Stay on track over the weekends!

Managing your weight loss journey. Weekends.

Given that this month we have three bank holiday weekends I feel like this email should have been the week before. But hindsight is a beautiful thing.

Anyway better late than never, so here we go.

For those of you that come to me to lose weight, you will often find that your progress can start to plateau when your social life ramps up.

When our party calendar increases it means that we are more likely to face temptations when it comes to food and drink.

In this email I’m gonna talk to you about what you can do to manage your social life and in particular talk about how weekend plans can affect your ability to consistently see the scales or measurements fall down.

Listen, I get it you don’t want to sacrifice your nights out for anything - being around friends and family enjoying yourself is what makes life worth living.

And I’m not gonna be the type of coach that tells you that you cannot have a good time or have a period of indulgence every now and again when you are celebrating.

We all need a bit of pleasure in our lives.

But, if you have struggled with weight loss in the past and you are consistently finding that you are feeling down, confused, fatigued and unhappy - it’s time to strike some balance with your consumption when having fun!

You can still have fun and lose weight. It’s the it just takes time and planning. The right coach and programme!

What can you do to still have fun at the weekends but still continue to lose weight?

Before I talk about the practical tips that you can do to manage weekends on your weight loss journey I just wanted to say that I lost 9kg in four months while still eating anything that I wanted on a Sunday evening…

I called it pudding day.

And I planned for it!

Knowing that I would find it difficult to avoid temptation on a Sunday with friends I had to be realistic about this particular event that would happen and I managed my nutrition and exercise activity around it.

It can be done!

So…

Here are some tips and tricks to manage your weekends and STILL stay on course.

CALORIE BANKING

Some of you may have come across this before.

Once you have your daily calories we need your weekly average.

Say that our calorie deficit is 1800 calories. Over the week that would be 12,600.

Think of your body and nutrition like a savings account. The less you put in during the week the more you have available to ‘spend’

So out of that 1800 if we only consume 1600 per day Monday – Friday… that gives us an extra thousand calories to play with over the weekend…

You will still keep losing weight!

Calorie banking isn’t for everyone though, because it creates a cycle lot of restricting and  bingeing. If this is a likely to trigger a history of disordered eating - avoid this and try the next tactic below.

INCREASE YOUR ENERGY EXPENDITURE

Moving more basically.

This could be adding more walks into your day. Increasing cardio throughout the week. Another strength workout. Something that’s going to keep your body moving more so that you burn more calories - all leading up to this busy weekend of fun!

You could coincide this with calorie banking to make sure that you’re able to relax a bit more over the weekend.

NOTE: Smart watches aren’t always accurate when counting calories that you’re burning off during activity. So be aware if this. If your watch says you’ve burnt 650 cals on a 20 min walk its likely to exaggerate on everything else. Use it as an indicator and not gospel!

EAT BEFORE YOU GO OUT

I personally like this one…

One of my clients eats a nutritious meal before they go out on a social occasion. Making sure that they’re completely satisfied so they are less likely to overeat.

When we are hungry we are more likely to make choices that have a negative impact. You will have heard not to go food shopping on an empty stomach. Eating before you go out carries the same principle.

If you found this helpful and you still struggle to have accountability with your weight loss journey, do get in touch!


Have a great couple of remaining bank holidays!


Best,

Paul x