Weight Loss Journey … Month 02 Diet Harder!

Kia Ora Whanau

Alex from Costas Enterprises here, and I want to welcome you to month two of my journey.

Note: This post may be long and may include some comedy about what I have observed. Like the last post Weight Loss Journey … The First Month I will be covering things like cravings, what the Diabetes has done and also my feelings … but in a manly way of talking about feelings… so crying deeply and rolling up in a fetal position??

Before I start I do want to also acknowledge and thank all the people that have kept me honest, supported me and also have helped me deal with all the other stuff currently going on in my life. You can follow my journey on Instagram. Don’t forget to check out my SweatCoin post where you can also support and follow my journey.

Week One

So thinking about this last month I take it back to Week One and if I can be honest it has been pretty much the same as what you have seen the last month.

Still craving food, but managing to stay away from the foods that make me feel “comfortable”… all those foods are still cravings but I have been good.

You all know the food I am talking about.

McDonalds
KFC
Chocolate
Fried Chicken
Pasta – any pasta!
Real Bread – yes Keto bread is an amazing substitute, well the one my partner makes is but I’m talking about sliced white bread with a sausage and tomato sauce
Pizza
Potato Chips.

I better stop myself here cause otherwise I will want these and the last thing I need is more temptation.

I’ll say this now, the cravings do still appear for the rest of the month. I also do give into them a little but not in this first week.

Diabetes Check – This has now been reduced to fortnightly checks and I am told that my blood sugars are doing ok but I need to increase my insulin by 5 units now up to 35.

Overall feeling pretty good with myself. No cheat meals this week and eating well.

Week Two

So those cravings I was talking about. This week they started to win… I had some sugar, I had some chippies and I had some chocolate. And let me tell you now, I felt guilty after eating it. I felt like I was hiding it, mainly because I was.

That’s not the worst part, the worst part was after something happened, I went and did the stupidest thing I could have done… I went to MacDonalds at 2:00 am and gorged on a Big Mac, A Double Cheeseburger, Nuggets and French Fries.

Why? You were doing so well??? You know what these foods do to your body and why 2:00 am???

Quite simply, I had just left the hospital and after not eating since 8pm I was very hungry.

Now some of you may say “that’s understandable”, except it isn’t. I knew I had food at my home. Where I stay now is closer to the hospital than the distance I had to travel to McDonalds.

No I am not knocking McDonalds, I have eaten there since I was a kid and like some of you I had birthday parties there, when I was five just to clarify, (pouring the ice cream was the best right??, you felt like you had so much power!).

For a long time it was a huge staple of my life (and diet??) and I will be honest, after not having it for over a month that first bite into a cheeseburger, it was like I had died and gone to heaven. Ronald was waiting for me with open arms and Grimace was giving me props for coming back to the way he was, well minus the being purple and looking like a weird sex toy, but you get what I’m saying!

Then after eating/ gorging I snapped back to reality. “What have I done? Was it worth it to break my streak?” I know these feelings of guilt and general ugh feeling because I have them every single time I have KFC. Again KFC used to be a stable of food for me. I used to have it all the time. But the feeling I always have after biting into that piece of chicken watching the fat ooze out is one of wanting to be sick, but not being able to stop myself.

My main problem this week was knowing what I had eaten, how do I stop from going back? Now I know a lot of people will say something about having a cheat day/meal is ok. Yes it is ok once in a while but not when one of your trigger foods is likely to lead you back to them.

I know my body pretty well and once I get a taste I find it very hard to ignore it. It’s like one of those little devils on your shoulder saying “Go on, you know you can have it, you have been so good”. Those little devils are bastards, and as a week goes on they grow bigger and also make you hyper-sensitive to foods, adverts of foods and smells of foods.

You feel yourself wanting to have one more, like a crack-head needing their next fix. Think of that Dave Chappelle character … for a fat person that is what those foods can do to you.

So I manage to make my way through the week after that feeling and trying my best to avoid all my trigger foods and also Alcohol. We have already covered my previous drinking was in my History post.

