Tips for losing water weight

People can carry a lot of weight from just water, and it can make you feel lethargic, puffy, heavy and bloated.. I often seem to carry the most water round my middle, which is annoying but can be lost with a little effort! Follow these basic tips to see how different you feel. You will be surprised to find how much you were actually carrying, and amazed by the results!


* Drink more water. Funnily enough you actually need to drink more water to prevent your body retaining too much fluid. Aim for 2litres or more per day.
* Cut back on simple carbs. Sugary foods and refined starches hold more fluid in your body.
* Reduce sodium and salt intake. Like simple carbs, they attract more fluid.
* Avoid artificial sweeteners, as they have the same effect on your body as normal sugar. Just because it's calorie-free doesn't mean it has no effect at all!
* Exercise more! Sweat out the excess!
* Try a water retention supplement to relieve excess retention. I wouldn't recommend using these too often as I would imagine they aren't too good for your system since they do all the work for you, but try one as a last resort if the above fails even after sustained effort.

I lost a lot of water weight in only 2 days (nearly half a stones worth!) and my stomach shrank from being flat-ish to being miniscule! Absolutely loved the results, and now that I know my own potential I'm more motivated to stop my body retaining so much fluid. Try it!

Comics!

I love comics but I hardly buy any because I'm too picky! I most love the ones with a hot, strong, fit and intelligent female as the lead. ie: someone to look up to! haha. I mean, I know they're not real but isn't it better to aim for something superhuman rather than within normal human capabilities? If you shoot for the moon you will at least reach a star, whereas if you only shoot for a star you may not even make it to the sky. Know what I mean?
Of the ones I've read, I love Witchblade and Tomb Raider, and I've always wanted Fathom too.. What kind do you like, if any? Any suggestions?


Oh and also, the photos I promised of fitness/figure idols..Well let's just say I've been rather busy lately but I'm working on it! Will get some posted up soon.

Uh oh...

Right, so a very close friend of mine who is trying to lose a little weight asked me if I would help out by writing a diet plan. I'm very much into health and nutrition which is why they asked me and I was really excited to get started on it. I wrote out height, weight, current daily calories, resting metabolic rate, goal weight loss etc etc and started working out macros to a new calorie total. I wrote out a few daily calorie totals for them to choose from, each with various macronutrient percentages to try out and see which they felt healthiest on and lost weight on. BUT...thinking so deeply into nutrition calculations got me a little neurotic about my own consumption again..I very quickly went a bit haywire again and started tracking my own diet down to every tiny morsel consumed, obsessing about my own macros and when I could eat. I thought I was over any dodgy relationships with food! Obviously not. Luckily I realised this very soon and have decided I need to take a break from writing their diet out until my head is sorted out again. I just need to focus on how much happier I felt when I was eating without counting and worrying. And how much better I was actually eating by not stressing about it! Being worried about it only makes you obsessed with food anyway, and then you struggle to maintain any balance.
So apologies to my friend, I will get right back on it asap!

Fitness models

I usually find it quite hard to find fitness models, figure athletes etc that I really find inspiring. I look for a mix of several things, including physical beauty, intelligence, good attitude, good TV personality and so on. Y'know, an amazing all-rounder. But I have now got a fair few favourites, like Ava Cowan, Alicia Marie, Mary Jarmolowich.. These women inspire me not only in terms of fitness and physical ability but also with their confidence, success-driven minds, intelligence.. They inspire me to break through my physical limits, to believe in myself and to follow my heart in my own way as they have done. In all, just to be the best me I can be! Here's Alicia and Ava :) Who inspires you?

My art

I've posted up some of my drawings under the tab 'Art'. This is stuff from when I was 16 or 17 until now. They're not in chronological order though! Hope you like :)

Mmm coffee :)

Found a great magazine to start reading! Anyone who knows me knows I'm crazy about magazines - I buy so many different types you wouldn't even be able to keep up, from fitness to lads mags, gossip mags, you name it. Anyway, it's New Scientist, a weekly full of all kinds of cutting edge news and it is fascinating! I used to buy Muscular Development mainly for the sciencey bit at the front, so this is similar but covering all aspects of science.

Just enjoying a nice cup of coffee too, Starbucks style. Decaf coffee with frothy milk, vanilla and cinnamon on top :) I use decaf espresso and just make a huge mug full instead of a tiny cup.

University..?

I went to Leeds Met uni to study graphic design straight after college but it didn't work out for me at all.. College kind of push you into uni so I ended up going before I even knew what I wanted to do. Graphic design was a natural choice because I've always been into art and I've drawn for as long as I can remember but I realised it's not something I want to do as a career, so I left university after only four months.. I'm glad I left but at the time I felt so lost and such a failure! Anyway I paid back everything I owed for my student loans straight away so I wouldn't have to worry about it, but recently I got statements from them saying I owe another £4000!! This is like, at least a year and a half after I left! So I rang them about it and they explained that £2000 of it is for tuition loans, which even though I left, the uni could still claim those since I'd taken a space on the course. I know for definite my place was filled though, because I was told there was a queue for the course when I was leaving! So that sucks. The other £2000 I actually paid them by debit card over the phone or online but for some reason they never received it :S So this needs sorting asap. What a pain :/

Even so, I do want to go back into education eventually.. I just can't decide what to do! What I originally wanted to apply for was languages, mainly Japanese but possibly Italian too. The only reason I didn't was because I have no previous qualifications for those languages, but that doesn't apply now as I'm a 'mature' student. Also I don't really know if a language course is worth it.. I mean, what careers could it lead to?

Another subject I keep going back to is human biology. I'm really interested in anything to do with the human body, genetics, fitness, health etc etc. But again, I don't know really what it would lead to. And I've been a little put off by all this crap from the student loans company, so if I go back to uni in future I'm gonna try and self-fund!!