The Three Biggest Lies in Weight Loss Programs

Okay, I may have been a bit dramatic in the title of this post by calling the topics I'm about to discuss "lies". I don't think that most weight loss professionals are trying to lie to you or that there is some huge conspiracy to keep us all fat. I am, however, very acquainted with how hard this journey is and what lies we tell ourselves and how they can damage our drive to stay healthy and to reach our goals.

I know I haven't written in a while. I have some confessions to make: I have been avoiding letting everyone know how poorly I have done since reaching my goal in January. I am back up about 15 lbs and I have struggled to get back to my good habits like logging food, strength training and cardio training, etc. It has partially been because I've had odd things going on like family coming into town, trips out of town, and my gym closing (a little bit of depression as well). Though these are all times where one can reasonably give themselves a break, I ended up coming to the realization today that I have another trip out of town in a week and a half, then my husband graduates with his MBA a few weeks later, then we go to the east coast for another trip, followed by practically my whole family's birthdays all in succession, and that takes me all the way until August. If I waited until August to stop my unhealthy habits, I'll end up right where I started in the first place. Guess what: then it's the holidays. That takes me to my first "lie".

1) There is a 'best' time to start a program.

Maybe when the kids go back to school or this crazy time at work ends. Then you'll suddenly have time, energy or money to devote to your program. Here's the truth: your life usually gets BUSIER as time passes, not less busy. You likely have LESS time, energy, and money as time progresses, not more. This will likely get harder, not easier. Now is best time for change. Have you ever heard the phrase, "you can't teach an old dog new tricks" or "old habits die hard". Don't let yourself become OLDER and habits HARDER to break as you wait for... What? 

2) It is (or should be) easy.

Let's just clear something up right now: if this is hard for you, there is NOTHING wrong with you! You are fighting against your very nature which is to move less and eat as much as possible just in case of an emergency. Expecting a fight against your nature to be easy is pretty unreasonable to yourself. When you do begin to struggle it makes you feel like you have some sort of defect. You feel dissolutioned and are more likely to turn back to Lie # 1 and go back to waiting for a magical easy / convenient time to change.

3) Life will be better when you get to your goal.

You will be the same person as a size 4 as you were at a size 12 unless you were doing a lot of other soul - searching activities than simply eating less and moving more. Your troubles don't all go away when you drop a few pounds. Sometimes we wait to live our lives until we get to a certain health / fitness goal because we believe that we will somehow be better or deserve to feel good about ourselves when we are no longer fat. If you need someone to tell you all the reasons you are worth being happy now, please email me. Even if you don't know me personally, I will get to know you and then tell you how awesome you are. Try me if you don't believe me. I dare you. 

There is also the misconception that it GETS easier. That might be true after YEARS of following a healthy lifestyle but here's another saying: "once an addict, always an addict." Brining up this saying is not to say that everyone trying to lose weight is necessarily clinically a food addict. I am simply pointing out that you can't expect to suddenly not prefer sitting on your couch doing another Netflix and junk food binge to eating kale and going to the gym to lift super heavy objects over and over until you can't anymore. Please don't be so unrealistic. Unrealistic expectations kill motivation. Thinking you are not good enough because it is not somehow easy for you to change will kill that drive even quicker. Remember, it took years to develop the habits you have developed. It will likely not take weeks, months, or even a single year for good habits to feel like second nature. 

Now, you may know someone who seemed like they flipped the switch. I have a fantastic client who told me he would never need to log his food because he was simply going to get rid of everything in his fridge and start afresh. I was skeptical but he did it! I am so proud of him! I do, however, need to emphasize that I was skeptical for a reason. MOST people don't flip a switch! It is never uplifting to compare yourself to others so please don't compare yourself to someone who has been able to change all at once. Besides, some people may be trying to put on a brave face. They may really be feeling inner anguish over really wanting a Big Mac.

Again, I don't want you to feel like I am trying to be a downer and tell you that it will never, ever be easy for you to maintain your good habits. Just don't put a timeline on it and don't be discouraged if you are still dragging yourself to the gym and wanting to stuff your face after MONTHS. 