Week Three

After finally managing to control my urges I step into week three with a bit more focus. That is the important part here, focus. I managed to do a little self evaluation and re-affirmation that I don’t need that type of food anymore. During this week I am doing great, I am walking a bit more that last week (but not hitting my personal goal of 12K per day) but I am at least eating better.

It is at this time that i remember one my traditions that I had been planning for the last month. International Womens Day.

For those that don’t work with me, you won’t know this but on 08 March every year (for the past 7 years) I bring goodies into the office for my team(s). A lot of this is to show the women I work with in my life that I appreciate them as they help me grow as a person.

This year I enlisted the help of my flatmate who owns and operates her own mini bakery. Check out her Instagram here for lots of delish cakes and slices (You will be in for a treat). My flatmate made 24 cupcakes (Chocolate and Berry, Banana, Salted Caramel and Vanilla). I managed to stop myself at two (one of each) and not only was the cupcakes … well F^&king amazing but that sugary carb infused awesomeness tasted sooooo good.

I could have stopped myself from having any, but that is part of the problem because sometimes we can’t stop ourselves. We (I in this case) grab those cupcakes on instinct, put it in our mouths and chomp down before stopping and saying “Do I actually need this?”

Diabetes Check – This week it didn’t happen because I had to cancel this. This was my own choice due to everything that was going on in my life at the time. I didn’t have the time to go back and change it. I kept monitoring my bloods and also kept checking my insulin and taking my pills so I felt confident I would be OK until next week.

Week Four

By this week Covid 19 had hit New Zealand and people are out there are starting to panic buy (I didn’t but some people in my family did). This means there are a lot of people at the Supermarket, Farmers Market and supply is certainly getting affected.

An example of this (which has only just hit me in the last two days) is that my partner has told me that the place where she gets the special flour she used to make the best Keto Bread in the world is all gone (After trying the cardboard like substance that passes for Store Bought Keto Bread I can easily say this is going to be hard! lol #ketoproblems).

What I want to get at it with this week is, there is increased tension and fear in the air and it’s all good to just tell people to “Chill out” but when the anxiety is hitting you from all sides, it’s’ times like these when you can fall back into your old learned behaviours. In my case I am more at risk to not cook the food I bought, go out and buy bad food like Pizza, or Burgers.

I am going to keep trying to keep this under control and cook the food that I like eating.

Now I am no Jamie Oliver .. well I don’t cook naked, I wear a robe I have some decency. I mostly do my cooking in the mornings, but what I do cook I enjoy. I am seriously thinking about making a Keto Recipe book in the future showcasing just some of the food I have and how I make them in a semi-lazy way. If you think this is a good idea let me know! Now when I say lazy I’ll give you an example of what I mean.

My main goto for breakfast is simply boiled eggs with sausages and veges.

I will put the eggs in from cold and let them boil. Same as the sausages, I will put these on the frypan. I will then go have a shower, put my robe back on, come back and flip the sausages, check the eggs and then go get dressed.

A little simple I know, but it works for me and it’s making me eat healthier.

Of course if you now have an image of me cooking in a robe … um your welcome?? and I apologize??

I want to show people in the future that this Keto thing, can be very hard but only if you make it hard on yourself (like me straying towards McDonalds instead of coming home to cook something). Otherwise you can have really tasty food (even if your a fussy bugger like me).

Amazon Affiliate Plug time! Yes it’s that time, I don’t get paid to write these crazy blogs but if you like what you read and want to help support me you can click the link below and if you buy anything from Amazon I will get a small percentage.
So what do I have for you today? Well how about something we all need at the moment but can’t get our hands on. Hand Sanitizer anyone??

Well thanks and congrats for making it all the way to the bottom. You will see some photos below and notice that since this journey started I have lost around 9 Kg’s (19.84 lbs) which is pretty good for two months work. I truly appreciate you all and want to tell you to like, subscribe and comment.

I want to grow this Whanau into a community.

Stay Safe and love you all!

March 19, 2020 0

Weight Loss Journey .. The First Month

Kia Ora Whanau!

Welcome to my second post about my weight loss. For more on my history you can visit my previous post “Weight Loss Journey … The History“

First off before I being I want to say a huge thank you for not only taking the time to read about my journey but also the out flowing support I have received from everyone either on my Instagram posts or my personal Facebook, and also in general life from the support of my family and friends. For those that know me it has been a long journey to even start this, and then to do it publicly is even more daunting.

