Maxitone - Thank You Protein

Maxitone are running a fab competition where you can win the chance to become the face of Maxitone 2013 along with other fab prizes such as a years membership at your local LA Fitness gym, full details can be found on the Thank You Protein page.  To celebrate this launch Maxitone have put together a great kit to help towards my goal.

My thank you has to go to several people.  Firstly my husband who helps keep me on track by not bringing my favourite foods into the house and making sure that when we go out to eat it's somewhere diet friendly, a massive help for me.  Secondly to Team WAMK and you guys, our readers.  You lot have helped me with motivation and have shared my journey.  Thank you for all your comments and tweets that have kept me going!

I still have a long way to go however I am proud of my achievements so far this year, I know that it's cliche but the start of a new year really was what I needed to get back my mojo.  I don't think I will quite make losing a stone in 31 days (2nd Feb) but I won't be too far off and am certainly not disappointed seeing as it's my birthday month. 

I have yet to add exercise to my current regime and know that if I want my weight loss to continue at the same rate I will need to think about exercise very soon.  I have a few DVDs to try and thanks to Maxitone I now have some small equipment to help with both cardio and toning.  I was sent The Firm Power Ball kit and The Firm Cardio To Go Kit.  I still can't face the gym especially as the one closest to me is over £60 a month! Crazy prices.  I have tried running and it's not for me so am planning to combine DVD's with evening walks as soon as the evenings get a little lighter, it's not much fun walking in the dark.

The kit also contains some lovely Sanctuary products to help relax after a good work out and an iTunes voucher to get some good tunes going - this is where I need your help.  Recommend me some songs to download that are great for working out to.  I am an indie girl through and through and absolutely hate dance music or anything similar.

An iTunes voucher to get some good tunes going - this is where I need your help.  Recommend me some songs to download that are great for working out to.  I am an indie girl through and through and absolutely hate dance music or anything similar.


I also have some Maxitone Definity Toning Protein Shake, a box of Maxitone Definity Crisp Bars with Cranberries and a Maxitone Shaker.  The shakes and bars are designed to provide much needed protein to help support body toning.  They are not intended as a meal replacement.

Maxitone diet trial

I'm sure most of you are aware, but for those who aren't: I'm currently taking part in a three-month diet trial that is sponsored by Maxitone called Hello New You. Involved are me and five other bloggers and we've all been blogging my progress over on the Maxitone blog that can be seen here. I thought it'd be nice to update here though with a little bit more about the diet. In a nutshell, Maxitone are a brand who create meal replacement shakes and bars; the difference with these compared to others though are that all the products are nutritious and high in protein and everything they do promotes healthy weight loss.

Between the six of us who are involved, two are doing it for weight loss purposes, two for improving their wellbeing and two want help toning up. Prior to starting the diet I had to keep a strict 3-day diary of everything that I ate and drink over that time which would then be sent to a Maxitone nutritionist, who would then talk me through the diet, tell me which range she thought would be best for me and just a bit more about the whole trial itself. After speaking to a Maxitone nutritionist, something I was initially quite nervous about, I began to feel positive about the whole experience and couldn't wait to get started.

I was sent enough protein shake powder (strawberry flavour, of course!) and meal replacement bars to last the three months - and probably longer - and, as advised by the nutritionist, I was to have either for breakfast and then as a snack if I got peckish throughout the day. For lunch I'd have something pre-prepared yet healthy so things like grilled chicken, tuna, any lean meats or other fish and salad and then for dinner I learnt that half my plate should be filled with vegetables or salad, a quarter carbs (mmm, my favourite) and the other quarter should be a source of protein.

Sounds easy, huh? Well, essentially, it is. It was definitely a lot easier to be in control when I was in London and had an actual routine. For breakfast I'd have a bar or shake, that would keep me going until lunch when I'd have an egg sandwich or salad and then for dinner I'd have what was recommended to me - usually chicken and salad. Alongside that I made sure I drank 1.5l of water per day too - something that I find really easy to do when I'm sat at a desk all day.

I do feel as though I've learnt a lot about the way I eat and the sorts of foods I should be eating too, a lot of it is also down to portion control and sizing which is where a lot of people tend to slip up. I'd definitely recommend Maxitone, before the trial I was wholly against any sort of protein shakes. I didn't see, and more importantly, didn't understand the benefits of them and had no idea they could be used as part of a healthy diet. Naive, perhaps, but I thought they were just for people who were severely underweight or for people who pump iron in the gym and want bigger guns!

To carry on tracking mine and everybody elses progress you can find Maxitone blog updates here.

Have any of you lot tried Maxitone or any other type of dieting aids in the form of meal repalcements? Would you ever try them?

Best British Bloggers & Maxitone

As I keep mentioning, I've been a bit absent from the blog over recent months. I've said in a previous Sunday Summary that I'd had a bit of a breakdown to the girls about how low I was feeling and how unhappy within myself I was. Since my return from Australia, everything seems to have spiralled out of any sort of control and I've reached an all time low. I'm unhappy within myself so I turn to junk food, which in turn makes me gain even more weight which then leads to me eating more to comfort myself. It's a horrible and vicious cycle. I then decided to ignore everything and just hoped it'd go away, I've always vowed to myself that I'll lose the weight one day, but with no plan or even any motivation to do it though, how was it ever going to happen? I was kidding myself and everyone around me. I'm full of good intentions but nothing ever comes of them.

Just days after my breakdown, Gem recommended me to Best British Bloggers and I can now announce that I'll be part of a massive Happy New You campaign that they're working on with Maxitone. It came at the right time, and I'm aware of how lucky I am to be able to work with them to help me lose weight and to try and help me on the road to happy. I'm one of six bloggers who will be working in unison with them, my progress will be tracked for three months and I'm going to blogging about it, not on this blog, but on the Maxitone blog so you can follow how well I'm doing on there. I'll obviously do updates on here too via Sunday Summaries but the main bulk of it will be done over there.

I was always a bit skeptical about protein shakes and supplements but I'm a lot more open minded after reading more and finding out about it and I'm excited to get started and to share my progress with all you loyal readers. Thank you for sticking with me and I promise I won't let you down again.