Libra Her Problem and My Analysis.

Here is the case study of one of my readers on the other website.

Hi Shiva,
You should be an inspirational speaker. Let me share with you some of my drawbacks and I am sure you will come up with solutions.
I am 50 years old and weigh 186 lbs. I have a treadmill at home and also have a weight set and ab rocket etc. My problem is by the time I am done my house work I am so tired I have no strength left for activity. Plus I have heel spurs so cannot stand on feet for long. Even with ab rocket crunches my legs start to ache and then I have problem walking. I am not a voracious eater; I am sure eating is not an issue, but movement is. I think I am answering my own questions. but somehow I feel like telling you all this.I am sure you will come up with a solution. Every night I tell myself, tomorrow I will start walking, sometimes I even do but thats it I give up in a day or two. By the way I was 45 kgs. at the time of marriage. Can you please shake me up. I'll wait for your response. Bye and God bless you.

My Analysis:

1. My problem is by the time I am done my house work I am so tired I have no strength left for activity. Plus I have heel spurs so cannot stand on feet for long

House work is great but if one does that over and over again for many years it becomes a habit for the body, which being smart starts spending less calories for the same work.

Figure out the best time to exercise. Try completing most of the work earlier in day, take a nap and then allot time for yourself to exercise. The best way is to sit with a blank paper and pen and write down your daily schedule and then decide the time where you are perfectly relaxed and not tired.

2 .I have a treadmill at home - Great you have a treadmill, start with real less speed. Don't increase the speed. Give yourself 1 month to increase on your walking time. Start by 10 -15 minutes and keep increasing your walking time till you are able to do the walking for minimum 45 min. Don't bother about the speed, bother about the stamina right now. Once 45 minutes become cake walk then start increasing the speed.

Stamina should be your focus right now. What I get from your post here is that right now any small activity other than your house work will contribute to your initial weight loss (you are a lucky girl).

3. and also have a weight set - Great, do you like watching TV. I love my TV and when ever I am watching a serial it becomes a perfect time for my weight training. While sitting, do the weight exercises of hand. You can also lift your hands up in semi circle, touch them and get them back down. Start with 25 counts and increase.

If you think this is crazy then hear this. I know a person who lost lot of weight and my family told me she was so crazy that she will do hand exercises and lift legs 500 times while watching TV and after eating (while she was visiting my family). For me that was a great idea and I simply adopted it. Any activity no matter how small makes you spend calories. Do a small hand shake 500 times and you will know how difficult it is.

SO do the upper body exercises, sit and do it. Start with 25 counts of simple exercises and gradually increase. Move your feet and then legs up and down while watching TV. You will soon get the idea that these seeming simple exercises are not that simple.

4. and ab rocket - Ouch!!!!. I stay away from these kind of machines, they are a sure shot way to an injured back. So I cannot comment on them.

5. Plus I have heel spurs so cannot stand on feet for long. Even with ab rocket crunches my legs start to ache and then I have problem walking

I had a broken back, I started with 10 minutes of walking it pained but by next week my stamina built up, so I increased to 20 it pained again but after few days 20 min of walking was a piece of cake. SO start slowly and build your stamina.

Take a hammer to your doctor and keep threatening to hit him with the hammer until he gives you the fair idea about what exercises you can do. Ask him about walking and keep hovering the hammer on his head until he tells you clearly that walking is good for you.

6. Every night I tell myself, tomorrow I will start walking, sometimes I even do but thats it I give up in a day or two -

Your weight loss is not coming for free, you have to put in all your stamina and strength to achieve it. Decide once and for all that you want to do it and you will do it no matter what. There is no negotiations here, you have one life and you will attain this dream of being thin at any cost.

7. I am 50 years old - Ok so you are young. You have age on your side, all you need is to get up and take a small step everyday. Don't let the pain rule you, you have all the right in this world to get up and venture out and have fun and wear short skinny dresses.

There is absolutely no excuse in this world which prevents you from weight loss. So get up girl, open your arms and embrace the day and start your journey towards weight loss.

WALKING IS A MIRACLE AND YOU HAVE THE RIGHT TO EXPERIENCE IT WITH NO PAIN. SO START WALKING TODAY.

