The Change

I have never been one to get up and just start doing crunches or go out for a walk. I've definitely never thought of carrot sticks or an apple as a snack. But we're changing that! Everyone has to start somewhere.

First, I suggest changing your habits slowly.
Change that comes on too suddenly has a tendency to be too much of a shock and can be overwhelming.
I also suggest changing your diet first, before changing your exercise routine. Eating healthy is the foundation to any weight loss program. Let's just say: if you eat like crap, you're going to feel like crap.

When I first started my diet, I went out and bought as much fruit and vegetables I could afford. I'm on a rather tight budget, so I thought that going on a diet was going to break my bank. To my surprise it actually wasn't that bad. I don't remember exactly what I bought or how much I spent, but it wasn't that bad. I bought things such as: bananas, apple, cucumber, spinach, and other such foods that can only be found in the produce section of the store.
I already had chicken breasts in my freezer, so I just stuck with that for my meats and didn't eat anything else.
I really suggest doing research, or looking at recipes, for losing weight and what to actually buy. (I will write on this later)
Try to stay away from fad diets, such as the 'Lose 10 lbs in 7 days', the '3 Day Military Diet', juice cleanses, and others. These are short term diets made for short term results. All of these types of diets generally lead to starvation  (which puts your body into hybernation mode slowing down your metabolism), vitamin deficiencies, and other such medical issues. Generally, after you finish these short term diets, you will gain all of the weight back in just a couple of days.

When I first started my diet, my weight fluctuated so bad because I didn't really know what was good or bad for me. I had never thought about what I put into my stomach before, or read labels. This was all completely new!
I was eating so many calories in a day, I don't even want to know how many!
Definitely count all of your calories! The app 'MyFitnessPal' has changed my life! It allows you to input any food and it will give you the nutritional value of anything. I have yet to eat anything that I couldn't find on this app. It sets daily goals for me and I try really hard not to exceed them.
To have successful, consistent weight loss, you're going to want to cut out or minimize the consumption of: fats, sodium, and sugar. Calories are not my personal, main concern because if I go over on my daily limit I can always burn them off at the gym. Because there is really no way of 'burning off' fats, sodium, and sugar, those are my personal concerns. Sodium will make you retain water, causing the lower belly pooch. Unrefined sugars and fat will cause you to gain weight. (I personally don't know exactly why, but I've noticed a considerable difference in my weight loss since cutting these out.)

The next fun part: adding exercise into your new routine.
At the beginning, after the diet wasn't doing enough for me, I went up to gym every day for 15 to 20 minutes. I have a gym at my apartment complex, so I was able to just walk right up and start exercising without having to go through the trouble of finding a gym and paying for a membership. If this is not available to you, I suggest working out at home. There are a lot of body weight exercises out there that you can do right from your living room!  (Eg. Squats, push ups, running in place, jumping jacks, etc.)
If working out everyday isn't your thing, I suggest working out 3-5 times a week at the least. No less than 3! If you really want results, you're going to have to work for them!
Even a 15 minute workout, 3 times a week is better than not working out at all.

This is what has worked for me and I really hope that it helps you. Even a little is great!

Getting Started

Let me just start by saying, I am still really new to this whole 'healthy' lifestlye. I have never, ever been one to exercise and to actually find it fun. I got a D in P. E. and my fastest mile was 18 minutes.  I wasn't fat, but I had absolutely no muscle mass. All through high school, I was the 'fatter' friend. Luckily, I was blessed with a high metabolism because I definitely didn't go out of my way to do anything physical.
Through high school, my weight fluctuated between 150 and 160, 165 being my heaviest. I was never happy with my appearance, having a muffin top and all, and I never really thought I could look like those woman in magazines.
Let's just fast forward a couple of years. I am now 22.
I recently had a hip injury (Jan 2015) and had trouble walking for a couple months. I knew I was gaining weight, simply because I wasn't doing anything. I layed in bed all day, sleeping a lot, and eating a lot. It was extremely painful for me to walk around or bend in any way.
When I first stepped on that scale (sometime around August) I was in complete shock! I weighed 180 lbs! I couldn't believe it at all, I seriously thought that the scale was broken.
Just before my accident, I had managed to get my weight down to 125 lbs, so I ended up gaining 55lbs in less then a year!
Needless to say, a bit of depression set in because of this situation. This was the heaviest I had ever been in my whole life! It took me three years just to go from 140 lbs to 125!
How could I possibly lose all this weight? It was just so overwhelming to think about trying to lose 55 lbs. I gained it easy enough though.
So far, I have lost nearly 20 lbs since I started taking my health and weight loss seriously.

This is going to be a journey of my weight loss.
What has worked for me, what hasn't, all of that good stuff.
I hope you all stick around with me through this!
I'll be posting some of my favorite recipes (from other people), my own recipes, motivation help, and more!