I've always had a slow motabolism / poor diet because I never ate properly and skipped meals. I'm only 21 and I only started eating breakfast EVERY day when I started my meds which require me to eat. Back in grade and high school I'd have breakfast a few times a week and usually never ate lunch, than I'd have an early dinner and snack. I've got my breakfast locked down, I try to eat lunch though sometimes there aren't leftovers and I don't really cook, though I could make tuna / tuna salad if I was hungry. I've never really had issues with 2 meals a day, even when I am active in the summer. As for extreme, the 30 minute walk / jog hasn't taken away from anything, and I usually do it in the morning which I find helps really start my day after breakfast, the other exercises I do every second day only take 10 minutes at best (just some pushups and kettlebell swings) and I normally do those before my run. In the future I'll either wake up earlier and do this before work, or do it after work / at night. I also find that this has helped me get away from my pc more. I still love playing games but I've noticed lately that I take more breaks to just walk around my house to see what everyone is up to and I play for shorter durations. If I can cut down on my snacking or eat healthy snacks I think I'll be pretty successful, these 3 weeks so far have been alright, I miss junk food but I don't really have cravings where I NEED to have them, my 1 cheat day a week is enough, and I try not to go nuts. If I really want something sweet now I'll just go for a chocolate milk, it hits the spot and isn't too terrible I don't think.
My bad! Sorry deadbeat. I always found breakfast the hardest part as you want something filling but low calorie and it is amazing how high in calories most cereals are. I'm not really a porridge fan so I went for breakfast mochi with a little bit of maple syrup, an espresso and a small glass of skimmed milk. That is the stage i'm at now and so far I am finding it pretty easy. It is the behavioural changes which help you to maintain your new weight. For me it has not been too difficult as I don't comfort eat, I had a pretty good diet and I don't tend to snack so I just had to learn to limit my portion sizes and choose some better options. Another important step was changing the behaviors of those around me so for example stopping the other half handing me her plate if she could not finish what she was eating. What I did find surprising was how well I could cope with only eating 1300 calories a day. I just got used to and I find now that I simply can not eat the quantities I did before. Now i have gone back up to my full calorie range I eat about the same amount, it's just higher calorie foods.
I haven't been able to exercise for around 4 years so this morning felt good I have been starving ever since though! Lots of fruit and Ryvita for me!
I have a problem with snacking, I think it's only my (presumably) high metabolism which is keeping me from putting on a lot of weight. What would people suggest to try and replace biscuits etc as snack food? My meals aren't too bad, and I'm looking to try and start eating breakfast, since it's never been something I've been overly keen on, and since coming to uni it's pretty much non existant.
Managed to lose 2.5 stone and sitting at 14s 12 for what seems like months. Have started drinking hot water with half a lemon first thing in the morning and then eating an hour later and since starting this last week, lost another three lbs. Seems to kick start the metabolism...
So far, my healthy eating is going well. I'm not really bothered by my calorie intake, because I go to the gym each week day and usually burn around 600 calories a session. What I have done, is totally cut out products containing refined sugar and limit my Saturated fat intake to less than 5 grams per day (the average person is about 25 grams) People mostly seem to keep an eye on calories, but forget that the fastest way that fat piles on, is through eating it directly. Saturated fat, is one of the fats that your body finds most hard to break down. It's the bad fat. I've also drank nothing but water for the last three weeks. Nothing. Whilst some days I feel like i'd swap my soul for a can of pop, the benefits of solely drinking water have been fantastic. I no longer feel tired after meals, my skin looks great and my sex drive has gone up. My moods are also way better. One other thing I would say, is that people tend to misuse their 'bad days'. When I used to have a personal trainer, he would tell me that a bad day consists of say having a tasty evening meal, or a bar of chocolate as a treat for being so good. People usually use the bad day to eat bad all day. That's not good for your body, because it's being bent to eat healthy all week and then when you shovel bad stuff in, it immediately reacts by storing more of the fat, because it thought it was being starved before.
