Here it is, folks. (And I warn you that this is a long one)
My health/diet/fitness plans for 2013!!!!!!!!!!!
You know me and long term health plans... It's not a good fit for me right now. I tend to say things like "I'm going to do Weight Watchers for the entire year!" or "I'm going to exercise every day for a month!" or "I'm going to do 30 days of blogging!" or "I'm going to lose 50 pounds in 50 weeks!"
These types of goals used to work for me. In 2010, I actually DID lose 50 pounds in 50 weeks, and had several exercise months. However, these very rarely work for me NOW. I think that I'm just not in a place mentally to handle such long term goals.
However, I do have a couple of plans for my health in 2013.
Sure, weight loss would be ideal. I am really jonesing to lose the 40 pounds that I gained with grief-related binges between May and July of 2012.
I have a couple of hard-core ideas on how to lose that weight relatively quickly. But I'm not sure whether or not I will stick to them.
Here's the diet plan that I think could help me to lose the 40 pounds fast:
1) Follow Eat to Live (first 6 weeks strict phase) Monday through Friday and practice intuitive eating on the weekends.
2) Exercise 5 to 6 days a week, three of them being running days. Two cross-training days, and one strength training day (optional).
However... I'm not sure if this is something that I can stick with for too long. I do definitely want to work on eating a more whole foods and vegan diet through the week and I want to give myself some more options on the weekend. This will work nicely for the first 5 months of the year, during which I will be living away from my live-in boyfriend Stacey because of an internship. We will be spending weekends together, but I will be on my own (well, with roommates!) through the work week. So having a stricter diet through the week could work for me.
One thing that is for sure about my health plans for 2013 is that I am signing up for a half marathon in October. And I want to run it, or most of it, if possible. And at this point I can run for 5 minutes only, and I have no idea how much distance that is. It's way less than 1 mile...
So the bulk of my health plans will be focused on EXERCISE, in the form of training for a half marathon.
As much as I'd love to lose these 40 pounds of grief wait as fast as possible, I also would love to KEEP them off this time. So I may end up going for a less extreme route, as far as the dieting goes.
But I really believe that if I'm training for a big run, I will begin to prefer to eat healthier, because it will benefit my running.
I have also begun to read Health at Every Size by Dr. Linda Bacon. So that may change EVERYTHING for me, we'll see. For now, I still really want to lose these 40 pounds ASAP, but in a healthy and sustainable way.
I don't know if I will follow a strict ETL diet through the week, but I will definitely be cooking more, and will be a more whole foods vegan. If I do ETL, I will stop counting calories. If I don't, I will continue to track via My Fitness Pal.
So... in summation, I'm not sure what my 2013 plans are quite yet. But what I've mentioned here (training for a 1/2 marathon plus going back to a healthy vegan diet 5/7 days) is the plan for now.
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| my cousin shared this pic with me on FB, and I love it! 2013 has to be better than 2012 was. |
