Eh?!? What do you think?

Question

Eh?!? What do you think?
OK I am very overweight. I am and lbs. I want to be . I dont have a time limit, though. Anyways, I have started eating healthy and doing weight training and toning exercises and crunches and squats for my booty. So, do you think that I will see results even though I am fat? Do I also have to do cardio or will it work with just weight training? The problem is I have no access to treadmills and what not and no time for running bc I have small children, work full time, and go to school, I cant run in the morning bc I cant leave the house with the kids in it! So is there any other type of cardio I can do or do I even need cardio at all?

Answer

Jumping rope might NOT be the best option. It puts a lot of stress on your joints. If you are truly overweight, your ankles and knees are probably already under stress any time you are on your feet. Try swimming. You can take your kids with you, no sitter needed. The impact on your joints is minimal, but you will get cardiovascular and resistancetype exercise. You dont have to do laps, either. Just being active in water is good.brbrIf you have a one minute resistance training session, your metabolic rate is raised considerably for eight hours. When you do the recommended minutes of cardio, it is raised a bit more, but only for about or hours. And muscle is a living tissue that needs energy calories at rest. Lots of them. So the more muscle you have, the more energy your body will burn throughout the day, even if you are sitting in class.brbrI highly recommend getting up an extra minutes early and doing some basic stretching. Stretching can be cardo. Try Sun Salutations or a similar sequence. Just be careful to not push to hard. If you start your day off this way, you will have more energy, which it sounds like you could use.brAlso, by having protein in the morning, especially an egg or two, your hunger will be curbed for longer. Meaning that you can wait to eat until you get home from work or school, and not stop at a vending machine or fast food place.brbrBut you need to remember to eat. Keep eating meals a day, or more. Just portion your meals out differently. When you stop eating for more than normal, your body goes into survival mode and stops using calories for energy. It starts using your muscle tissue. As I said earlier, muscle tissue is a great ally when you are trying to lose weight. Try to cut down if you havent already on refined sugars and other processed foods. Its also cheaper to cook some kind of grain and serve steamed or stirfried veggies over it. Add tofu or beans for protein if you are of the vegetarian persuasion. Especially if you eat meat, keep in mind that extra protein turns to fat in your body, not muscle. So make sure that you arent eating more protein than your body can use. The FDA has some pretty good guidelines. brbrDrink juice cut by with plain water. It will help encourage hydration, while keeping your blood sugar at a more stable rate. If you are overweight, it puts you at risk for diabetes, so this is very important. Keep sugarfree hard candy with you if you get a hankering for something tasty when its not convenient for you to get something healthy.brbr Most of all, dont worry too much about losing weight, a lot of people are stress eaters, and your heart doesnt need the extra strain. But you are inspiring to have so many things to contend with and be trying to better yourself at the same time. Good luck.