3 1/2 weeks ago when I started carb cycling my Omron handheld bodyfat monitor gave me a reading 23.8% and 24%. I know my body and felt the Omron was fairly accurate.

I wanted to double check with calipers but was too embarrassed to ask my friend at work to pinch my fat rolls so I waited and the result of the skinfold yesterday with the lange calipers was 21.8% which means I've dropped about 2% in 24 days. I'm averaging about a .5% loss per week.

According to bodyfat expert Tom Venuto that is totally normal for somebody like me (fit, at desired weight, been exercising all my life).

I would like to speed things up in the next 4 weeks so I'm going to get a little more strict with my starchy carb choices i.e. quinoa vs. pasta, brown rice vs. tortilla, Ezekiel bread vs. the 12 grain I'm eating now. I'm also cutting out alcohol (this is something that was allowed on hi carb days on Conquer the Fatloss Code but I feel it needs to go for maximum fatloss.

I also need to cut out my afternoon caffeine fix and drink more water and get back to eating a wider variety of greens like kale, chard, collard greens, brussel sprouts, bok choy, etc.

These changes should help me get down into the 17%-18% range in the next 4 weeks then I can keep going from there.

Damn! Today is no carb day and I am soooo hungry and craving my healthy french toast that I make. Tomorrow is hi carb day so I just need to get through today.

I hate being hungry on no carb day. It's like trying to intermittent fast when you wake up starving except worst because you actually have to deal with food.

I'm thinking of making one of my no carb days an intermittent fast next week. I'm thinking it can work to deplete glycogen even more but only if I can get back on track without going nuts with carbs.

Had to post that I got my hunger/carb crisis under control by having a filling breakfast:

spinach mushroom tomato and cheese frittata w/ 2 mini sausage links and 2 cups coffee

will also be drinking lots of water and eating a plate of raw veggies with 1 tbsp hummus for lunch

plus chocolate orange protein drink after my workout later today

gotta plan ahead if you want to get through a no carb day!

Carb Rotation Update: It's hard to believe that you can burn fat eating as much carbs as I had yesterday but it's happening and I can't wait to take my 8 week pics (just 4 weeks to go).

Yesterday was high carb day and I had:

egg, mushroom, cheese burrito with 1 mini sausage, and coffee

big piece of homemade chai pumpkin bread and coffee

2 small pieces Dominos sausage & peppers artisan pizza, and water

handful tortilla chips and hummus plus water

homemade veggie, beans, rotini, chicken tomato soup (this was the best meal of my day yesterday), and water

I also did a full body interval workout for 30 min. I LOVE hi carb day but am happy to go lo carb today. Tomorrow is no carb then the cycle repeats and on the 7th day I do a low carb day.

I weighed/measured again since starting and was very happy with the results so far:

Before carb cycling and carb rotation
chest around ribcage (I store fat there and notice when my workout tops start fitting snug) 32"
waist 29.5 (I freaked when I saw this number)
hips 36
weight 120.5 lb
bodyfat (according to Omron) 23.8% and 24%

After 3 weeks of carb cycling and 1 week of carb rotation
chest around ribcage 30"
waist 27.5"
hips 35.5"
weight 119 lb
bodyfat (according to Lange calipers) 21.8%

I'm excited that I'm losing fat and not losing weight! This is actually a good thing. I'm also excited that all my baggy pants fit baggy and my not so baggy pants are also starting to fit a bit loose again and my workouts tops aren't digging into my ribs anymore. Ah it's good to be back to normal.

Now the hard part begins: No more alcohol, healthier starchy carb choices, smaller cheats on high carb days, longer harder workouts.

Self sabotage reared it's ugly head yesterday. Not sure why this happens to me and has happened to virtually every client I've worked with right around the time when you start making some serious fatloss or weightloss progress.

I've written a few articles about weightloss self sabotage and weight los sabotage solutions and have helped plenty of clients conquer it.

My issue with it has to do with higher expectations at work and I'm already experiencing that on my site. I got flooded with fatloss questions this past weekend (visitors and friends too). It was overwhelming.

I'm also a private person and even though I'm excited to take before and after pics I'm NOT excited about the idea of having my pics circulating on youtube and other sites. These are big issues for me that could most definitely fuel some nasty self sabotage but this time I'm dealing with them before they stop my fatloss dead in it's tracks, instead of ignoring them like I have in the past.

Part of my self sabotage plan was to find the smallest pair of pants I have in my closet and start wearing them more often. That and filming more videos will help curb any desire to cheat, workout with less intensity, and other silly behaviors I engage in that prevent fatloss.

Self Sabotage Prevention Plan = Increased Fatloss so be sure to come up with one. If you do not devise a plan to stop self sabotage before it starts chances are you won't reach your fatloss or weightloss goal. Check out my articles for helpful tips.

