Lose fat without losing muscle

[aubree_0123]

I'm 15, about 130 lbs (I have a more muscular build with bigger bones but would still be considered slim/in shape), and 5'3.
I know that this is probably a very challenging question to answer and you'll probably just want to skip it and move on, but please please please help me.
I swim and play water polo for high school team but haven't in about 2 months because that's when the season ended..
In those couple of months I have definitely gained a little weight/fat
I'm trying to get toned (not too toned) and lose fat but I don't want to get bigger because of an increase in muscle mass.
I am very health conscience and do eat very healthy, I'm very interested in eating healthy and am always cooking healthy recipes. It's actually become sort of a passion for me (I have recently fallen in love with healthy blogs). I cook very lightly and although I stay away from counting calories, I am fairly confident that I am eating a good amount of food with necessary amounts of carbs/proteins/fats. I do know about what's healthy and will only eat brown rice, whole wheat bread/pasta, I cook without oil and cornstarch, I eat a lot of vegetables (currently obsessed with avocados!) and yeah, I do know about eating healthy despite age; you can trust me on that.
problem is cardio. Although I'm in pretty good shape and I swim/play water polo during the school year, I'm usually the last one in laps and the first out of breath.
I honestly don't know why I'm like this, but I just can't stand cardio. I seriously can't run for more than a half a mile without feeling like I'm dying (although I can usually rough it through the mile). I never used to be like this, but in the last 2 or 3 years it's just slowly taken a toll on me.
I know that I can build up to longer distances without getting tired but I swam for a whole season, 2 hours a day, and I still cringe when I think of swimming laps (again I can rough it but it's seriously killer and I'm very slow).
This summer (I have 2 months left), I want to lose fat. I'm pretty skinny but I just feel big sometimes (I do have pretty large bones). I want to slim down because I'm sick of looking at all of those super fit models and feeling jealous (and of course I want to be at optimal health and fitness :p).
Again, I do not want to gain very much muscle. I do not want to get bigger, I want to slim down.
I love other exercises such as crunches and other forms of ab exercises (push-ups aren't really forte :p) and I was wondering how to reach goal of slimming down by just doing things like crunches and leg-lifts or different eating habits.
Please do not tell me to run or swim or go on an elliptical because trust me, I know these things will help. I want to know ways to slim down with minimal or without any (preferably without any) cardio.
Also, they need to be things I can do at home because I don't have access to a gym.
I know that this is probably a very challenging question to answer and you'll probably just want to skip it and move on, but please please please help me! I will be so grateful!

[Alinshop]

If you don't want to do cardio then I suggest you go low carbs for a while, along with cutting them out during late afternoon, for ex) no carbs after 5pm. You might also want to cut out some fat as well. How many avocados are you eating everyday? What else are you eating on a daily basis.....If you don't want to do what's necessary to burn off of your food, then you prob need to cut some food's out, even if YOU consider them healthy.

[Boss Man]

I know that this is probably a very challenging question to answer and you'll probably just want to skip it and move on, but please please please help me.

HI Aubree and can I start by saying It's okay we are here to help . We never skip stuff, but we occasionally overlook things due to to time constraints, or occasionally cannot answer something if it's very unusual and beyond our knowledge limits, which happens very, very rarely, but you're okay right now.

I will say that reponse might be a little long, but because I care about you, I want to tell you as much as I think is good for you to be told, rather than just half- it and not really answer your questions properly .

Secondly I wanted to say how proud of you I am for caring about yourself. A lot of people your age start to get mixed up with bad things and sometimes bad people as well and it's a slippery slope to bad health or worse, so WELL DONE to you for valuing yourself so much, as you should be proud of you too, because at your age to want to car about yourself so much is pretty cool.

I know cardio seems like a bummer, but maybe I could suggest other forms of cardio, like Zumba, Bockwa, Tai Bo, etc, if you can get DVD's of those, or doing bike stuff with music as possible ways to liven up cardio, by getting a cheap fold up exercise bike and using music or TV whilst using it.

You might even find outdoor jogging with a friend works well, or just with some music on your own.

I'm not going to say you should do cardio though, I'm just suggesting possible ways to do it that perhaps you've never thought of or tried .

I also wanted to reassure you that any muscle you do have, beyond what might be considered average for a young Lady of your age, is certainly not bad and should be viewed as positive.

1lb of added muscle burns an extra 45-50 calories and developing female muscle is perfectly normal, feminine and healthy, so if anyone ever tells you rubbish about female muscle development beyond normal childhood levels, being abnormal, freaky, possibly causing hair growth, promoting lesbianism and other garbage, then ignore them and be strong and be muscularly fit if you want, because it's completely okay and it will never stop you becoming a beautiful young adult, except in the eyes of the dumbass minority.

I am guessing you don't have any weights at home, so it will have to be bodyweighted stuff you do when you train, which is perfectly fine.

This is the sort of thing I sometimes post on here as a standard thing.

Squats, 2 sets 10 reps

Lunges, 2 sets 10 reps

Good Mornings, 2 sets 10 reps

Vertical flyes, 2 sets 10 reps

Bent over Rows, 2 sets 10 reps

Shrugs, 2 sets 10 reps

Planks, 30-45 seconds.

This is done 3x a week, every other day.

There is another possible scenario involving cardio you might be interested in, which involves circuit style stuff, which you could do on a couple of the days you were not doing bodyweighted stuff. Again it could involve music and could be done at home, or in a back garden.

Marching on the spot 3 minutes to warm up.

Circuit 1.

Burpees, 30 seconds

Mountain Climbers, 30 seconds

Spotty Dogs, 30 seconds

Star Jumps, 30 seconds

Pendulum Swings, 30 seconds

Take a 60 second rest break

For Circuit 2, repeat Circuit 1, but do everything for 45 seconds, then take a 90 second rest break.

For Circuit 3, repeat Circuit 1.

March on the spot for 3 minutes to cool down, when you've repeated circuit 1.

This adds up to 17 minutes 15, but if your rest breaks are a little over, then it would be around 20 minutes tops, so not long at all.

If you wanted to try this, then you could add it into the weekly schedule along with the bodyweighted stuff in this way.

Day 1. TBT

Day 2. Cardio

Day 3. TBT

Day 4. Day off

Day 5. Cardio

Day 6. TBT

Day 7. Day off.

As for the diet, I wouldn't necessarily go low carb by just cutting carbs, I'd suggest if you lower carbs, don't go any lower than 20-30g per meal and replace the carbs with fat.

This means keeping calories as they are and then as the body needs energy from carbs and can't get it, it should use more fat for energy, as fat is a secondary energy source.

You may find fat burning a little easier by adding cayenne pepper into your diet as cayenne is said to be thermogenic, in other words it increases the bodies ability to potentially burn fat more easily, by increasing internal heat.

What foods are you eating right now and what times do you eat them? How does this all look as a daily routine?

I hope I have made some sense and if you're not sure about some of the movements I talked about, let me know and i'll explain or try to find some videos for you and like I said before, be proud of yourself Aubree, because you are doing a brilliant thing for yourself and it rocks .