Never Been Skinny

Have a Plan B for "Bad Days" - the Moment of Weakness Goal

2011-10-05T16:46:00.000-07:00

I'm now on Hubpages you can see my profile here at Brandonhart100. Also check out this year's top gag gifts and best white elephant gifts.

Happy Halloween!

I want to share some of my weaknesses in the hope that when you have your moments of weakness you'll understand that you're not alone! So here's the one I've been facing lately!
My kids went trick or treating this week and came back with a mighty handsome load of candy. I decided that they would get 1-2 pieces a day that they could choose if they were good. Thinking that I was stronger than I was I put it all in a huge bowl along with the leftover candy we still had for people coming by!

Big Mistake.

Last night I ate 6 pieces of it! My wife was laughing at me because I was stuffing my face with it while I was on the elliptical machine we purchased. (As a tv-aholic ellipticals are a must trust me!)
A little too ironic?

I will probably eat the same amount tonight. If I don't who will? Luckily I can calculate how many calories they are and them count them in as part of my calorie tracking.

You see I really have 2 sets of calorie goals. My daily goals and then my "Moment of Weakness Goal".

For my daily goal I never want to go over 2000 calories/day. This is my max. I have a second goal for my moments of weakness. That goal is to never go over 2500 calories/day! I figure even at that intake level I won't gain weight!

In Other words have a plan B for bad days!

Best Gaming Monitors

2011-03-08T08:48:00.001-08:00

A review of the best gaming Monitors based upon specifications fit for long hours of gaming. Not every monitor is equal and some produce enormous amounts of ghosting and input lag. To avoid a less than adequate gaming experience make sure to get a good gaming monitor!

Untitled

2011-01-21T14:01:00.001-08:00

Are you looking for the best gaming mouse? Razer, Logitech, and Microsoft offer the very best gaming mice on the market. We'll compare the three and let you know what you can expect from each.

You've probably read my most recent hub on how to build a gaming computer under $1000, but you can have the best gaming pc in the world but if your mouse is trash, you may still be at a great disadvantage. Gamer's share a unique connection with their mouse because...

Read the full article on the Best Wireless and USB Gaming Mouse - Top Razer, Logitech, Microsoft Sidewinder Optical Laser PC Gamer's Mice for 2011.

Best Gaming Headset for 2011 – Top 10 PC / Xbox Wireless and USB Headsets

2011-01-20T11:24:00.001-08:00

Selecting the perfect gaming headset can be a diffcult thing to do. Besides your video card it's probably the most important item in improving your overall gaming experience and performance.

A good headset eliminates background noise, can easily adjust volumes, and provides crystal clear connections and sound...

Read more on the Best Gaming Headset for 2011

Best Valentine's Gifts for Men

2011-01-19T15:23:00.001-08:00

Looking for the perfect Valentine's Gift for that man in your life can be difficult, that's why you need to understand his personality, understand his friends,

and understand how he works to give him the perfect Valentine's Day Gift.

Read This article on the best valentine's gifts for men.

Free Government Cell Phones in 2011

2011-01-19T14:39:00.001-08:00

Did you know the Goverment gives discount cell phone plans through its Lifeline program for low income families? I didn't either. You can check out more about Free Government Cell Phones Here.

Best GPS Watches for Runners

2011-01-19T14:34:00.001-08:00

If you are looking for a GPS watch, then check out this article on the Best GPS watches for runners.

White Elephant Gifts for Christmas 2010

2010-11-20T14:34:00.000-08:00

Article Summary:

Each year around the holidays my wife and I hold a friendly white elephant gift party.

See my top 50 Gag gifts here.

Each year it gets a little more rowdy than the year before.

In year's past we've seen live goldfish, enormous superman underwear, lingerie, stuffed chickens, a shave-with-me barbie (I'll show you how to make that below), and other unmentionables - you never know what to expect. (This year's rumor is someone is going to have a live chicken).

If you like this hub please check out my 50 best gag gifts hub too!

My Other blogs

Oh The Places You'll Go Review - Theodore Geisel Seuss

50 Best Gag Gifts for Mom & Dad

Bacon Explosion - Bacon Accessories

A Penny Saved is not a Penny Earned

10 Best White Elephant Gifts

Using MWAP Mafia wars autoplayer in Firefox to get to level 300 in one day

Isolating Children With Video Games and why you shouldn't do it

Isavers Network Review

So You Might Think I am Crazy.... or a Man

Progress Report Week 8 - 230's Here I come!

