Are you gonna finish that?

Fun fact:
Did you know that 80% of your body shape comes from good nutrition? Just 10% is from working out and the remaining 10% from your genes. It just goes to show that you can hit the gym all you want, but unless you are eating properly you won't experience the healthy lifestyle for the long term.

So, yesturday I found a great website for those of you who REALLY want to know the nutritional value the food you're eating.



I gained about 37 pounds during my pregnancy. After having the baby I lost 25 pounds in the first 2 weeks without watching what I ate and without exercise. The latest research shows that a significant amount of weight (more than 5 pounds) cannot truly be lost with breastfeeding alone even though women still claim that to be the case. Our system just flushes out all that extra fluid from pregnancy resulting in weight reduction by doing "nothing". Women believe it to be the breastfeeding, but forget to take metabolism, genes, lifestyle, normal healthy food choices, etc. into account. But I digress ....

Anyway, I have been holding onto about 8-10 baby weight pounds for the past few months and I am officially tired of it and I'm tired of complaining about it ;) 8-10 pounds isn't much, but it's more than I want to have on me and I desperately want to get to my pre-baby size.

*Thailand 2004

So I put myself on my first, official diet. For about a month I cut out snacks like popcorn, extra bread, ice cream, rice cakes and any "non-essential" foods. That way any fine tuning done by the diet wouldn't be a huge shock to my system. I ramped up my gym workouts to 4 days a week with baby in tow and yoga twice a week.

On June 1st I started using a program called Diet Organizer and it has been great. You download it to your computer, enter in your weight loss goals, your current weight and your measurements. It tells you the calories, fat, carbs, etc. you should have everyday so you have a healthy weight loss. If I follow the program I could loose 2 pounds a week for 5 weeks. The best part for me is I enter in what I eat, the portion and it tells me if I am within my range. All the guess work is gone. It has gotten a little tedious to weight and portion my food everyday, but I have lost 3.5 pounds in a week and a half so I am seeing results. 3.5 pounds doesn't sound like much, but it is nearly half the weight I want to loose. Already I can comfortably get back into my "skinny jeans" so that has been a real boost to keep going.

However, eating 3 oz. of chicken and a cup of steamed veggies everyday (sometimes tiwce a day .... gross) for dinner is starting to get old. I want to eat normal food, but not feel like I am cheating or crash my diet altogether and loose out on all the work I've done so far. Cue Spark Recipes. You enter in the ingredients from a recipe and it tells you the nutritional information per serving. It allows you to eat food you are used to, but make it fit into your diet. It also lets you know if that food you want to eat is even worth the fat and carbs. So you can have brownies, pizza, and ice cream as long as you portion out what is appropriate.

I think this whole experience has taught me a truly valuable, life lesson on healthy eating. Food can be enjoyable, satisfying and nutritious. You don't have to make certain foods off limits. You can maintain a healthy weight AND eat whatever you want for the rest of your life as long as you watch your portions. I also firmly believe that if you make healthy choices your body will stop craving the unhealthy ones and the battle with food will be over.

Just in case you wanted to know how this yummy, childhood comfort food will affect your waistline here it is ....

Corkflake Potatoes
Amount Per Serving (12 servings for one tray)
Calories 375.1
Total Fat 23.2 g
Saturated Fat 9.0 g
Total Carbohydrate 33.5 g
Dietary Fiber 2.6 g
Sugars 3.5 g
Protein 8.6 g


To try out your own recipes go here:
http://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-calculator.asp