Don't be afraid to change up the "norm"

A while back when I was at 138 I felt stuck, I felt like even though I was working hard my body didn't want to lose any more weight. I had hit a plateu and that meant it was time for me to change things up, challenge my body, and make sure my diet was truly clean. Going paleo and changing up my workouts helped me reach my spring goal of 129. I'm now a size 6 or 4, depending on where I shop, and I've comfortably been maintaing my weight for several weeks now. 129 is good, but I am only 5'1" so I would like to get down to at least 125 or a little under. My main goal actually is just to continue to slim down in my midsection. Who doesn't want a flat tummy?? So I've stepped up the intesity of my workouts, cut back on all the cheat meals, but I haven't really been seeing many results. I'm back to where I was when I had hit 138. I didn't realize it until I read Jamie Easons facebook page yesterday.
"If u have been training a while, sometimes you hit a plateau simply because u have increased ur muscle mass, which in turn, increases ur metabolism. You now expend more calories on a daily basis. If u are still eating the same # of calories u started with, u may need to slightly increase them to fuel ur new, more muscular body. I recommend a slight increases in calories (a few hundred) on leg & maybe back days." Well duh! I blogged about this a while back, eating more to lose weight. It sounds silly but Jamie is right. I'm lifting pretty heavy these days and my body is definitely more muscular. So in my effort to get down into the low 120's I've decided to not so much change up my workouts, but my diet.
Eating paleo is a great way to go, and its really gotten me to open up to so many different and healthy foods. But in an effort to shake things up I'm encorporating some grains and legumes back into my diet. Eating clean is obviously still the main objective, but to add some more calories into my diet i'm going to embrace some foods that have been out of the picture for a couple months. Starting right now with some oatmeal!