2009-11-03T16:38:00.000-08:00

Week 8

Plopped out of bed and quickly did my morning routine before I weighing myself. (I always do this so I get consistent numbers - otherwise I'm all over the place)

Stepped on the scale and..... (drum role please)

241 Pounds! Hey maybe I'll get into the 230's by next week!

This has really been a unique experience for me as I have never been able to lose more than 10 pounds EVER!
I want to be careful how I use this statement because people normally roll their eyes at it or think it's misleading: The greatest part of all of it is that I've never really felt like I was hungry. It's the truth I promise! That doesn't mean I never had to deny myself of excessive snacking or 1000 calorie pieces of cake... I have, but when it comes to dinner I've been able to eat pretty much whatever the heck I feel like eating.

How?

Well if you've been reading my steps and tips, then hopefully you know how, but basically I eat a measured breakfast (usually around 200 calories), a modest lunch (around 4-500 calories), and then have a few snacks during the day before I get to dinner. By the time I get to dinner I usually have over 1000 calories to eat! If you've made dinner yourself and know how many calories are in it, then you know that that is a LOT of food!

The trend for me personally has been to eat a big dinner and then feel full enough that I don't need to excessively snack later on. Maybe this will help you, but just find whatever works for you to not feel hungry. That's the key.

230's here I come!
My goal by Thanksgiving? (break into the 220's!)

Replacement Tip V: The Leafy Subterfuge

2009-11-02T13:18:00.000-08:00

You've seen all this before I'm sure. It's the Salad menu at Chilis. Innocent customer's come in and decide on a salad because they want to make a responsible and healthy choice. The problem is that most of the menu items on this table are just as expensive (speaking in calories) as some of their juicier items.

One of the funnier things about all of this is that my wife doesn't even like salad and I'm sure many of you don't like it either! In this case she really doesn't need to pick the salad (unless it's the house or caesar with light dressing) and she can just go with something lighter and tastier to her!

If you do go with the salad make sure you go with light dressing

2 tbsp of Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing = 140 calories

2 tbsp of Hidden Valley Light Ranch Dressing = 80 Calories

Half as many and honestly with the Hidden Valley brand I can't tell the difference. Other brands I can for sure.... Yuck!

If you like to have croutons on your salad a basic store bought crouton is about 10 calories a piece. So if you add 10-12 that's another 100-120 calories. Try 5-6. You won't notice it that much I promise! Keep the same amount of salad on there.

Anyway, the point is if you're going to go with a salad at any restaurant know how many calories it is and then try to adjust down from there! Otherwise, you may even want to check out what some of the other items on the menu are calorie wise and pick one of those instead.

The Oily Popcorn Incident - Replacement tip IV

2009-11-01T08:21:00.000-08:00

So if you've been following along you've noticed I have placed some food replacements over on the tip menu. Those tips are general for everyone, but in my case there were a few things I was doing that were just WRONG.

So I've never blamed my being fat on anyone, but if there was something I would blame it would be my popcorn popper. When my wife and I got married five years ago we received a popcorn popper that we absolutely loved. Here she is in all her glory! (Just a little factoid, we popped popcorn so much that we went through 4 of these in 5 years!)

I could whip up a batch of popcorn with this baby that would make your mouth water... It would also probably give you a coronary.

You see I had always heard that popcorn was a great treat as it was low in calories and very filling. While that can be true a hand popper like this requires something to pop the popcorn. The something I used was lots and lots of vegetable oil. (I know you're shaking your head, Don't judge me! )

Once it was popped I'd put it into a big bowl and my wife and I would sit there and eat it several times a week (this post makes me gag just thinking about it). This went on until I started my life change a few months ago. Five years of shoving a highly concentrated vegetable-oily popcorn in my mouth!

The thing I hate about all of this is that it was all so unnecessary. I could claim ignorance, but not once had I stopped to look at the back of the vegetable oil label to see how many calories were in that batch of popcorn. (I have since figured out that it was around 1500) I would have been better off with a huge bowl of ice cream!

