I’m BaaaAAAAcccckkkk!!!!

Have I mentioned before that I HATE writing titles? I’ll never get a book published because I’ll never ever be able to come up with a decent title. (also I need to actually carve out time to write… that’d probably help as well.) So before I sat down my brain was buzzing with the content of this post- then I started typing and had to add that darn title. SO for some reason all I could hear in my head was that little girl from the Poltergeist movie- you know- the one that came out in 1982.

Ok… I feel like I’ve gotten off topic a bit… Anyway- so after more than a year of not posting- I fully intend to start regularly posting again. It’s not that I haven’t wanted to post this past year- but I’ve been struggling MAJORLY with depression and that has made it really REALLY easy to blow off things like this.

My plan for this blog is to post something at least once a week. Maybe twice- depends on how I feel that week. Since this blog/website was always intended to just be a ‘whatever I feel like talking about site’ I’m going to stick to that general idea- and just post on what I feel like at the moment. However to give myself a little direction there are a few topics that I’ll focus on more than others- Health/Weightloss, Anime/Book/Movie/Entertainment Reviews, and I actually have a little comic that I’m going to start posting here and on Instagram. I’ll be still posting my struggles about mental health- and my triumphs as well, because I think that is important to talk about- also I need an outlet sometimes. As true to form probably most of my posts will be stream of conscious writing like this with very few edits, though hopefully I’ll get into some better writing practices as time goes on and actually plan out what I’m going to say ahead of time.

Oh by the way- I now have an Instagram account that goes with this site! You can check it out: https://www.instagram.com/decidedly_nikkie/ Starting today I’ll be posting there daily, mostly I’ll be talking about what I’m doing to become a healthier person- but also will throw in some other stuff as well. I have 6 whole followers so far! Woot! So if you’re interested in daily updates- check it out. If you’re happy with once a week updates- then this is the place for you 😀

OK so the purpose of this post- and if you came over from Instagram you’re probably wondering when I’d get to the point- and here it is! SO over on Instagram I’ve posted a graphic that looks like this:

And I promised in my description to go into a little more detail on each bullet point. So here we go!

Exercise 45 min a day

Honestly this one doesn’t take too much explanation. Why 45 minutes? Honestly because I read somewhere years ago that anything less than 36 minutes doesn’t do a whole lot for you, and neither does anything about 60 minutes. I think the idea was before 36 minutes you’re basically just warming up your body- and after 60 minutes you are to a point of exhaustion and you are more prone to injury or strain. Also at that point you need a rest for your body to catch up. I don’t know where I read that- a quick google search on ‘how long to exercise’ brings up at least 30 minutes a day. SO I’m not sure where I got the 36 minute thing, it is a weirdly precise number…

Going by an article on VeryWellFit.com in an article titled simply ‘How Long Should You Work Out‘ They point out that the American College of Sports Medicine says you should exercise at least 150-250 minutes PER WEEK to lose weight, with the recommendation at 250 for maintaining weightless. So assuming working out 5 days a week @ 150 minutes per week- that is 30 minutes per day. 5 days a week @ 250 minutes per week is 50 minutes per day. Or about 42 minutes if you do 6 days.

My plan is 45 minutes a day 7 days a week. However I’m not looking at super intense exercise, as my body is large, soft and doughy and I have a few knee issues- I’m focusing on just that 45 minutes of sustained movement. So I’ll be walking or using my indoor bike (outdoor bike as well if I ever get around to fixing it) I might split the difference between the two just for variety- but that 45 minute mark is my goal.

If you want to get healthy with me- set your own goal! I mean 10 minutes walking is better than 0, and if you can do 3 10 minute walks through the day then you’re doing more than you were! Movement is movement.