Hi Shiva,
I don't have words to thank you enough for replying to me. There is no question unanswered and no excuses left on my part to get moving in the right direction.
As usual I visited this website and I was thrilled to see my name (felt special too).
I read it many times and before thanking you I went and walked on the treadmill for 15 minutes at the speed of 2.2mi/hr.
I felt extremely comfortable with no pressure of speed. (I had previously been making the mistake of walking 3mi/hr and still not being happy with what I was doing.)

Thank you for sharing your insight in regards to my queries, and motivating me.

Where is the Start.

Every time when I decided to lose weight I would tell myself this is the start. From tomorrow I will eat less and will start exercise. No more oily food, no fats, no sweets nothing. I will live on boiled food. The next day would start with enthusiasm only to end up in a big failure.

After sometime as things were not moving in the direction I would like them to move, I started thinking where should I start from. I would go back to eating big amount of food, it was yo yoing between trying to start and ending up to fail.

And it still happens. If I am off my schedule for few days I am back to square one struggling to start.

So lets define start here.

Starting weight loss :

If you want to start with weight loss this piece of information will help you and you will be glad to know that there is NO START.

There is no starting point in weight loss. To get your body in the groove to start losing weight all you have to do is eat the same kind of food but a little less quantity and introduce some walking. Thats all, period. You don't have to start with eating boiled veggies and banning all food.

If you want to be successful with weight loss then you will have to condition your mind and body to start adjusting to the new changes. If you are too strict the probability to break is more.

My weight loss happened when I never planned a start, all I planned was to keep eating what I eat but a little lesser amount and start walking.

Once you get going with weight loss its only then you start making more changes to aim for a further loss.

Starting after a break:

Oh my, this is the worst. If you are on a vacation and have been eating outside food and no exercise then getting back to routine is major kill.

I keep postponing getting back, my heart will throb and I will get this deep dark sinking feeling before starting exercising.

So all I do is tell myself that I will be just regular. So the first week after the break, I eat homemade sensible food and am regular with the gym/walk. I don't train heavily the first week. I concentrate on being regular and do not concentrate on exercising heavily. The heavy training routine starts in the second week after the vacation, the first one is dedicated on just being regular.

There is this one amazing truth about losing weight : If you take a break from your exercise and diet routine, you loose 80% of your stamina and of course you will gain weight. But once you get back to exercising, you will have to start from zero, that means your body will have to struggle and the weight loss will start happening. Building back on stamina is a great effort for body and it utilizes lot of calories in doing that. So a break after all is fruitful.

The start is where you look for it. It is right there in your plate disguised as smaller eating portions. It is right there in you shoe rack disguised as walking shoes.

Size Does Matter.

This Post is best viewed in Mozilla Firefox.

Size has obsessed us from the ancient times. In weight loss kingdom I bet my soul that size does matter. It plays the most crucial part in satisfaction.

In my old fat days, I would cook in bigger vessels as, of course, I would not apply any measuring method like The Mighty Rule of Fist

The picture that you see below is of my Rice pot. The one in which I used to cook earlier and the one in which I cook now. I used to cook for 2 people in the bigger pot. I still cook for 2 people but in the smaller one now.




























These are the past and present vegetable cooking pans.






























This is the classic. Ever since my childhood I hated eating with small spoons. I always wanted bigger spoon so that I could take bigger bites and enjoy my food. I was known as a fast eater, I would quickly finish my first round and will be ready for the next. My meal would be over in 10 minutes max.

During my weight loss, I still used the bigger spoon. But I never felt satisfied while eating. As I would eat my food quickly but would force myself not to go for the second round.

Then I came across an article in which a woman lost 5 kgs by eating with baby spoons. I tried but baby spoons are way to small. Then I finally found what suited me best. The desert spoon!!!.

I have been eating with desert spoon from a long time now. Even if I try to eat with top speed I really can't manage much with this spoon. As this spoon force me to eat slowly I am satisfied with the first round of serving itself.
Now at parties I have real tough time with bigger spoons, I first go to the ice cream counter to get a smaller spoon for my meals.















This is a great trick, apply for sometime and see the difference.

