Whatcha eating today VSGers...Friday!!
OMG I made it through the week!!
B: Protein Shake (Coconut/Almond Milk; Protein; Flax Meal; Spinach)
S: Coffee; Low Carb Cream Cheese Pumpkin Muffin
L: Mahi Mahi; Spinach Salad
S: Chicken Vegetable Soup
S: Protein Shake (post workout)
D: T-Bone Steak
Water: 6/14
Vitamins: Check
Exercise: 4 miles
"WLS is only for people who are ready to move past the "diet" mentality" ~Alison Brown
"WLS is not a Do-Over (repeat same mistakes = get a similar outcome.) It is a Do-BETTER (make lifestyle changes you can continue forever.)" ~ Michele Vicara aka Eggface
Keith let's not even talk about it...I'm BEYOND frustrated. I have vented to my real life friends. My peeps on FB and those from OH that I have their numbers. In fact some days I want to dive head first into some ice cream, cake and pie oh and cookies. Because I could honestly be eating that **** on a daily basis and do the up and down bouncing that me and the scale are doing.
I promised myself that I would give it all I got till the end of the year, so that's ALL I have to hold onto.
ok, so the jumping in and eating part is a head problem. Lets set that aside for a moment because #1 we all have that and #2 wanting to eat doesn't make you fat, eating makes you fat, so we will come back to this.
Let me see if I have this right:
- You are eating right
- You are exercising (pretty aggressively from the looks of it)
- You are getting your water in
- You are relying a lot on will power more than restriction because you are a little farther out
But the scale is not moving. I assume this is your frustration.
So lets look at the other things that could potentially be causing this. Your daily plan looks good (except for the popeyes days but that's once a week and that is fine).
So we learn from our doctors that we should eat high protein, low carb, low fat. BUT everything I have read about ketogenic diets and advanced low carb strategies say that we should eat moderate protein, low carb, higher fat (not high fat). This is to get our bodies used to burning fats. The book I am reading now says you can get your body geared this way in a 2 days to 2 weeks. The idea is to give your body fats to burn for energy instead of carbs or proteins. Your body likes to burn fat last. So if that is all it has then it burns it. The great thing is our body is very inefficient when it burns fat so instead of burning a whole calorie it only burns a half a calorie and it throws the other one away. Theoretically speaking for every calorie you need you end up losing 2. This is ketosis. You liver converts fats into ketones which is what your body will use for energy. If you notice when you are in ketosis no matter how much water you drink, your pee is darker and smellier. This is good this is your body tossing those half calories of fat. This is why it is so important to drink water during our diets. Now the other thing is the cheat day that everyone here freaks out about. What happens on that day (i.e your popeyes day) is your body gets a cheap easy energy to burn in the form of carbohydrates. Your body goes nuts. It burns that stuff up but when it has no more (i.e. the next day), guess what it goes back to burning? Fat and it has to burn twice as much to get the same result as the day before. Cheat days do not have to mean candy and cookies, they can mean fruit and oatmeal, but the point is once a week you make this drastic switch from a difficult to burn energy to a very easy to burn energy. Its like stomping on the gas while you are in neutral, the engine revs up high but when you take the foot off the gas it does not immediately go back down to zero, it takes a while to come back down. The way an engine burns gas is not all that dissimmilar to how our body burns fuel.
I would be willing to bet with a few small changes you would be a fat burning machine.
Are you eating a lot of salt?
Another thought you are doing some intense work out, are you doing any lower intensity (i.e. fat burning) exercises too like walking? When you to intense exercise your body does not burn fat, it goes for sugar and protein and when you don't have any left (which we rarely do on our limited calorie diet) it goes for the muscle.
I have not talked a lot about this on this board because this would get me a tongue lashing like there is no tomorrow for suggesting these deviations, but this is science. Hopefully here buried I won't get slammed too bad.
Ok I read all that twice, not sure if there were suggestions (which I love) or just information (which I also love).