Personal Update (for those following my progress)

Like I said, I am up about 15 lbs from goal. Some of that is 'real' weight. Some is not. Here I am today:

It is frustrating to be up again but here is where I started:

So I have maintained some of my progress. I have come to a realization, though, that numbers are really bumming me out. Rather than weighing myself and setting a weight or even a body fat percentage goal, I think I just need to eat 2000 calories a day, do 4-6 weight workouts a week and do cardio every day until I stop nursing, stop progressing, or I can see my abs. Then I will weigh myself and reevaluate. Other than that, my only measurements will me weekly photos and my pants. 

I have noticed that I do a really good job getting into a routine, but having a goal that is a number on the scale makes be subconsciously think that there is an 'end' to this lifestyle. I don't plan on dying when I reach 145 lbs so I should probably stop thinking of that number as my 'end'. Maybe that is why I keep sabotaging my own program right before I reach that number... 

Challenge Extended ....

Hey everyone,

I have decided to extend and personally participate in a new challenge. It will start tomorrow (3/23) and end in 112 days (or 7/13). I am extending it because I seem to need a challenge of event to keep myself motivated and having it be a personal challenge isn't working anymore. I need to compete.

So here's how it will work:

I will be opening up a Paypal account and I will put in $10 every week. Anyone else who wants to participate may choose their weekly contribution based on your own desires. Simply put your contribution into the account every week and email me.

I (and anyone else who participates) will set a weekly goal which, if reached, will allow me to keep my contribution. I recommend setting a process - based goal rather than a results - based goal. That means that I am going to reward myself for doing the things that lead to change rather than basing my success on losing a certain amount of weight. You can decide what your goals are but keep in mind that there are so many factors that affect weight that it would stink to lose your contribution because of something silly like not losing two pounds due to eating Chinese food and retaining water.

My personal challenge will be to log ALL of my food EVERY day and to stay under 2400 calories every day. That is what is going to get me to my goal. I am also going to be cutting out sodas, eating out and "junk food" but I want people to know that it is not necessarily to get me to my fitness goals. As I have said before in this blog that I don't believe that certain foods keep people from their fat loss goals. I am mostly doing it because I have noticed that a) my daughter is now looking at and becoming interested in everything Mommy is doing and it is not going to be long before she really starts to mimmic me. I want to develop better habits for her sake b) I spend more money when I drink sodas and eat out and I don't make good decisions when I do and c) I don't tend to remember what I ate in order to log correctly when I eat "junk food". I will, however, have a fast food backup plan. It is better to eat SOMETHING every 3-4 hours than to go without eating just because I can't eat the "right" thing.  So I will have a backup for every meal at McDonald's and Starbucks but it has to be because I would otherwise have to go without eating.

There will be make-ups. For example, if I do have a slip up and eat 2600 calories one day, I can make it up the next day by doing an extra 50 mins of cardio. I have to do it within 2 days of the slip up or I forfeit that week's contribution to the account. I will stay accountable by doing weekly blog posts for everyone in the competition to read about. Anyone else who would like to participate may email me at kerri.allyson@gmail.com every week before Friday evening to let me know how you are doing with your own goals. I will contact anyone I haven't heard from for a week but if I go two weeks without hearing from you, I will assume you have quit and put all of your contributions into the forfeit pool (unless of course I hear later that there was a legitimate excuse).

At the end of the challenge, I hope to get 100% of the $160 I will be contributing to the account to put towards a prize for myself. However, if I didn't complete my challenge three out of the 16 weeks, I will only get back $130. $30 will be forfeit. What happens to that money? Well anyone who completes their personal challenges every week (this will have to be on the honor code) will get to split my forfeit cash. If everyone has a few slip - up weeks, meaning that no one was 100%, then the top 3 challengers will get to split the cash. 1st place will get half of it, 2nd place will get a third and 3rd place will get the remaining 20%. So everyone will get their money back, some will forfeit a contribution here or there, some may earn extra but you basically have to quit in order to lose it all.

I am personally motivated by being in a competition. I like to be accountable to others and proving to them that I can accomplish something. If even one other person joins me I am fairly certain I will be almost 100%. If there is the potential of losing something, my efforts will likely double. I hope that this is a good idea and a lot of people would like to participate with me.

If you are one of those people, I am giving you until Friday, April 3rd to join. You can join by simply emailing me with your weekly goal and your weekly contribution. If you need help deciding on a process-based goal, let me know and I would love to help you out. From there, simply do your thing and email me once a week to let me know how it is going. I'll be posting my progress as well.