No wonder as the vessels shrunk so did my size. Remember be it size zero OR ground zero it always matters

The Queen of Fats

The best case study is me myself. I have told you about my success but do you know about my failures. Failures made me what I am and I love my failures.

I had lost so many battles with weight loss and one of them was when I was in mumbai. I was working and I joined a gym in an attempt to loose weight.

A typical day in my life back then

1. The company bus would come at 8:00 am sharp. So I would just grab my breakfast and would run to catch the bus.

2. My breakfast was a sandwich and tea. If I am not getting anything from home then it was from office which was a big plate of poha/upma.

3. I am a software engineer and my work is done sitting at the desk. Lunch would be home made food, that is, 2 chapattis and sabji.

4. Usually, with co-workers we would either catch someone to give us a samosa/patties party OR would have vada pav after office.

5. I was home by 7:00 pm all tired but would push myself to go to gym. I was back home by 9:00 pm, hardly had any energy and would collapse on bed. I tried getting up early and going to gym but that would leave me tired at office. Hunger pangs keep hitting me and I would have a full dinner before going to bed.

Mental work tires you as much as the physical one.

I didn't loose weight with that kind of life style. I was simply too tired. I had no time to exercise but was pushing myself. Now I think it would have been better to just go for a walk and eat simple food. It would have benefited me much better than the gym.

Presently, I have just shifted to a new country and have yet to start job search. I am basically a lazy person who just spends time in front of her computer. But no matter what, I do exercise for 45 minutes.

In my previous posts I have given the diet that I follow.

Weakness - Lazy

Strength - Commitment to exercise, can control food portion even being a foodie. My family specially my sister is so surprised to see me exercise so vigorously. She would stand in her balcony just to admire me walking fast because according to her that is the only time she saw me moving. She would also lovingly wave to motivate me to move faster when my legs were already killing me.
It was a great shock for my family to see me eating less or refusing to eat outside.

Its very very important to analyze yourself. There is no point in being tired and beating yourself to death for weight loss. Weigh loss should easily fit in your lifestyle and it shouldn't be a forceful addition.

I discovered my strength in exercising, I enhanced my strength and now it is a part of my life.

We cannot live a peaceful life with anything or anyone that generates pressure on us. Same rule for weight loss, you cannot continue with it for life if you feel pressurized to behave in a certain manner to loose weight.

The Bored Bridegroom

One character of my life to whom I am really attached to and on whom I can do all my weight loss experiments is my husband. My husband is a Punjabi and a complete foodie at heart.

Its a sin to offer him a paratha without butter. A sure shot way to hell is to commit a greater sin of making his paratha without ghee.

This is a typical day in the life of my husband.

1. He gets up at 6:30 am and leaves by 8/8:30 am to office. If the wife is sleeping and is in no mood to cook and when all the attempts to wake her up has failed, breakfast is cornflakes and milk. This is his most frequent breakfast. The days when wife does get up, he is lucky to get a veg sandwich with a glass of milk (those days he leaves for office with a happy smile on his face.)

2. He is back for lunch at 2:30 pm. Which is 2 chapattis, sabji, dhal, raita and soup.

3. He does snack out without the knowledge of his wife. And when he feels guilty about cheating his wife, he holds her hands and looks in her eyes and confess his adultery.

4. He is back by 6:00 pm sometime 7:00 pm, has some small snack. Dinner is served between 8:00 pm to 9:00 which is almost similar to lunch.

Past has seen my husband over eating, he will count 2 samosa's as 1, standing instructions to me were start counting the parathas only when 5 are over, that is, only when he has finished 5 parathas should I ask him how many more he will still have.

Strength - He will give up outside food any day for a meal at home. It doesn't bother him to eat at home. We don't eat out frequently and he is comfortable with that.

Weakness - There is absolutely no way this man would ever stand on an exercising machine. I have done everything to make him workout but he simply won't budge. He is ready to eat less but he won't exercise. For years he told me that Yoga is his real calling and would end up doing only the relax asana. Then he said Yoga is boring and he would soon join a Gym. He is always too tired to join a gym. If I tell him Gym he says Yoga, if I agree to Yoga he says Gym. Is there anyway to tame this creature.

Like other men he won't eat small meals at office as he is busy. My only success with him is to give him nice home made meals which are less in calories and amount.

