Just a quick update on what I have been up to lately. As you can tell from my post frequency that I haven’t been very active online, or offline for that matter. After injuring my knee 10 weeks ago I’m now just able to bend my leg enough to start running in short bursts. This is very encouraging and I’m using that progress as motivation to restart a serious weight loss program.

Over the last 10 weeks I have done everything perfectly in order to GAIN weight. I’ve consumed way more calories than I’ve burnt, exercise has not been a part of my routine at all and my stress level has shot through the roof. Add all that together and what do you get?……..FAT and lots of it.

I have been receiving comments about how much weight I’ve gained and to top it off I need to buy a new pair of suit pants tomorrow for a wedding, since I can’t even get my old ones done up anymore.

Now this may all sound negative but I don’t see it that way. Sure it’s been frustrating and at times depressing but I look at all of these things as lessons and motivation. For example:

1. Not being able to run/walk until now has made appreciate how enjoyable it is just to take a nice slow walk around the neighborhood with my family.

2. Having to buy new pants, give me an actual physical target goal to strive towards. (Fitting into the old ones again).

Most importantly this whole experience has reinforced the principals of weight loss, that diet and exercise are both equally essential to maintaining and dropping the excess fat. Neglect one and the weight comes back slowly but neglect both and weight gain is very rapid.

So that is basically what I have been dealing with over the spring and first half of the summer. I feel that I’ve regained my focus now and I’m looking forward to big changes in the second half of the summer. Also look for more regular post updates as that is part of the plan.

Finally, I turned 32yrs old last week, great time to re-evaluate my goals!!

I was telling a co-worker of mine the other day a story about the time when my first daughter was born. I had been sleep deprived for weeks on end and I was practically falling a sleep at the wheel on my drive home from work. Most nights I had to pull over on a side street for a 15 minute power nap.

One night in particular freaked me out but now looking back I can see the importance of it. I got in my car at work like any other night and started to drive. Swiping my security pass was the last thing I remember until I opened the car door in my driveway!

I had driven 50 km and didn’t remember a single red light, left turn, right turn or any other cars on the road.

Your Body’s Auto Pilot System

I’m sure that all of us have had situations like this where you do something that you’ve done a million times before in the past but have no recollection of actually going through the motions.

I think this is your body’s auto pilot system. It engages when there is a problem or when you are out of balance. In the the incident above I was way over tired and my mind just couldn’t devote the energy needed to focus on every little detail of my drive home. In essence it tuned out everything around me.

It Happened Again

What triggered me to tell this story to my friend was something that happened a few weeks ago. It happened again . I was driving home from work but didn’t remember swiping out of the parking lot, just getting into my car and from there the very next thing I knew was that I was handing the debit pin pad back to the lady at the McDonald’s drive through.

I had driven 10 minutes, placed my order (which I always get), pulled out my wallet and entered my pin# for my debit card before coming out of my auto pilot mode. No word of a lie! The next words out of my mouth were WTF (the long version). I didn’t know weather to laugh or cry.

Formed From Habits

I am convinced that this subconscious auto pilot system is formed by our habits and gets triggered when you are doing something that your mind sees as a major problem or threat.

In the first incident I was extremely sleep deprived and since I had driven that same route day in and day out for so many years, my mind and body already knew what was expected of them without me even thinking about it.

The same thing goes for the “McDonald’s situation” as my wife calls it. I had done that drive through run so many times that once triggered my body and mind knew what they were to do. Instead of sleep deprivation this time it was excessive hunger. I had been trying a new way of eating and I was starving!!! Mcdonald’s is apparently my default choice for food.

This is something that I am going to work on changing over the next few months. I know it’s not an easy thing to change and it will take time to make it happen.

What are your thoughts? Please share your stories with me, tell me I’m not alone in this?

Note: This was my second ever post and it got 0 comments, lets see if we can change that

When it comes to losing weight, size does matter. Portion control is essential. Many people underestimate the amount of food that they are eating per serving or even know just how much a serving size should be. Below I have outlined some of the best ways to control the amount of food you’re consuming. As well as some of the more useful items to have in your kitchen that will help accurately measure your food.

1. Stick to the serving sizes on the package. Most manufactures make the serving sizes smaller on purpose in order to keep the overall calorie and fat content as low as possible. It’s a marketing thing, but use it to your advantage.

2. Eat off of smaller plates. It’s a simple and effective trick. If you fill your smaller plate it looks like your are eating more food than normal, but in most cases it’s much less.

3. When eating at home split your dinner into 2 portions. Eat one and put the other in the fridge for lunch the next day.

4. If you absolutely have to eat out at a fast food or other type of restaurant, order the kiddie meal. You’ll usually end up saving a few hundred calories and you get a toy

5. Leave the food on the stove or counter, not at the kitchen table. You’ll be less likely to go for seconds.

6. Never eat your food out of a bag, carton or other container were you can’t see what you are eating. If you can’t see it you don’t know how much you have had or how much is left.

How much is a serving size and how do you measure it?

A serving of beef, poultry or fish is usually 3 oz (85g) or about the size of a deck of cards.

1 cup serving of milk, vegetables or yogurt is roughly the size of your fist.

A serving of cheese should be equal to the size of your thumb.

A medium sized apple or orange is the size of a tennis ball.

Top 3 measuring tools in your kitchen

1. Digital or Mechanical food scale

2. Measuring Spoons

3. Double sided measuring cup for both liquid and dry ingredients.

You can check out more of the weight loss “weapons” at weapons for weight loss

Overall if you are watching your portion sizes on a regular basis, there is no reason that you can’t enjoy your favourite foods while still losing weight.

What are your thoughts?