Incredible isn't it? Well I still love popcorn but I've figured out a way I can eat it without all of those calories and still make it taste as good.

Use an Air Popper.

I know what you are thinking again! NO it tastes like cardboard that way! Yuck!

Just give me a chance....

Go out and by an air popper.

Then grab this stuff at the grocery store. Fat free/Calorie free cooking spray. (Get the no-name brand it's cheaper) That's right it's virtually calorie free! 10 sprays of this stuff might be like 15 calories but still - nothing you have to worry about!

Here's my recipe:

1. Air pop your popcorn
2. Put it into a large bowl
3. Spray over the top of the popcorn with the fat free/calorie free cooking spray
4. Toss popcorn a bit so that the non-sprayed popcorn in the bowl is on top
5. Repeat this 8 times

During this process add as little or as much salt as you'd like to use. I know people say to limit the amount of salt you intake, and you should, but if we are just talking about losing weight, salt actually has 0 calories.

If you can make a snack that tastes good, then you won't feel hungry at night when you're ready for that fourth meal! Avoid the coronary! Make Healthy Popcorn!

The Truth about Weight Loss Programs

2009-10-30T10:55:00.000-07:00

The Truth about Weight Loss Programs

Ok hopefully you are willing to hear this. When it comes to weight loss there is a lot of self-motivation involved with it. The thing that bugs me about weight loss programs is that you are paying someone else to help motivate you when it is you in the end, for a long-term change, that is going to have to be motivated!

I'm not saying that weight loss programs don't help in the short-term or that having a planned meal isn't important, but you aren't going to stay on that program forever and eventually you will have to plan your own meals. That's why you need to motivate yourself into finding a plan that works for you without having someone do it for you!

Sometimes people think of weight loss programs like they would a lawn care service. They want to pay someone else to do all of the work and then just be rid of it! Again the only problem is you aren't going to monthly meetings forever. Then what?

I guess what I'm saying is that if your life dream has been to become a Doctor and you're ready, the only way to do that is go to medical school. Talk is cheap! In weight loss talk = no results!

That's why I am so adamant about sharing my success. I found a way that worked for me and I believe that it will work for you too. Just remember, this is your Diet! If you find something that works even better for you, then by all means Go for it!

The Skinny on Restaurants - Know before you go!

2009-10-29T07:34:00.000-07:00

Weight Loss Tips

Counting Calories at Restaurants

One of the most difficult things about my journey to weight loss has been going to restaurants or parties with friends.

My wife and I quickly found out that the best way to avoid a caloric binge was to have a "game plan" before we went into the restaurants. Simply put, you need to know exactly what you are going to eat before you go, that way there are no surprises. (We should all probably do this before going to Costco and spending an extra $100 on "stuff" too!)

So how do you know how many calories are in what at the restaurant you are going to?

The best way is to use the internet to find nutritional information from the restaurant. If the restaurant does not have nutritional information, then type in the menu item itself followed by calories. This works with a lot of menu items. The reason I used this example is because I couldn't easily find the answer with this one. If you can't find the calories for Texas Roadhouse's pulled pork then just try "pulled pork calories" and that should give you a good idea.

Here are some links to some restaurants we use frequently and remember knowing your caloric information before going in is a great way to avoid a coronary!

Arby's
Chilis
Subway
Applebees (here's what their site says but I found a good alternative anyway "We do not provide nutritional information on Applebee's items. Too bad I found it anyway!)
Wendy's
McDonalds
Old Spaghetti Factory
Taco Bell

The Fun Theory for Weight Loss

2009-10-28T12:23:00.000-07:00

The Fun Theory - Great for Weight Loss Too!

Watch the difference!

Five Steps to a Healthier You!

2009-10-28T11:25:00.000-07:00

Five Steps to a Healthier You!

Welcome to my Weight Loss Blog!

Hopefully you are here because you have a desire to lose weight or are focused on keeping yourself healthy! (Or maybe you just want to read how a chubby guy finally lost weight)! If that's you then you have come to the right place!

I decided to setup this blog after I had success losing weight! If you are in a rush, then I'd suggest you start with reading my five step process in the menu above. It shouldn't take more than a few minutes to get through all of them.