January 2009 he was 94, then till November 2009 he was 91. Jan 2010 he is 88 kgs.

If you can't get yourself to exercise, (Which you one day have too, you can't keep loosing weight without exercise, the weight will stop dropping after sometime), then start with healthy meals of right amount. You will surely see the difference.

The crucial point is starting. You just can't sit and dream about your target, at some point you will have to take a tiny first step towards the goal. The tiny first step is the most important part, without it your journey won't start, without it you will never achieve your goal.

If you want to read how I analyzed myself click here - The Queen of Fats

The Hero.

If life has the answer of why others are thin and you are not. Then it also answers the question why others are so fat.

Here is another character of my life who answers such a question.

Brother -in-law (Jiju) - My Jiju (my sister's husband) and I really gel well. Both of us are extremely fond of food and both turns a deaf ear to my sister's constant nagging about our life style. My Jiju lost a great eating buddy when I started weight loss.

He is 6ft tall and here is a typical day in life on my Jiju

1. Morning - Gets up at 6:00 am, helps my sister with the kids. At 8:00 am he has his breakfast and leaves for office.

2. Breakfast - its 4 breads + 2 eggs OR 2-3 aloo sandwiches OR 2 servings of a big plate of Poha/Upma.

3. He has an office job where he sits the whole day. Lunch is around 1/1:30 pm which is 3-4 chapattis + sabji.

4. He usually snacks in office. Evening he will either eat something at office cafeteria like a patty/samosa etc.

5. He is back by 6.00 pm and eats something from the fridge. Be it a sandwich, a piece of cake, namkeen chudwa anything.

6. Between 8:00 pm to 9:00 pm he has his dinner which is usually from outside. It is 3-4 times a week, 1 chicken hakka noodles, the big restaurant amount serving. He loves outside food and that too Chinese food. And he wants it atleast 3-4 times a week sometimes he will eat daily outside. If he is eating at home it is 3 -4 chapattis and sabji. He will retire to bed by 10.00 pm.

He is usually tired from office work and he weighed 96 kgs. Clearly he is eating far more than he requires.

Weakness - Food. He just loves to eat outside food. Its his habit.

Strength - He can exercise.

When I kept smiling at him while he was having his lovely meals, after few days of my smiling torture he gave in. He said the golden words "I too want to loose weight".
Well, I told him to start eating out only at weekends and go for a walk in the society. Thats what he did. Lastly I heard, he weighed 92 kgs and is regular with his walk. In fact he is so committed to walking, that he took his shoes and walking clothes to a party, excused himself for 40 minutes and once his walk was over came back and enjoyed the party. Once the weight started going down he also started eating more often at home.

People who have weakness have great strength too. My Jiju never exercised in his life, no one knew he would end up being so committed. My Jiju, though had to really fight the urge to eat out showed real commitment for exercise.

The luckiest people are those who have not yet started with weight loss, meaning, have not yet started exercising. This means the first 5 kgs will go off easily by making little shift in their life styles.

Start by making small shifts and then once you start seeing the difference try enhancing the changes. In my Jiju's case, he can't eat in between meals at office, so no frequent small meals for him but as he was happy with the results of walking he decided to join a gym. He also travels a lot. He is not regular with the gym but is regular with his walks. No exercise in a month is far worse than some exercise in a month. His weight loss is not rapid because of the nature of his job, it is slow but it is happening.

Sit and analyze your weakness and strengths and work around them for maximum impact. If you have a weakness you will be astound to discover your strength.

Even if you are buried deep down in work there is someway out. If you can't exercise in weekdays workout on weekends.

There is simply no excuse for not starting with weight loss. You are not the only person who is busy, look around and you will find people busier than you attempting to loose weight.

The Busy Bee

If you take a moment out of your life and observe people around you, you will find real nice characters in your life. If you envy someone for being so thin observe how she leads her life. And if you know someone (other than yourself) who is fat, observe her life too.

Observations give you answers to the biggest question of life "Why the hell I am like this and she is not.???"

Everyone of us has some strength and weakness. Weight loss is all about accepting our weakness and enhancing our strength.

In this 4 part series I will describe few characters of my life, a typical day of their lives, their strength and their weakness and why are they the way they are.