Since I was about 6 years old I have been eating at McDonald’s. It started as a regular Saturday ritual with my Dad and sister. We would go and play on all the unsafe playland equipment, the hard metal Grimace slides, the fry guy rocking horse things on the giant springs that were way too loose and could catapult you right off and my personal favorite the mayor McCheese tower.

McDonald’s became a special treat for me and as I entered my teens I traded my dad and sister for my burger loving friends. McDonald’s became a hangout and a place to meet new people. As a teen with very little money I seemed to naturally gravitate towards my local Mcd’s. (I remember getting 8 hamburgers for .25 each on their anniversary one year)

Enter Adulthood and a Steady Paycheck

As you can see I have always had a fondness for McDonald’s. Good times with family and friends and no adverse effects on my weight or health…….yet.

Once my lifestyle started to change and my activity levels dropped I should have also adjusted my eating habits, like cutting back on the Mcd’s. Unfortunately I didn’t and continued to eat there 2-3 times per week. It seemed that “all of a sudden” that food was sticking to me and I was gaining weight quickly.

I have made many incredible lifestyle changes over my weight loss journey but McDonald’s is the one major habit that I have been unable to break…..until now.

The P90X Restart

From one of my previous posts I let it be know that I have been gaining weight again and I was planning to restart the P90X workout program. That day is today.

So today is day 1 and I am very optimistic for 3 reasons. The first is that I am doing this as part of a group effort with some friends and coworkers. There is a commitment with us all to help support each other and to follow up with our stats as well as our daily workout results. I didn’t have this the first time around.

Reason two is I have the backing of my family. Over this past weekend I let them know of my plans and asked for their full co-operation. A big ask, but they listened and agreed to help however they can. Lately that have been big contributors to my weight gain.

Reason three is that as a part of our commitment to show the seriousness of this, we decided that we had to give up our biggest health vice for the full 90 days, no cheating what so ever. For me that was obviously the twice weekly McDonald’s runs. I don’t think it will be as hard as I think, I’m at that point where I am ready to let it go anyway.

Sell Your McDonald’s Stock

I am predicting that McDonald’s stock will drop over the next 90 days as a direct result of my holdout

As of Thursday October 30th this is the McDonald’s closing stock price. I will be providing updates in the sidebar as the 90 days progress.

New York Stock Exchange (NYSE)
MCD:$57.87 up 1.21%

With all the great weight loss information available on the internet today, I am amazed to see the popularity and high rankings of diet pills on the search engines.

A quick search on Google shows over 9 million pages related to diet pills either directly or indirectly and using the Seobook’s Keyword suggestion tool it’s estimated that there are more than 2300 searches a day for the keywords diet pills.

For someone that promotes healthy weight loss without using pills, I find this very disturbing. The more I see the ads on TV and the internet the more I ask myself why? Why risk your health? Why waste your money? Why are they so popular?

The Most Popular Diet Pill

By far the most popular diet pill has got to be Alli (AL-EYE). The first over the counter FDA approved “weight loss aid”. With sales of more than half a billion dollars since it was introduced in 2006. It costs $50- $60 a month and claims to block 1/4 of all the fat that you consume in your diet.

I know quite a few people that have tried this pill and actually had some good results. But, was there weight loss a result of the pill or the fact that they started eating better and exercising more often?

I asked 2 of my online friends (Kim and Maria) who took Alli for 3 months a few questions as to their results and why they decided to try it in the first place. Here are their answers.

Question#1

How much did you lose in the 3 months that you were taking the pill?

16 pounds and 25 pounds, mostly upper body (chest) but a good amount from the hips and butt area.

Question#2

What changes did you make to your diet and exercise routines?

Kim – “I didn’t change much other than watching what I eat a little more closely.”
(Note that she was already working out 3 days a week at the gym)

Maria – “A complete change for the first 3 weeks then I went back to a modified version of my former diet. I averaged about 2 days a week of scheduled exercise and I was walking a bit more too”

Question#3″

What made you actually the cross the line and buy the kit?

Kim – “The promise of easy weight loss. I read a lot of testimonials and online blogs saying that people were seeing results. Plus my gym partner didn’t want to do it by herself.”

Maria – “I was just tired of not losing weight. I tried the Zone, Atkins, and South Beach but I couldn’t stick to them. That and Alli was said to be safe other than the side effects. The promises were definitely a factor too”

Question#4

What were the side effects?

Kim – “Burning lots of calories running to the bathroom. That and I would also get stomach cramps every now and then”

Maria – “Yeah, it seemed like I was going to the bathroom all time and the claims about “leakage” are true and gross.”

So Why Are Diet Pills So Popular?

My first conclusion was that people are just lazy and are looking for the easy way out. While that is true to a certain extent, I don’t think that is always the case. Most diet pills are fairly “new” meaning that odds are the generation before you have never tried the same ones that are popular today.

The claims they make are incredibly appealing. They are marketed very well and do deliver some results, which makes them all that more difficult to resist.

The bottom line is that no matter how much you educate people on the risks of taking diet pills there will always be a rather large percentage of them that want those quick results. But they aren’t necessarily lazy; in fact many of them will workout even harder while taking them.

It’s like anything these days, as long as there is a demand in the market for them and money to be made they will be supplied regardless of what you and I say or do.

Long Term Side Effects

When it comes to the issue of long term side effects I’m left with more questions than answers.

Who really knows what kind of long term side effects any diet pill will cause?
What is an appropriate length of time to determine that a product is safe?
Are the potential results really worth the possible risks?

The fact is that we just don’t know the long term effects and that alone should be enough to make you steer clear of diet pills.

Final Note

Both Kim and Maria stopped taking Alli for the same reasons. Which were the cost, the side effects and the fact that their results had slowed dramatically.