Saturday, June 15, 2013

2 weeks out



Height: 5'10". Current Weight: 128.4 lbs. We are 2 weeks out from NPC Bikini-San Jose Fit Expo. 13 solid weeks into cutting.

Today's Topic: Trust and Support, How I Went From Lazy and Chubby to Fit Inspiration?
For as much hate as I got early on in this prep / weight loss journey, now I'm receiving such an overwhelming amount of love. All of you are wonderful--I don't go a day without a text from SOMEONE telling me that I'm looking awesome or am inspiring them, etc. I'm just so aghast that this is all happening. Why me? Why am I so blessed to live this life? I am so incredibly humbled by your kind words and support. I am so proud to announce that I will be joining the Serious Nutrition Solutions team in a minor role as a social media rep--something I never could have dreamed of doing. Not sure of all the details currently, but I am so overjoyed that a company saw my potential and my love for their products and offered me a solution to my social media itch! This blog has become rather successful, and with the support I have received elsewhere on the web (including Reddit and Instagram), I really hope that this is just the start of a "side job". My dream is to teach English, but with my newfound passion for fitness and lifting, and my desire to get NASM-certified, I think it's very possible that I could pursue something bigger (once I build a LOT more muscle over the next year). I think a great goal to have would be, in about 2 years time, get a pro card for the IFBB...and I think I could obtain that goal if I stick to the plan and keep pursuing excellent training and nutrition. But it's UNBELIEVABLE to me that just 8.5 months ago I was sitting on my couch eating ice cream bars and Pringles...and now I'm here. I don't mean that AT ALL in a vain way...I just wish I had started so much sooner. I LOVE fitness, and I hope I inspire some of you to love it too.

Today marks Hell Week #1. 100% on point diet. No semi-cheating (aka a lick extra of cottage cheese or hand measuring my oats to about half a cup). We are going STRICT--weighing everything down to the gram and making every macronutrient count. Tonight will be my very last "ice cream"--a Skinny Cow-- until exactly 2 weeks from now. That means no Arctic Zeros either (that extra 150 calories could be expended on chicken and steak and brown rice--clean foods that are non-processed/non-engineered). I will let myself have a Quest bar a day (today is my last day with 2 Quest Bars) because those calories could be spent elsewhere. I need to start controlling my sodium and carb intake now so that Peak Week isn't SO dramatic (no sauces, no sodium, little to no carbs for 3 days, etc). Coach is still reading, still experimenting, and I'm still trusting. And that's what this is all about--TRUST. I need to trust in myself, trust in my coach, trust in the feedback I'm getting from teammates and loved ones. This is now a mental game. I've done everything I could possibly do to get as lean as I've gotten. All we have left is a nice hypertrophy week followed by drying out. I will be MISERABLE next Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday (June 24, 25, & 26) because it'll be the hardest diet I've ever been on. But internally I know I've done the spiritual work to help send me through to the final stage.

I have jumped the hurdles of fear and doubt, I got rid of my major bloating (mainly by going off birth control and not eating 4 Quest Bars a day), and I've incorporated tiny bits of real cardio into my plan. I'm so so so glad I trusted Zach when he said "you do NOT need to do cardio every day, twice a day...or even every day...or even, meh Eff it, don't do cardio unless it's yoga." I had read SO much going into this prep, and I'd watched girls on instagram and so on and so forth. All of them seemed to be doing TONS of cardio (you won't find me at a cardio machine but MAYBE once a week). All of them seemed to be eating chicken and tilapia and broccoli and asparagus. And yeah, I eat 3/4 of those things...but I ATE REAL FOOD, DAMNIT. I ate what fit in my macros. That meant lots of egg whites, oats, almonds, avocado, salads, filet mignons, greek yogurt, Chipotle sides of steak and chicken, carrots, brown rice, quinoa...and my diet changed EVERY day. I thought that the key to success was prepping 6 meals of chicken and broccoli. Nope. No way in hell I was going to limit myself to a cookie cutter diet or not let myself have some frozen yogurt if I wanted it. Of course, my diet is actually what I will stick with forever--when I'm done prep I will just eat MORE of what I've already been eating--but it's been fun to experiment and change things up to fulfill my macros for that day. I've learned SO much about my body so that next time I compete, once I know what I need to improve, I can really dial in. It's a game, and while I was obsessed with filling out MyFitnessPal, I never obsessed about eating the same things and I can guarantee NO ONE has heard me complain about "dieting" or "how hard it is"... because it HASN'T been hard... it's been delicious and fun the whole way through. The only thing making it hard now is the fact that I am SO. CLOSE. TO. CHEESECAKE. AHHHHH! :P

3 comments:

  1. You might want to be careful about those Artic Zeros! http://www.reddit.com/r/loseit/comments/12eern/bought_some_arctic_zero_ice_cream_for_the_first/

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  3. Do you recommend going off birth control pills? How soon would you do it before competition day?

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