Healthy Living in Connecticut Blog

I know a lot of you like to lose weight in the early spring in preparation for the beach in summer. Ideally you should want to lose weight in order to live a healthier life, but so many set goals to lose weight in order to look better. You may have unrealistic goals on how fast you can lose the weight and you might be putting a lot of extra stress on yourself.

Wellness challenges traditionally run in the fall and spring at many local YMCAs. Some participants think why lose weight now when Thanksgiving and Christmas are coming up, the typical holidays that always brings lots of food. But losing weight now is better than waiting for the spring. This way, when Thanksgiving comes around, you'll be more prepared to eat healthier and because you're living a healthier lifestyle, you'll be less likely to overeat. And when you do cheat, it will be easier to keep your weight in check.

I've learned a lot the past couple years on the correct way to lose weight, mostly from trial and error. I was like many others out there, and struggled to try and lose weight but not succeed.

Finally I realized... you have to eat properly too, not just exercise. Before I lost the weight, I would exercise two to three times a week but did nothing to change my diet. When I think about how bad my diet was back then, I wonder how I could eat all that I did. I mean a good majority of the food I ate had a ton of sugar in them. I'm talking about candy bars, ice cream, frozen dinners, cookies, the list goes on and on!

I know a lot of weight loss challenges are going on this fall and I thought this is a good time to remind people of the superfoods I eat. I did a post months ago where you can read my list of the favorite superfoods, click here for the link.

The list is pretty much the same, but I wanted to stress the importance of a few of the foods and a few more that I've tried since then.

Back when I was obese, I was lucky to get maybe two workouts in at the gym each week. I wasn't able to use the treadmill faster than like 4.5 MPH and I was lucky to stay on for 20 to 30 minutes.

I was also sitting most of the day at a desk. I would barely get up and move or even stretch my legs. I remember my legs would be so stiff they wouldn't even want to move.

I had such an awesome doctor's appointment today. For those of you who might not know, I was pre-hypertensive less than two years ago. My doctor wanted to put me on blood pressure medication. I told him I would rather lose the weight first than go on medication.

I had wanted to see if it were possible to lower my blood pressure through diet and exercise. If I was on medication while I was losing the weight, it would be difficult to tell if it were lower because of the medication or the weight loss. This way, with no medication, I now know that blood pressure can go back to normal with proper diet, exercise and weight loss!