OK so straight up, this is gonna be a loooong post so I hope you will stick with me.

There are photos at the bottom of this blog and I explain these a bit more so if you don’t want to read the post first before you get the saucy half-naked yeti photo, feel free to come back to this!

So my first month, I’m gonna break this down week by week and I will try to discuss all aspects of it.

Week One

Well lets just start this with the first day, I started following a meal plan that my girlfriend created for me, as I mentioned in my previous post, I didn’t actually realize that what I was doing was a personalized version of a Keto diet.
As you can see from my photos below, I wasn’t exactly super focused on my health (specifically photo three).

The meal plan was a one pager that included, food I can eat at breakfast, lunch and dinner and all food I can’t go near.

Now I am not a big vegetables guy – It’s like I always thought of the word as a bad swear word, and the ones I did eat were mostly heavily carb/ sugar focused, potatoes, corn, carrots and berries, apples banana’s. … seeing I couldn’t have these made me a little weary. I automatically felt like I would be failing within two to three days, let alone trying to turn this into my new lifestyle!

But I persevered! I was doing it for the right reasons, I was gonna be healthy and change my life … Cue my eventual Hypo(glycemic) attack within 12 hours of starting the diet and having to have my girlfriend buy me fruit at the farmers market (where we had gone to go buy all the veges I could now eat) just to bring my blood sugar up.
Now I admit I f%&ked up in this instance. I left for a big walk after taking my 120 units of insulin, my diabetic pills without any breakfast and very little to eat the night before.
I also didn’t take my Jelly Beans (Shout-out to my diabetic’s reading this, you know how much those little sugary beans can pick you up!).
As you can imagine I had not made the best impression that this was gonna go well.

But the main thing is I recovered and decided I better have some jelly beans with me all the time. The meals were tasty and nice. If you go to my Instagram you can see every meal I have made or had since starting this journey.

Now before I started this Keto diet/ lifestyle I had started increasing my walking – trying to go for 10 thousand steps a day, this has since increased to 12 thousand and hopefully climbing as time goes on.

During this time, like literally just before, my change in lifestyle (I’m gonna try not to call it a diet from now on, because lets face it most times I try to diet, I Die @ doing it!). I discovered Sweat Coin. Now this isn’t a plug or anything like that, but basically Sweat Coin is a crypto-currency app that you earn by walking … seems to good to be true right? well it is actually true.
You can join my Sweat Coin and I get $5 sweat coins if you use my code. I will do a Sweat Coin post in the future if people are interested.

Because of the app, I actually enjoyed walking and seeing my coin’s increase, gives me an incentive to keep with the walking and the new lifestyle!

Day three … another Hypo, this time I was at work. The mistake I made this time, I had been monitoring my blood sugars but the one thing I hadn’t done … I never changed my insulin. Naturally with the low sugar I was eating, my natural blood sugar would be reducing … A fact I saw while doing my blood sugar readings.
This time I called my friend who worked in the diabetic field. What did she say to me? “Get your ass to the Dr’s!”
Note: I really want you to go back and read that line like in Arnie’s voice from Total Recall, not because of the person who told me but I figure it will make you laugh every time you think about it.

I took my friend’s advice and then luckily on day five I saw the my diabetic nurse. He was not happy with me, not because of the changing lifestyle, or the walking. What he wasn’t happy with??
The fact that I had not had a blood sugar HbH1C test (this measures your blood sugars over the last three months), in about 18 months… yeah not proud of that.

My diabetic nurse went through the meal plan and issued me with a new diabetic machine (my old one was over 10 years old), now I am a big tech geek so when my friend who I phoned said there are now meters that connect via Bluetooth I thought “I don’t have to write in a book anymore, sweet sign me up!” if you are diabetic, talk to your Dr about getting one because these things are awesome!

A condition of my new machine … I had to come in every week to talk to the diabetic nurse. When I discuss week two a bit more I’ll expand more on why that was a great idea.

