Just started today, looking for friends, support, and advice!

[samitronic]

Hey everyone!

My name is Sam, I'm 24, and I'm in my senior year of nursing school (YAY!). I'm trying to make big, healthy changes in my life, and I found NF while searching for healthy lifestyle blogs. I've actually known about the Paleo lifestyle for a couple years, but have been previously adamantly opposed to it, mostly because the dude who introduced it to me was pretty lame. The thing is, it makes a lot of sense, and I really want to be one of those women who can kick ass at the gym. Plus, who wants a fat nurse?! No one. No one wants a fat nurse.

I've been yo-yo dieting for the last five years or so, and I really want this time to stick. I know that in order to make this work, I need a strong support system to help me out, whether it's helping me realize how much I DON'T want to gorge myself on an entire bag of Ruffles, encouraging me to go to the gym, or cheering me on as I'm reaching my goal size and strength.

Speaking of goals, here are some of mine:

1. Reach and maintain goal weight (first goal is 147, then I'm going to re-evaluate)

2. Exercise at least five hours per week

3. Eat at restaurants (including take-out!) twice per week or less (ideally less)

The third is a huge one for me. My friends and I eat a TON, and we eat crappy foods. I love cooking and have an amazing kitchen - I need to cook most, if not all, of my meals! I have a ton of excuses, but none of them matter anymore. RIGHT?!

Any words of wisdom?! Any nursing students out there have any tips for success? Anything and everything is welcome!!!

[lizzies387]

hello fellow newbie! i'm not a nursing student but i i do have good friend who while also being a combat medic in teh national guard moonlights as a nurse at a univeristy hospital! but as far as the weight loss/ strength gain it helps me more hwen my friends are one board in a postive way or if you have someone in person trying to get healthy too ( work out buddy!) if not well you always have us!

[Razor]

Whoa. How the heck did a cat get into NURSING SCHOOL???

But in all seriousness, welcome! Words of wisdom... Most of the battle is your nutrition. As a nurse, you probably already know that. The thing is, you can't treat this as "dieting". Diet is a word that means what you eat. You've been eating your entire life right? Then you've been dieting. Don't diet, make lifestyle changes. Eating at restaurants is more expensive than it is unhealthy. There's nothing wrong with eating out unless you CHOOSE to eat something bad. But the exact same thing can happen if you CHOOSE to buy something unhealthy at the grocery store.

If you have an amazing kitchen, I'm jealous, and yes start cooking. It may be a pain to wash dishes, but it's always better than eating something you didn't cook. You don't have to cook all the time. Honestly sometimes my dinner is just a tuna sandwich and some greek yogurt when I'm feeling lazy.

[Ja_rossjr]

Another point on the exercise, choose a number of days a week, and write out your exercises and how many sets you are going to do. I work out every other day and every exercise and rep and weight is logged, that way I can not leave the gym until I finish everything on that days page. It really helps "cheating" (which I can be bad at.)

Other than that, welcome aboard!

[Thilde]

Welcome!! Happy to have you here. This is an amazing community, for sure!

I second Athena's suggestions re: your exercise goal. 5 hours is a great goal, and you can definitely still meet it, but I would agree that you might have more success against the psychological demons that inevitably arise if you restate that into something like # of days per week. I work out minimum 5 days/wk, preferably 6, so I know I'm getting right around 5hrs of exercise every week, maybe a little more if I do something big for a workout, like a hike. But, like Athena mentions, because my goal is "Work out 5-6days/wk," my brain cannot easily sabotage me by working out on Monday and then letting 3 or 4 days go by because "Oh, I have plenty of time to get my last 4 hours in" and then before you know it, you're trying to cram in 3 or 4 hours on the weekend. There's also the risk of injury trying to cram too much exercise in too short a time span. Just a thought from outside, but really you do whatever feels comfortable for you!

Best of luck with all your goals! (there is a great paleo forum here, too! I am in there ALL. THE. TIME. A great tip if you have newbie questions like I do: use the "search forum" feature with key words...I have dredged up so much awesome info on general paleo topics that way! You can do that in any forum but I have found it the most helpful in the paleo/primal forum.)

[Deacon Blues]

Welcome aboard fellow newbi. A few cooking tips that help me is planning and preparing my meals a day or more in advance. For instance, I love eating this healthy chicken pizza, so to save time when I'm in the mood for it I grill and store my chicken breast and dice my onions and bell peppers. When I'm ready for it, I only have to wait 10 minutes from prep to cooking. I've also discovered that there are great healthy alternatives to the standard junk food out there. My chocolate whey smoothies taste much better than anything that McDonalds serves up. That's another point. I'm happy to hear that you're not going cold turkey as far as eatting out, but the more healthier you eat, the less you'll miss the junk. I use to think that a McDonald's Quarter Pounder was the bees knees, but now its a salty mess to me.

Take care and keep us up to date!