120 Day Healthy Living Exchange

120 Day Healthy Living Challenge!

​     Welcome to our Challenge.  “Not another one? You say”.  Well we hope that you will find that this is not like all the other Challenges out there.  In fact, let’s not even call it a challenge, let’s call it an exchange. Exchange of unhealthy lifestyle choices for New, improved and healthy choices.  Ok, let’s start again.

120 Day Healthy Living Exchange!

​What makes us different? We are a couple, a realistic, everyday couple who just want to get healthier.  We have a budget to adhere to, we aren’t working out for hours a day, no gym memberships (not until winter anyway as we live in Canada) We have tried all the “fad” diets, programs etc that we could possibly try ( Shelly more than Mark). Spent money that we likely didn’t need to on all those gadgets, programs, special foods and were always left disappointed with empty pockets to boot!  
 
Not all those programs are bad, or don’t work, it really is a matter of what you put into them, and whether or not you can stick to it forever!  However, in our experiences, as well as numerous others we know, they were hard to stick to, you feel deprived, get tired of counting calories or macros or really don’t want or enjoy working out 4 hours a day.
 
We want to improve our overall health and wellness with a clean and healthy eating and exercise more to improve energy levels, and rid ourselves of the day to day aches and pains, and improve sleep quality.  We want to Exchange our unhealthy habits for healthy habits and cleaner living. 

Who We Are?

Mark
​​ 
     About 6 years ago I was diagnosed with IBS and went from 190 lbs to 150 lbs in about a 5 month period.  Most of what I lost was muscle.  From process of elimination I have found foods that affect it and try hard to keep them out of my diet.
At 52 years old I still have a very fast metabolism and I find by working out, lifting weights and staying very active I actually gain and keep weight on. Yes, his goal is to gain weight in a healthy way and keep it on! ( I know, I can’t sympathize with him either LOL)
However, I have very low energy levels during the day and lots of energy at night, which of course leads to a very unhealthy sleep pattern. 
I have been taking meds for a couple of years to help with sleeping and I am hoping our changes in lifestyle will take me off of them.  The only other supplement I take is Glucosamine for a sore hip and a daily multivitamin. 

​Shelly
     At 16 I was diagnosed with arthritis.  I am now 50 and osteoarthritis has set into my joints, especially my hands. Some days it’s hard to get much accomplished without a great deal of pain.  I take meds, with side effects of course, daily. 
I also have Hashimoto’s, which is basically hypothyroidism.  It’s amazing how many things within the body this effects! But my energy levels get zapped, and I could just sleep the day away.  Of course, that doesn’t happen as I have a job, kids, grandkids. So needless to say, I don’t have a problem getting to sleep at night, staying there is another issue (Menopause is so wonderful!)
Unlike Mark, I don’t have a great metabolism and weight is something I’ve struggled with off and on for almost 20 years. I also have a huge family history of Type 2 Diabetes.  I never had to worry about what I ate, how much I ate, weight loss, until I was in my early thirties, then everything changed and I packed on the pounds and the merry go round of yoyo dieting started.
I’ve tried so many of the programs out there, did all kinds of different fad diets, bought books etc etc, I’m sure you get the picture! Some worked well, as long as I stayed with it, which is SO hard to do both mentally and financially. 

​During our Challenge, both of us will be going about it a bit differently.  We will eat similarly, however Mark will be consuming more calories and doing a light workout daily (light for his standards) I will be working mostly on healthy eating and walking more.  Mark wants to gain weight with lean muscle mass and I want to lose weight and reduce inflammation that causes my pain.
 
We are not nutritionists, we are not medically trained in anything (Well First Aid if that counts) We don’t work in any field that relates to Healthcare, weight loss or fitness.  We live in a modest older suburban home. We really are just an everyday, working class couple who just want to get healthier and share what we learn along the way with other normal everyday people. 
 
We both started weaning our unhealthy diet choices out of our lives about 3 weeks before we started our Challenge on June 10 ,2018.  In fact, we didn’t even start looking at it as a possible Challenge until about 2 weeks in.
As we all know, one of the biggest obstacles we all face is sticking to a plan, especially at the beginning.  We feel miserable, we feel deprived, overwhelmed and even depressed sometimes. Which leads to failure. 
 
We want you to succeed! We want to succeed! So, we will help each other out by blogging and posting content to help us all along the way. 

We have taken pictures and measurements and will update you monthly and show the before and after photos when the 120 days is up.
 
Watch for our upcoming posts, we will touch on many aspects of our lifestyle changes, on our own personal status’s, and yes, the good and the bad, as well as:
 
-costs
-fitness
-juicing and blending
-different types of “diets” and the pros and cons associated with them
-great low cost healthy recipes
-getting and staying motivated
-stress
-sleep
-guest bloggers (maybe that will be you?)
-we might even add a bit of our travels on here.
-some shopping/budgeting advice to eat healthy.
-a YouTube channel
 
 
I hope you will join us, the more the merrier.  You can never have too many friends or support to guide you through, and that is what this is all about.
 
Take care until next time
 
                        Shelly & Mark