My Sister - Ever since my childhood I have secretly prayed for her to be fat. My mother tells me this creature was a very lousy eater. It was very difficult to make her eat in her teens as well. She is a tortoise personified, she will eat her little plate of food for hours on end.

My prayers were finally answered when my sister was pregnant. I was so happy for once to see her in my clothes. I was bouncing with joy. To my horror, she went back to be 56 kgs even after having 2 kids. I am back to secretly praying to god to show me some mercy and make her fat.

And to top it all, she says she is eating to keep herself at 56 kgs because she will look skinny if she loose more. Lady, here is someone struggling to be at 56 kgs, at least eat and be 80 kgs to show this someone some respect.

Any ways, here is her typical day

Morning - She gets up at 5:30 am. Wake the kids up and send them to school. This includes dressing them up and leaving them to the society gate, waiting for the bus to come. 9:00 am she has her breakfast.

Breakfast - 2 aloo sandwiches OR 2-3 parathas OR poha/upma 1 big full plate.

Then she goes on a cleaning spree. She is continuously moving around the house in top speed cleaning and doing house chores. She also does her gardening in this time. She says she has to do as much as possible before the kids come back.

She has her Lunch at 2:00 pm which is 2 roties, rice, sabji, dhal and raita.

The kids come back and are fed and put to bed for a nap. Then she paints because the only free time to engage in her hobby is when the kids sleep. If she is extremely tired then she catches a nap.

5:30 pm she makes tea, wake the kids, take them to park for an hour, then teach them. She has her dinner at 9.00 pm which is 2-3 roties and sabji. With rest of the house work and putting the kids to bed and all, she goes off to sleep by 12.00/12.30 am to again wake up to start her day at 5:30 am in the morning.

On a serious note now, it is very difficult to ask her to even taste food in between her meals. She hates to eat in between her meals. I exercise very vigorously but when I tried following her day I was so damn tired. I have never seen her siting around and lying on bed. She seems to be moving always. She doesn't sit and watch TV, she doesn't have a cable because she wants her kids to grow up without one (what kind of people are these???).

The reason why I struggle with my weight is because I am not as active as her. I am a late riser and I hate house work. My weight loss was also about being active in house. I would do chores that I hated before because that meant extra burning of calories.

If you cannot go to a gym or like my sister have no inclination to exercise, start moving around the house. There is so much to be done. Take your kids to the park and rather standing or sitting play and move with them. Stop eating between meals. One of my friend lost weight by dancing with her 2 small daughters (How cute). When she was alone at home, she would turn on the music and dance with the kids for sometime, even in parties once the music started we used to see her dancing with her kids. It doesn't look odd at all and its the best exercise.

I understand that metabolism differs, but it is scientifically not possible for a person to be highly active and still gain weight.

If you like watching TV, then don't sit and watch. I iron my clothes in this time, if you think that is easy then try doing it. I have found it to be a very good activity while watching TV. I ended up standing for 2 hours straight and ironing during TV time. I was damn tired at the end of it.

Remember, activity no matter how big or small adds to weight loss. If you workout its great, if you don't then starting with your house chores is not a bad idea. I noticed my sisters way of life and compared it to mine. You can pick anyone else to see what are they doing differently to be at your desired weight.

To read an analysis on another character click here - The Hero

Partners in Crime

Love is shown in all forms. Some show love by caring for each other and some by clawing each other but there are also those who show love by eating food together in one plate with each other. Affection is shown in the strangest gestures.

I have tried to control myself a lot but I just can't help checking out the other person's plate. In restaurants the food on the other table looks so much better than what I have ordered but the saddest part is I never get to know the name of the dish the other person is eating. So you can see how much I am fond of noticing whats on other people's plate.

Of late I have stopped controlling myself, whats the use when I end up sneaking anyways.

The plates and eating habits of others have great answers to some real complex questions of life such as "Why are these guys so fat???".

Once I went for a lunch to one of our relatives. The table was loaded with real yummy and rich food. Now there was husband and wife couple who were no fat but obese. If you have seen my past photos then the lady in question was 3 times my old size and her husband was huger. Both the family sides of the couple were huge.

