I’ve really seen a diet I decided on work for me. I still haven’t weighed in since my first workout. However, no number on the scale can make me feel as good as how I felt when I realized I was succeeding just my looking at myself in the mirror!
Photo credit: BetaDaily.com, starting an ice cream truck business