You Probably Don’t Want to Hear This…

This is probably where you are going to think that we have gone a little crazy. But, let me explain how we came to this. Dwayne is a research hound when he wants to start something new. Like, when he wanted to learn about photography, there was a solid month that I did not see my husband. He was up researching how to properly take photos. When we decided in July to do a life change, he dug in full force, watching documentaries about weight loss, looking up journal articles on how the body processes different foods, and yes, even reading books. We have a plethora of books sitting on my dresser right now on Fat, Sugar Intake, etc. He came across some research being done by Dr. Lustig out of the University of California on how sugar and fructose is digested and stored in the body. Dr. Lustig believes that the reason that, not just the United States, but all of the world is becoming obese, is because of sugar and fructose consumption. We could go on and on about it, but you need to watch this video series that the university put together. It is called “The Skinny on Obesity”. Just click here to watch it: The Skinny on Obesity This concept, along with getting the vitamins our body needs and eating the proper amount of calories per day, has been the key components to us losing weight. If I had to say one of the weight loss concepts was more important than the other, it would be our mindset on what sugar does to the body. We still eat sugar in our fruits everyday, but we try to avoid processed sugars as much as we can on a daily basis. Now, that doesn’t mean that we have given it up altogether. We have drastically dropped our sugar intake daily/weekly. Things that we completely avoid are fruit juices, sodas, sweet tea, and any processed snacks such as Little Debbie cakes, chips, cookies, and most candies. Now, I know that you must be saying, “You don’t drink sodas because you drink diet sodas because they have no sugar.” If you watch some of the videos that Dr. Lustig has done, aspartame and sucralose can have the same effects on your body as sugar. So, the best option for us, and you have to decide if it is best for you, is to avoid these drinks altogether. Since you may not have had time to watch the video yet, let me try to explain why sugar was making us fat. Your body takes the sugar and sends it to your liver. Your liver is supposed to tell your brain when your body has had enough fat and that it can burn your energy properly. The chemical that sends this signal to the brain is called Leptin. If Leptin doesn’t get to your brain, it begins to think you are starving. If your brain thinks that you are starving, it causes your body to slow down so that you will not burn energy and it will store everything that you eat. What we have found is that sugar blocks Leptin from going to your brain. Here is a brief explanation of what Leptin is: According to http://authoritynutrition.com/9-reasons-to-avoid-sugar/ “Leptin is a hormone that is secreted by our fat cells. The more fat we have, the more leptin is secreted. This is supposed to function as a signal to tell the brain that we’re full and need to stop eating. It is also supposed to raise our energy expenditure. Obese individuals actually have high levels of leptin, but the problem is that the leptin isn’t working. This is called leptin resistance and is a major reason why people eat more calories than they burn and become obese. Fructose is a known cause of leptin resistance, both because insulin blocks leptin signalling in the brain and because fructose raises blood triglycerides which also blocks the effects of leptin. This makes our brain think that the fat cells are empty and that it needs to keep eating. Willpower is very weak compared to the leptin-driven starvation signal. This is the reason people can’t just “eat less, move more” and live happily ever after. To reverse leptin resistance and make the brain WANT to eat less, sugar has to go.” So again, we are just passing along information that has helped us. You need to look into this and see if it is something that will work for you. One of the things that you need to remember is that fruit eaten in its raw form has sugar, but the fiber in the fruit counteracts the negative effects of the sugar that is inside of it. So think of it this way, sugar without fiber is bad. Sugar with fiber, as in fruit, is fine. One of the statements that Dr. Lustig makes is that you couldn’t possibly eat enough raw fruit for the sugar to have a negative effect on your weight loss. Also, remember, running fruit through a juicer removes all of the fiber. That is why we use a NutriNinja or a blender to make our smoothies. It maintains all of the raw elements of the fruit. **Keep in mind that this is for those who do not have issues with diabetes. If you are diabetic, it will be different for you. You need to consult your doctor to see what works best for you.** Ok, enough for tonight. Tomorrow is Wednesday which is very crazy for us, so it may be a day or two before our next post. Happy eating!

Alright, let's get started!

We are going to give you a fast rundown of what our day looks like. Then, we will come back and explain everything in greater detail. Breakfast - Our breakfast consists of one part fruit to two parts vegetables. I know, eating vegetables for breakfast sounds like not a lot of fun. What we do is we use a NutriNinja blender to make smoothies using our fruits and vegetables. Lunch - Most days, we take sandwiches made with Healthy Living Whole Wheat bread and deli sliced turkey or leftovers from homemade dinners the night before. Dinner - This is where it goes back and forth. The best option is to make a healthy, homemade dinner using lean meat and fresh vegetables. But, we live a very fast paced life and eat out a lot. We will talk more about how we choose what we eat when we are at restaurants. So there you go! Thanks for coming to our blog! Good luck on losing weight. :) Ok, I know you want more than this. We are going to break this down into each meal and explain what we use and why we use it. But first, let's talk about the greatest app ever designed for the iPhone (It works on Android too, but if I was you, I would only buy an iPhone. :) ). The app is called MyFitnessPal. You can also use it online if you would prefer that over using your phone. This app is used to journal everything that is put into your mouth as well as exercise, water intake, weight loss and measurement information, and much more, which we are still learning. THIS IS KEY!!!!!! Journal EVERYTHING and be truthful! Even when you go to Brusters and order two scoops of the Double Chocolate Chunk Ice Cream (which we did tonight).... The app will help you determine how many calories you need to eat in a day calculated by your height, weight, and long-term goal you have set. You can choose to lose one pound, one and a half pounds, or two pounds per week. We need to tell you this very important fact about calories per day... DO NOT BELIEVE THAT EATING LESS THAN 1,200 CALORIES PER DAY WILL MAKE YOU LOSE WEIGHT FASTER. Your body will go into starvation mode if you eat less than 1,200 calories per day. When it does this, it stops weight loss and goes into survival mode, which will cause you to NOT lose weight. Tomorrow, we will begin explaining how and why we eat what we do for certain meals and how you can do the same thing. http://www.myfitnesspal.com/