Due to my dodgy health and various stomach surgeries, I go and see a Dietitian every month to help organise and schedule what and when I eat.. She always comes back to the same things. You should try and have 5 small meals a day Breakfast, 11s's, lunch, tea, supper. Even if you have a glass if milk and a biscuit, thats better for breakfast than nothing. You can have it an hour after you get up if you like. For lunch and dinner, it should be a fist sized portion of protein, and the same for carbs and veg. For dinner, you should stop eating 2/3 hours before you go to bed, so you have an emptying stomach over night. These work for losing weight and maintaining weight, as long as you adjust portion size and contents
I was 120kg (19st or 266lb in old money) at my heaviest in Summer 2004. That was accumulated through variously not exercising, beer, pizzas, kebabs, beer and certain illicit substances that are renowned for giving one a binge appetite Oh, and beer. Student life was fun, but it had taken its toll. I then took on work for the autumn working on a farm (mixed livestock and arable). Once that work had dried up I found a job working for an ex-Marketing Director who was renovating a mansion in a local village. I worked as a general labourer from 8-6 six days a week for about 6 months. It's worth noting that in that time I ate like a horse. Entire baguettes stuffed with cheese, meat and mayo for lunch, big cooked dinners etc. By the time I had decided to go back to office based work in early Summer 2005 I weighed 79kg (12.5st or 175lb), which was bordering on the lightest I could possibly be for my frame - I'm 6ft 2in but quite heavily set naturally. I had veins in my arms and defined muscles for the first time since I was a teenager. That was proof that hardcore exercise is the single best way to lose weight quickly and effectively, I worked like a mule on that site, constantly pushing myself to be better, stronger. It didn't hurt that one of the chaps I was working with had recently left the Australian military and was much more effective on the site than I was to start with, so I pushed hard to keep up with him and it got easier week by week until I was a good match. Diet is important, that's for certain, but exercise - REAL exercise where you feel like you're going to break for several hours of the day - is by far and away the quickest, most effective way to shift a lot of excess weight. I'm by no means as light as I was (I'm a greedy f***er ), but I have never got anywhere close to that silly sort of weight since, despite my current exercise levels being the odd walk at the minute. TL;DR - Diets can be useful, but get yer arse in some shorts and go out for a hard run, every day! Or better still, find work that pays you to exercise.
Started a MyFitnessPal profile today, with a goal of 1950 Calories a day. Gonna stick to this religiously and go from there. Wow, that's epic. Is that half a lemon itself (like a tea bag type of effect), or half a lemon worth of juice?
Just relogged into myfitnesspro. I was on track yesterday untill I added the 4 pints of cider I had after work. 4 pints aspall. 1380 calories. Owch!
I overshot my 350 calories yesterday, I was fine until dinner when my mother-in-law offered me beer and moules mariniere for dinner.
I used to be a lot chunkier in my early/mid teens (6ft, about 15 stone) started cycling like a madman once I was 17, dropped about 4 stone over the next 2 years and never looked back! Best thing i ever did was pack in the fizzy drinks and cut down the crap tbh (less processed stuff, dark chocolate instead of ten mars bars etc). It is a long process though - I remember thinking it would never go away but there is light at the end of the tunnel!
Half a lemon worth of juice.... I just halve one, squeeze it then chuck the half into the cup before the hot water...
Sorry, I should have been a bit more specific about what I meant. I was actually referring to people who try to lose weight via dieting only and not exercising. Your body requires many more calories per day to maintain muscle than it does to maintain fat. So what happens with extreme calorie controlled diets (circa 50% or less of your daily RDA), is the body tries to lose some of this "expensive" muscle which in turn gets converted into energy. Meanwhile the fat reserves remain largely intact. Essentially what is happening is the body is adapting to maintain proper function of the organs on an insufficient daily calorie intake.