New Beginnings

Well it has been way too long! In the past six weeks that I have not been writing I have reached my goal, gained a bunch back, lost it again, changed my goal to be more aggressive, given up entirely, and come back to the reevaluate stage again.

This week while in one of my sessions, a client of mine mentioned a theory she had recently heard that everyone has a "weight thermostat" in their bodies which kind of forces them to maintain a certain weight or body composition. That would explain why many of us plateau and struggle to get past certain milestones. 

I have heard this theory before in my own weight loss and fitness studies and it is my personal belief that, if the thermostat exists, it is PHYCHOLOGICAL rather than PHYSIOLOGICAL. Personally, I would feel much better about myself if I could simply say that my body is just set for 150 lbs and that is why I am stuck where I am but if I'm going to be really honest with you, 150 lbs happens to be the weight at which I begin to sabotage myself. I also see it with my other clients. I find that some people have a particular weight which, when they reach it, they simply stop progressing. As I have worked with these people and looked a bit deeper into my own progress, it boils down to a few mistakes we make when we reach our "set weight" and throw the breaks on our program. So here are the mistakes I have made in the past six weeks which I hope you can all learn from:

1) I got rid of my accountability - I thought to myself 'hey, I've made a lot of progress. I eat the same thing every day. No need to log.' I quit wearing my metabolic arm band because my activity was pretty static and I obviously stopped writing this blog and checking in with my workout buddy because I had 'made it'.

Here's the big problem with that mentality: I was only eating the same way every day because I was LOGGING it, I was only burning a ton of calories every day because I was MEASURING it and got competitive with myself to burn more and I was definitely going to be much more consistent when I had to tell people if I wasn't doing what I promised I would do.

Lesson learned: the time for more accountability is actually once you've already had some success and begin to feel complacent. It is much harder to motivate yourself if you are feeling entitled to a bit of a 'break'. Get your support group ready!

2) I decided to let loose and 'celebrate': there is nothing wrong with having a splurge every once in a while. My problem is, though, that I had my splurges AND stopped being held accountable at the same time. Essentially, I told myself that I didn't care anymore. I stopped my momentum dead in its tracks and had no mechanism to push the train back into motion

3) I decided it would be easier when ... : that's right everyone. Dispite my previous posts declaring that there isn't a magical day in the future where vacations, relatives, and social events don't exist and excuses no longer plague your thoughts - I succumbed. At first that magical day was called "NEXT MONDAY WHEN MY MOM IS NO LONGER HERE FOR A VISIT" the next week came around and I didn't miraculously have a burning desire to eat fruits and vegetables and lift weights for an hour a day. So I looked for another magical day which I called "NEXT MONDAY WHEN THE SUPER BOWL IS OVER AND I START MY NEXT CHALLENGE".  Can you guess what happened? The Super Bowl came and went, I had been not only eating junk but binging on it for over two weeks losing ground by the minute and I STILL hadn't magically transformed into a health nut!

4) I think my biggest mistake was getting rid of a clear and measurable goal: Perhaps subconsciously my mind decided that I would be too bored maintaining my goal so I on a subconscious level had to sabotage myself. My advice to anyone in my shoes is this: have a clear, measurable goal decided upon  BEFORE maintenance with a plan attached so you don't get there or get close and the aimlessly go back to what you were doing before. I've already lost 50 lbs. I don't want to gain it back just for the fun of having to lose it all again!

So I've realized the error of my ways and I am coming back to the fold. My new and measurable goal is  this:

I am going to log ALL of my food EVERY day until July 11th (the day I will compete in my first Olympic triathlon). 90% of the days between now and the triathlon will be under 2100 calories until I need to reevaluate my nutritional needs due to:

- getting below 135 lbs (I'll need to increase calorie intake to maintain)

- I may be weaning from nursing before the race (I exclusively pump which is EXHAUSTING but keeps me burning a TON of calories) 

- burning more than 3000 calories/ day with increased cardio training for the triathlon.

Each month that I complete with 100% food logging will yeild a prize (a PROCESS-based prize). And every time I hit a milestone in my weight loss, I will have a slightly bigger (or at least more desirable) prize (a RESULTS-based prize).

Currently, I'd just like to log everything that goes into my mouth between now and going to California for Spring Break in two-and-a-half weeks. My prize is a haircut because it has been WAY too long ... Excuse the pun in that, please....

See you next week with my post entitled : the Biggest Lie In Weight Loss!