Eat Home Cooked Meals

Again, obvious, but I’m going to talk a bit about this. One of my biggest struggles as an adult- and especially as a mom and wife is cooking. It is NOT my favorite thing- and there are SO many quick and easy options. Whether they are fast food like McDonalds, Zaxby’s or Chick fil A, or the ones that we try to tell ourselves are good (convenience meals at the grocery store- like your frozen lasagna’s and whatnot). Of the 2 examples the grocery store convenience meals are DEFINTLY better than grabbing fast food; and if that is where you are at- go you! Any change towards eating less calories and smaller portions is going to be beneficial.

For me I need to start cooking my own food- for a few reasons I’ll get into in a second.

I was asked which diet I’d be following- and the truth is I’m not following one- at this time. When I say ‘Diet’ I’m specifically referring to those named diets (Atkins, Keto, Mediterranean, or whatever) This is why: First off- most are stupidly restrictive- I’m not talking ‘make sure you have reasonable portion sizes’ restrictive, but eliminating entire food groups. Before you tell me ‘but if you actually follow the diet you can add things back in’ that’s only true of a few of these diets. Also they are SO very different from the way that I eat now that I’m just not going to stick with them. I know this because I’ve tried. The other critique I have about a lot of these named diets is they often have foods in them that end up being in every recipe that are either really hard to find or really expensive or both. I get the feeling that many of these diets are written by people with unlimited budgets who just like weird foods. And that’s fine for them. But for me- and I don’t think I’m alone in this- they are just not realistic things for me to follow.

So I’m not going to follow a named diet. With all of that said- I am going to be doing an elimination diet- I’ve always had a lot of food sensitivity and recently that has gotten a lot worse- to the point where more often than not I’m spending nights not sleeping because of severe heart burn and feeling like I’m going to throw up. Which isn’t fun. SO I’m going to start with just a few NORMAL foods and then add to them over time. For this week I’m mostly going to be eating chicken and veggies. Mostly because in my experience chicken and veggies are pretty safe foods for me. I’ll be adding things in over time and of course keeping track of my foods in my planner so I can pinpoint what is making me react.

Now as far as my diet beyond that- I’ll be limiting my portion sizes (smaller plates) and increasing my veggie intake while dramatically lowering my refined carbs intake. At this point you can probably see why I’m going to be making it a focus to cook my own food.

Drink approximately 1 gallon of water per day

Why one gallon? I actually know from experience that I feel WAY better when I’m drinking about a gallon of water a day. That is nearly 4 liters of water- which is a lot. Which is why I have the word approximately in there. I’m not going to beat myself up if I only manage to drink 1/2 gallon of water a day. However- I know that I have more energy and that I eat less, but still feel satisfied, when I actually drink 1 gallon of water a day.

And no- I don’t pee all day when I drink that much. I see that a lot from people- and yes, when you are first increasing your water intake your body has NO idea what to do with it and just dumps it out. HOWEVER once you get used to drinking that much your body starts using it properly and your whole self starts feeling better. There is actually a biological reason for this- but I’m not going to write about that right now- it would require a bunch of research to make sure I was spouting facts and not just half remembered info from collage.

For your water intake- you need to do what is best for you. The recommendation is half your body weight in ounces for weight loss. I’m not sure how good of a metric that is because if you are 250lbs or above you’re drinking over a gallon of water a day- which just seems insane. If you are 160lbs and trying to lose a few pounds then you’re only drinking about a half gallon a day. Maybe that’d be enough. Do your own research and maybe even talk to a doctor if you can.

Move every 30 minutes

Currently I am a stay at home mom and also a freelance artist. Both careers plant you on your rear end a lot. Even with small children it is honestly hard to get a realistic amount of movement into a day. So my goal on this is simple- every 30 minutes just MOVE. Maybe walking laps around my basement, maybe I’ll do a jumping jack or 2, but in any case I want to put more movement into my day.

And that’s pretty much my plan. At the very least for this first week (Starting tomorrow through next Sunday) I’ll be modifying it as I go. Because I’m going to get stronger and fitter I’ll be able to add things and step it up a little more each week.

If you got to the end- thank you so much! I know this was a looong post.
~Nikkie