So I manage to get through the first week with a few minor hiccups but overall it seemed like I could get used to this, sausage and eggs for breakfast (with a lot of veges thrown in), steak, chicken, or fish for lunch (insert previous comment about copious amounts of veges) and repeat for dinner.

Now over the first week my mind did actually wonder .. can I actually do this for a sustained time? I mean wont I get sick of the same meals all the time. Well one month on and I can say I still enjoy the meals and even trying to create new ones as well. so that’s a yes … so far, lets see how next month happens!

Week Two

So I am getting in to the pattern of cooking my food and actually quite enjoying it, but there is one thing that’s bothering me.

Bread.

Yup that’s what I said, Bread, god did I miss bread! It is one of those essentials that I didn’t even think of missing that much. The funny thing, it wasn’t even actually for the bread itself.
OK stick with me but, it was what I could put on the bread, Peanut Butter, Marmite (for those from overseas, if you haven’t tried marmite on bread and butter it’s … an experience, Kiwi’s love it, everyone else … not so much!).
The point is, I couldn’t see myself putting peanut butter on a cracker (cause carbs) or marmite on a slice of cucumber … no thanks!

I expressed this frustration to …. well anyone that would ask me “how it’s going?” The cravings for those carbs did hit me pretty hard but I pushed through the struggle … and munched on more bell peppers and cucumbers.

The big “D“, Diabetes that is, Week two and seeing my diabetic nurse was a little bit better as I didn’t see the same person, but what I did get is the result of my blood glucose. I was 97 … If this was a class room that would be a pass right??? not in the world of diabetes.
To give you some clarification a “healthy” person’s blood glucose should be around 40 to 60 (or when your testing your blood between 4 to 6).
I was sitting at over double that.
But the diabetic nurse looked over the food I had been eating (I have been tracking everything through My Fitness Pal), and also my new blood sugar measurements … because now its all on my phone so I can easily watch my progress.

The diabetic nurse tapped me on the head and wished me well until next week, when my original diabetic nurse came back to see my progress.

So it’s been two weeks and you would think I wouldn’t see any change right?, well you would be wrong!

OK so I’m not gonna make out like I had lost heaps and look like a Greek Adonis of a man, my heritage suggests I should look like. I am however defiantly noticing my increased mobility, the tightness in my breath disappearing and the need for being sore for lifting my fat ass every time I need to move. So I’m calling it a win at this stage.

Week Three

Now this was a big week for me for my fitness. Last week I did something which surprised me, I walked from my work to home, a distance of about 7 Kilometers across some hilly terrain. It took me three hours.

This week, not only did I do this walk in two and a half hours, I also went for a massive walk to the Red Rocks Reserve. This reserve houses some pretty cheeky Seals and is somewhere I have always wanted to go to… I have lived in Wellington all my life .. of 37 years, Way to see the world right??

The food was going well, but that craving of bread was still there and this week it was like a cheesy horror film tagline, “It was back for vengeance!” or “Don’t go into the bakery!”

Now this would be all good, if it wasn’t for the fact that I live with three qualified bakers, one of whom, specializes in amazing cakes and slices. Temptation is real people and her name is Carb City!

My girlfriend knew I had a problem with this, and how much it was getting to me. She made me a deal. Before I started my Keto journey I used to frequent Dominoes, and as such I had a free pizza voucher from them.
I texted my girlfriend one night and fessed up that I still has this and (if I’m gonna be completely honest, I almost slipped and spent twenty minutes trying to convince myself not to use the voucher. I had even logged in to the app and ordered my pizza before pressing the complete order button), she was proud of me for not going through with it. I asked if she wanted the pizza . . . Hoping we could share it (this would be the ultimate cheat meal!), she saw through my plan and told me I can swap the voucher for a present.

I didn’t want to, but I thought “ok, I don’t actually need the pizza”

She surprised me with the best gift ever … Bread!!!, specifically Keto bread that she had learnt to make and advised she would make me every week. My love tank bubbled over, something so simple like a loaf of bread made me dam well near cried my keto tears of joy.

Week there was hard but everything is getting easier, I am cooking more and feeling so much better.