Our Back Story

Yep, this was me back in 2008 and Dwayne dancing with our niece at her wedding in 2010. I was the biggest I have EVER been and I felt horrible. Dwayne was pushing close to 300 pounds. Back in 2000 or so, I was diagnosed with Fatty Liver disease and was told that I had to lose weight. Losing the weight would cause the fat deposits that were forming in my liver to reverse and go away. So, at that time, we started on what seemed like our never-ending weight loss journey. Growing up, I never had to deal with my weight. All through high school I was extremely skinny and was perceived as being under weight. I was always skinny. Not an ounce of fat was on me. Ever. Dwayne on the other had was somewhat the opposite. He has struggled with his weight since early in life, but was never to the point of obesity until after we graduated college. I have always loved food, as you can probably tell, but it wasn't until after my first year of college that it all started to catch up with me. I just tagged it as the "Freshman Fifteen", but then noticed that after each year, I was just tacking on more and more weight and not losing it. I always kid Dwayne and tell him that I didn't start gaining until I met him because he taught me how to eat. So, after we graduated and moved into "the real world" of work, it all spiraled out of control. It was by chance that my Fatty Liver was discovered. I had gone to the doctor for a yearly check up and found that my liver enzymes were slightly elevated. After blood work and ultrasounds, I was finally diagnosed. At that time, I was 180 pounds. We knew we had to do something and hence, Weight Watchers came into the picture. We both worked together to lose weight. He lost over 50 pounds and I lost 30. During that time, we were trying to get pregnant (That is a testimony all in itself.). As we were working to lose weight, we discovered that our first baby was on the way so we stopped dieting. During my pregnancy, I gained all 30 pounds back and Dwayne, having sympathy cravings, gained his back as well. Ten months after Kiersten was born, we ended up getting pregnant with baby #2. I did pretty well with keeping the weight off after this pregnancy until I quit nursing my son at four months old. At that point, it all ballooned into a big FAT mess. Hence, the picture at the top. I blamed the birth control and the hormones that it was putting into my body. It made me feel exhausted, drained, fat, unattractive....and the list goes on. But, when I look back, I realize NOW that, yes, some of it may have been the medicine, but a majority of it was the poor eating habits that had spiraled out of control, Dr. Pepper, cake, chocolate, pasta, bread... every day, several times a day. This picture at the top of this post was four years after Hayden was born. I was 196 pounds. I cringed at the thought of reaching 200 and that alone is what started me back on the path of undoing the mess that I had gotten myself into. Up until about three years ago, we went to gyms, worked out, lost here and there, but never seemed to gain total control over our weight. I had lost down to 160 pounds and Dwayne had lost over 20 pounds, but then our focus shifted from us to our kids' sports and we stopped dead in our tracks on our weight loss journey. I ended up gaining back up to around 170 pounds and then a year a half ago, I lost my job. I was miserable, depressed, worried, sick, and wanted to eat ALL OF THE TIME. It was my safehaven. Before I knew it, I was back up to 180 and climbing. I loved my temporary position that I had last year, but the suspense of not knowing was killing me. I continued to gain. Then, in June of this year, the nightmare was officially over. I was offered a permanent position and I saw my real self begin to emerge again. In July, we both had had enough. On a whim (after trip to the beach and feeling REALLY fat), we decided to get rid of the old baggage, and do a total and complete LIFE CHANGE. And it has been just that. We have learned that through the years we have done it all wrong. Yes, exercise is important, but we never changed our eating habits. We hadn't bought into the entire package. Even on Weight Watchers, we were always hungry and understand now that we were eating the wrong foods. Until you are willing to change everything about what you put into your body, you will not be 100% successful in your weight loss journey. You may lose weight, but as you can see in our story, it won't stay off. The key is LIFE CHANGE!

Our New Journey

Ok, before we get started talking about what we are doing to fix ourselves, we want to say a few thing first. 1. This is what has worked for us and we are not saying it the only way to lose weight. Over the last three months, our lives have changed in a big way. We are going to talk about the changes we have made that are great for us, but in no way are we doing this blog to put anybody down. Family and friends have been asking what we have been doing and we want to pass the information on to them. We did not want put the information on Facebook because we don't feel like it's the right place. We wanted a place where family and friends could come and read, ask questions, and just talk about what we are doing in this life change. 2. We are not trying to be know it alls. The information we pass along is done to try and help. We are always learning and always looking to better understand how and why our bodies work the way they do. 3. We are not on a diet! We have changed how we eat. We want to say that the change is for the rest of our lives, but only time will tell if that is true or not. But, our plan is to never eat the way we did before! And our hope is, after we show you what we have learned, you will make some changes too. 4. To effectively change our lives, we had to stop doing what made us fat! We will talk about all the things we did to change our eating habits. Some were hard, and some were easy. Now it's time to get started! We will try to keep the post short, but informative.