Giving yourself a Break (without Taking a Break)

This week I was surprised to find that almost all of my clients sat down and told me the exact same story I’m about to tell you regarding my last weekend. If you are among those who have experienced this or will experience it in the next few days because of the holiday, I hope you will find it helpful:

I have been steadily losing body fat and consistently been doing well with my plan. I have gone without breaks or ‘cheat days’, including Thanksgiving Day. I’ve been rocking it thanks to the wonderful support I have been given by family, friends, and all of you readers. Thank you!

Unfortunately last weekend, I had something inside my brain snap. It has happened before and I’m fairly sure it will happen again: I was making cookies for my husband’s holiday work party. I decided to try the dough because it is the law when baking cookies to eat the dough. I tried a little… then a little more… then I decided that I had ruined my perfectly planned day and I might as well do whatever I wanted. Two bags of chips, three Cosmic Brownies, and a piece of Razzleberry Pie a la mode later, I lay on the couch in a food coma wondering how and why I did that. I logged it all when I came back to myself and found that I ate a 1500-calorie SURPLUS!

I was disappointed in myself to say the least. I was tempted to quit until the New Year. It was then that a bunch of my own quotes from this blog, from my conversations with my clients and even a quote I heard in church popped into my head:

·      “There is not magical time when weight loss/ health will suddenly be easier.”

·      “One bad day will not affect your program that much as long as you move right along. Plus, if you logged it, you know how to fix it.”

·      “If you don’t feel like praying, pray until you do” – I applied this one to fitness and told myself, “If you don’t feel like logging/ working out, log/workout until you do.”

That last one was extremely helpful in getting me to suck it up and get back on track. On Thursday I was at work doing my very best to stall getting to my leg day (which is my least favorite day) when my workout partner popped her head into the trainer’s office to keep me accountable. I grudgingly told her that I was going to go out and do my workout right then. About five minutes after she left, I finally dragged myself out of my chair and into the weight room. I picked up a couple of 25 lb weights and began the only effective leg workout I could possibly think to do in only 25 minutes; the lunge/ squat combo. In that short workout something special happened: Whatever it was that had snapped suddenly snapped back into place as the sweat began to pour down my cheek. I could feel the fire sparking again and, by the end of my workout, I was back (and I have been back ever since).  It took six days to get that fire back but it came eventually and only through continuing what I had started. After doing the math and looking back at the Friday Fiasco I realized that, because I had done what I was supposed to do the rest of the week, I still ended up with a deficit. I only lost about half a pound but I was still moving in the right direction.

So the main message I would like to leave with you all as the year comes to a close, you are with your families is that food will likely be a huge part of your celebrations. Can you really look me in the eye and say that Christmas is still Christmas without your great-great grandma’s homemade fudge? Mine won’t be. I feel a special warmth in my heart (and in my belly) when I eat certain holiday comfort foods. That is just the way it is so I am going to have to give myself a break and enjoy them as they are offered. That doesn’t mean I have to take a break from my progress though. I suggest you all enjoy your holiday however you enjoy it most. But here are some tips to stay on track:

·      Have a timeline for your celebrating – if Christmas Eve is your big celebration dinner with family. Enjoy it. But if the celebration starts Christmas Eve and ends New Year’s morning (food-wise) you will end up moving backwards. Decide how long you will be letting yourself eat what you want. Set an alarm if you must to remind you that it is time to get back on track.

·      Log it – at least you will know what the damage was. You can decide how long it will take to rectify any splurges. Knowing the damage might affect decisions you make the rest of the holidays.

·      Give yourself a break – enjoy yourself and don’t worry too much. If you have an unanticipated surplus just get back on it the moment the splurge is done. I promise damage will be minimal as long as you keep going. “Don’t let perfect be the enemy of good”!

·      Don’t take a break now – taking a break means you stop trying until you think things will be easier. If you do this now I promise you will begin to slide backwards.

Well I am going to go to bed. I am going to my favorite restaurant with my family tomorrow morning for brunch and I am ordering whatever the heck I want. I am going to have a fairly normal day until our big Christmas Eve feast at around 4:00. I will also have whatever the heck I want including dessert. Christmas day might also be a lot of food but I’m not worried. I am not taking a break, just giving myself one. 