Now when the lunch was served, the couple served their food in one plate. They told us that after marriage they have always eaten in one plate, thats the way their love holds.

Now as with my habit I was not only counting my tandoori naan intake but also my husbands and also of others (sorry to be mean but that is the way I am guys). I could actually count for all others but I lost my count for this couple. I really don't know how much naans they had. When the desert was served they never bothered to share the desert, they took it in separate bowls.

I have known the girl before her marriage and she was fat but never obese. After marriage she just grew more in size. Can you see why????

By eating in one plate neither her husband nor she were reaching any satisfaction. The moment she has taken 2 bytes of naan the rest of the naan is finished by her husband so she takes another naan, and the same process is repeated. She and her husband has no idea how much naan they have actually eaten, same goes for rice and other heavy stuff.

If a thin couple eat in one plate and are not putting an inch on, great please keep doing it. But if you are growing in size by eating together then its time to separate the plates now.

Our crime partners are the ones with whom we can eat as much as we want and with whom our calories doesn't count. These people eat more than us so we are in the comfort zone of thinking that we are eating less but hey no we are not.

The food on my plate is my food and it better gives me the satisfaction. So, if I have 1 roti full without sharing it with hubby, I will feel much happy and will love my husband more rather than eating endless amount and having no clue how much went inside me.

Your satisfaction is also visual. That is why you stick to a particular amount of food, like 2 rotis in lunch. If this visual is hampered then you are bound to eat more.

Sharing desert is a great idea but eating in one plate with endless servings is not.

Your love doesn't grow by eating in one plate but your size does.

Do You Still Have An Excuse??

For two years of my life I believed that I cannot do anything about my weight as I have a broken back. It pained so much to walk that I seriously cannot walk to lose weight.

Though I have never given a thought to marathon suddenly running the marathon seemed so inviting. Oh only if I could move my legs and walk without pain.

Somewhere I was happy with misery, happy with the fact that weight loss will not happen because I seriously cannot exercise.

Then I came across an article which featured a man on a wheel chair. And this is how the real life story of a man (which changed my out look towards life ) went.

This man when he was young had a bet with his friends that he will jump from a running train. That simple stupid bet cost him both his legs. He lost his legs and was paralyzed from waist down.

After suffering in misery for sometime he decided to get a job in handicapped quota. Once he had a job he wanted to also look good. Moreover, he felt that because his lower body is useless he should still look powerful so he started working on his upper body. Slowly he achieved a very good powerful looking upper body.

He then fell in love with a girl. There was no way the girl would agree to spend her life with a man on a wheel chair. But still he proposed only to be politely refused.

But he did not stop at that, he kept chasing the girl for 2 years on the wheel chair. He would go behind her and give her flowers, would wait for her in rain, would be there to see her off, he did everything on the wheel chair. Finally the girl saw his love and agreed to marry him.

Both were very happy as this man was a fabulous husband. But then he realized that he wants to be a father. His wife gave him support and said she is fine with no kids but the man was not. SO he consulted doctors and one doctor suggested that he could perform a surgery on the man and would extract the sperms and then the wife can conceive the child.

The man went ahead with the surgery and the couple had a child.

Now here was man on a wheel chair paralyzed from waist down with no legs and here I was with a broken back still with legs so what if with pain.

The story of this man really touched me, he went out with a hammer in his hand and kept hitting at life till he got what he wanted.

This is how we should be. We should keep hitting at life till we achieve what we most desire.

So if you tell me you are blind, deaf, suffering from thyroid, have small kids, no matter what I will still tell you to go and walk. Suffering from depression??? We all do. Whenever I am depressed I tell myself I will break from depression for 50 minutes to exercise and will continue to be depressed after my exercise. Depression does not mean not to exercise. So, give your self 'time please' for exercise and then return to depression.

As long as you are not on a wheel chair there is no excuse for not walking/exercising and even if you are on a wheel chair please go and do your upper body workouts.

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Watch Out to Eat Out

Life is not all that simple and when you want to do everything right, it will make sure to throw at you everything wrong. Thats life, deal with it.

When I started with my weight loss project the first thing that I decided to give up was eating out. So, if I fancy eating something delicious I would make it at home. I never said I will give it up, I just took it up for a month as an experiment.

