My 5 Month Diet

My senior year of high school rolled around and I realized that I was in need of loosing weight. In stead of searching the next new diet plans or asking my friends what they thought, I just kind of used conmen sense. Finding foods with low calories, controlling how much I was eating and making sure I kept myself on a regular exercise plan.

I figured since the most important meal of the day was breakfast, I needed to start there. I stopped eating my sugar cereals and went exclusively to eating one "Smart One's" instant meals for my breakfast. I know for a lot of people it is hard to eat non-breakfast food in the morning, but quite frankly it made me feel better. Every day I was starting off with protein and veggies with my starches. Normally I would eat there Swedish meatball or chicken alfredo do entry, but to mix things up I once in a while would try other random entrees like there fajita plates, but that wasn't the best food breath-wise for socializing at school.

Next came working on my lunch. In stead of eating pizza, fries or burritos at school, I started bringing my own lunch which consisted of a Wrap; a bottle of water and that was it. To make this wrap I started out with a "light" in calorie extra wide wrap and added eight super thin slices of meat(I usually used roast beef or pastrami). Then I would drip on a little Iguana Deuces vicious jalapeño pepper sauce just to add more flavor. This hot sauce pretty much is just a flavor thing in my opinion, I am a hot sauce fanatic and I just love this hot sauce because instead of just trying to be "hot," it actually is flavorful. After that I would usually dice up some fresh bell pepper, tomato and onion. After tossing these on I would add my lettuce( and depending on the meat) pickles as well. I started drinking water everyday, which up to this point I was almost only drinking soda (about 2-4 cans a day).

Dinner usually consisted of whatever I wanted; I just had to watch the proportions. No seconds, and if dinner happened to be fast food, I made myself order my burgers with no cheese or sauce(mayo/ketchup) and made sure to stay away from the fries. I always would allow myself during this diet plan to have a soda if I was out to eat at a restaurant, and there I would order and eat whatever I wanted, but since I would only go out once every other week I figured it was ok.

When it came to sweets, I have to admit, I was not ready to give up chocolate, so I didn't. Before my diet I would make and then consume cakes by myself over about a 3 to 4 day period. During my diet plan, I knew I was not going to be able to do this any more so I made myself a deal. When I had a cake in the house (maybe 2 times a month during my diet) I would allow myself to have one slice after dinner every night. However, were not talking about a 4" across slab, were talking about a thin to average slice of cake. Not only was keeping the size down, but the method of which I ate it was important as well. To eat my cake, I would always take the smallest cut out of the cake possible, just enough to get the great yummy taste in my mouth and to still make it feel like I was eating. Essentially, I would be able to eat the whole slice of cake like this, maybe over a whole 15-20min period and get about 50 bites!

This diet was hard to start, but easy to maintain once I got going. Along with this diet plan, I kept myself on a small 10-20min exercise routine that I did every other day and made myself be less lazy. In stead of watching TV laying on my couch, I made myself sit and with any and every situation that presented itself I got up. If I got thirsty, I got that glass of water, if I needed to pick up the phone, I got up to do so and if I needed something from the other side of the room, you better believe I got up and retrieved it without any hesitation. This might not seem like anything, but compared to just laying on the couch for hours on end, I was getting up about 2-3 times during an hour show, walking around and just not being a lazy lounger. My exercise plan was fairly simple, a fast walk for 8-12min on the treadmill and then just 10min of lifting free weights.

That's it, I don't have a high metabolism, by the end of a 5 month semester of my school I had lost 48 pounds and went from a size 40 to a size 32! This worked really well for me; I hope that these tips and strategies work well for you too!