Salt: I put a little salt on my meat when I cook it. I dont' consider it alot because I used to use ALOT, and then when I took care of my mom I used none, and now because of my low blood pressure my doc suggested moderate so I moderate salt. Maybe 1/8-1/4 tsp MAYBE.
Exercise: 2x a week = Started 30 min now 45-60 min on the treadmill at 3.5 (moderate/fast walk); 2x a week and the kettlebells; 1x a week Personal Trainer (I do 20 minutes 3.5 on treadmill before our session).
I know my Popeyes might be a bad rep BUT the stats fits into my day with 430 calories, 27 protein, 13 carbs, 28 fat. 2 fiber
Right now my nutrition goals are 1200 calories, 120 protein, 45 carbs, 60 fat, 18 fiber. With the breakdown of the 1200 calories as follows: 15% for carbs; 40% for protein and 45% fat.
What do you suggest I change, add subtract from the above information?
No your Popeyes day is fine, especially since you do it on the same day every week. So here are specific suggestions. Your macro breakdown looks fine to me. I was going to suggest more fat but 60 is great. I would suggest more fiber.
Wow, you should be shreading it up. Here is my one big suggestion. On your popeyes day, ramp up your carbs. go for 100-120 on that day. In fact throw caution to the wind on that day. On the day after popeyes day, reel it back in and go super low carb, the rest of the week stick to your plan. Oh also make the popeyes day your hardest workout day, particularly with muscles. You will find you get through it much easier.
Let me think on this some more. You are doing everything right. I think that "cheat day" will ramp it up though.
So you "feel" my pain. I have NEVER worked this hard and see NOTHING...but...also...WOW throw caution to the wind huh =) I like the sound of that, lol.
On a serious note, thank you for your suggestions.
Here is my plan let me know what you think!
On Tuesday: Add fruit and more flax meal to my protein shake...normally it's just 1 tbsp flax and spinach. I have some berries and other stuff but I had stopped it.
Add Fiber: Will think on this...I know adding more flax meal to my shake and maybe making some recipes I have that include psyllium husks and more fiberous vegetables (will research which are the highest fiber content)
Thanks so much Keith =)
Oh and a heart rate monitor is my gift to myself next payday.
Add fiber across the board 18 grams a day is not enough, my target is 35 and I would like to hit 50.
On your "cheat day" - flax is good, think about some higher complex carb stuff like oat meal, it is slow digesting so it spreads your carb absorption out across a longer period giving you more energy. Berries are good, they are the lowest sugar in fruit (blackberries beat blueberries for antioxidants so that is good). You want your carb count high on this day so think about things that are not necessarily sugar that you can eat like whole grain breads, brown rice, oatmeal, barley, corn (good day to eat popcorn).
You might want to think about some fish oil supplements too. I just picked up some Mega Red Krill Oil last night, the are smaller and go down easier.
Here is the book I was talking about, it is called Low Carb Diet Strategies You Don't Know About by Susan J Campbell, it is $3.99 in the amazon kindle store and if you don't have a kindle or an iphone or an ipad, you can use the web based kindle reader. Here is a link to the book:
Another good book with some food and exercise hacks that I really enjoy is called the Four Hour Body by Timothy Ferriss. I like his writing and there is some really good stuff in his book. I don't use a lot of it because I am trying to stick to "our plan" to give it a chance. I do the 30 grams of protein within 30 mins of waking up and I add cinnamon (a thermogenic fat burner) to a lot off stuff.
I will find alternatives because I haven't eaten oatmeal and most grain breads since 3 years out because I discovered it causes me unbelievable CRAVINGS for carbs. I discovered that my cravings for carbs are STRONGEST a day or two after I've eaten most "good for you grains." Now while I do eat popcorn I discovered last January that ANYTHING that is corn, ie popcorn, corn tortillas, and grits, usually the NEXT day I'm easily up 5+lbs.
I take krill oil everyday for the last 2 years, but I need to check the dose...because I think the ones I have now the dosage is 3 pills and I have only done 2 (my old pills were 2).
I'll definitely check out the book.