If you have a little more time, then please read through my tips and journey through weight loss as well as the five steps that have helped me lose weight and keep it off!

As I'm still on my journey please subscribe to my feeds on the left. I try to update them frequently!

*Updates to Come

- Before and After pictures (I'm going to try and put together a slideshow)
- Why you need a weight loss companion
- More Replacement tips, and information on each steps!

Weight loss Worries I - Do I have to excercise?

2009-10-28T08:39:00.000-07:00

Weight loss Worries I

Do I have to excercise to lose weight?

No! The truth is as long as you are keeping your calories under your required amount (if you haven't read step one, then you can go there to figure out how many calories/day you get) then you will lose weight.

In fact, my friend who had lost the 70 pounds is not a person who likes to exercise. He had lost it by simply lowering his caloric intake by 1000 calories/day and had done that for about 7 months!

Exercising, not a must, but still a good idea!

I love to eat, so I've only lowered my caloric intake by about 700 calories/day. But 3-4 times a week I exercise! In fact, if you exercise you will take off the weight faster not only because of the calories you are burning, but also because of the boost your metabolism will get from having more muscle and getting your heart rate up!

As you lose weight you get fewer calories to eat each day. True or False? True! If you go to the calculator in step 1 and type yourself in as a higher weight, it will show that you get more calories. So how can you offset this?

By Gaining muscle. How do you gain that muscle? Exercise! Also, make sure you are occasionally lifting weights.

For women: Don't worry you won't bulk up! Just do lots of reps! Lot's of women have this concern but it's a misnomer. You can't naturally gain the muscle you see on all of those muscular women unless you take supplements or are lifting very heavy weights etc... No worries!

With an increased metabolism and exercise you'll still be able to eat a substantial amount of food each day! Remember, you don't have to go hungry to lose weight!

Skipping School Girl Expectations and My Weight Loss Plateau

2009-10-28T08:20:00.000-07:00

You'll notice that under the tips section I have already spoken about weight loss plateaus, what they mean etc..

This section under "My Own Journey" is for my own personal experiences, what's going on in my life etc..

So by the title of my blog and by everything I've put up you may think that my weight loss journey is over, but it's not! I've still got a lot of hard work ahead of me. The other thing I have mentioned in my steps is that this is a lifechange for me, once I'm done losing the weight I'll still keep track of what I'm eating. Not only to keep the weight off, but also to keep myself feeling better!

So as promised here's the skinny on my weight loss plateau and that crazy title:

I'm five weeks into my weight loss and I think I'm on top of the world. I had lost 19 pounds in just four weeks! Each week I had, as an overly-excited school girl, skipped over to the scale in excitement and it had rewarded my skip with fantastic numbers! This week would be different.

The skip continued but when I looked at the scale... it said 250.5. 18 Pounds! What the #%)(#%*)#% !!!

I had been trying as hard as I possibly could to lose weight, exercising 4 times that week, and on the scale?

I gained a pound! Well ladi freakin woopty doo!

My wife was going through a similar problem so at least I wasn't alone going through this hard situation, but in that instant I had lost my schoolgirl skip. Want to know the worst part about it?

It lasted for 3 weeks! The second week I lost nothing and the 3rd week about a pound!
Since then my weight loss has been more consistent but that was an important crossroad.

Want to know the best part of it?

I didn't quit. That's right I didn't. it's not like this was the first time I had tried to lose weight, but this was the first time I hadn't quit. Anyway, the point of my whole story is to expect it and remember the point of weight loss is to lose fat. The scale is just a tool, in fact when it doesn't give you the number just call it exactly that... stupid scale tool (you can kick it too if that helps, just try not to break it).

Remember that even if you are plateauing or not losing weight you are probably still losing fat - and that's the real goal anyway!

Healthy Cooking Tips I Pizza

2009-10-27T09:04:00.000-07:00

Healthy Cooking Tips I Pizza

Make it yourself!

So if you've been reading my blog you'll notice that I mentioned a friend of mind that had lost 70 pounds. He's a HUGE pizza fan.

One night he had my wife and I over for dinner and made a cheese pizza for the kids and a veggie pizza for us. It was the BEST pizza I had ever had - and I am a meat pizza kinda guy!

