Lorien

I did really well on Thursday and Friday, but I feel like I overdid it with the "cheating" with bread and sweets on Saturday so I'll try to focus on that next weekend. I shouldn't have too much trouble with it today as all stores are closed here on Sundays and I can only eat the few sweet things I have left from yesterday! Next week is going to be a challenge for me as I will be on a work trip for three days - to a country which is famous for its fries and waffles (go ahead, guess it!) and I am certain that the hotel breakfast will mostly consist of pastries... which I will then have to avoid... somehow! I blame hotel breakfasts (at least a few days a week almost all of last year) for my 4kg weight gain last year

Just checked - 100km to go! I hope to be there by the end of next week!

The long article is here: https://www.nerdfitness.com/blog/walking/ The actual google doc is here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wl-ae9nFdPMyQ8uMbpwIYGbXEJirOq4P3EDHiy94iXc/edit#gid=0 I'm a bit less than 100km away from Rivendell

Walks and jogs are a great way to build stamina. I've been going for walks for years now (as kind of a substitute for working out) and now I can walk for a couple of hours without getting tired or even really noticing that I'm walking. Most days I only walk about 5 kilometers, but occasionally, when the weather is good and I'm up to it, I take longer walks. I went on a hike a few weeks back and only started feeling tired after about 17 kilometers, which I am pretty impressed about! So stick with it. Has anyone told you about walking to Mordor yet? Also, how did you quit candy and ice cream? Asking for a friend...

Alright, so the weather's suddenly very warm and very sunny. When I went for a run in the park right after work I felt that it might be time to switch to shorts and a T-shirt, as my back was soaking from sweat. So when I went to the store after taking a quick shower at home, I decided to wear a dress. And oh man did I get a case of the chub rub! This definitely amped up my motivation to stick to my eating routine and add a few bodyweight sessions per week to my routine. Diet: · Eat sweets and bread/pastries only on the weekend - no sweets or pastries today · One meal per day without grains - had porridge for breakfast, but no grains for the rest of the day Fitness: · Twice a week, go for a 10 minute walk (or run) after work - went for a jog in the park and did one round of NF bodyweight exercises Level Up Your Life: · Spend 5 minutes every day learning the local language - read a few pages of my target language book in the morning, will probably read some more before bed All in all, it's been a very successful day! I am slightly worried about bingeing on sweets and bread over the weekend. If anyone has tips on how to keep it moderate, I'm all ears (uhm, or eyes)!

How far are you from Rivendell?

Hey, how is the challenge going?

Hi, Rainelf! Thanks for asking! Last week was pretty great, walking wise - I actually went on a long weekend trip to another city I had never been to and walked about a total of 30 km on Saturday and Sunday. On the other days I did pretty OK as well, including hitting my 3 jogs a week goal. Hi, ShadowLion! Thank you! I agree - on average I did pretty well and I am completely OK with being flexible with these goals. The language goal is strangely tough indeed. What I've come up with is moving this up to the morning. I like to wake up early and read a book while I have breakfast, so now I'll just try and read a couple of pages in that target language! What have you used as triggers? As for my goals: Diet: · Eat sweets and bread/pastries only on the weekend - I was doing pretty good until Thursday i.e. the day before Good Friday. Apparently Easter is a huge deal in this country and my colleagues brought me lots of sweet treats which I just had to eat right away. I bought some sweets for my trip on Saturday (as my train left at 6:30am, I wouldn't have had time to go to the store on the same day) and couldn't help myself - I ate a whole 100g bar of dark choc on Friday. On Saturday and Sunday I just enjoyed my holiday, but ate everything in moderation, no bingeing. On Monday, when I took the train back home, I kind of slipped, I have to admit - I ended up eating almost all the sweets I had left over from the trip. Today I brought some treats from the country I visited to work and of course I wanted to try some as well, so I had one piece. All in all, though the week was not perfect, I am not beating myself up about it. I'll just do better for the rest of the week. · One meal per day without grains - To be honest, I didn't keep track of this. I probably did well until Friday and missed Sat-Mon (again, my trip) completely. Today I had three grain-free meals, however. Fitness: · Twice a week, go for a 10 minute walk (or run) after work - yep, perfect. Covered a little over 60 km this week. Level Up Your Life: · Spend 5 minutes every day learning the local language - This is quite on and off. I certainly didn't do anything on Sat-Mon as I wasn't even in the language environment. Like I mentioned earlier, I'll try to get this done first thing in the morning and in the form of reading a book in the language. I found "PS! I love you" on the office bookshelf. I didn't like the movie, but knowing roughly the story helps me understand the text.

