Tag: postpartum weight loss

WHAT THE RUSHTUSH GLOW CLEANSE DID FOR ME

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My clothes were tight, gym tops even tighter, my level of tiredness and lack of motivation was skyrocketing while trying to remain positive and quite frankly, I couldn’t get my bottom into my lycra gym tights without feeling like a Heffalump!

This was all happening while stuck in the land of a serious plateau that just WASN’T budging and I felt as if my weight loss journey had come to a halt. I was frustrated and disappointed and literally wanted to dive head first into a box of chocolates and give up – we’ve all been there!

After sulking for an entire weekend, I decided to give the Glow Cleanse from Rushtush a go. I had read amazing things about it and had seen fabulous results from other REAL women who had tried it. Rushda had also had a baby around the same time as me and was on the same postpartum weight loss journey. And let me tell you, she kicks some serious ass in the gym!

In general, I am not a believer in meal plans and diets, but when you find yourself stuck in a place not fully understanding how to nourish your body properly and how to eat within a calorie deficit to promote fat loss, then the right plan can definitely come in handy and be beneficial. For me, the Glow Cleanse was just that! It helped reconstruct and refresh my knowledge that I had somehow lost over the last 5 years of how to eat healthy, keeping myself full and curb those 4pm cravings that tend to creep up on us!

The famous Hulk Juice!

The Glow Cleanse is a 4 week eating guide that is super easy to follow and includes a maintenance plan in the 4th week, which pretty much guides you with how to live your best life – eating wise. During my first week of the Glow Cleanse, I dropped 2.2kg – I mean, can you imagine the excitement, after being stuck in a plateau for almost one month? In total, over 3 months, I lost 8kg and -37cm in total all over my body. Goodbye size 16 and hello size 14!

The biggest loss of cm around was around my hips/butt at – 10.5cm, my chest/upper back fat at – 6cm and my kangaroo pouch (lower abdomen) at – 6cm. I had a mountain load more energy and started to feel a little more aero dynamic, being a little lighter! My skin also really cleared up and my nails finally stopped breaking! Totally giving the hulk juice credit for this!

What I really loved about the Glow Cleanse is that the recipes are all easy to make. They’re simple. They keep you feeling full and they’re budget friendly. I also found that there’s minimal waste when it comes to left overs, as the structure of the meal plan allows for them to be used up on the following days.

One of the delicious GC meals! Yum!

One of the most spoken about recipes from the Glow Cleanse is the Hulk Juice and Hulk Soup – they’re green, and packed with all sorts of goodness! YUM! Think roasted greens, garlic, broccoli, onions, spices and you have yourself a delicious, filling Hulk Soup!

Everything off the menu is FRESH and organic. There are no processed foods and you can say goodbye to things like bread, cheese, dairy, processed meats, refined sugars etc. The Glow Cleanse allows for delicious natural foods making up your smoothies and meals. Have you ever thought of pairing strawberries with chicken and almonds in your salads? Me neither, but learning to love new flavours together has become something that I’ve REALLY enjoyed through the Glow Cleanse journey!

What about carbs? Oh yes, don’t think that you have to give those up – they’re in there! Natural carbs like sweet potatoes, quinoa, bananas!

It honestly is such a rewarding feeling to see the results of eating correctly for health, and Rushda is on the ball with online support! No question is ever too silly to ask. Rushtush is taking the fitness industry by storm and helping other ladies reach their fitness and weight loss goals – together as a community!

She is also proving that postpartum weight loss is totally possible after having a c-section herself too, which gives me hope! While using the Glow Cleanse, I also used her 8 week Newbie Body Guide which has helped kickstart my exercise journey. It’s perfect for beginners as it is a step by step guide to the fundamental exercise movements. The guide is made up of 4 rounds of 7 minute circuit exercise movements, and it sure does get your heard rate PUMPING and those results in!

Below are my results from a combination of the Glow cleanse and Newbie Body guide after just under 3 months.

On the left is June and on the right is August 2018
On the left is June and on the right is August 2018
On the left is June and on the right is August 2018 – the saddle bags are finally budging!

I’m so glad that I stuck to the glow cleanse and Newbie Body Guide for 8 weeks, and then integrated what I have learned through this program into my lifestyle. I have 3 more months to try and reach my weight loss goal for our Christmas holiday in Cape Town and feeling super confident that the Glow Cleanse will help me get there!

Now that I am feeling stronger with my fitness, I am moving towards weight training in the gym and more cardio. I actually enjoy cardio – can you believe that?

All in all, my thighs and lycra gym tights are totally thanking you Rush!

Until next time,

Mycaila – Jade

xxx

P.S If you want to follow join and follow more of my postpartum weight loss journey through the ups and downs, head on over to my Instagram account @bootyandbeautyblog

FITNESS UPDATE: MY POSTPARTUM WEIGHT LOSS JOURNEY MARCH 2018

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This month has been an amazing month of testing my boundaries with eating chocolate (because Easter), starting a new fitness class, making friends (which might or might not have resulted in a day of cocktail drinking and a disgustingly delicious Italian pasta meal), and of course, a month of yet again wearing my lycra gym pants 5/7 days of the week because of the much-loved spandex benefits.