Yesterday was no carb day and it was an o.k. food day. I had too much fat at one meal and could have had more veggies. I also ended up eating a small piece of grilled pork sausage for dinner and woke up with periorbital edema today. My body really seems to hate pork right now.

Today is hi carb day which means I can eat a lot of carbs but I will be sticking to the healthier carbs like quinoa, beans, and will have 1 small piece of homemade pumpkin bread that is left from Sunday's hi carb day.

I caught a glimpse of hourglass figure today in the mirror which is cool but probably won't last if I take my body fat levels down to 17-18%.

Today I'm adding massive weight to my best butt workout in the hopes of building up my booty as I continue to debulk my waist. This is such a hard thing to do for those of us with boring rectangle shapes.

If you were born a triangle or hourglass then you've got it made compared to rectangles and cones. All you have to do it workout and eat clean and bam you're lean and curvy. Cones and rectangles gotta literally bust their butts to look lean and curvy.

Learn all about how to workout for your bodytype in my latest article: Hourglass Body Workout Tips

Of course if all you want is to be healthy and fit then don't worry about any of this body type stuff.

Hi Monica,
I absolutely adore the tips you bring us. Before you, I didn't know about hi carbs and the like. Thanks for the great info -- this article to me is spectacular!! One of your best yet.

Thanks so much for your comments April and glad my tips are helpful.

Carb Cycling Update:

My weight is now 118 lb so I've lost another pound since last week. If you are new to carb cycling I would not recommend you weight on a hi carb day (like I did yesterday). My body doesn't tend to retain a bunch of water when I eat carbs so I can pretty much weight any time but some people do retain water if they eat hi carb so try to hold off on weighing and do it after a low or no carb day if you must.

I also found out that my strange allergic reaction was not because of pork. My boyfriend told me the sausage he grilled was chicken (he even showed me the package) so I went through 5 weeks of my journal to see if I could figure out what might have caused or contributed to the face/under eye swelling and I suspect it is peanut butter. I'll cover diets and food allergies in detail in another post.

Also yesterday's hi carb day was awesome, had plenty of carbs which fueled an amazing lower body workout that included an exercise with a 20 lb. sandbag that I had not done in months. It was challenging but not as challenging as I thought it would be so my best butt workout is definitely doing the job of strengthening my glutes and core (which are both hip and low back stabilizers) as well as building a nice booty and stripping away layers of ab fat too.

I know I write a lot about training to look good but I am big on functional training so all my workouts include functional exercises that do more than just help you look good. I just don't write about it as much bcz sadly people don't care as much about that as they do about fitting into their skinny jeans and losing weight.

I believe that a great workout should improve function, health, and body composition too! If your workout only addresses one of those thing then you are not going to be very happy with your results long term.

My workouts this week have been so much better since I switched from Conquer the Fatloss Code style carb cycling to Carb Rotation Diet. I have more energy so I can train with more intensity now. I've now added more weight to some of my exercises plus 4 minutes of tabata protocol at the end of my workouts to boost fatloss and it's been great!

I did forget to eat my second serving of starchy carbs yesterday (lo carb day allows 2 starchy carbs per day) so I started craving junk late at night and woke up starving this morning. I think I might do another lo carb day today (this time I'll remember to eat starchy carbs twice) then no carb saturday. Same number of hi lo no days per week just in a different order. It's totally o.k. to mix up your days any way you like as long as you get:

2 days hi
2 days no
3 days lo

*would not recommend doing 2 back to back no days (not fun)

I've been reviewing the 4 day diet for my fatloss workouts site. It is very similar to carb cycling and promises 7+ pounds of fat loss in 4 days. I don't know what it is about quick weight loss and rapid fatloss that is so appealing to most people (even me). I guess if it really is possible to lose 7+ pounds of fat in under a week then why wait 8-12 weeks for the same results.

The most fat I've ever lost was 5% bodyfat in just over two weeks which showed up on the scale as a 4 lb loss. I have had clients who lost 15 pounds in just over 2 weeks but much of it was false weight (either way it motivated them to stick with good eating and exercise and keep losing).

The truth is the more overweight and out of shape you are the easier it is to achieve quick weight loss or rapid fat loss. The leaner and fitter you are the longer it takes and the harder it gets to lose fat. The main reason for this is your body doesn't like being lean. It would rather retain a healthy level of bodyfat in case of famine (your body only cares about survival).

The reason I'm writing about this today is that it's very tempting to ditch a plan that is giving you consistent but slow results for the promise of fast and easy weight loss or rapid fat loss but the reality is that weight loss and fat loss takes time, patience, commitment, will power, and perdiodization for life not just for 1 week or 1 month or 12 weeks.

There ARE ways you can speed up your weight loss or fat loss results. Check out my article Fat Loss Secret Tips for strategies that really work. Just remember that the leaner and fitter you get the harder it gets to get results fast.