So after sharing my fitness journey last week I though that this week it was only fitting to share the five things I wish I knew before I started my fitness journey. As much if my fitness journey has entered around weightless, this is what the bulk of this post will focus around.
1. Weight loss is not a linear process.
Before I started this journey I assumed that weightless was linear, that the scale would go down week by week and my Fitbit would end up showing me a graph that was a diagonal line going down across the space of a few months. This is NOT what happens. Our bodies fluctuate a lot. Like seriously a lot. Especially for women.
When it comes to your time of the month you will be heavier than other times in your cycle. If you eat a massive meal late the night before, you will be heavier, not because eating late at night makes you put on fat but because you will be weighing yourself and your food that hasn't fully digested.
Also life happens. Last summer when I started my journey I had holidays and festivals that had already been booked. Personally I decided to use these as 'refeeds' (basically go off plan) because I didn't want to feel any stress around food in places where picking the lowest calorie option was going to be extremely difficult. And its okay to do that. Life is short and it is more than okay to not stick on plan so you have a better holiday etc.
2. The importance of protein, even when you're in a caloric deficit.
So I'd always assumed, up until fairly recently, you only needed to have a high protein diet if you were in a caloric surplus and trying to gain muscle. But, this is not the case. Having a high protein diet whilst you are in a deficit can help massively with body recomposition, particularly if you weight train.
From having a higher protein diet during this deficit I have noticed a far more significant change in my body than I had in previous dieting phases.
3. "Healthy" snacks aren't always "healthy".
Okay so I put healthy in quotes here because to me a healthy diet is a balanced diet. But, that being said, there are a lot of snacks out there marketed as "healthy" and the majority of the time the nutritional information is the same as an "unhealthy snack".
The reason I wish I knew this is because when I properly started my journey last year I would constantly go for the "healthy" snack (like a cereal bar, or something by graze) and then be confused when I tracked it and it was more calories than having like a chocolate bar, and the micronutrients would be lacking as well.
4. You don't have to "eat clean" to get the results you want.
The "eating clean" movement is one of the things in the diet and fitness industry that now annoys me a lot. Its based off the idea of eating only "clean" foods and typically follows the base that if you eat "clean" you'll lose weight.
The only way you'll lose weight is a calorie deficit.
Obviously due to the foods that are grouped as "clean" they do typically have lower calories so can help you achieve a calorie deficit BUT you don't need to "eat clean" to lose weight. Personally I found that I've gotten better results from eating a balanced diet than when I tried to eat "clean".
5. Listen to your body - rest when it wants you too.
When I started my journey I was incredibly rigid with when I would train regardless to how I felt. My rest days were Sundays and that would be the only I would have off, regardless of how my body felt. While this kept me in a good routine, I wasn't listening to my body and I wasn't properly recovering.
Now I listen to my body a lot more, if I feel like I need a rest day I'll push my training session back a day and take the rest day. It's far more optimal to take a day off than risk an injury because you haven't fully recovered.
Thank you for reading this post and I hope you found it useful!