During Thanksgiving I decided it was a good time to take a break from the "grind". Didn't really structure too many workouts and loosely tracked my calories. I had decided it was just time for a tiny bit of time away from working on and worrying about my physicality.
Has it been easy? Yes and no. Easy in the since I'm sort of just letting my body tell me when to eat & when I'm done eating. It's a scary prospect for me because the girl can EAT. I really don't pay attention to that full feeling so instead of tracking, I've been slowing down and just "listening" to what my body is telling me. But even that hasn't been easy. Not tracking has come with weight gain. Notice I didn't say "fat"...WEIGHT gain. My body is used to being in deficit (part of why I'm taking a break) so naturally added sodium, glucose, etc is puffing me up some. Mathematically it would be pretty difficult to say every pound is fat because that would require eating much more than I think I could. Also, I don't want to perpetuate the myth that my body has adapted to the deficit. Your body doesn't do that. Starving will cause weight loss...extreme weight loss and death, so no, your body doesn't adapt to a deficit. That being said...you should live your life IN a deficit either. Taking breaks might help you mentally & physically even if you are pursuing weight loss.
I'm not really in pursuit of weight loss, per se, anymore. I'm definitely on #TeamStrength so, whereas, abs are nice to look at having a SLIGHT a bit of fluff is helping me with muscle building too. I said SLIGHT, I'm not too low in body fat nor am I too high. Neither one of those are healthy and no one should delude themselves into thinking they can be.
Now having said all this, I had built my discipline of eating and working out before I decided on taking a break. If you still struggle with getting to the gym or lack self-control when it comes to binging, please get some support to keep you on track until you trust yourself to take breaks without abandoning your health journey. I will be heading into a deficit starting January 23rd. I picked a day in the spring and counted back 12 weeks from that date. I have a start & ending date for a deficit. There are no plans to continue my deficit after Easter...I will be working towards maintenance calories to focus on muscle building again.
Why am I telling you all this? Partly to let you know that weight gain irritates and worries me, too. I don't have fitness locked down with no thought given to it anymore. I tinker, I experiment, but I also do it in a healthy, mindful way. I don't do anything drastic. I don't fast, binge, try crazy supplements...I stick to the basics and maneuver within those parameters. I also tell you this to let you know it's ok to take a block of time and regroup. Recenter your focus. Decide what goals are worth pursuing. Ditch ones that don't work, add new ones that excite you, but always be working in a mentally and physically healthy way.
I can't wait to share my new journey through these last few "break" weeks and how it ends in April.
--Elle