In 2014 Rebecca weighed over 100 pounds, in two years she lost half of her weight and continued her journey to a healthy body. In 2021, the girl’s weight was 90 kilograms, but she was carrying two babies inside her.
How she managed to lose weight and why she continued to train even during pregnancy, we tell you with an expert.
nutritionist trainer
It is important to realize that losing weight is the first part of the task. It is equally important to keep the result. That’s why you need to change your eating habits in such a way that you can stick to them for life.
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By 2014, Rebecca Grafton tried a dozen diets, which at first gave results, and then led to breakdowns. After each of the attempts to sharply limit the diet, the girl gained even more and lost faith in herself.
Grafton felt miserable looking at her reflection in the mirror. Most of all she was frightened by the thought of how much time and effort it would take to get rid of dozens of extra pounds, but she coped.
I didn’t let fear stop me. I started with small changes that led me to my first results.
The first step to a new body and life was to switch to a healthy diet. The girl kept a calorie count, which allowed her to eat her favorite foods in moderation. In the diet began to prevail products rich in protein, namely eggs, chicken breast, low-fat cheese.
Emphasis was placed on a variety of fresh vegetables seasoned with spices. “Of course, control the portion size,” Rebecca advised her subscribers.
In addition to a balanced diet, sports played an important role in weight loss. Rebecca started running. The girl immediately chose a fairly intense schedule – she trained three days a week.
In high school I always had a tantrum when in gym class the teacher made us run a hundred meters. And if someone had told me then that I would volunteer to go to a fitness club to work out on a treadmill, I would have just twisted my finger at the temple.
Within a year, Grafton was able to lose 35 pounds and began participating in running marathons. At her first small race in her hometown, she ran to the finish line first. In January 2016, Grafton reached a very important milestone: she lost 45 pounds.
One day, the weight came back on
Throughout her journey, Rebecca shared her journey with the public by launching her blog, My Girly Follies. In 2019, exactly five years after the story began, a new post appeared there that startled everyone who was inspired by her story: ‘What I learned from gaining back 13 pounds.
I realized that there really is no secret to losing weight: all it takes is a healthy diet, exercise, and a persistent mindset to NEVER give up, no matter how many “misses” you have along the way.
In this post, Rebecca shared that she became a “slave to her food scale”. She couldn’t afford to eat in public places because she needed to know the composition of the dish down to the gram for peace of mind. The girl ate no more than 1600/1700 calories and still exercised at least six days a week.
One day Rebecca went on vacation with her boyfriend and decided that on vacation she would allow herself absolutely everything. This led to a gain of six kilograms in a week. Afterwards, despite her efforts, the girl gained another seven kilograms, which made her very worried.
If a pair of pants that were too small hanging in my closet made me feel like a terrible person, I decided it was time to just buy a pair of bigger pants and move on! From that point on, it took me almost eight months to fully realize this.
“Just like my habits at my highest weight weren’t normal, my habits at my lowest weight weren’t normal either. I just went from one end of the spectrum to the complete opposite. I had to teach myself what NORMAL LIFE should look like, and here are some of the conclusions I came to:
- if I go overboard on calories or allow myself something delicious, I’m not a bad person;
- I don’t need to impress anyone but myself;
- having healthy relationships is more important to me than having abs;
- getting in shape again isn’t a bad thing;
- losing weight will always be part of my identity, but it’s not my whole identity.”
Nutritional Coach
I am generally against calorie counting because I know from personal experience that obsessing over numbers leads to eating disorders. Calorie counting can be helpful for people who have difficulty controlling portion sizes. Even so, I don’t recommend counting calories for longer than 2-3 weeks. This is usually enough time to build a rough picture of a balanced diet and stick to it without a calculator.
How does Rebecca look today?
Rebecca gave birth to twins in early January 2022 and is now in great health. She drinks plenty of water and eats a healthy and balanced diet. During her pregnancy, she continued her sports activities and exercised quite intensively: she ran in the gym almost every day.
In her social networks Rebecca actively shares with her subscribers recipes of healthy dishes, talks about the dynamics of weight and supports everyone who decided to change.
While I was on my weight loss journey, I never advocated perfection, I preached consistency. Even though I no longer actively seek to lose weight, my habits are still a part of my life.
Nutritional Coach
This kind of schedule doesn’t work for many people. Working out is stressful and the body needs time to adapt to it. Only then can we call training beneficial. Adaptation means recovery and rest. It is optimal to train 3-4 times a week. If you do it more often, the risk of overexertion increases. The recommendation to increase domestic activity will be useful. You don’t have to rely on training alone: take the stairs instead of the elevator, wash the floors in the house yourself, give the robot vacuum cleaner a rest, you can also get off two stops earlier from your car and walk. These habits can contribute even more to weight correction than exercise.
During her weight loss, Rebecca was able to form healthy habits and sticks to them to this day.