How did I find strength and motivation to lose weight?

In 2017, I decided to fight for myself, get motivated and, above all, persevere in my decisions to get back to the form in which I felt just myself. Today I am sharing with you my very personal story about how I lost weight 20 kilo in 40 weeks and finally I see myself and not someone else in the mirror.

 

If, like me, you want to motivate yourself to lose weight, before you start reading this post, take the first step - bring and put a piece of paper and something to write at hand. Please. You will thank yourself for it.

 

My weight loss story

Finding the strength to lose weight, but in principle to persevere in this resolution, took me about ... 7 years ... counting lightly. As a girl, I never had weight problems, but everything changed when I entered high school. I was still not fat, but I had to be careful with my diet much more than my friends.

 

Although I should really say that since then I have been ruled by two extremes: either I was on a very restrictive diet (I also had many hunger strokes or during the course of the bar-powder diet), or I lived the moment, completely not caring about what I throw in my stomach .

 

For the first time I stopped feeling comfortable with myself in collegewhen the periods of neglecting myself definitely outweighed those when I ate with caring - in fact, it's hard to say that a restrictive diet is caring for myself - it was only a concern for my appearance, with one goal - to lose as many kilos as possible as quickly as possible.

 

It is not difficult for you to guess for sure that after a restrictive diet, when I was going to a fairly relaxed student lifestyle, and later the life of a young, overworked businesswoman, it ended with the yo-yo effect and required a transition to an even more restrictive diet.

 

What was my day like? A lot of learning, more and more work - I created my dream company and devoted every free moment to it. To this day, I remember phone calls from customers received in the university toilet - it was quietest there. My success measures were good grades (the scholarship was a great source of funding for my student budget of a young entrepreneur) and hours worked, satisfied customers. Then the slogan: WORK HARD, PLAY HARD became my motto in life. Neither the word "work" nor "hard" meant regular meals, healthy shopping, and everyday cooking. Sausages and a bun were a great and quick lunch (I was delighted with the idea of ​​individually wrapped sausages), and in moments of greater concern for health ... only sausages to reduce carbohydrates. I catch my head writing this today.

 

The stupidest dietwhich I was tempted to, apart from the Copenhagen one, which I endured for a day and a half, was the Dukan diet. What's more, at the age of 25, I got acne, which affected my entire cleavage and back, face - luck to a small extent - and its treatment was very difficult and took almost 2 years. I completely did not combine it with a change in eating style and the fact that 90% of my menu was dairy (at the university, in the office or in the car, apart from sausages, it was easiest for me to eat cottage cheese with cherry tomatoes, I even ate a few of them a day), and how to eat a few years later it turned out - I don't tolerate dairy well - and so do my kids!

 

My next dietary hit was the Cambridge Diet (i.e. from the VLCD cycle - Very Low Calorie Diet), which was based on artificial bars and powdered cocktails, which were eaten on 2-3 meals a day (if the bar or cocktail can be called a meal) and did not develop absolutely any good habits. She let me not take care of myself completely, then tighten my belt for a week or two and feel good again in jeans. Of course, after stopping it, I returned to junk food, and the preparation for the transition to a healthy lifestyle was zero.

 

I passed too stage of work with a dietitian, at first, my metabolic age 10 years higher than it really was, impressed me, but did not motivate me enough to follow all these recommendations. I did not realize then that the financial incentive - so that the money spent on a dietitian is not wasted - is a poor foundation for a new lifestyle. I gave up on the advice when it turned out that I could not follow them, and going to the next measurements and finding out how much weight I had gained was really a waste of money and time for both of us.

 

At that time, I was motivated only by diets that gave quick results, I was young and I wanted to have everything. Even thinking about a diet longer than a few weeks saddened me so much that I did not want to approach her at all. The time horizon of several months completely scared me, and the slow effects did not motivate me to make any effort at all.

 

A moment after graduation, when I was about 25 years old and I was freshly married, I felt so bad in my body that I was still coming back to fast and proven diets, telling myself: only this one time I will put everything on one card, I will spend savings on bars and cocktails, I will lose weight to my favorite size and it will motivate me so that somehow I can eat less and keep it.

 

Unfortunately, each subsequent diet ended with an increasing yo-yo effect, which resulted in 20 extra kilos!

 

I have 162 centimeters tall, and the weight I liked myself a lot, which I kept roughly until 22, is 48 kilo and 34 size. I felt just then good, comfortable, attractive and healthy.

 

In 8 years I gained weight 20 kilogram and began to wear size 42 with an increase of 162 cm. And that's just 2,5 a kilo a year! 200 g per month! Who would notice? Who would worry! But in 8 years these kind of things meant that I stopped seeing myself in the mirror.

