In the age of coronavirus, stay-at-home orders and social distancing, comfort food is now trending online. Stress eating and coping with hard times by using food is causing the COVID-19, as in 19 pounds gained!
Below are some tips on how to manage your weight while on lockdown from author of Heart of Miracles and heart-disease survivor Karen Henson Jones. – Markette Sheppard
Glow Girls, committing to eating healthfully has been one of the best (and most controllable) decisions of my life for so many reasons. The first one is glowing health and feeling great. The next one is happiness. Happiness is a bio-chemical state induced by eating nutritiously and exercising regularly.
Successful weight management and healthful eating is about eating within nature and valuing and respecting yourself (and the body that God gave you).
What it’s not is conforming to a body image or stereotype. I’ve been through it all, and have done the research to come up with some advice tips for the best results!
MINDSET TIPS:
- About one week before embarking on your new lifestyle change, every day for a few minutes, wrap your arms around your body, close your eyes and speak to your body about what it’s going to be doing. This gets your body prepared, and it will respond more quickly and easily to the change.
- Erase the mantra: I am on a diet I have to workout. Replace with: I DESERVE TO BE IN GREAT HEALTH!
- Know that weight management is not a temporary diet. It is a permanent lifestyle, with room for reasonable indulgences. Below are some affirmations that can get you in the right mindset to begin to
naturally balance your weight:
I am the healthful weight for me.
I love and accept myself.
Thank you body for everything that you have done for me.
I respect myself. - Don’t look at the scale. Exercise develops muscles, which weigh more than fat, so you may even be gaining numbers on the scale even though you are getting leaner. Stick with the program and you will lose fat, just check the scale occasionally.
- Always remember you are doing this for yourself! You deserve to feel and look great!
PRACTICAL TIPS:
- Combine healthful eating with exercise. Doing both together is the quickest way to a healthful body. Consider consulting an experienced dietitian or nutritionist.
- Drink water and exercise in the mornings before you eat so that you burn fat, not just sugar.
- Focus on strength & resistance training 2-3 times a week. Cardio can make you very hungry and lead to a tendency to overeat. Also, the more muscle you have, your body is burning calories more efficiently throughout the day.
- Cancel all refined sugar and refined carbohydrates (anything with white flour) and fried foods until you’ve reached your goal size and weight. Once you’ve maintained your weight for a while, an occasional indulgence is OK as long as you return to your consistently healthful diet.
- Before your main course at dinner, eat a salad. Your main protein at dinner should be 3oz or less, usually about half of a regular restaurant size portion.
- When eating out, learn how to wave the bread basket away, split your main course with someone and take the rest home, or share or sample dessert.