Hi, Gemma! Thanks for your reply! I am actually already walking to Mordor! I started in the beginning of January thinking that I could do it in a year. I was successful at first but I soon saw that the 8+km per day was making my hips hurt, so I was forced to dial it down a bit. I am now at 537 km, so I'll see you soon in Rivendell! Hi, Hazard! Thanks for asking, I think I've been doing pretty well (>perfect!)! On Wednesday there was a health day at work so I could measure my BMI, metabolic rate, blood pressure, sugar and cholesterol. Everything else was perfect, but I am about 3-5kg overweight and my metabolic rate seems to be weirdly slow - apparently my metabolic age is 42 (compared to my actual age of 27!) - so the nurse suggested that I try to exercise a bit harder a couple times a week to rev up my metabolism. Diet: · Eat sweets and bread/pastries only on the weekend - I did try some dessert when I went out to lunch with my colleagues on Monday (normally I pack my own lunch) and on Friday a colleague offered me a piece of local chocolate that I hadn't tried. I did eat sweets and pastries today and yesterday, but in a completely reasonable amount. So - pretty good! · One meal per day without grains - I failed at this today (oatmeal for breakfast, muesli bar for lunch (I was hiking) and pasta for dinner) and possibly yesterday as well (pastry for brunch and pasta for dinner), but did well on other days. Some days I had several grain-free meals. Fitness: · Twice a week, go for a 10 minute walk (or run) after work - I went for walks on Tuesday and Wednesday, and decided to do a 10-minute bodyweight exercise session for the metabolism. On Thursday the weather was really nice so I wanted to go for a short jog (20 minutes of alternating jogging and walking + walking there and back). On Saturday I went for my usual run - 30 minutes at a moderately hard pace and then 30 minutes alternating. On Sunday I went on a city hike and ended up walking close to 21 km. So I think fitness-wise I was pretty damn perfect! Level Up Your Life: · Spend 5 minutes every day learning the local language - I did worst on this. I think I only studied vocabulary on half of the days, it's the easiest to forget. Oops...

Hi elleyrie! I ran my first half marathon last year so I am super excited to follow your experience. Make sure you stretch before and after running! I am a little concerned about your calorie intake, but I don't know your height/weight so I can't be sure. All I know is that I was eating about 1800-1900 daily when I was training. With 1500 kcal per day I would have had a very difficult time and dangerously rapid weight loss. 900 kcal/day is way too low for any adult. Maybe just consider revising this number. The concern is coming from somebody who accidentally had bulimia for about a year. By accidentally I meant that I didn't understand why I had these eating binges when I was eating perfectly well the rest of the time (I really wasn't, the amount was ridiculously small, but I didn't realize it) and was exercising reasonably (1h weightlifting + 1h running 5-6 times a week + walking everywhere instead of using transport, not actually reasonable). A therapist and a doctor-assigned eating disorder nurse helped me understand what I was doing wrong. Good luck!

What a badass!

Looking good! Great job! About coffee... lemme tell ya something. Years ago I would drink Nescafe 3in1 thinking it's good coffee. Then I moved onto filter coffee with milk and sugar, this became a habit. Black coffee or coffee without sugar tasted horrible, I could not see how anyone would want it. With milk and sugar - that was my coffee. Fast forward a couple of years, I was now officially an adult, working in an office and all. The office decided to change its structure and departments had to switch floors. I had to move from the 5th floor to the 6th. On moving day, after me and my work friends had moved everything upstairs, we decided to have one last coffee in our 5th floor kitchen. But! I had already taken my sugar upstairs (still had my milk though). Eh, didn't feel like going upstairs to get it, I'll survive this one coffee without sugar. And I've never put sugar in my coffee since. I discovered that I'd lost the taste for it. Now I can't stand sweet coffee. Of course, by the end of it I was only putting like 1 tsp of sugar, but consider that I started with the disgustingly sweet 3in1. My point is, have hope, young Padawan. If I could quit putting sugar in my coffee (and now finding sweet coffee yucky), so can you.

