Don't let Stress take control of your life! It has been so hard to keep up on anything and everything the past few months. Especially posting and focusing on our weight journey. It all started with our house-hunting adventure. Renting an RV and traveling around 4 different states looking for a house... With 4 dogs. Then the worst thing happened, my Mom, Amy's Grandma passed away. After everything settled down we finally found the perfect house. But we also found that Stress and weight gain are real and we are back to owning our lifestyle journey!
Key Takeaways
- Stress impacted our weight journey while house-hunting, leading to unhealthy eating habits.
- We realized that both stress and happiness can contribute to weight gain, but we have now found a happy home.
- Our learning lesson: never beat yourself up for setbacks; focus on what matters.
- To regain control, we plan to weigh ourselves weekly, measure food portions, and exercise more regularly.
- We're excited to share our lifestyle journey and encourage others to join us on this path.
Not Staying on Track
Needless to say, we have not been tracking what we eat like we should be (and like we did in the past). I mean when traveling so much and not staying in our own house it's very easy to eat wrong and not hold yourself accountable. Plus, half our meals were at fast food restaurants. And Yes maybe a few too many glasses of wine Not cool. So it's easy to pack on a few extra pounds. . .well 20 extra pounds. Those dang sweatpants keep stretching with me. At least my jeans start to warn me a little when I've overindulged.
Both Stress and being happy can impact the diet!
So we know it's an excuse to say, "Stress caused me to gain weight". But I know I am a stress eater and lucky for Amy she is also!! Hey, I passed on all the great traits. Haha Something else we discovered is that even being super happy can cause weight gain.
So, I understand everything that has happened over the past 6 to 8 months has been extremely stressful. But, when I look at my life right now, I have never been happier. I mean, I am giggling happy. After everything settled down, we finally found the perfect house. We are back in Ohio, right in the snowbelt, big yard and two separate living areas for each of us to have our own space. Also, I work with my best friend and have 4 sweet, funny dogs that keep us laughing and are always up for a good cuddle.
We have the house of our dreams (or will have the house of our dreams after the remodeling we are doing is complete). We will be blogging over the next few months about the changes in our house. Please stay tuned and follow us on our lifestyle journey
What Have We Learned?
Our biggest learning lesson is NEVER beat yourself up. Things happen in life and you have to deal with it and it just gets worse if you beat yourself up for things you can't control.
Know that when things get out of control you can stop and think about what is important. Know that you don't control everything. Yes, sometimes I'm a control freak.
You know that old saying "Get Back On The Horse". Well, I feel like that's where we are right now. We went off the direction we were on and now that life is back on track we need to get back on the "Horse" Or in our case, back onto our lifestyle focus. I'm not calling it a diet because it isn't a diet it is a lifestyle journey.
What we did Right
The major thing we did right was to keep our recipes low-fat and full of flavor. We love to cook and come up with new ways to have our favorite foods. The problem is we were eating more than one serving and yes were having more than one glass of wine with each meal. So, I'm still proud of us for continuing to make the right foods. We just didn't measure what we were eating and we had "bad" snacks even when we weren't hungry.
What We Are Changing
Really nothing is changing. We are doing this:
- Weighing in Every Week. We haven't weighed ourselves for several weeks! That was a mistake "HUGE"
- Measuring all the Food and Wine we consume and being accountable. Know that I can only eat or drink so much a day. And we really don't need a snack at 10 at night.
- Exercising. Yes, we even stopped walking the dogs! They miss their walks and we now have a new neighborhood to explore
We know this is everything we did before and how we lost 50+ pounds each. But it worked and I just like how awesome I felt when I knew exactly what I was eating.
We are excited about getting back on this lifestyle journey and sharing our adventures and food choices with you.
Please let us know some of your ups and downs. Let's do this journey together.
jenny says
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