That doesn't mean you have to make a veggie pizza, but if you are adding the ingredients, then you know what they are and how many calories are in them.

He used Mama Mary's Pizza Crust. You can find it at Wal-mart - 2 for $3. Here's the Mama Mary's pizza creation website for some ideas. Mama Mary's

Anyway, since my friend made that pizza for us, we've had more pizza at home then ever, and we're still losing weight!

Your First Weight Loss Plateau

2009-10-26T13:32:00.000-07:00

YOUR FIRST WEIGHT LOSS PLATEAU

If you were looking for my weight loss plateau story click here.

If you've ever been on a diet you've probably experienced it - Your first weight loss plateau.

Don't panic! Instead, be expecting it! When it happens to you here are a few basic things to go over in order to make sure that you haven't forced your body into this plateau.

With most diets you lose a great deal of weight in the beginning because of the loss of water weight. As you begin to get in to the serious part of your weight loss plan (burning fat) many of you will be tempted to eat less than is necessary.

This doesn't work!

Losing more than a pound or two in a week can be unhealthy and force you to lose muscle along with fat. Because muscle increases the rate at which your body burns calories your caloric intake can go down as well, resulting in fewer and fewer calories that you can eat each day.

It can really be a cycle that never ends. Make sure that you aren't eating more than 1000/calories less than your maintain weight! Never Never do it!

If this isn't you, then just continue past your plateau. It's challenging but don't give up! You are still losing body fat, you've probably just temporarily put in some water weight.

Remember your goal should not be to lose weight, but rather to lose body fat!

Easy Replacements III

2009-10-26T13:19:00.001-07:00

EASY REPLACEMENTS III

I'll try to add a few of these each day but here's some more easy replacements.

Replace Cottage Cheese with Low-fat Cottage Cheese.

Doing this you can have a half a cup of cottage cheese for only 90 calories! This is great for a snack or side dish.

Replace Sour Cream with Low-Fat Sour cream

Notice I'm giving you all the easy ones. I've done that on purpose! Make these small changes and you'll still be able to eat a lot of what you like to eat already! Low-Fat sour cream has about half the calories of regular sour cream! If you like to cake it on this can be an especially good tip!

Easy Replacements II

2009-10-26T08:37:00.001-07:00

EASY REPLACEMENTS II

Here's another tip to help you cut some calories without cutting out as much food in your diet!

Replace the high-calorie drinks with low ones.

Replace soda for diet soda

When I first replaced my daily pepsi with a diet coke or diet pepsi I couldn't believe how easy it was. No it didn't taste the same, but after a week I hardly noticed the difference. Yes, I know you've heard that diet drinks have bad chemicals that hurt your body, but you can deal with that one later! I'm sure a coronary is much more dangerous than those chemicals!

Replace flavored drinks with Crystal Light.

Ok, when I started my lifechange my friend mentioned this one to me. There are a lot of fun flavors to try out as well! If you find it expensive, or are a thrift shopper like me, here's another tip: Get the Great Value brand at Wal-Mart! They are $2 for a 4 pack (a pack makes 2 quarts).

Again, I've heard there are harmful substances in these, I'm not sure whether that's really true but for now do whatever you can if you are trying to lose weight!

Make sure you to drink Skim Milk

Remember for all of my tips that you don't have to do this if you plan the 1%,2%, or even whole milk into your daily intake of calories. Milk is certainly a good snack and way to get protein into your body. (You want protein in your snacks as that cuts your cravings!)

What skim milk does is lower the amount of calories in each serving.

Just think of it this way as this is not an exact science:

Skim is about 85 calories per cup and every 1% higher you go up about 15 calories.
I.E. 1% 100 2% 115 etc... Vitamin D is probably more like 160 calories.

Anyway, chose your options wisely!

Easy Replacements I The Mayo Mustard Conundrum Solved

2009-10-26T08:03:00.000-07:00

EASY REPLACEMENTS I
The Mayo Mustard Conundrum Solved

Hopefully you are here because you are thinking about your nutrition or want to lose a little weight.

Let me share with you a few easy things that you can do to lower your caloric intake each day without substantially limiting the amount of food that you can eat.

