I have been here for over 5 months now and I think I have mentioned that I was scared I would gain weight moving abroad. I thought I might lose motivation or stop working out. But the opposite has happened. I work out every morning before work and was hiking on the weekends, now it's been replaced by dancing for hours.
On the exercise front, I haven't joined a gym. I bought a weight set to keep at my apartment and an exercise bike. I have been using Fitness Blenders FB30 8 Week Program for Busy People. There is a lot of weights and weight training for muscle building. I have been ignoring the scale for the most part and just looking at the way my body has been changing instead. I definitely have noticed a big difference in my composition and muscles. My arms especially have seen a vast improvement in muscle. There is cardio in there as well, but not nearly as much. I pair this with 25 minutes on the exercise bike a day for a little cardio boost. Then at night I am doing a 30 day ab challenge just to tighten up my stomach area. After losing 90 lbs it was in desperate need of something to tighten it up.
On the eating front, I am not nearly as controlling over my food as I was back home. I, of course, am trying to watch what I eat here, but I don't want to limit myself and not experience the food here. Especially since I am obsessed with how good Korean food is. During most of the week I eat a clean breakfast, small snacks, Korean cafeteria lunch, and a salad with chicken breast for dinner. On the weekends I try not to go too crazy, but I am not as strict. I am lenient when it comes to my latte time (I get lattes 2-3 times a week, on my busy teaching days).
On a general front, I try to stay aware of what I am doing and if my habits are becoming too lazy. I try to take the stairs at work whenever possible. Since I am teaching most of the day I try to stand and teach instead of sit and teach. Some days I am better about this than others but I would say overall I stay active with my job. Since I teach kindergarten, I try to spend a little time with my students running around and lifting them a lot. I count it as an extra workout, with the children as my dumbells.
I haven't lost a tremendous amount of weight since living in Korea but I feel healthier and happier than I have in awhile. I think I have found a good balance between staying healthy, but also living life and not missing out on the things I want to do. I definitely still have a little weight I want to lose, but I am not nearly as stressed out about it as I was before.
