I have a group devoted to hysterectomy recovery weight loss and many are struggling with weight loss post-op. Nutrition is an important part of weight loss because no matter how much you exercise, it all comes down to what you’re putting in your body. If you look up any article from a reputable source, most say that the 80% of your focus should be on your diet and 20% on your activity. That’s huge! Many weight loss groups talk about keto diets, intermittent fasting, and the like. But if you don’t have a basic understanding of clean eating which includes eating good fats, the right carbs, under ..read more

In the spirit of making small changes for 30 days, my Hysterectomy Recovery Weight Loss Partners group and I are going to have a 30-day challenge to help get us back in to shape. Still in recovery? No worries! You’ll be happy to know that we’ll also have a non-physical challenge to develop healthy habits from staying hydrated to eating more fruits and veggies. Challenge #1: Walking For those who are physically up to it, I found this the 30-day walking challenge (not created by me), which has a variety of different types of short, 20-35 minute walks in different scenarios like listening to a po ..read more

I looked at my progress on MyFitnessPal over the year and saw that I lost around 10 pounds since last December! What changed you may be asking? All I did was make small changes to my lifestyle once every month – I only changed one thing and kept compounding another new thing the next month. It seemed to be working because my body fat used to fluctuate between 32-34% for months and now it’s holding steady at 31%. Granted, my goal is 25%, but at least everything is going down! I’ve since switched to a lazy mediterranean Keto diet that consists of fish, fats, carbohydrates from veggies and fruits ..read more

Intermittent fasting is when one cycles between fasting and eating. I’ve been giving that a shot for the last month and have been having pretty good results. I did this schedule with the guidance of my personal trainer, and I tracked it all in MyFitnessPal to make sure I was eating enough calories and track my macros. As always, please consult with your doctor to make sure this works well for you. My Results I’ve been at ~32.4-33% body fat and have been hovering at around 165 pounds for the past year. I work out regularly (4-6 days a week) and work with my personal trainer 2x a week. Right now ..read more

It took me about a week before I was able to have any bowel movement (BM), and I was on the toilet set for ~45 minutes just letting gravity do it’s job since there was no way I could’ve used my stomach muscles push it out more. My feet were falling asleep on the toilet, but boy…it sure felt good to let it all out! When you’re taking your post-op meds, one of the side effects is constipation, and there’s nothing more uncomfortable than being in pain AND feeling bloated. Here are some things that worked for me when I got home and as I’m trying to lose weight. Drink lots of water If you think ab ..read more

Last October 2019, I weighed 172 pounds, and here I am in April 2020, maintaining a weight of ~161-164 pounds for the past couple of months. From my Fitbit You might be asking what I did to lose that weight. Did I go on an extreme diet or exercise like crazy? All I did was watch my portion control and use MyFitnessPal to track all of my calories (intake and expenditures) with the help of my personal trainer. I also focused on exercise and making sure I expended more calories than I ate. So my personal trainer is, from what I’ve been told by others, tough. But since I’ve lost 10 pounds, somethi ..read more

A few weeks ago, I decided to make it my goal to walk 10,000 steps a day. Before, I had set my target to be 8,000 steps/day which I never hit (I usually got 5,000 if I was lucky), but my personal trainer pretty much scolded me for setting the bar too low; “10,000 steps/day should be your minimum” she said. Why 10,000? When you walk 10k steps (approx. 5 miles), you burn 400-500 calories a day, which means that you have a pretty good chance of losing 1 pound a week (3500 calories burnt = 1 pound lost). This is, of course, assuming that you’re minding your nutrition and aren’t eating crap. So far ..read more

Recently, I’ve rejoined the world of online dating apps. I’m not a fan of them because all judgments (mine included) are primarily based on looks. While I have ZERO expectations that I’ll meet anyone, at least I can say that “I’m out there”. When you create an online dating profile, one of the questions to answer is “Want Kids?”. That’s a hard question to answer now. To be honest, I don’t want kids anymore. I’m 45 and, even if I didn’t have a hysterectomy, the odds are against me. I’d be a high-risk pregnancy. In fact, women over 45 have a 1-in-35 chance of giving birth to a child with Downs S ..read more

Cooking and eating at home is definitely healthier, but what if you want to eat out? I found these tips on what to order and what to avoid like the plague! Another tip that someone told me: If you order something rich and don’t intent to take it home, put lots of salt on it. That’ll prevent you from grazing if you’re deep in conversation with a friend. Yes, I know it’s wasteful, but I know there are some folks out there who don’t like taking home leftovers. Here are some highlights from Shape Magazine’s How to Eat Out & Still Lose Weight Mexican Restaurants No chips. Save the salsa f ..read more

You hear it all the time on exercise videos or in exercise classes to “engage your core muscles”, but what exactly does it mean? As I’ve shared before, I’ve been working with a personal trainer for about 3 years and she would always tell me that I’m not engaging my ab muscles right.  I had no idea what she meant and even when I asked her, I still didn’t understand because I couldn’t envision it even though she showed me. When I had abdominal surgery, I hardly used my core muscles because it was associated with my post-op pain.  So relearning how to use those muscles again after they ..read more