Emotional/mindless Eating + Update

Hello! It has been about a week since I started my CNY weight loss plan. Since then I manage to do 3 out of 5 rules that I have set for myself. I am doing exercise everyday like running, yoga and touch rugby. I have always been bringing my own lunch to work so there is no problem for me to healthy-fy my lunch. I am able to massage every other day and drinking loads of water everyday. However, there are 2 rules that I need to improve and change. 

No starch for dinner is really difficult to fulfill if you are an Asian and your mom cooks at home. It is just not possible for me to eat the vegetables and meat without form of starch plus my mom will force me to eat at least a bit of rice. Therefore, I will just reduce the amount of rice by half or eat no rice whenever possible. 

Out of these 6 days that I have started on this plan, I actually snacked for 3 of the days and worse of all, I snacked at night after my dinner. I "blamed" this to emotional/mindless eating. I used to not have this habit of eating after dinner and I like the feeling of being hungry. However, once I started work and I have free time in the evening, this is when I started to snack regularly at night. Furthermore, the things I snack on are usually high-caloric and sweet food items which is obviously not good as these food will be stored as fats since they could not be used up by the body. 

Therefore, to counter this problem that I have, I will change the rules and prize for this CNY weight loss plan. The prize for this weight loss plan is a toy that I have always wanted from Stay Real, a brand that 五月天 阿信, had made which cost $40. If I snack for one day, I can only buy the toy 1 week later after 29 January 2013. Since now I have snack for 3 days, I can only buy the toy 3 weeks later. Hopefully, this is a huge enough incentive for me to work on. Gambatte!!!

|ser|

Stats of current situation:

Height: 168cm

Weight at start: 60.5kg

Weight 6 days later: 60kg

BMI: 21.4

Expected results: 56kg

Preferred results: 52kg

NOOOOO!!! Too heavy!

OMG! I saw a dreaded number on my weighing machine yesterday. I can't believe how much I have gained since 2012 after my graduation. I think that my jobs and my state of mind results in this absurd weight gain. Therefore, I decided to amp up my weight loss regime to get ready for Chinese New Year (CNY) which can act as my short term goal. 

My following plans goes like this:

1) EXERCISE EVERYDAY

           I will try to do about 30min to 1hr of exercise during the weekdays and possibly up to 2hrs during the weekends. Even if I have no time (which is not an excuse), I will definitely try to do some deep stretches or some pushups/situps before I go to sleep. 

2) NO RICE/NOODLES/STARCH FOR DINNER

         This is just to reduce my calorie intake as it is stated that to lose 1kg per week, about 3500 calories have to be loss via exercise or diet. That means we have to have a net deficit of 500 calories per day which cannot be attained by a 1hr exercise. Since a bowl of rice is about 100 calories, this can help to increase my net deficit of the day. Furthermore, refined carbs causes a spike in sugar level which will be stored as fats storage if it is not used up during the night where our activity is low. 

3) FRUITS & VEGETABLES FOR LUNCH AT WORK

         I have been bringing lunch to work since I started work. Usually I will bring a sandwich or a wrap or a pasta but since I need to bring up my calories deficit, I decided to just eat fruits & vegetables without any dressing. Vegetables have loads of fiber and vitamins which are essential to our body. However, the amount of calories it contains per cup is too little (excludes starchy vegetables) therefore I added fruits to the lunch. For fruits, although it contains loads of fiber and vitamins as well, some of the fruits contains too much sugar which may be stored as fats since my job is rather sedentary. My choice of fruits for lunch should not contain grapes, cherries, mangoes and bananas.

4) NO SNACKS/SWEETS/FRIED FOOD/CANNED DRINKS

         Need me to say more about this? I guess this is self-explanatory. 

5) MASSAGE EVERY OTHER DAY & DRINK 3L OF WATER PER DAY

         Self-massage every other day with firming cream, lotion or oil to get rid of water retention in the body. For ladies, it is easier for us to retain water in our body which may cause us to gain extra weight and also look more swollen. Water retention can be caused by having too much salt in the body. Salt will retain any water that is close to them which will take time to excrete out. One other way to counter water retention is to drink more water. By drinking more water, it will make our body think that we have enough water in the environment so our body do not need to store water for later use. Also, water allows us to flush out the toxins which are bad to our body. In conclusion, water is good.

These are the 5 things that I will concentrate on from today, Christmas Eve, to 29 January 2014 (as 30 January is CNY Eve, which screams steamboat!). The prize that I will give myself is $100 to buy yoga clothes as I have just started on doing yoga and I do not have yoga tights to wear to class. Every time I did not do one of these 5 things, I will deduct 1 dollar off my prize. 

At the end of this plan, I hope to achieve a better body in terms of the physical and aesthetics of it. So I will try update every week with the things that I have done and if I manage to complete all 5 tasks. Good luck to me!!

|ser|

Stats of current situation:

Height: 168cm

Weight: 60.5kg

BMI: 21.4

Expected results: 56kg

Preferred results: 52kg

Day 6: Green Tea

GREEN TEA! My favorite hot drink. I drink this almost every day in the office (because office provides this. HAHA!). However, even if the office does not provide this, I will definitely buy it and drink it everyday in the office. Lucky for me, I am very sensitive to caffeine thus I am unable to drink even a cup of coffee. However, I am able to accept the caffeine level in green tea which can provide me with more health benefits than a cup of coffee.

Superb Antioxidant

As our body ages and be exposed to the external environment, our body will react to these external factors and become oxidized to produce free radicals. These free radicals will then proceed on to "steal" electrons from other molecules so as to stabilize themselves. By doing this, our cells may become even more vulnerable to other forms of attack. This is the same concept as the aging of our skin. Aging due to sun is because the UV rays are able to attack our skin and produce more free radicals which will remove electrons from our cells and thus making the skin vulnerable and thus will aged faster. 

This is the reason why antioxidant have been so popular lately and you can see many different kinds of antioxidant supplements appearing in your local pharmacy or drugstore. Why buy these expensive supplements when you can actually get it cheaply by drinking it?

Green tea contains a large amount of polyphenols, a type of antioxidant, which is known to be able to fight cancer. This type of antioxidant can also be found in apples. However, green tea has the most powerful type of polyphenol known as catechins and not only can this antioxidant able to reduce the chances of having cancer, it can also reduce signs of aging. 

Fats Fighter

As many of us may know, tea in general helps to "clean" the fats out of the gut. The same applies to green tea. It can actually help to reduce the amount of the "bad" (Low Density Lipoprotein) cholesterol in the body by preventing the absorption of these cholesterol into the bloodstream. 

Green tea can also help to increase fat oxidation when coupled with exercise (source). I was pretty surprised when I saw this study. Next time I shall try going exercise after drinking a cup of green tea and see if it does work to reduce the fat percentage in my body. 

Since green tea can help to reduce signs of aging, prevent cancer and to reduce amount of fats, why not starting drinking green tea from now on =)

Bye!

|ser|