 

These average 200 g monthly and continuous diet was so delusional for me that I absolutely did not feel the size of 42. I did not see it in the mirror, I still felt that slim girl in size 34, until I had to go shopping, look unexpectedly in the shop window, try to buy a swimsuit (to go out without a dress, but crying), or look at yourself in the pictures.

 

Is it really me Did a bee bite me? Could someone have pumped me up with fat?

 

Exactly 100 cubes of lard. That's what my 20 kilos of overweight was. I literally threw something like this "on my back" - I wrote it in quotation marks on purpose, because I gave such luggage and poison to my organs, my face, arms, legs, waist… every part of my body.

 

What happened that I finally fought for myself?

 

I fought for myself for the first time after a miscarriage. When I didn't know I had thrombophilia, lutelic disease, and too high NK cells, I decided to change my lifestyle and before I could successfully get pregnant I started working on changing my habits, which meant that due to the fear of a child, I had a beautiful hold on my whole pregnancy and gained only 8 kilo, which I lost quite quickly after pregnancy.

 

Ale this is not the beginning of my real fight for myself - then my absolute motivation was a child, external motivation, which is not the best form of motivation to fight for myself. Of course, after the birth of my son, I tried to compose healthy meals for the whole family, but it soon turned out that Mikołaj was a strong allergy sufferer and I had to run two separate kitchens anyway. As you can guess, I was just one step away from going back to my old habits. It is true that I did not return to the destructive miracle diets, but my healthy habits were losing strength, and I regularly changed my pants to a larger size.

 

Efforts for a second child, as you can guess, they again made it easier for me to get back on the right path of health, but as you know it there was good motivation.

 

But then even before the birth of Maks, I decided not to spoil it all for the second time and not let the fight for myself with the birth of the child - though I never really get started on it.

 

How did I find motivation to lose weight?

 

I wrote down - brutally honestly - what I was losing by weighing 68 kilos instead of 48, wearing 162 at a height of 42 instead of 34. I will share with you some of my notes.

I will keep the most intimate and painful ones for myself.

 

Every day I lose:

• Self-Esteem,
• self-confidence in both personal and professional relationships,
• sense of agency - if I cannot control what I eat and what I look like, how can I believe that I have control over my whole life,
• sense of strength - since I lose weight and pants every day,
• photos - because I don't want to take them, even with my husband or family, and I don't like to watch the ones I have,
• holidays, because I don't like to go on it and worry that I am ashamed to undress on the beach, and I will definitely come back with extra kilos and it will only get worse,
• activity - because I'm ashamed of my lack of fitness and my appearance in the gym,
• beautiful wardrobe, because in size 42 I have to wear unattractive fashions to look good, and laces, frills and tight sweaters only thicken me and emphasize what I want to hide.

 

Now, take the card and write the question on it:

 

What am I losing today weighing / wearing a size ......
instead of the desired / desired …… ...

 

Important: Perhaps you suffer from something, take medications that prevent you from achieving the weight you dream about - I am sure that you need healthy habits and a healthy diet even more and you should write why you want to go towards the desired weight, though it's hard to predict when and if you will get there.

 

I am asking you to do it today, although in your head there are a lot of excuses like: I do not have a pen and paper at hand, I do not want to lose weight from today, I have to prepare for the diet, I will start, but I will start on Monday, I will do it in my head, it is enough too ...

 

Why do you have to do it today?

Not for me, but for myself! Why shouldn't you wait until tomorrow? Monday or new month?

 

First of all because today you need to know why you put so much work and effort into slimming and changing habits, why should you take the first step at all?

 

Even if I was trying to lose weight without strong internal motivation quickly - for over 10 years - I returned to previous habits that did not serve me and again I returned to the previous weight. I was even in the plus.

 

How do I know that those habits did not serve me?

 

And how were these habits supposed to serve me, since I wrote a great list of things I lose?

 

To get to this point, you have already devoted 5 minutes in the text, so if your excuse is to be lack of time today, do not read the text further - come back to it tomorrow, and now close your eyes and answer the question, what are you missing every day ...

 

You made a list.

Maybe you are sad, angry and upset now, so now the nicer part of the task for today.

 

Answer the question in writing:

 

What will I gain when I achieve the desired weight or approach it? How will I feel then?

 

I wrote to myself then:

• I will be more confident
• I'll be prettier (without a second beard for sure),
• I will feel light - ah, how nice it must be!
• I will be a model of health for my children,
• I will not worry every day what to wear to mask the rollers,
• I will not give up shopping, because nothing looks good on me, nor buy what I won't wear because I feel bad,
• I will want to go on vacation,
• I will want to take pictures with my husband
• I will be more athletic
• I will be healthier
• I will buy these dream dresses and the rollers will not stick out to me,
• I will be HAPPY.

 

But I will start from Monday ...