1. Get Rid of the Mayo

Ok, you don't technically have to get rid of the mayo if you are counting your calories and everything is going ok, but it's one of the easiest replacements I know of that will make the biggest difference in your calorie bottom line. If adding fat free mayo helps you, then go ahead and add it, but to me the real difference came with flavor and that's where mustard comes in.

Funny, I wasn't a fan of mustard before my lifechange started but now that I've replaced mayonnaise with it, I've become quite fond of it. Oh and the best part?

Replace it with Mustard!

Mustard is virtually calorie free at about 3 calories per serving! Go ahead and replace it, and fill good about it. Give it all you can mustard! (HAHA yes, I know Punny, but at least now the conundrum is solved.)

Mayonnaise (1 tablespoon)	Calories
Mayo, regular average (mine at home says 140)	100
Mayo, light/reduced fat	50
Mayo, fat-free	10
Hellman's Light mayo	50
Kraft Light mayo	50
Smart Beat Light mayo	40
Weight Watchers Light mayo	25
Weight Watchers Fat Free mayo	10

Table from Caloriecounter.com

Fifth Step

2009-10-25T20:53:00.000-07:00

YOU ARE GOING TO HAVE A BAD DAY(S)

I'm hoping that the title of this wasn't quite what you were expecting. You came here hoping there might be more to the step process, but I can assure you that this is the fifth and final step.

Realizing that you are going to have bad days and it's OK

Throughout life we are constantly trying to change ourselves (hopefully for the better). We have good days and bad days. It's no different with losing weight or getting your nutrition on track.

In reality if you go into this as I had mentioned before thinking of this as a FOR-LIFE change, then I think you have the right frame of mind.

If, however, you came into this post hoping to just have a quick fix or quick weight loss I think you are coming into it with the wrong frame of mind.

I mentioned as a part of this that you would hit a plateau in your weight loss. Let me tell you a little about mine. (If you want to read more about diet plateaus see the link in the Tips menu!)

During the first 4 weeks of my lifechange I lost 19 pounds. That's right 19 pounds!

I know what you are thinking. But Brandon, you just mentioned that you should not lose any more than 2 pounds a week and you lost an average of 5/week the first month.

You are right, but here's some encouraging news - you will do the same, at first.

The reason I underlined at first, is because this drops off at some point. Between weeks 5-6 I lost 0 pounds. It was disheartening, but as I had said before I finally came into this diet with a lifechange in mind so I kept going.

Guess how many pounds I lost week 7? 2. Week 8? 3.

I had to look at it all differently. If my caloric intake was in fact the 3000 that it said it was supposed to be in order to maintain and if I was taking in 2000 calories per day I was then losing 2 pounds of fat a week like my other post had mentioned. After week 8 I had lost 16 pounds of fat. Notice I had lost 24 pounds. I would say at least of that was the 8 pounds of water!

That's where these crash diets come in that say they can lose you 10 pounds in a week. They take all the salt out of your diet, lower your calories, and Bam you lose 10 pounds the first week. Of course you did, but you only lost as much fat as you didn't intake in calories!

People who continue that trend eventually can end up burning muscle instead of fat, in turn, this causes them to lower their overall caloric intake! So if they quit they gain back the weight faster then ever. What a vicious cycle.

So do it the right way - come into it with the right frame of mind, and NEVER quit!

That's the greatest part of all this. After you've kept track of your calories long enough to lose all the weight you will have great insight into what your body needs to be taking in each and every day. That's why this is a lifechange and not just a diet. Everyone needs tp do this.

Thanks for sticking with me through the five steps. If you'd like to read more about each step, I will be posting tips for each step in my personal blog posts. You can also read more about me and my family's personal journey to health.

Fourth Step

2009-10-25T20:41:00.000-07:00

SUPPORT

Now that you know what your caloric intake is and you have a spreadsheet to keep track of everything you eat in a day I want to talk about one of the most important parts of calorie tracking. This is the reason I entitled the blog "Family Weight Loss Plan".

You need Support. This goes beyond weight loss. If you are a person that likes to improve yourself each day (having a desire to lose weight puts you into that category), then this step is essential to all of your goals!

As I mentioned in the about me section, my wife and I have three children and after having the third we both realized that in the midst of creating life we'd created a little bit of extra weight for ourselves too. She was the obvious person to be my support!

