Spring 2010: The Diet Adapts

I always am experimenting with my diet and altering everything that goes into my mouth and what I'm doing with my exercise plan. In an effort to avoid allergens I am once again, altering my diet. I tried having a whole "cheat day" once a week and it did not work for me at all. I use Fitday.com to help me calculate my macronutrients.

This is what I'm eating:

High Fat: Olive oil, coconut oil, and butter

Low Carb: 30-50 grams per day

Calorie Cycled: 1300-1900 calories per day.

This is what I'm not eating:

Soy

Nuts

Dairy

Grain

Gluten

Legumes

My eats:

Low Calorie day:

Pre Workout: 1 hard boiled egg

Post Workout: 1 scrambled egg, 1 tbsp. butter, 1 c. blackberries

Lunch: Avocado Salad with olive oil or 1 cup stir fry vegetables in coconut oil

and protein 3 oz.

Dinner: Sauteed vegetable or vegetable soup or stir fry with olive oil and protein 3 oz.

High Calorie day:

Pre WO 1 hard boiled egg

Post WO 1 scrambled egg, 2 tbsp. butter, 1 c. black berries

Lunch: Avocado Salad with olive oil or 1 cup stir fry vegetables in coconut oil

and protein 3 oz.

Dinner: 2 cups sauteed vegetable or vegetable soup or stir fry

3 tbsp. olive oil

and 5 oz. protein

and 1 cup of berries

Protein: pork, chicken, or beef

The exercise plan: in 2008 I was successful in my weight loss when I was focusing on cardio and yoga. I have decided to go back to that rotation. At that time I was also aiming for 60 minutes in my THR. That seems like a good plan. Over the winter I had dropped back to just 30 minutes per workout in my THR. I don't think thats enough to lose weight. I'm going to increase my cardio. I had also been doing more yoga. Over the winter, I was doing about 2-3 yoga sessions a week. I think that needs to be closer to 4-5.

This is my new rotation:

Sunday: Long jog or MMA Boxing, 1 hour Gary Bromley yoga

Monday: off

Tuesday: Step, Yoga Today

Wednesday: Jog or HIIT, 1 hour Gary Bromley yoga

Thursday: Step, Yoga (netflix dvd)

Friday: Jog or MMA, Kathy Smith Yoga Basics

Saturday: Step Circuit

Heres to this working !

Cold Food

Does not appeal to me. The idea of something cold (except for ice cream) in my stomach is a complete turn off. I like to cook from fresh. I got this way living in FL. I used to like drinking cold water but something happened on one hot humid day working in a theme park, I had this tremendous pain in my stomach and I doubled over. This feeling repeated everytime I drank cold water. Ever since, I don't want cold things. I don't want cold chicken. I don't want cold much of anything (except for ice cream.) I don't mind if a salad is cool and crisp. Thats ok.

Healthy eating step by step from Bay Books

I bought this book on sale. I had to do a ISBN search because the title brought up way to many search results from Google. There are a lot of full color photographs. The book is primarily aimed at the low fat dieter. I am a low carb dieter, my aim is a higher fat diet. However, that doesn't mean you can't use books intended for the low fat dieter. Its very simple to add butter, olive oil or coconut oil. Also, sometimes you may be cooking for someone who requires a low fat diet. While it seems to make sense for everyone to be on a low carb diet not every body can tolerate one. There are medical conditions which preclude one following a low carb diet. Also, there are other things to take into consideration, protein while normally embraced on a low carb diet is not always an appropriate part of one's diet, people with kidney stones often avoid a high protein diet because it tends to increase the number of kidney stones they have. I don't eat as much protein as some people do because I don't lose weight as quickly on a high protein diet. I do better getting most of my calories from healthy fats.

Another fun tid bit about "Healthy Eating Step by Step" is that it was clearly written in a different country than the US. The temperatures are given in F, C and gas numbers. Also, in several instances there are subtle lingual variations such as biscuit where a US citizen would say cookie.

I do like this book. If you see it in a bargain bin, you might pick it up. I'm planning to serve the Pearl barkely and Asian Mushroom Pilaf on page 64, the Swordfish Skewers with White bean puree (I will adapt it to chicken) for a party. I plan to also use the brownie recipe on page 105.

Happy reading!

Saturated Fat is not evil

Cool blog about the role of fat in our diet. I am following a high fat low carb diet myself. I found this article to be somewhat vindicating.

Serious Weight Loss

When you are serious about your weight loss goals you throw out the junk food. You just let it go. Yesterday, I dumped two boxes of cookies. I realized that they were not the monetary value (not to mention that now they were stale) that my weight loss goals are to me. Taking care of my health is important to me. I have spent lots of money towards this endeavor and I don't see the point in saving maybe 5 bucks in cheap carbohydrates. I'm leaning towards giving my dark chocolates from Christmas (I still have over half a box.) to a friend. Sound like a plan? I think so.

I'm working on a 50 pound loss. Last year was real rough. Getting started up in the first part of the year was a bit iffy due to travel in February. Also, I didn't have the gumption to get on the scale. I know I'd been heavier on the first but I waited until mid February to weigh in. I know I had been heavier and that I did lose size/inches in February. This weight thing is an ongoing challenge. When I was younger, I thought that once I had lost that weight that would be it, I would be home free. I did not understand that this was a thing one had to maintain on a daily basis with a healthy diet, exercise, and setting my intent everyday. I also have to make sure I have healthy foods available. I can have an issue, especially first thing in the morning, where I'm hungry and I just don't care and I will eat anything, potato chips, chocolates, ice cream you name it and I will eat because its been 12 hours and my blood sugar is low. The key to a successful day starts the day before with a cleaned kitchen and prepared breakfast foods.

These days I am allowing myself a small amount of fruit after a meal. Usually, its a cutie. Today, it was half cup of fresh strawberries. Overall, I'm not finding grain to be my friend. I don't eat much in the way of tubers either such as potatoes or carrots. I do have a fresh eggplant in the refrigerator. I am focusing on green leafy vegetables, cruciferous, and plenty of healthy fats such as olive oil and avocado. I love the avocados on my salad. Watch out for the vinegars, they can have hidden sugars in them. Lemon juice is a safer bet than vinegar.

I am very sore. I don't what did it, either my Cathe Friedrich workouts or the weed pulling or the jogging. I don't know. I do know, I'm experiencing nasty doms in my hamstrings that are preventing me from doing much of anything, including sitting. This week I'm concentrating on a weights/cardio program called 4 Day Split. This will give me three days of rest to work with and time to recover. I will start back up with my jogging program in a week.

What a fabulous idea! Real Food Challenge

Very interesting article. I love the idea of going completely unprocessed. I could do it myself. I don't think that my family would do it. My brother and Dad are addicted to refined foods. One goes for a taco run at least once a day. I could eat just vegetables, fruits, oils, and meats. I could, I really could. As a matter of fact its not a bad idea. I wonder if the challenge excluded dried legumes? Such as lentils or red beans. I do have some gluten free millet after my workouts. I also like the dried Bob's Red Mill coconut meat. Its a fabulous snack, gluten free, low carb, and very high in healthy fats.

Go to http://ow.ly/1dmJI to see what I mean.