I Switched From Veganism To The Keto Diet And Lost 60 Pounds
I started competing in pageants at age 4, and eventually became the number-one pageant trainer in the country. My industry comes with extreme pressure to be thin, so, for a long time, I worked hard to keep up appearances.
That all changed when I got married in 2014. It was wonderful—I felt like I was finally able to relax, after meeting someone who loved me for who I was on the inside, not just the outside—but I also lost interest in my healthy, active lifestyle.
My life felt like a constant celebration—constantly eating out or having a few cocktails each night—which was a whole lot of fun, but not good for my body (or emotional and mental health). A lower back injury from a car accident around this time also made workouts painful.
Basically, it was the perfect storm. I slowly fell into a rut—and the thing about ruts is that one day you just wake up and you’re there.
Here’s the thing: I knew exactly why I was gaining weight—and I still couldn’t stop.
Years of pageant coaching led me to be come a sort of health coach for my clients. I’d tell them to eat at home, for example, because that way you can control what goes into your food.
But the busy schedules that my husband and I kept meant we were eating out constantly. (French fries sound way better than a salad when you’re tired and overwhelmed from working a 16-hour day.)
I was also vegan, which was not helping me—all I ate was carbs, which made me feel constantly hungry, tired, and grouchy.
When I didn’t recognize the person looking back at me in the mirror, I knew I had to change.
My husband loves to take tropical vacations, and it made me so insecure to be on the beach or at a pool in my swimsuit. When someone would ask what I did for a living and I responded that I was a pageant coach, they’d look at me, puzzled—all of this just reinforced that I had to do something differently.
At first, I tried going pescatarian. Adding fish back into my diet slowly helped my body make the transition out of veganism
After about six months following a pescatarian diet, I eased into paleo—adding chicken or beef to my diet, and taking away most of the carbs. After six more months of that, I began to feel better and more focused—but I’d only lost a few pounds.
Since I’d worked so hard on getting meat back into my diet, I decided to give something else a shot: the keto diet.
My body started changing dramatically on the keto diet.
A quick primer on the keto diet if you’re not familiar with it: It’s a high-fat, low-carb, moderate-protein diet that forces your body into a state of ketosis (where you burn fat instead of carbs).
It was tough at first (I had to cut out my beloved starchy carbs, along with any sweets), but eventually I got the swing of things and actually started to enjoy it. I lost about 35 pounds in the first six months.
Here’s what a typical day of eating on the keto diet looks like for me:
- Breakfast: coffee with grass-fed and organic butter or ghee with MCT oil.
- Lunch: a huge salad with arugula, romaine lettuce, and mixed greens with goat cheese, caramelized onions, organic grilled lemon and rosemary chicken, pecans and homemade balsamic vinaigrette dressing.
- Dinner: roasted salmon crusted with crushed pecans and dijon mustard with asparagus topped with truffle oil.
- Snacks: keto bark (a mixture of Lily’s chocolate with coconut oil, crushed macadamia nuts, and unsweetened shredded coconut flakes).
Once I started losing weight, I felt comfortable working out again, too.
I found an incredible orthopedic doctor who sent me to physical therapy for my back injury, and I also started getting cortisone injections and other treatments to help with my pain.
I was able to start working out slowly—about three days a week at the gym, doing a mixture of light weights and slow-but-steady cardio. After a few months of this, I lost another 15 pounds.
Keto isn’t always easy.
Sometimes I slide backward and eat something that isn’t keto-approved—but I don’t punish myself for it. I just tell myself tomorrow is a brand-new day and I get to start fresh.
I also never feel deprived on keto—which is huge for my happiness. I always make sure to have tasty keto snacks on hand: single-serving guacamole, Moon Cheese, Epic Bars—I even get to have tasty pork rinds. And, while I do a lot of my own cooking at home, I always make sure to check restaurant menus beforehand when I decide to treat myself to a dinner out.
But it’s not just about the weight loss—doing keto and making a commitment to exercise helped me start putting myself first, which ultimately made me a healthier, happier person overall.