If it were easy then everyone would be doing it. Good job sticking to the goal though. One small step at a time.

Hi all! I've been pretty healthy and active all my life in the sense that I've always eaten veggies, fast food or eating out is usually a once-or-twice-a-month thing and I love to take long walks. Sure, I eat too many sweets and my abs are hidden behind a comfy, squishy padding, but all in all, I'm not in a very bad shape and I am more or less happy with myself. The thing is, I've always been an anxious person and this has led me to eating disorders - which I hadn't noticed myself. Three times in my life (when I was about 5, when in middle school, and a couple years ago in my last year of University) I've also sought help from psychologists or therapists and gotten my groove back. It has also taught me to notice when my eating habits change due to the stress I am under. About a month ago I moved abroad for work. This is a project-based job, meaning I will be here for a year, so although I miss my family, friends and cat, I do understand that this is a great opportunity for my career and personal development, etc etc etc. These rational arguments do, of course, nothing to decrease my stress level and stop me from feeling lonely (you know the saying that you can be surrounded by a lot of people and still feel lonely? That's me. I go out and meet plenty of people but they're not my tribe. Finding my tribe takes time and a lot of introvert energy). There was also a two-week period where I had already moved to my new hometown, but wasn't working - due to bureaucracy. So in addition to being in a new place where I didn't know anybody, I didn't have anything to do all day. Did I mention that there was also a cold wave here at the time, making spending time outside a horrible idea? Naturally, I was stressed out - though not really realizing it because I was trying to convince myself of how great of an opportunity this is - and started overeating. Like buy a pint of Ben&Jerry's and demolish it in one sitting, AFTER having an actual meal-overeating. I saw this as a clear sign of being close to the edge and tried setting some rules for myself to return to a balance. Getting back to work helped put some structure into my day, keeping a food diary with some easy objectives helped with reducing overeating (not an everyday occurrence anymore, but still happens). What I need now is a tribe to help me stick to these simple daily goals and to talk to about the difficulties. Reading other people's stories also makes it feel like I'm not doing it alone. My main objective is to not lose myself to anxiety and eating disorder during this year away, and to build healthy habits. When I did the same one-year-project in my home country last year, each member of my team gained on average 4kgs over the year because of the sweet and salty snacks we kept eating in meetings and the free booze on the flights home. This is something I want to avoid. If I end up losing weight instead, great! Anyway, the origin story has gone on long enough, here are my challenges for these four weeks: Diet: · Eat sweets and bread/pastries only on the weekend (I love food and being in a country that makes super good pastries means that I want to try them out. Plus, on Saturdays I go running with my running team and afterwards we usually go to a bakery to have some delicious breakfast. Limiting sweets/bread/pastries to the weekend is my attempt at balance. I am afraid it'll lead to bingeing on the weekend, but I gotta have faith) · One meal per day without grains (this comes from the NF diet 10 levels. I cannot cut out grains from my breakfast every day, because I sometimes love to eat oatmeal for breakfast. Plus there's the post-run croissant on Saturdays. So instead I'll try to be flexible) Fitness: · Twice a week, go for a 10 minute walk (or run) after work (again, this is in addition to my Saturday morning 1-hour jogs, and the fact that I'm walking 6600 (last week it was 6500, some time before that 6000, 5000, etc) steps every day. I ran a half marathon last summer and found that I was completely fed up with running after that. Now I am trying to get back into the habit of running. However, it's still too cold outside to go running (for me), so I'll settle for walks - just to get into the habit) Level Up Your Life: · Spend 5 minutes every day learning the local language (this means dedicating 5 minutes of my free time to learning vocabulary or reading an article or watching a Youtube video in the language) If you have made it this far, thank you for reading. If it made you think we're of the same tribe (i.e. similar ideas and goals), please let me know - we could encourage one another! PS: My screenname "Lorien" was the name of my first D&D character. Back home I had this amazing group of incredible people I could shamelessly nerd out with over board games, video games and weird horror movies. The best thing about the group was that they all had their own health/fitness goals so we would occasionally stop our D&D game to talk about how to get more protein in the diet or how to squat properly. If this isn't Nerd Fitness, I don't know what is. This is also the reason why I joined NF.