7 Secrets For A Perfect Bridal Bod
For many women, their wedding day is one the most important days of their life. For that one big day, you are the very centre of everyone's attention... not only do you want to look your absolute best, you want to feel amazing too. The team here at BUF have trained hundreds of brides and we've got a few secrets to share to get you on the path to bridal bliss.
1. Nutrition
It's no surprise that Nutrition is #1 on our list... AT LEAST 70% of your results will come from your diet and you need to make sure you give yourself plenty of time to get results from any healthy changes you need to make, rather than simply starving yourself in the last 2 weeks before the big day! There are plenty of other articles on this site but the basics are to avoid (or ideally remove) all alcohol, sugar, coffee, processed foods, trans fats (bye bye chips) and low nutrient grains like bread and pasta. Instead, eat food as close to it's natural state as possible (e.g. lots of veggies and fruit), when eating grains go for nutrient dense grains like Quinoa, replace coffee with herbal tea, and try replacing your sugary cereal with a protein breakfast like eggs. Get this right and EVERYTHING becomes so much easier including your body, your skin and your head space.
2. Exercise
Again it's important to give yourself plenty of time. Some of my clients see immediate results from exercise but for others it might take a month or 2 to start seeing dramatic results.If exercise is your worst nightmare, chances are you just have a really negative association with it. The trick to overcoming this is reassociating the "pain" of exercise (something you avoid like the plague) with a "pleasure" (something can't live without). One way to do this is by reassociating the "pain" of exercise with the "pleasure" of a goal (e.g. looking amazing on your wedding day), in which case a good old fashioned bit of goal setting is what's needed. What works for me is writing down what I want, being as specific as I can be, and then I read that morning and night, visualising what it'll be like when I realise the goal. This usually gets me bouncing out of bed excited to get into the day. Another way to reassociate exercise with "pleasure" is to make it fun - rope in your bridesmaids and do it together, join a group, do things that you actually like doing to get fit and avoid the ones you hate!If you're not afraid of exercise then you might need to take a look at the type of exercise you're doing. Sorry to break it to you but long slow runs are not your best friend here, unless you're putting in some serious kms. A much better idea for a time poor bride is interval training. Have a look through this site for some more ideas but one quick and easy example of interval training is stair runs... sprint up, jog down... repeat... 20 min of this is plenty.
3. Skin
Here's where diet can have a huge impact. For a lot of girls, just cutting out the booze (and cigarettes if you smoke) will make a huge huge difference in a matter of weeks. Beyond clean eating though, some other things you might like to try are avoiding gluten and dairy, and feeding your body lots of goodies such as omega-3 fats from oily fish and some seeds such as flax and chia. Also load up on dark green and purple fruits and veggies. One thing that really works for me is adding a little chlorophyll to my water.
4. Stress
Stress can wreak havoc on your body and chances are your stress levels will start to peak as the big day approaches. To develop your serene oasis of calm... try 10 min of meditation first thing when you wake up and last thing before you go to bed. Yoga is another good one of course but really any kind of exercise will help with stress. Also avoid caffeine and sugar as much as you can, and opt for reading a book instead of mindless TV when you feel the need to unwind - studies show that reading can have some of the same benefits as meditation.
5. Sleep
You're going to have lots of things going on that will try to rob you of your shut eye but with a little vigilance you can get your 7 to 8 hours a night. Again, avoiding the TV can help a lot, as well as turning all your gadgets off well before bed time to make sure when you want to sleep, your body is ready. Plenty of exercise will help you sleep too and in terms of diet, avoiding the booze, sugar and caffeine are probably the key ones.
6. Put Yourself First
When you're about to take off in an aeroplane, the safety demo will remind you to "put your own mask on first" before helping others. The reason, of course, is you can't help anyone else if you can't breathe yourself! It's the same with your wedding day, there's always so much to look after so get your priorities straight and put yourself first.
7. Get The Right Team
One of the secrets to success is surrounding yourself with the right people. If you need a little help with any of the above then seek out a nutritionist, a personal trainer, a beautician, a yoga class, etc. If you need help putting together your team of experts, then look no further than our new bridal program that will have you well and truly covered across nutrition, fitness and more including special deals with some of Sydney's best bridal specialists (photography, gowns, hair, makeup, etc).