My Journey With Health And Fitness – Heading To Mexico

Yesterday was my husband’s birthday so I took him out for lunch to the Noodlebox. We had been there once before and he really liked it so I thought it would be a nice treat for him. The problem of course is the noodles that comes with each dish are high calorie and high carbs. So, I opted to have mine with zucchini noodles and was surprised how much I liked them. Just that simple change dropped over 200 calories off my lunch and since I only ate 1/2 of the dish my calories were in line with what I normally have for lunch. But really, it was a nice treat and very enjoyable.

First thing tomorrow morning we fly to Mexico. We will be in Playa del Carmen for 5 weeks and can’t wait to get there. Of course my siblings will take care of the house and pets. But, the trick is going to be keeping myself on track which is even more important because I am 2/3 of the way to my weight goal (I weighed in yesterday and had again lost weight). I am determined that when I come back I will weigh no more than I did yesterday and in a perfect world I will have lost a few pounds. The question is, how am I going to pull that off while still enjoying myself.

First of all, I have worked out an exercise plan with my trainer. It is still going to be every day but will be dropping from 5 hours per day to 2 1/2 hours (note, since I started on this new journey on Jun 6th I have only had 1 day where I didn’t do any exercise). My day will start with an online fitness course followed by an hour walk then 30 minutes of strength training. My challenge is the heaviest weights I have found in Playa are only 6 lbs and I need 10 lbs to help keep me where I am now. The trainer gave me some tips on what to do if I still can’t the heavier weights that will allow me to maintain my strength.

The second issue is going to be meals. I fully intend to continue to log all my food in my fitness app and while I might go over my daily goal, I will be cognizant of it always being less than the average calories that I burn. On top of that, I am going to do everything I can to avoid the trap of eating out. We are fortunate that there is such a variety of fresh fruits and vegetables in Mexico that it should be easy to continue eating healthy when we make our own meals. Don’t get me wrong, there will be eating out but it will be far less frequent than normal for us in Mexico and even then I am going to try to make healthy choices as often as possible.

Finally, alcohol. Ok, I admit we tend to drink more alcohol when we are at the condo. Late almost every afternoon we meet our friends poolside and have a few drinks. However, my plan is to opt for lower calorie alcohol such as light beer or liquor mixed with diet soda or club soda. Yes, there will still be wine involved but I’m trying to make that occasionally.

I know it sounds like I’m taking all the fun out of this trip but really, it is just about making the right choices. I know at every point during the day where I am at calorie wise and that will guide my food decisions. And really, since I have pretty much given up snacking I am confident I can stay away from junk food. I also know there may be a slip or two in this plan but if I can keep it to only a few then I think I will be successful.