Finding someone to help you or go with you on this journey is even part of the third step of accountability. If either one of us didn't write something down a certain day, then the other was their to make sure it happened. If one of us had had a bad day, then the other was their to make sure the next day was a good one.

Maybe your choice isn't as obvious, I realize that. If you can think of a good friend or family member or your entire family to do this with, then point them in the direction of this site. You can all do it! The point is FIND SOMEONE!

If after all of your efforts you can't find anyone, then shoot me an e-mail or a comment and I will be that support or find someone that can.

One step left.

Third Step

2009-10-25T10:39:00.000-07:00

ACCOUNTABILITY

I know you hate that word, but in any real change you make you have to face the big "A" word.

I'm not going to sugar coat it:

With weight loss, accountability comes in the form of tracking your calories.

Don't go! Don't go! Stay there I have a great way to do this!

You are going to need an excel spreadsheet to track what you eat each day. You can download the one I have been using here:

http://www.mediafire.com/?dq3om2mfmtt

If you don't have excel you can use A google doc spreadsheet. It's free and online. I like this option anyway as it goes to work with me wherever I am!

Now, remember with calorie tracking that google is your friend. Here's an example:

I ate a small apple today, so simply go to google type in "small apple calories" . Or just click on that little link I gave to you. Now simply click on the first link available. There you go small apple with skin 55 calories.

Now open up the spreadsheet I provided and type small apple under the snacks category.

What has really helped me is to leave that open on your computer the entire day! That way it's easier to remember.

Second Step

2009-10-25T10:15:00.000-07:00

Now that you know how many calories you get let's go on to the next step. It's really pretty simple let's figure out how many pounds you want to lose.

3500 Calories = 1 pound.

So if I want to lose a pound a week I need to lower my caloric intake by 500 calories a day.

Let's suppose that after calculating your caloric needs per day you discovered that you need 2000 calories a day to maintain your weight.

If you want to lose 1 pounds/week = you then would get 1500 calories a day

If you want to lose 2 pounds/week = 1000 calories/day

For someone in this calorie range I wouldn't suggest trying to lose any more than a pound a week.

If that discourages you, then let me give you some options.

1.) Excercise 3 times per week. If you aren't already doing this then this can be an easy way to not only build muscle and increase your muscle (thus you would burn more calories naturally each day) but also to increase the amount of calories you need each day to maintain. It's a lot easier to go for the 2 pounds/week if your caloric needs are 3000/day!

2.) Go to our third step!

Additional Tips on the second step!

For more information or personal experience on this go to my blog posts that talk about my personal experience with weight loss. Yes, I have done this!

One thing you might want to consider if you are 50+ pounds overweight is buying a spacesaver elliptical. Not only will this allow you to burn calories but it will put less stress on your body while you are trying to get in exercise shape. I was especially concerned about my knees and ankles as I was 6'4" and was 270 pounds!

If you are very overweight look for an elliptical with a high weight limit. The one I picked was the audiostrider 990 from NordicTrack . It has a 325 pound weight limit.

I'm not getting paid anything to say that so trust me it's great! I especially like the space-saver option so you can tuck it up and put it away after you are done.

Just so you know I'm not getting paid the audiostrider 990 is made by Icon Fitness .

They make the same model in several brands. If you want another option other than NordicTrack then check out the other 12 brands that Icon makes this model for. They are the SAME thing!

First Step

2009-10-25T10:04:00.000-07:00

The First Step to REAL weight loss is finding out how many calories you have. It's easy enough to find this out online:

Open this in a new window to find how many calories you get!

Once you find out come back here and take a look at the second step.

For those of you who want to calculate this on your own here you go:

Female

655 + (4.3 x pounds) + (4.7 x inches) - (4.7 x age)

Men:

66 + (6.3 x pounds) + (12.9 x inches) - (6.8 x age)
Sedentary : BMR x 20 percent

Lightly active: BMR x 30 percent

Moderately Active (You do some type of excercise each day.): BMR x 40 percent

Very Active (Intense excercise every day): BMR x 50 percent

Extra Active (For Every day Athletes): BMR x 60 percent

The First "Real" Step - How many calories a day do you get?