Now I knew that in initial stages of weight loss having an outside meal once in a week/month is also not possible but then how long can I hide in my house refusing to meet people.

So, I ended up sitting with 2 of my close friends at the famous Burger joint whose burger and french fries I would eat at least once in a week (one being my sister and the other my husband).

I was so damn afraid to fail at that time. Anyways I decided to dress my best to make myself realize that look I am loosing weight and clothes are fitting much better now, I seriously can't blow this for a burger.

Now I am a human and that too a food loving human. So naturally my mouth was watering but I sat in front of them, while they were happily enjoying their meals, sipping coffee. This should not go without mentioning that I took coffee to stop my self drooling all over the place.

Each of them had not one but two burgers accompanied with french fries and soft drink. And I was sitting there watching them and slowly I started watching others too. You will never fail to sight overweight people in such joints and even the thin ones who are gorging them selves with these goodies are right on the track of fatdom.

That day it gave me immense pleasure to know I am aware, instead of concentrating on what I am missing I checked out the bulges and double chins of people happily eating away.

Believe me the urge to have a burger meal has gone for good now. I no longer am that strict with myself but if you ask me to have one loaded burger then I already feel like puking.

Imagine, I craved for this kind of burger for so many years. Ate it without giving a single thought about the bulges it was contributing to my body.

Next time you are tempted, while on a diet, just look around and you will get the answer why you should not eat such stuff.

Tough is Sometimes so Simple.

When I lost weight, my friends would ask me how I did it??. And I like a super heroine will go into elaborating "how mindful eating and little walking did the trick", but what I always got back from them was "I know that but you must have gone through some treatment, I have tummy fat and sure you must have done something special about your tummy." In short no one was ready to believe that the transformation in me was because of following basic simple rules that we all know and not because of some treatment.

Earlier, I was not a very different person either, I always thought that the person is lying about weight loss if what she was doing sounded extremely simple to me.

I had spent lots of money in Gyms. Twice actually. One time in college where I managed to loose eight kgs under a strict dietitian only to have the weight coming back and that too the double amount.

Second time, I hardly managed to loose 2-3 kgs thats it, I didn't loose much but I did gain back all that I lost. But in those days if people complimented me on loosing weight and when they learn that it was because of gyming, they will accept the fact easily and would also sometimes be interested in joining the gym themselves.

So in short we believe that weight loss will happen if someone is spending money on some fancy treatment but not when someone is actually following simple rules of eating right.

The truth is weight loss is damn simple, the day you decide to eat right you hit the nail on the spot.

The biggest attitude change in weight loss journey is to approach weight loss as easy and friendly.

A Fridge Full of Goodies.

The best part of weight loss is that you fail. More than success its the failures that teach us how to be prepared for the next round.

Lets see a real life situation, if my husband is coming home for lunch I usually keep the lunch prepared but if not then I am like 'why bother, I will cook something for myself when I am hungry'. And when the hunger strikes, I am so damn hungry that all I can make is instant noodles and while noodles are cooking I also grab few snacks. It happened for 2-3 days and of course the weighing scale never lie and out goes my wisdom and in comes a complete diet failure.

What I did next was, I kept daal, daliya, veg raita in my fridge. The moment I was hungry all I had to do was take 2-3 spoons of daalia with lots of daal and microwave it and have it with raita. I was so satisfied with just a bowl of this in contrast to a packet of noodles and few chips. We won't even argue here about the calorie difference in my 2 meals not to forget the nutritional value.

I know freshly cooked meals are good for health but then I also know that I am someone who will get extremely hungry and won't be able to control the hunger (come on we all are different). A pre cooked meal is far better than instant food that you bought from the super market.

Now here is the suggestion for pre cooked meals -

Make sure that it is a staple, something that will satisfy you for 2-3 hours. It won't help if it is high in calorie. So analyze what you like to eat as an individual meal which is healthy and low cal.

I always store, daal, starchless rice, raita, daalia, sabji, fruits, amul paneer, mushrooms, tofu and some dosa batter.
I do this because I have done research on the times when I am hungry and what makes me really satisfied.