Let me put this in perspective for you, Prior to my new lifestyle, I was having a sick day almost every week. Not something I am proud about either. When its’ once in a blue moon it’s ok, but every week for like four to five months … there’s something wrong buddy!

I seemed to have a cold that would never go away, I was constantly popping throat pills to clear my airways. I was not well.

Three weeks of eating mostly veges and no carbs and internally I feel like a new man.

Diabetic appointment number three. I no longer feel bad or horrible, I’m starting to be more aware of what I should be doing and when I should be taking my readings. Everything is coming up Alex!

This week I also have to visit the Hospital for a previous referral about my eyes. A lot of people don’t realize that diabetes can also make you go blind, yes not the original thing that your parents said you would go blind for, but sugar!

The good news is, apart from looking like Mr Sparkle because of the eye drops, it appears that finally my eyes are finally getting better since the change.

Also this week I had my first cheat meal (notice I said meal and not day). As it was Valentines Day, my girlfriend and I went to a restaurant and I had ribs, not a lot but just enough. It was a welcome change … it wasn’t pizza or pasta but it was delicious! The main thing is I didn’t feel like I now need a cheat meal every week.

Week Four

So this is the week I am in now, I know it’s early so I cant talk about my diabetic appointment, but I can already tell from my reduction of insulin and my readings that I have already knocked off around 40 from my score from 97. I have been promised that in April I can go for another blood test so that will be a huge indication of what has changed.

I no longer feel shame walking around, and the confidence that everyone has given me from their support and love had made me feel like I am doing the right thing and also inspired me to keep going.

Now I am an Amazon affiliate and if you click the link I mention here you will be taken to Amazon and if you buy something (anything) I do get a slight commission, that said one of my friends referred me to listen to an audio book from Tony Robbins called Unshakable. This book, while mostly is about talking about how to invest in index funds and the diversifying of your portfolios, it also talks about changing your mindset and effectively trying to make your mind Unshakable. I’m not gonna lie, it actually helped me quite a bit during week two and three when I felt I was gonna fall off the wagon and go have that slice of non-keto bread, or go buy that chocolate. The point I want to make is that it’s not just the health stuff I am eating or moving it’s also about changing my feelings, my emotions and also my mindset. It’s worth a listen or read if you have a chance. I hope to cover my mindset change in a future blog.

Once again thanks so much for reading all the way to the end, feel free to like, comment, subscribe and all that good stuff. I try to respond to everyone. I want to build this into a community as well as a network and in order to do that I need you.

OK so you made it all the way to the end of the first month! Here is your reward, some old photos and some new ones:

Me at the Wellington Rugby Sevens as The Fat Chippendale (Kids don’t search this, ask your mum what this is!)
Me as Psy from Gangnam Style at one of the 12 Pubs of Christmas pub crawls
Me on my 30th birthday. I drank all 30 shots in less than 7 minutes … something drunk Alex used to be very proud of … I would do this about 4 years in a row
Fast Forward to NOW! This is an example of the food I have been eating to change my diet, Chicken Drumsticks baked in spices with veges
A Egg omlette with sausage, bell peppers and cheese
Me today (18 February 2020) I am down to 124.40 Kgs (274.25 Lbs) – down 5 KG’s roughly from start this journey

March 19, 2020 4

Weight Loss Journey… The History

Kia Ora Whanau
Alex here from Costas Enterprises and this blog I’m going to tell you about my personal journey through weight loss.
NOTE: I am right at the start of my journey and part of the reason I am doing this blog and posting on Instagram is to make myself accountable. I do not have any secret to losing weight but I want to share what has been working and helping me.

Don’t have time to read?? You can listen to a copy of this post from my podcast the “Get a job and get healthy with Costas Enterprises” podcast on Spotify right here.

HISTORY

Ok before we get into to all of this I better tell you a little history of the way I was.

At my heaviest I was 149 Kg (328.45 lb’s) back in 2005. I have always been fat/ heavy/ obese/ big boned, whatever you want to call it, and I distinctly remember only starting to be fat from being five years old and without making excuses I come from a Greek family that likes to eat. I am now (as of today’s date 15 February 2020) 37 and a half years old.