Month 5 Update

I just had my measurements this week and here are the results:

7/31- Start

Weight: 198 lbs
Body Fat %: 35.1
Lbs Body Fat: 69.5
Lbs Lean: 128.5


11/7- Last Measurements

Weight: 165.5 

Body Fat %: 27.5

Lbs Body Fat: 46.2

Lbs Lean: 119.3 

Total inches lost: 20

12/15- Current

Weight: 155.5 (-10 from last; -42.5 total)

Body Fat %: 25.5 (-2 from last; -9.2 total)

Lbs Body Fat: 39.6 (-6.6 from last; -29.6 total)

Lbs Lean: 115.9 (-3.4 from last; -12.6 total)

Total inches lost: 29.7

Successes: I have logged almost 100% of everything that went into my body. I also only had 3 days in the last 3 months where I ate above maintenance calories. 

I reached to of my goals: 1) to be under 27% body fat. My prize is a rug for my kitchen and 2) to not have any "cheat days for 90 days. My prize is a ceiling fan in my bedroom.   

Confessions: I did have a holiday stress freak-out where I ate a 1500 calorie surplus. I was absolutely distraught afterwards and it took five days to kick myself back into gear and to be motivated. I will be writing about this in a day or so. 

I'm in the home stretch! I only have about 4% to my goal and I would like to reach it by Valentines day. I am going to have to work really smart this holiday!

 Here's Where I started

Today

I'm super behind on my actual posts. My next blog might be posted tomorrow called, "Giving yourself a break without taking a break." It will be helpful for anyone who struggles with holiday guilt. 

Weight loss survival kit for the holidays

Everyone who has ever tried to lose weight during the holidays has probably experienced the frustration of going in with the best of intentions and ending up throwing in the towel sometime between October and mid-December.  This is the first year of my entire life that I have not done the same thing. Usually I am frustrated and decide right about now that life is getting too busy and my goal is too hard to do until the holidays are over. Besides, my weight loss goal was my New Year’s resolution last year.

But this year I have a few tools that I’ve never really had before or (if I did have them) didn’t utilize them properly. Here is what is different this year:

1) A support group

·           I know that I have not been the best at updating my blog lately since work has begun to pick up but I still receive emails, comments and texts from people cheering me on. So I’d first like to say THANKS for everyone who’s following. I am not saying that a weight loss blog is right for everyone but you have to admit that it is hard to be a perfect 10 on your own motivation scale 100% of the time. Especially during the holidays.

We as human beings enjoy pleasing one another and would usually be more likely to disappoint ourselves than to let other people down. So let people know what your goal is and how they can best help you. You may find that they have similar goals and were not sure how to enlist your help. Not everyone will be supportive and some may even unintentionally make things more difficult (I am sorry to say but I am almost always a terrible influence on my own mother). So have multiple people in your support group that you feel you can help support as they support and uplift you. You can do this in your church, friend circles or even with online programs and apps.

Please open yourself up. I know that your weight can be a personal struggle that you may not want to share. Take it from someone who recently decided to make hers very public – the more people you have on your side, the better.

2) Consistent accountability with zero exceptions  

By ‘zero exceptions’ I mean there is no excuse for not being accountable. I am not saying that you need
to follow a diet or eating/ workout plan perfectly.

If I had to pick one tool in my holiday survival kit that has made this year better than any other year, I would pick this one. This year I set a goal not to have any ‘cheat days’ (or days where I eat at a calorie surplus) for 90 days. In order to know whether I ‘cheated’ or not, I would have to log ALL of my food EVERY day no matter what.

I have had parties, activities, dinners out, my own wedding anniversary, and even travel where foods were served that I didn’t anticipate or I yielded to the temptation to eat something “bad”. Normally, after arriving to the unexpected event or eating the ‘bad’ item, I would stop logging and go crazy with the thought in the back of my head that I would be ‘good’ tomorrow, the rest, of the week or wait until Monday or whenever ‘life gets more manageable’.

This year, though, I have logged every bit of my good decisions and my bad decisions. With the information that I gather, I have been able to enjoy just about everything there is to enjoy about travel and the holidays and have been able to stop before ruining any of my hard work. I may have a few maintenance days but at least I can have the piece of mind knowing that I have not lost any ground that I work so hard to gain.