If you remember my brave decision as of last month to finally ditch the bloody scale because we weren’t really seeing eye to eye, then you’d have probably guessed that YES, I was of course close to a little pants piddle when tallying up my results from the last 30 days with my monthly weigh in and measurements. The main thoughts running through my mind were “Have you managed to pull this off?” and “Heavens above, please don’t let the scale defeat me”. Having not checked in on my results weekly as I normally would have kind of left me off track, not really knowing what to expect.

4th March vs 4th April

Although my results aren’t happening as fast as they once did before, I am reaping the rewards in other ways. I started this journey as a size 18 and have bought my first pair of size 16 jeans during the month of March. I also have a few items of clothing that I set as short term “goals” to fit into. These were mainly tops/coats that were too tight around my arms, but now fit. Yay!

One size down in my new jeans named after Harper! Yay!

MARCH’S WEIGHT LOSS TOTAL

Although, the scale says I have only lost 1.6kg this month, my measuring tape says otherwise, with a MUCH more positive attitude. I am 9.5cm down in total around my body for March.

TOTAL CM LOST AS OF 4 JANUARY TO 4 MARCH:

March has been a great month of movement as I have started an aerobics fitness class twice a week, followed by a bums and tums class straight afterwards. These classes burn an average of 850 calories twice a week, which KILLS me, being 1hr and 15min total, but it is so worth it and is a fun way to do cardio.

My daily goal at the moment is to burn 500 calories worth of exercise a day. Monday, Wednesday and Friday are weight training focused exercise days and Tuesday and Thursday are aerobics classes cardio.

I am going to start encouraging myself to be a little less lenient when it comes to weekend wine, as it is Robbie’s birthday next month and I’d like to wear something feminine and flowy and hopefully in a size smaller.

4th January (left) vs 4th April (right)

I’m looking forward to the next month of this journey, and hopefully a smaller Mycaila will be writing to you from behind the computer screen next month!

Keep those bottoms moving, heart rates up and calories down!

Until next time,

Mycaila – Jade

 

FITNESS UPDATE: MY POSTPARTUM WEIGHT LOSS JOURNEY FEBRUARY 2018

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This month’s journey has been an interesting few weeks of trial and error, making space for room to grow (well not literally – we’re trying to shrink in size LOL).

I’ve been on this journey for EIGHT short WEEKS!  When I realised how long I have been on this journey, I couldn’t help but feel a little sad, thinking that I should have lost at least a minimum of 8kg this far. I had a pity party moment, sulked, might’ve eaten a Cadbury’s crème Egg (or I might not have), and read back over my progress chart to try and figure out where I have gone wrong.

And besides for the Cadbury’s Crème Egg, I realised that I hadn’t really gone wrong anywhere! I’m not going to pretend as though I’m a Positive Percy 25/7 (25 (not 24/7) because wannabe over achiever).

Thank heavens for the progress chart, because that ended my pity party very quickly. Although I have had a month of crazy toy – toying with my weight on the scale, my measurements have really fly kicked through what I thought were feelings of disappointment of thinking that I could do better. Only losing 1.6kg this month can send one into a state of such thought, especially after losing almost 5kg the month before.

January 4th 2018 to the left and March 4th 2018 to the right.

So, what’s going on? Why is the scale playing with my feelings like this?

First things first, anyone who is on a weight loss journey should know that the scale is NOT a true reflection of how your body has changed for MANY reasons – especially if you’re a lady, but more of that for another day.

I have always used the scale to measure my “success”, but have also let the number that reflects back at me control how I feel when it’s not what I want to see. For this reason, I have made a big decision going forward, which is to DITCH THE SCALE and my weekly weigh in and only go by measurements.

I’m doing this because for the last month of hopping on and off the scale every week, with minimal results and fluctuations more disastrous than the stock market, I have been second guessing my progress, feeling somewhat demotivated. I will be doing a casual weigh in once a month to keep myself in check and relying mostly on the progress of my monthly measurements results.

THIS MONTHS UPDATE

Although I have only lost 1.6kg, I have also lost a total of 13cm – which backs my decision even more to ditch the scale.

This brings my total weight loss over the last 8 weeks to 5.8kg with a total of 29.5cm lost all over. My measurements have gone done the most around my “mum pouch”. I have lost 11cm around that area so far, which makes my little heart very happy as this is a VERY difficult area to lose from and a total of 6.5cm around my waist.

January 4th 2018 to the left and March 4th 2018 to the right.

Throughout this month, I have also tried to put my fear aside of exercising my abdominals after my C section – and I have managed to do an abs session at least twice a week now. I can feel that this area is getting stronger, slowly but surely. Abs have always been one of my favourite exercises to do, which is now becoming more of a reality again since having Harps – and I AM SO FRIKKEN EXCITED!

January 4th 2018 to the left and March 4th 2018 to the right – Not the best look, but small victories count!

So, if you are on this journey too, and you feel like you are taking one step forward, and … you guessed it – 2 steps back, then try and find the denominator as to why this is. Mine was the scale which was tugging at my heart strings ever so viciously, but I’m hoping that this new strategy going forward will help change the mind-set to get where I (you) want to be.

Until next time,

Mycaila – Jade

xxx