Lil' Bitty Progress Post.

                                                    
Yeah, you can pick my body apart all you'd like (I see cellulite, ewwww!), but my muscles are just, like, aching to break free.  I love juicing, I can get all of my nutrients that way, but I never had enough energy to really BUILD during that time.

After ending my juice fast I've started over at zero.  I am trying to balance juicing, eating healthy, exercising, and sleeping.  The juicing and exercising have been easier for me than the eating healthy and sleeping.  I've been slowly cutting out processed food by eating HEALTHY processed food (so when I am finally able to eat clean, my body won't miss the flavorless substitutes!  But those rice cakes are actually pretty good.  Ha.).

Anyway, I'm still here trying to figure shit out one day at a time. 

I feel a super-duper workout week coming on, so stay tuned for some Trainer Boy updates.  I hope he has some wisdom for us! :-)

Skinny-fat.

So, since finishing my cleanse in December, I've been happy with the results, but I've had this feeling of incompletion.

I'm not sure I had a specific goal (as in, how I wanted my body to look) in mind when I started juicing aside from relieving health problems and fitting into my clothes again. I still don't feel like I did what I set out to do, and it has been eating away at me and keeping me up at night. Why wasn't I happy with this accomplishment?

Then I came across this website: http://muffintop-less.tumblr.com/.

Okay, I'm not saying I want to be a body builder, but I love some of the information she offers.

I've been preaching about how all I did during my cleanse was some light walking and jogging. I had more than one person comment on my pinterest pictures about how I was "skinny-fat". Please don't think I've been obsessing over those comments, because I think adding fruits and veggies has done 100% good for my body (and NO, I don't think I am skinny OR fat).

BUT.

The wheels have been turning. I guess I figured doing minimal exercise would be enough to get my body back to this:



It isn't! This is 20-year-old Kristen who only had to jog a few times a week and do the 8 Minute Abs video.

I'll be the first one to admit that gym equipment intimidates me. I was content for a time that jogging on the treadmill was enough. Now I feel antsy again and I am curious to try a different workout regime. I am going to ask my gym for help. :-)

I am curious to see where this path takes me, and I am kind of eager to share it with you all!

I'm SO [im]perfect, It's not even funny.

I'm not skinny, and I'm not going to pretend to be.

Yes, when you look at my before and after pictures, the difference seems VERY dramatic, but would you like to know how much I weigh?

140lbs. I am still curvy, and I will probably ALWAYS be proportioned this way... but I love it.

My goal for the juice cleanse was not JUST to lose weight, but to get my body healthy from the inside as well. It sounds cliché, but it's the truth. What kind of life can you live when you don't want your own husband to touch you, especially when he's a ruggedly handsome dude?

I've also never let the scale rule my life. Ever since I hit puberty, I've had some va-va-voom hips and a booty to match. In 8th grade, I won "Biggest Appetite" in the yearbook. My jeans size would always surprise my friends, because I carry my weight pretty well.


These classic lyrics define my body shape to a T: Baby Got Back. Ha.

Anyway, I think the main point I am trying to get people to realize is that I still look like a normal woman, and I have not suddenly transformed into some kind of Super-Healthinator. I still juice daily and eat WAY better than I ever have in my life, but I have my moments of weakness. My battle with food will be an ongoing conflict that I will probably have to deal with for the rest of my life.

So, for the readers who keep asking me "How much weight did you gain back?" and "What do you eat when you end the cleanse?", here are some additional Questions Answered, Part Deux.

1. Don't you just gain all of the weight back? Um, NO! 60 days gave me quite a long time to learn how to listen to my body. Going through this cleanse was like having an epiphany about eating. It didn't matter how many hours I spent at the gym, or how hard or how long I ran, because my diet stayed the same so my BODY stayed the same. My weight fluctuates about 5lbs both ways (which I think is the norm, right?). I am happy to say that I have a closet full of new jeans and I am lovin' the way they fit. :-)

2. What did you eat after the cleanse ended? Like you may have seen in a previous post, I had a fish taco as my first meal. I wish I could say I weaned myself back into solid foods by eating fruits, veggies and smoothies (as recommended by the Reboot team), but like I said... I am totally addicted to food. Once I knew my juice cleanse was almost over, my brain became FIXATED on fish tacos. The only other time I remember craving something that bad was

A. When I worked at Hooters (yeah, yeah, I know.) and I couldn't get enough of the hot buffalo shrimp. Those things are NO JOKE. Thank God I had a high metabolism.


B. When I was pregnant and I seriously could not get enough Pepsi into my system. I don't even DRINK soda (or coffee!), but if I could have safely absorbed Pepsi intravenously, I would have.


Folks, listen to the experts. If I could do it over again, I would have eaten raw foods. Unfortunately, I am impatient and imperfect, so I went as healthy as I could while still making something that would make my mouth happy. My stomach didn't hurt or bloat or anything similar (until I ate cheese), but I may have just been lucky...

3. I can't find the 60-Day program on the site...?? They don't actually have the 60-day cleanse that Joe Cross completed in the documentary as a program option on the Reboot website. It is a potentially risky, VERY difficult fast, and they probably want to play it safe by offering shorter versions. AGAIN, before diving headfirst into the full 60 days...

... TALK TO YOUR DOCTOR.

4. So, wait, you STILL aren't a doctor? Erm, no. As I said before, I am not a doctor, dietician, or nutritionist. All I can do is explain what worked for me, and back up my information with some linkage.

I don't know how to end this, so I just want all of you to know...

...that...

...I bought a Shake Weight.

Let the judgments begin. :-)

At my most miserable. No, Kristen! Don't eat the cake!

At my most memorable. Just a reminder that thin ≠ healthy.

My most recent pictures are in the "Boudoir" post (that's all you get, ladies and gents)... healthy and working on myself. :-)