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These 7 Tips Will Help You Stay Active This Summer
Doesn’t it feel like the summer season just gets hotter and hotter every year?! It is absolutely nuts! With numerous barbecues happening every other week (or, to some of you luckier ones: every week) and constantly chowing down on every opportunity you get with delicious eats in the summer, staying on track with a diet plan in order to stay consistent with eating smart and healthy can seem so difficult to the point where it can become almost impossible to get back on track.
Summer is the hardest season of all to stay consistent with healthy eating habits. Don’t believe me? Here are 7 Reasons Spring Is The Best Time Of The Year To Lose Weight.
You may become more active playing with kids and exploring outdoors–however if you’re not planning carefully, you might find yourself making frequent decisions on running errands for slurpee and popsicles (or at least be tempted to–but you shouldn’t even have to be focusing on those thoughts!)
Here are 8 tips to help you stay on track and stay consistent shedding those pounds while enjoying your summer and the summer food:
Make Your Breakfasts Overly Delicious
If you start the day nice and strong you’ll end up feeling full for a longer period in the day, while attaining the energy to keep up with your physical activities. A good way to start is to have breakfast with sufficient portions of healthy carbs and protein.
Related: Want To Start Clean-Eating? Here Are 6 Ways To Start
A protein shake with fruits and spinach is a great combo, and oatmeal or eggs as well.
Stay Active
The benefits of staying active is being able to keep those pounds of yours at bay. In addition you’ll stay more consistent with energy throughout the day.
Here are some healthy lifestyle habits to help you stay active:
- Riding your bike to work or while running errands
- Take a walk
- Take the stairs instead of the elevator
- Park further away from your destination and walk the distance (ever parked at a lot and watched someone park on the other side of the lot, wondering to yourself “what in the world is wrong with him/her?!”)
Please read: If you frequently take your dog out for a walk in the summer, please be mindful of these summer heat tips for dog owners. Be aware of hot pavement.
Stock Up On Gum
You know what’s a perfect to-go item to have on you? Gum! Carry sugar-free gum so you don’t suffer from the weight gaining effects it can drag you down with. You’ll also help reduce chances of being vulnerable of other health problems as well, even if its just a small percentage.
And did you know that chewing gum prevents mindless eating?
Read: 7 Worst Mental Attitudes That Make It Harder To Lose Weight
Plan Ahead
Pack or own snacks! If you’ve already been meal prepping, then you’re good to go. Just don’t depend on what your family or friends bring for you. It’s a good habit to always bring bags of nuts, like almonds or cashews. Some other great snacks to bring with you are carrots, apples, cheese sticks, coconut water, dried fruit, apples, and almond milk.
Read: How to Lose Weight Other Than Eating Less
Drink More Water
Drink plenty of water! I cannot stress this enough. Regularly drinking water will provide you with many great health benefits, including:
- Improved memory
- Increased energy levels
- Increased focus
- Reducing mindless snacking
And many more. Proper hydration is probably one of (and if not, the most) biggest key factors for fast weight loss. So if you’ve been wondering how to lose weight fast in 2 weeks, 3 weeks, 4 weeks, even 2 months, make sure you’re giving yourself some space for water consumption. Just make sure you’re drinking at least 2/3 portion of your weight (in ounces). Start with flavored waters.
Related: This is How Much Water You Need to Drink for Weight Loss
Note: If you want to try a new strategy to approach weight loss, Liz Swann Miller invented the new Red Tea Detox program proven to improve weight loss and reduce weight by burning unneeded pounds from our bodies—switching from carbohydrate fat burning to high-octane burning.
It is based on over a decade of medical research revolving around the cleansing of toxins and the benefits of African red tea. However, there is much more to it than that. The program is very thorough and divided into three parts that help each other: diet, exercise, and mindset. Go there now or follow the button below.
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Give Yourself Adequate Sleep
When you’re not giving yourself enough sleep, your body transitions into a serious carb craving state, and you’ll end up reaching for carbs like chips, bread, cookies and other sugary snacks just to get yourself throughout the day. It’s an easy habit to submit to, so be careful and keep yourself in check.