I never left eating paneer during my weight loss, its tasty and it makes you feel full. So, if I am late and have to cook a quick sabji all I have to do is put tomato and paneer together in a pan and add some spices and serve with roti. I do this many times because I avoid eating out and after an outing I have no strength to cook food.

My this simple preparation saves me few calories from outside eating and also saves on time.

Sauteed mushrooms and frozen veggies are also good. I put the frozen veggies like peas, corn with few pieces of paneer and microwave for 3 minutes. Sprinkle salt, black pepper and oregano. I have big bowl of this to curb my hunger.

So before starting the weigh loss analyze yourself for 2-3 days, note the times when you are hungry and what you ate. Then write a low calorie substitute for it. Evaluate, were you able to control yourself to cook a healthy meal or were you so hungry that you garbed anything in sight.

There is nothing better than being prepared. If we are prepared for what is going to hit us we will be able to hit back and that too with a long strong shot.

Weight Loss and The Magic of Clothes

In fat old days no matter what I wore it always ended up in one way on me and I always looked the same in those clothes, I looked fat always.

This first time round when I did managed to lose some weight I never changed the pair of clothes because I thought, come on they still fit me and are so comfy now, so let me wear them for a while. Loose clothes and that too the old ones soon made me go in the comfort zone of thinking I am thin and I never knew when they became tight again.

This time around I was sure not to repeat the mistake. But then I didn't want to keep spending on clothes which keep getting loose. When I went to India no one seem to notice my change as I was still in loose clothes. So, when I was in Ajmer, I saw some beautiful Kurties and they were just 100 bucks. I decided to get the figure hugging ones. That was a start of getting compliments and people noticing that I have changed.

I came across an article which said its always better to wear clothes which show some bulges as that prevent you to overeat and make you conscious. I followed that tip to the core. The family gathering were always dreadful, it meant hotel food. The flowing bulges from the Kurties took care of my drooling tongue and when you wear figure hugging clothes believe me you can't eat much.

This is me in a hotel and yes black might hide it, but the bulges are there and I am practically trying to suck in my tummy, put my hand in front so that the bulges don't appear in the pic. The fear of the bulges appearing in the pic never stopped me from wearing a fitting dress outside because I was always confident about loosing them. My fitting kurti was a constatnt reminder of reality, what I am and what I am trying to be.




Clothes are important, if you keep wearing loose clothes you will be in the false notion always. You won't even know when you over ate or gave into your indulgence. So, think smart and wear smart.

Invest in few smaller size clothes which fit you closely, there is no problem if you want to buy the cheap stuff, I do it. I buy from sale these days and they do the trick perfectly. I even have a dress which is a size smaller and I try it on every month to see my progress.

Clothes makes you feel beautiful and they make you appreciate your body more. I never bought the crap of dressing according to age. What the hell, I lost weight when I am not in my twenties so should I give up my desire to wear what I want, no way. Clothes are your way of celebrating your body which you worked hard to carve. Each and every curve of your body came out because you decided to lose weight. No matter what your age, what your status, wear what reflects your personality and what makes you happy.

Few Suggestions.

1. Just for comparison, keep few loose old clothes, rest donate or keep for your pregnancy.

2. A big No to loose pants. Come on you are a woman be proud of it. Plus tight pants means less food.

3.If you are on weight loss and have lost some weight, then go for smaller size dresses for motivation. Let some bulges show, believe me its tried and tested. Go have a dinner in a dress which shows your tummy bulge when you sit (I have done that), let me know how the dinner went (when I was loosing weight, it made me sad because I didn't want a bulge and there it was right on my tummy so it meant I better check my plate if I want to loose).

4. You are a queen and you deserve to dress well. Most years of my life I wore T shirt and pants, guess what I was fat in all those years. This is me in my classic dress.















5. Just because you are fat is not an excuse not to be your best. Sometimes I meet such gorgeous women who inspite of their weight will give complex to smartly dress thin girls. They are this way because they decided to celebrate their womanhood no matter what their size.

You might not agree to me on this but for me the charm of clothes does weave the magic.

Loosing weight will be all the more fun if you decide to dress to kill.

I am a plain jane but wearing small size clothes brings me all happiness in this world.

Hahaha, this is one more classic snap. Old fat snaps are so much fun.















These are my latest snaps.