Slowly succeeding

We’re on day 20 of our 90 Day Challenge. I am down 5 pounds, Elbert is now down 11 pounds. I’m only SLIGHTLY jealous….We’re still just continuing on with our clean eating and ViSalus shakes twice per day.  We’re also each trying to drink 2-2.5 liters of water each per day.  It gets tough.  We were never really big soda drinkers or anything, but we do love our energy drinks.  I generally tried to only have them on the weekends, and I only drank the sugar free/0 carb ones, but they’re still bad!  So my goal, really, is to try to get away from artificial sweeteners.

Speaking of ingredients……I know there’s a lot of different “stuff” out there praising ViSalus products and also trashing them, big time.  Here’s my personal opinion on it.  If you are a person who is very overweight, and I can say that because I’m over 250 pounds, and you’ve been searching for something that will help speed up the process of taking the weight off, then it doesn’t necessarily matter whether there are a few “junk” ingredients in this product.  Yes, it’s a packaged food, there’s going to be some ingredients in it to help preserve it’s shelf life.  I can see if you were a person who didn’t have too much too lose, or are very concerned about what goes into your body, then you’re in an different place and a different mindset than most.  And if that’s the case, then sure, use something else that works for you! No need to bash anything – I’m pretty sure you can go in to any vitamin/supplement or drugstore and find all sorts of crap on the shelves claiming to help people, not to mention all the other independent companies out there claiming the same. It’s really just a matter of choice and finding what works for you.

Here’s the thing – I’m pretty sure that being 50, 100, or more pounds overweight and the risks and dangers you face dealing with that weight (which may not be an issue for you at the moment, but continue it for 10, 20 years you’re bound to start having some problems!) and the items that you consume on a regular basis that “maintain” that type of lifestyle — the bad stuff in that far outweighs the bad stuff in using ViSalus shakes for a short period of time – be it 90 Days to a year – to try to get that weight off.  I do know, however, that ViSalus has helped thousands of people lose weight so it can’t be that bad!  And, if you’re a person like me who’s actually serious about losing 116 pounds, you’d realize that it may not happen in 90 Days.  During that 90 Days you also need to educate yourself on how to eat properly, begin putting exercise back in to your life, all those things.  Yes, ViSalus doesn’t have “coaches” like some other companies, but who’s to say those people are actually “qualified” to “coach” anyone when they themselves are battling weight. Their mission, though, is that you don’t go at it alone.

So, you can reach out to those people who have actually succeeded and say hey, what did you do? What worked for you?  Just like I continue to try different combinations of things to see what will work best for me.  I didn’t put the weight on overnight, it’s not going to come off overnight.  That’s why I’m focusing at least four 90 Day Challenges during this entire year on losing the weight.  I work a sedentary job full time, I have several businesses on the side, I have a husband and church activities, and I’m a first time mom to a busy 1 1/2 year old — I don’t always have “time” to figure all this stuff out.  But I do know that if I can make it a goal to eat clean 75% – 95% of the time, and use my shakes to help me reach my goals because if you’re eating well, using the shakes and exercising it works! Then I know that this year I will actually achieve my goal.  It may not be as quickly as I like, but unless I am able to dedicate 8 hours per day to work with a trainer and go to the gym to work out for hours like all of these reality shows depict, then the weight isn’t just going to fall off of me! So I have to lower my expectations that the weight is going to come off quickly when I’m not putting in the work to do it.  You cannot drink the shakes and then eat {insert favorite fast food restaurant here} every night for dinner and step on the scale next week disappointed that you didn’t lose anything.   But, any loss, big or small, is still a success and gets you that much closer to your goal.

Also wanted to mention people who say,  just eat properly with the right portion size, and exercise – you’ll lose the weight.  Yes, that can be very true and is easy for someone to say who 1) is not or never has been extremely overweight.  I’m not talking 20 pounds overweight, I’m talking hundred(s); or 2) has already lost the weight they wanted to lose in that way.  Again, there are so many different factors as to why certain ways don’t or cannot work for certain people.  Not all fat people are just plain lazy.  Some are, but not all.  Me personally, I’ve been working at it for years.  I don’t have the time, money, motivation, etc. etc. to lose weight.  But that doesn’t mean that I’m going to sit back and give up on it.  I’ve tried so many different “diets” I’ve gone several different doctors to have so many different tests performed to see if there was anything wrong with me or preventing me from losing.  Nothing came up.  Their answer was that I could just have bariatric surgery.  Not a good enough reason for me.  So it tells me that I just need to muster up the strength to try harder.

In the beginning of this blog I was saying I was slightly jealous of my husband for losing so much faster than I have.  But, if I really look at it, I’ve dropped 5 pounds since starting the Challenge 20 days ago.  Im’ being pretty good about mostly eating clean and using the shakes.  That’s still a 1/4 pound loss per day!  Even if the amount is “smaller” than I’d like it to be, it’s still a loss, and I’m still getting closer to my goal.  I’m slowly succeeding!

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