And studies show that the lesser sleep a person gets, the slower their metabolism is, which isn’t good news for your cortisol levels.
Cortisol is known as the stress hormone that helps you control your blood sugar levels and helps regulate your metabolism. This could actually lead to excess in fat so the more rested and stress you are the better. Here are 5 Ways Sleep Can Help Slim Your Body
Give In To Food Cravings
If you think this sounds oddly weird to you, don’t worry, you’re not alone. But listen, it works. I mentioned this in a previous article, practicing mindful eating is a must if you want to lose weight fast. Leo Babauta shared a great story of when he used to eat mindlessly on a daily basis. But long story short, he changed his eating habits and found it much more manageable to shed those pounds.
Related: Weight Loss: Sniffing Foods That Help
What did he do? One of the things he was doing was he learned to give in to his cravings for his favorite foods. Here’s the catch: Do it in moderation. Keep your portions small and enjoy every bite, nice and slowly. Do it like you mean it. You won’t have the same food craving like that again for awhile.
Find A Workout You Love
The best way to stay consistent with the gym every day is to find workouts you love doing and incorporate them into your workout routines. You are more likely to stick to your gyming habits and stay motivated to keep you going.
There are so many workouts you can do to get your heart rate up and burn extra fat such as weight training, which is great for boosting your metabolism! To get you started, here are 11 Best Exercises To Diminish The Fat Around Your Belly
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Bigger and Better Arms With James Hollingshead
Kailan Kalina
November 19, 2018
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3 min read
Whoever says there are too many arm workouts out there probably doesn’t have arms the size of James Hollingshead’s. And if you disagree, maybe his guns will convince you that your own routine just ain’t cuttin’ it.
Strict form is the name of the game here, and that applies to both the warm-up and working sets. Hollingshead’s workout also makes liberal use of the rest-pause method in a classic high-intensity training style. Basically, you hit all of your reps for the first 2 sets, making them essentially warm-up or ramp-up sets. Then, on the final and heaviest set, you go for broke. Hit 6-8 solid reps, leaving you right at failure. Rest 10-15 seconds, then do a few more reps. Keep going in that pattern until you can’t do another rep, period.
If you’ve primarily taken an “all the volume, all the time” approach to arms, doing high-intensity arms like this could feel like a crazy battle each and every movement. But stick with it for a few weeks, and this approach will shorten your time spent in the gym and still allow you to bring the ultimate intensity that those babies need to grow.
We know you’d never skip arm day, so you might as well give yourself something good to look at when you stop to flex in the mirror.
James Hollingshead’s Arm Workout
For each exercise, increase the weight you use for each successive set.
1
3 sets, 12, 10, 6-8 reps (plus several rest-pause reps on the final set)
2
3 sets, 12, 10, 6-8 reps (plus several rest-pause reps on the final set)
4
3 sets, 12, 10, 6-8 reps (plus several rest-pause reps on the final set)
5
3 sets, 12, 10, 6-8 reps (plus several rest-pause reps on the final set)
6
3 sets, 12, 10, 6-8 reps (plus several rest-pause reps on the final set)
Technique Tips
V-Bar Triceps Press-down
Hollingshead likes to start his arm workouts with a cable exercise like this one to prepare his arms and elbows for the heavier free-weight exercises to come.
As Hollingshead mentions, the V-bar tends to be easier on the wrists than some other handles. A straight bar in particular can place strain on the elbow joints. But that doesn’t mean you can’t also go heavy in the final set.
Dumbbell Overhead Extension
Stay nice and upright with your shoulders pulled back in a seated position. Your elbows should be out wide and the dumbbells parallel with each other behind your head. Drive the dumbbells up as high as you can. No half reps allowed! As you lower the dumbbells, don’t let them bang together.
Machine Dip
Keep your elbows tucked behind you, as flaring them can put unwanted pressure on your anterior delts and take away from the full-on blast to your triceps. Descend all the way down to 90 degrees before returning to start. You can go surprisingly heavy on this move, so give that final set everything you’ve got.