I used to live the “invincible” lifestyle, what I mean is I used to eat whatever I wanted (fried chicken, pizza, chocolate, lots of bread) and I used to drink … a lot… I was never an alcoholic, although I did see someone about my drinking because I did start to get worried … well I wasn’t so much worried about my drinking but my doctor’s were given I could easily drink a whole 40 ounce (1.25 litres) of bourbon or 12 beers a night every weekend for ten years.

I have had some success in losing and keeping weight off in the past (well I dropped from 149 KG to 120 kg (264.55 lb’s) and then went back up to 130 kg’s (286.60 lb’s) which is where I was when I started this journey).

Now in the past I had tried a few diets and Yo-Yo’d more than Puff Daddy/ Sean Combs/ P-Diddy changes his name. Shoutout to the D to the A to the D-D-Y
But what I am trying to get across is that I tried a lot, but failed a lot more.

I considered and was registered for Bariatric Gastric Sleeve surgery, twice! Very quickly for those that don’t know, Gastric Sleeve surgery involves removing about 75% of your stomach, the advantage is you not only lose weight (and pretty fast), you also can also lose any diabetes effectively overnight. But it is not easy, you are effectively reduced to eating small and only certain foods for the rest of your life… a big change for someone and as always there is a risk of not actually making it through the operation. It has had a lot of success but also instances where it hasn’t been so lucky. However one of my friends, Tamara, has recently been going through this and documenting it on her Instagram and is part of my inspiration to document my journey.

The “D” word … Diabetes, I have type 2 (the one you can get because … well you think you’re invincible and eat sugar almost every day for like 20 years, well at least I did and that’s how I got it lol). I have had this for about 15 years now, I previously … like up till about 4 weeks ago didn’t control it very well. I did the bear minimum of taking my pills and the occasional insulin that I needed to have.

Part of the reason why I am taking this journey so seriously is because I started noticing how bad my control was getting.

So why are you taking this journey??? Ok I’ll be honest, 99.9999% is because I didn’t want to lose the one thing in my life that makes me happy .. no not food … although that used to be the 99.9999%.
It’s because of my partner, she saw how bad I was, we have been together for over a year and she saw (and helped me) change all other aspects of my life (I’ll delve into that I’m sure on other blogs), but the one part of my life I didn’t really try to change was my health (notice I said health and not weight … that’s the important part here).

You see something bad in yourself when you see the person you love crying because they ask you to change, you don’t and they give you the world, and all they ask is you look after yourself. Trust me this isn’t easy for me to write. I am a proud person by nature and to even admit that I was this way is hard, but if these last two paragraphs make you aware that your in this situation because your loved one shows you that they care for you and ask you to change whatever your doing that is hurting them and you do nothing .. Wake The F&*k Up and change!

NOTE: I am going to mention a book now and the link goes to Amazon.com of which I am an affiliate so id you buy something I do get a commision, but trust me if you are in the above situation you and your partner need to read The Five Love Languages and it will help you learn how to fill your partner’s “Love Tank”.

Ok that’s enough of the history, but there is more and I will expand on it a lot more in the future.

So what are you doing now? What’s Different?

So as I mentioned, My partner told me how I can fuel her Love Tank, by trying to get healthier. She made me a meal plan. I said I will follow it.

The meal plan is customized to me … because I am such a fussy eater, I don’t eat a lot of vegetables, and some of the ones I do eat are pure carbs.

If you follow weight loss and diets your will already have jumped to the conclusion of what my partner was getting me into (You were quicker than me if you guessed KETO).

For those that don’t know there are heaps of KETO recipes and diets out there and variations but the one thing I was most worried about was … what if I get a hypo(glycmic) attack??? if you or someone you know has diabetes you would understand why I worried. For those that don’t know, a KETO diet is effectively No Carbs, No/ very little sugar intake.

Now to give you an idea of why I was so worried. A normal, healthy person’s blood sugar reading should be between 4 – 6. My usual was around 23 – 24 … as you can imagine I was very worried!

I will write another blog post shortly concerning the start of my journey.

Thanks for taking the time to read this post and I hope you continue to follow my journey.

Hit that subscribe button and feel free to leave me any comments and/or feedback about what you want to hear about.

February 14, 2020 11

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