3) The allowance not to be perfect

·         It’s the holidays, people. Food is a HUGE part of enjoying them. Anyone who says differently is either lying or not a normal person. As much as you may try to deny it, food is a huge part of enjoying LIFE. We keep trying to forget that fact and treat food as if it is the enemy. Even if your goal is to eventually not use food as your go-to for emotional comfort (which is a fine goal to have) you probably won’t be able to change your deeply ingrained mindset in a few short weeks or even months. Let alone during the holidays. So if you fall to the temptation to have a comfort food, it is not the end of the world. You are not a failure. You are a normal person enjoying one of the greatest pieces of the holidays and quite frankly something that brings your family together. Don't beat yourself up for enjoying time with your loved ones to the fullest. 

One cookie will not make or break your goal. One dozen will. Somewhere in between one and one dozen there is a line. If you know how much your body burns in a given day and what you need to eat in order to lose weight, you know what the line is (or at least a decent estimate). If you cross it but logged it, you will have a clear indication of what you need to do to fix it.*

*Again, I am advocating logging food. I have had clients ask me in the past if I could just make them a nutrition program and tell them what to eat. That is called a diet. I don’t like diets because they don’t teach you how to live your life. So, yes, I could do that if you are willing to eat that way for  the rest of your life or at least the foreseeable future. If not, let’s log. If so, you’re a better man than I and I applaud your ability to shift lifestyles so dramatically and permanently.

My Progress: 

Weight: (Because I have been traveling and eating differently, I have decided not to step on the scale until I can be sure that my lack of water or bloating is not affecting the number. I know that I have logged a calorie deficit every day so no need to worry about it. However, the day before I left on vacation I weighed in at:) 158.8 lbs 

Successes: I didn't even cheat on Thanksgiving day. I logged all of my food including pumpkin pie and whipped cream and I was able to hit a deficit every single day. 

Confession: I have certainly not eaten a very nutritious diet even with a deficit... Lots of pie, not lots of fruits or veggies.

Month 4 Update

I just had my measurements this week and here are the results:

7/31- Start

Weight: 198 lbs
Body Fat %: 35.1
Lbs Body Fat: 69.5
Lbs Lean: 128.5


10/7- Last Measurements

Weight: 175.5 

Body Fat %: 32 

Lbs Body Fat: 56.16 

Lbs Lean: 119.34 

Total inches lost: 12.75

11/7- Current

Weight: 165.5 (-10 from last; -32.5 total)

Body Fat %: 27.5 (-4.1 from last; -7.2 total)

Lbs Body Fat: 46.2 (-9.96 from last; -13.4 total)

Lbs Lean: 119.3 (-.04 from last; -9.2 total)

Total inches lost: 20

I didn't reach my goal of 31% this month. It seems that, along with my fat, I am also losing quite a bit of lean body mass. I'll be cracking down a little more on my nutrition and set a goal for five days in the weight room this month. 

Successes: I have been logging everything everyday despite an entire week of being sick and unable to work out. 

I set a goal not to have any 'cheat days' for 90-days (except Halloween and Thanksgiving). A cheat day means that I eat a surplus of calories. I used to allow myself at least one a week but I want a ceiling fan in my bedroom and this seemed like a fun way to earn it. It has now been three full weeks and I have either been at a calorie deficit or at maintenance. 

When I wasn't sick, I did walk to the gym four times a week and I did do my weights. I set my new steps goal to 10,000/ day.  

Confessions: Though I have been doing a decent job logging my food and staying at a deficit I have not been doing a great job focusing on my macronutrients (proteins, cards, and fats). 

My goal for October is to reach 30% or less. My prize is a carpet for my entryway. Wish me luck!

 Here's Where I started

Today

I reached my goal to be under 30% body fat this month! My prize was a runner for my entryway. I have to say that it feels really good to go to the store, pick something I really like, put it in my house and every time I pass it think, 'I earned that.'

It's cheesy to add a picture of my prize but I EARNED it!

Successes: I have only had one day of a calorie surplus in over 40 days. My next goal is to try to stay at a deficit every day until Thanksgiving. It is getting harder and harder for a classic stress-eater like myself to not pick a weekend to go off rails but it is worth it for a ceiling fan in my bedroom. 

I'm doing a decent job getting to the gym four times a week though my current goal is five. 

Confessions: Still not focusing on my macronutrients (proteins, cards, and fats). 

My goal for November is to reach 26% or less. If I reach it I will have reached half of my entire fat loss goal! My prize is a bathroom decorating project. Wish me luck!