Biceps Curl
Hollingshead normally does this exercise with dumbbells, but here he uses a machine. If you’re a gym floater, take advantage of equipment you don’t normally use! Dumbbells or a barbell with a supine grip would definitely still get the job done. And don’t skip the rest-pause reps at the end of the final set.
Single-Arm Hammer Curl
Your elbow should never leave your side as you curl; assume that it’s glued to your side at your rib cage. Engage your core and keep your body rigid. Your opposite arm should be straight at rest. Slow and controlled reps will stimulate a more effective pump.
High-Pulley Cable Curl
It’s your final chance to really fill those guns with blood! Set up the attachment so that your hands are even with the pulley when your biceps are fully contracted. Start with your arms extended out (you will be in a Y-position) and bring them toward your head. Keep your elbows high, parallel with your shoulder joints.
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What Is In The Best Fat Burners?
There are two main kinds of fat burners: those containing stimulants, and those which are stimulant-free.
Most (but not all) thermogenic fat burners contain stimulants, usually including caffeine. Caffeinated fat burners are good for people who find it difficult to summon up the energy to do a vigorous workout or lengthy cardio session.
“[Caffeine] helps burn fat, and help athletes do more work for longer periods in the gym and in sport,” explains Robert Wildman, Ph.D., RD, in the article “Boost Your Workout with Caffeine.”
Caffeine is also a potent appetite suppressant for those who find that their ravenous cravings get in the way of their results. So yes, there’s a very good reason that it’s such a popular ingredient in fat-burning supplements!
As effective as caffeine is, though, it’s far from the only ingredient in popular fat burners. And it becomes even more effective when combined with some of the others.
But to be clear, just because a fat burner has more ingredients doesn’t make it better! Especially if you’re new to fat burners, focusing on a few essential ingredients like these is a good place to start.
Green Tea: Green tea and green tea extracts have been shown to activate the body’s thermogenic fat-burning activity. A study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that men who ingested the active ingredient in green tea (catechins) significantly reduced their total fat area, waist circumference, skinfold thickness, and subcutaneous fat area.[2] As exercise physiologist Nick Coker explains in the article “Your Expert Guide to Green Tea,” taking this ingredient with caffeine has been shown to make it even more effective.
L‐carnitine: This stimulant-free amino acid has been physique athletes’ secret weapon for decades. Taken once or twice daily with food, it can also help your body convert stored body fat into energy, leaving you leaner and more defined. It does this by breaking up fatty acids so the body can use them for fuel. As Jim Stoppani, Ph.D., explains in “Your Expert Guide to L-Carnitine,” it has also been shown in studies to support recovery from workouts, reduce muscle damage, and even reduce exercise-induced muscle soreness.
CLA: Conjugated linoleic acid, or CLA, is a naturally occurring fatty acid, similar to an omega-6 fatty acid. Even though CLA is a fat, studies show that consuming 1.4-3.0 grams per day can lead to overall body-fat loss.[3,4] It can also help you retain muscle during periods of weight loss, as kinesiologist Ciaran Fairman, Ph.D., explains in the article “Your Expert Guide to CLA.” Remember, muscle is your ally for long-term success!
Yohimbine: This ingredient, made from the bark of the yohimbe tree, is a popular stimulant in fat burners. It has been shown in a well-known study to produce significantly better fat loss results than a placebo among well-trained soccer players.[5] However, more research is definitely needed, and yohimbine isn’t for everyone! If you’re prone to anxiety or are very sensitive to stimulants, proceed with caution when it comes to yohimbine. Some people find it makes them very jittery or anxious.
Garcinia cambogia: As nutritionist Jonny Bowden, Ph.D., explains in the article “Fat-Loss Hope Or Hype: The Truth About Garcinia Cambogia,” this caffeine-free acidic fruit extract has become very popular in recent years. As long as you take it properly, he explains, it can offer potent appetitive-control benefits.
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