Ellen's Health Journey

Today I'm thankful for my awesome job! The last three weeks have been pretty fun, just sitting in a circle with the other counselors and planning out awesome, messy, crazy, and hilarious activities to do with our 5-6 year-old campers :) It's been fun getting to know my fellow counselors and I cannot wait for the real fun to start next week when camp begins! I'm sure I'll have plenty of wacky stories to tell about campers, games, and laughs that will happen over the next eight weeks, so stay tuned for those :)

 

This is a camp photo from last year. A group of thirty kids made me into a human sundae with whipped cream and various other toppings. I was picking oats (yes, oats) out of my hair for three days!

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Health Update: Didn't weigh in today. Because I'm nervous. After many laborious hours of research I'm still puzzled as to what's up with my lack of weight loss. That's the frustrating thing about this whole process: Nothing is concrete or proven. Everyone has a different theory about how to lose weight and an opinion on what's right or wrong. There are no definite answers or specific formulas because every body is different.

I thought maybe I wasn't doing enough cardio, so, as I mentioned yesterday, I upped it to 40-50 minutes per day (Well, this includes strength and abs, as well) from my old 25-35 minutes a day. We'll see if this helps.

I've also read articles about the "starvation mode" theory that states: If you work out, you need to eat more than 1200 calories a day. Otherwise your body will think it's starving and store the fat instead of burning it. I'm not sure if I believe in this theory, but, if it's true, that could be what's happening to me. Though on days when I exercise I tend to eat more like 1300 calories, leaving "wiggle room" of 200 or so calories in case I overestimated my exercise or underestimated my food. (On the My Fitness Pal app, that's the green number that shows how many cals you have left to consume that day.)

If anyone has any encouraging words or advice, please feel free to comment!

Have a great Thursday :)
-Ellen