2009-10-24T09:21:00.000-07:00

So you want to lose weight? As we've seen on the Biggest loser time and time again losing weight can be a very emotional thing (Jillian do we really have to make people cry every episode?). To minimize the amount of emotion involved and mental blockage to turning on that switch I talked about in my last post I wanted to talk about something very logical you can do to understand what you get to eat in a day.

When I started losing weight the thing I was most concerned about was being hungry all the time, but then I spoke to a friend who had lost a considerable amount of weight. He told me

"Brandon, you don't need to be hungry, you just need to know the amount of calories you get each day and then go under that number".

I could hardly believe what I was hearing! I didn't need to be hungry? Well, if I needed proof I had it. He'd lost 70 pounds in 10 months!

So in this first real step I want to let you know that you don't need to do a binge diet, if you want to follow the success I have had and success others have had that I've spoken to, then you need to make a For-Life change.

Let me repeat that again, you need to make a For-Life change. I am using the word For-Life as a term that means exactly what you think it does... Yep, that's right all the way until you kick the bucket.

On the way hand, you could take this as a very imposing task... changing your life for your entire life. Or on the other hand, you might actually take a step back, take a breath, and realize that you can spend as much time doing this as you need to! You don't need to look good tomorrow, you just need to feel better each day!

Anyway, let's figure out how many calories you need per day!

DietBlog has about the best Calorie Calculator I've seen out there:

Calorie Calculator (open this in a new window so you don't lose me here)

After you have figured what your caloric intake is each day you need to remember 2 things.

1.) 3500 Calories = 1 pound
2.) 1 to 2 pounds of fat is the MAX you should be losing each week
3.) Although you WILL lose more than 2 pounds a week starting out most of that will be water weight, so remember not to get discouraged when you hit a very natural plateau in about 6 weeks.

I'll tell you about the plateau I had in my diet in my next post.

Subscribe and Stay tuned!

The Skinny on Me - The Triple Chin Motivation

2009-10-23T21:32:00.000-07:00

skin⋅ny
–adjective
1.
very lean or thin; emaciated: a skinny little kitten.
-Slang.
a. accurate information; data; facts.
b. news, ; gossip: i.e. Here's the skinny on the latest Hollywood scandal. (http://www.dictionary.com/)

Ironic as it sounds here is the "skinny on me" (even though skinny has never really been on me). In other words, I'm not, nor have I ever really been skinny. I'm a Father of 3 who simply took his child to the fire station one day, took a picture, and then realized I had a problem that in my case needed to be taken care of. For those of you who are visual people I'm going to put a picture here:

It's not that bad is it?

Yeah that's what I had told myself previously, however; in that moment something clicked inside of me.

I was tired of seeing that triple chin take over every picture!

It was that simple switch that we all have inside of us that at times we want to turn on but don't always seem to have the motivation for.

My energy level had gone to a new low, and even though my "family happiness" meter crashing through the "full side", my health and well-being meter was on a "warning" sign.

In my mind it never made sense:

Ever since I was a child I was the only person in my family with a weight problem. Believe it or not my Mother is a triathlete and my Father is a grew up a hardworking farm boy. How could I end up overweight?

It's pretty simple actually, as I simply ate more calories than I burned in a day over a very long period of time... but that explanation is for another post.

Just kidding, what a lame answer I know, (although it is true) in the end I just had some underlying issues about how I felt about food (after all I am the middle child) and how I always felt like I was never full.... Yes, I'm already using the middle child card.

In my family I am also the designated plate cleaner (gasp what could that mean). That simply means that after my family has eaten their food I do all of the clean up. Unfortunately, the leftover food on my children's plates never seemed to make it into the sink. Call me a sucker fish, call me a human garbage disposal, or whatever you want, but the truth is that I was always eating food that other people had left behind.

Most of it was done without thinking and my children's highly caloric diet of hot dogs, grilled cheese, chicken nuggets, and pizza was starting to collect in one of the more noticeable places on my body.... my chin.

Now that that's out of the way (I'm glad you've made it this far), I wanted to let you know why I started this blog.

I'd like to help.

As lame as that may sound, I know what it feels like to be overweight (I still am), and I know things that are working for me and those around me and I want to write them down so that you can use them.

Anyway, that's today's skinny. I'll try to write as often and as soon as I can to get some of my quick tips up.