And you may not believe me, but I realized that postponing healthy eating for "Monday" was my biggest opponent in returning to my old self.

 

Requirements too restrictive and the expectation of zero deviations from the assumed new eating habits meant that, first of all, the weekend before the diet I was quite indulgent - in the end I was going on a diet and I had to end everything that was delicious and unhealthy, everything was now to be banned! Our weekends, called by me and my husband Wojtek "farewell", during which we allowed ourselves all the dietary sins of the world, combined with gigantic lists of prohibitions and orders "from Monday" meant that before going on a diet I was additionally "getting fat", and I went on a diet heavy, so that I could stay on this new super hyper diet for maybe 3 days. Why? I imposed such restrictions on myself that I found it difficult to stick to them, and I treated any deviation as surrender. Then there was a black despair, a decline in motivation to zero and thinking - I couldn't bear it again, I will never succeed.

 

I remember the hit I invented then, and actually heard on breakfast TV: since I can't be slim, I can't (here I read a list of what I will never gain, how to lose weight, since I will never lose weight) - at least I will eat a lot and eat a lot and at least in this subject I will be happy!

 

I usually got up quickly, promising myself that I could manage this Monday! Can you see it Again from Monday, because I must first compensate myself for these future hardships! I have to say goodbye to my life !!!!

 

Only when to the list of what I lose and what I will gain, when I fight for myself, I added a fight from TODAY, from NOW ...

 

- put a copy of this list in your wallet and read at any moment of weakness -

 

I was able to lose weight 20 kilo in 40 weeks and again buy 34 jeans.

 

A beautiful feeling, a dream come true and a fulfilled list ... I felt exactly as I imagined it, or maybe better, because I did not expect such a reaction from the environment.

 

It absolutely does not mean that I did not fall, I did not commit gigantic sins, but I just got up NOW, dusted my knees, adjusted the crown and kept going - who said you have to wait until Monday to start your diet? I have sinned for 12, I continue my diet with 13! Everything the old way! New rules and habits at the station!

 

Every time I am tempted to give myself time to start a diet, I tell myself: yes, you have a sweetheart And you keep going! You have a choice here and now whether you buy these pants in your favorite size or not! Every decision you make today will either bring you closer to it or take it away. Put the past aside - you ate a piece of coffee cake with your friend - it's hard, it won't stand out and it won't hurt you anymore, but what you eat now, in an hour and two, has a real impact on how you will look tomorrow, in a month and in a year!

 

Why did small goals turn out better than large ones?

They proved to be achievable. And nothing motivated me like achieving my goal and treat myself to a prize - on the way I bought three beautiful dresses in size 40, 38 and 36 - today these are my trophies and I do not mind that today the one in size 40 is too big because it reminds me of my victorious fight and I love wearing it, although you can see, it's too big. I didn't wait for the finish line, I rewarded myself along the way.

 

It's also fantastic that although the goal is distant, the effects are already visible in the process - and fewer rollers and kind words from the surroundings, which you will surely hear, will only be an additional motivation.

 

Many times it was also enough that when I hesitated in a restaurant whether to order my favorite pizza or a distasteful (including the restaurant) salad, it was enough to have a look at my wallet and recall the list of things that I would gain (I quickly learned it by heart) and believe me - even the tasteless salad without sauce tasted better than pizza when I knew how beautiful it brought me closer to my goal!

 

Strong motivation was able to make my friend's birthday only lick sandwiches, because I had such a beautiful result that I did not want to spoil it with eating bread for the night! This list gave me strength, and I end with starting from Monday and belief that every decision, even the smallest one, brings me closer to the goal, gave me strength to persevere. I regained a sense of agency and control over my life.

 

Am I still on a diet after achieving my goal? No, but I'm still working on healthy habits that serve me. After finishing the reduction period, however, as part of healthy habits I allowed myself to deviate much more often. Regular weighing (I have a weight that also shows the percentage of water and fats in the body) or simply the button in my favorite pants best illustrates whether I have not deviated too much from my dream weight and whether I should concentrate a little more on maintaining healthy habits.

 

It's impossible to hide, I finished the reduction diet a year ago and I was absolutely afraid to answer your many questions and requests to tell me about my transformation. I said that I was not ready and that was the truth behind which I was afraid and afraid that my change would be temporary, and this time I would gain 30 kilo and it will stay that way.

 

Today I know that since I went on a diet - I finally started at 70 kilos and lost to 50 kilos, my weight varies between 50 and 52 kilos and this level is absolutely fine for me. When the weight reaches over 52 kilos, I limit deviations from a healthy diet to a minimum and everything returns to normal again.

 

I learned that slimming is not a one-time action, and I thought about losing weight in my head thinking about health and healthy eating.

Unfortunately, but if I stop taking care of healthy habits, the old weight comes back. I realized that I would like to use the knowledge and skills acquired during slimming for the rest of my life, so that the weight in which I feel healthy and light will remain. Let me be and feel myself.

 

Healthy habits ... but what?

 

I'm also glad that I also support my health, replacing almost permanently light deep-frozen bread from the bakery for home-made spelled bread, replacing light pasta with dark pasta and groats, lentils and other wholesome products, or sugar for dates or xylitol. Of course - I do not get crazy - and both during the reduction period (less often) and outside of it (more often) I allow myself delicious sins - sometimes I love to eat a not very healthy white warm roll made of deep-frozen bread that came a few months ago from Hungary or order the biggest piece of meringue cake with raspberries - and I allow myself to do it from time to time, without any remorse! 90% health, 10% exceptions! I also try cook healthy for the whole family, using healthy, valuable ingredients, paying attention to eco products.

 

And just such a time has come in my life - December is behind us, the time of cooking, baking gingerbread and absolute pampering also for me, and a sad and lazy January, which unexpectedly came to my medical treatment, anxiety and fear, and even days when my main concern was how to find the strength to get up despite my broken heart, go to work and take care of the children, and because of the lack of strength, food was lost on the track ... Yes, I accept it fully and feel calm because I know how I handle it. I consciously allowed myself to make all these deviations without remorse, because today I have more confidence in myself - since I managed to lose 20 kilos and keep them for a year, now I am not afraid of how I can lose the extra weight, two-month-old 4 kilograms.

 

I thought it was a fantastic opportunity for us to start working with healthy habits, thanks to which we will lose extra kilos together! 

 

No matter what your goal is, although, as you know, mine is "only" 4 kg today, if we achieve it together, you will see how it goes beautifully despite the initial difficulties!

 

4 kilo is also not my goal for one month, I prefer to set goals smaller than 1 kg per week to achieve them more often and motivate myself further and more!

 

Are you thinking - hey, less than a kilogram a week? I don't want to lose weight so slowly! But today I know that I prefer to introduce changes slowly, to the best of my strength and possibilities, to lose kilograms in the slow version (not dehydrating and not burning my own muscles instead of fat), but to achieve the goal than to take a hoe to the sun, impose on myself the unrealistic waiting and ending the diet again after a week, frustrated that I had failed.

 

Remember, time will pass! Just like my 40 weeks. You do not believe? Remember the diet you went to last year? Time has passed anyway, whether you stick to your diet or not. I will also comfort you that the first kilograms or centimeters motivate enormously! And I danced for joy when I lost my first size! So it's not like nothing is happening along the way and the reward is waiting for you in many months.

 

motivation (list of things we lose and gain) you already have - you wrote them down today, right?

 

I have also worked it out the greatest enemy, i.e. the eternal postponement of the diet for "from tomorrow" or "from Monday", so if you want to start with me almost immediately, I cordially invite you.

 

Sign up for our challenge "I don't wait - I act!", And in a few days - on Monday February 11, 2019 I will send it You Motivation and Goal Completion Cardwhich helps me a lot in achieving my goals, and also perfectly diagnoses my mistakes, beautifully answering the sometimes asked question - why is the diet not working? Why it failed again? Will it fail again? Why don't habits work?

 

I will share with you my proven ways and assumptions that helped me lose my health 20 kilo in 40 weeks, but the motivation and goal card will be universal - each of us will enter our healthy habits there and implement them for the next 28 days, because maybe you already have your own proven ways to lose weight that do not work only because you lacked motivation and regularity . You will also find motivation cards in mine Planner On A Good Dayso that you always have them with you. There is a place to cross off the next glass of water you have drunk, write down today's meals, and see your progress. There you will also find the Health tab, where you can enter medical appointments, test results and supplements that you take - because taking care of yourself is not only healthy eating, but also check-ups and supplementation of ingredients missing from your body.

 

What, you will take with me the 28-day challenge "I'm not waiting - I act!" #daddy

 

Remember, how we will feel next year will be the result of our decisions today.

 

Do you still feel inner resistance to taking up the challenge? Give me at least one reason why you should not change today what led you to a situation in which you made a list of things that you lose every day?

 

If so you can add to my Facebook group today, where we will share healthy habits, goals, recipes and menus - I will gladly provide you with my sample menus, which I will compose with the help of a dietitian.

 

PS Due to the relationships built in the group, I only accept people who have authentic Facebook profiles - at least 50 friends, name, surname and profile photo. I believe that this will allow us to build solid support based on trust. And if for some objective reason you cannot have your photo on Facebook (for example, you are a judge), write to me at mail@agnieszkakudela.pl - I will try to make an exception for you 🙂

 

Subscribing to the challenge is tantamount to subscribing to the mailing list from which you can unsubscribe at any time.