Help needed with diet

[ThePigDog]

Hi

I need a "Supermarket" diet if one even exists, I am eating my 5 a day or at least 3-4 of them but with work I am missing breakfast most days and substituting it with a cup o soup at 11 and then eating lunch at 1 and then team at 8! with a snack at about 4

I know this is bad but with my working hours I cant get around it however if i can get some sort of ready meals I can eat at 4 if it takes less than 15 mins to prepare and eat!

I work 10 hour days and with the commute to and from work I get home and don't want to do much of anything I have a lot of weight to shift and want to shift it and am in this for the long run I don't care if it takes 3 or 4 years to lose it because if I don't lose it I am gonna die of heart failure or something!

I am short and fat and need to sort it, help please.

[ffrr]

hmmmmm a supermarket diet! .... never thought of it the way you put it, but I buy all my food from a supermarket/s and it suits me fine :)

diet is the first place to start really in my opinion... but before you jump in and start you'll need to answer some questions.

how tall are you? how much do you weigh? how much weight do you want to loose? do you exercise at all, if so what and how much? ...and lastly be honest.

[Roach-Rampino]

The key to a good diet is preparation. By buying "ready meals", fast foods and prepacked snacks, you are just being lazy, we all are. If you plan your breakfast, mid-morning snacks , lunches and afternoon snacks (yes lots of small but regular meals) you can actually save money, get the correct amounts of nutrients to help you achieve and maintain a good physique (MUST be coupled with regular exercise!).

Buy ahead items such as brown rice, wholemeal pasta, beans, lentils, pulses, couscous, fresh vegatables, chicken or turkey breast portions (which can be frozen individually)tinned fish (tuna, mackerel/herrings, sardines), porridge, nuts, seeds and salad items. Boil up enough rice/pasta/couscous/beans for 3 or 4 days worth of meals in advance. Freeze individual portions of fresh fish that can be left out the night before to defrost. Make tupperwares full of mixed beans (kidney beans, chick peas, haricot beans, broad beans), rice or pasta. Drizzle a little olive oil onto them to moisten, use black pepper (NOT SALT!) chilli powder or lemon juice to flavour. Chop and add item like tomatoes, red onions and betroot the night before.

There's bundles of good combos out there and they cost next to nothing compared to convienience foods and pre-packed shit that is often unsatisfying, full of artificial crap and expensive to boot!

Prepare and plan your meals in advance, it's the way forward.

[ThePigDog]

I am 20.5st and 5ft 5 ish.

I am hoping to get some sort of a diet together that will keep me feeling full with as few calories as possible so that I can use up the fat I already have stored up.

I am starting to excercise a lot atm and am going to renew my gym membership on payday and will be going 2 - 3 times a week for at last an hour of cardio work and maybe 10 mins of light arm weights to gibe me a little upper body strengh. I will also be exercising at home before bed a few push ups and sit ups.

I agree that ready meals arnt that good I am mainly thinking about these "be good to yourself" "Weight watchers" meals the ones that say they are good for you.

I am happy to eat just salad for dinner and tea and toast or something for breakfast but I dont know what this will do to me vitamin wise etc

ty for advice

[steve10574]

http://www.tescodiets.com/index.cfm?...=m&code=700500

read very good things about this mate

[super mike]

I would suggest a well structured weight routine to add to the cardio, it will help you burn calories and when you do get the fat off there will be a physique underneath, doesn't have to be much, just do 2-3 days a week with weights followed by the cardio.

The meals you are talking about is something that i really hate, they are very expensive and tasteless IME, you would much better off to spend a small amount of time to make your own food. This way you know exactly what is in it, it will be cheap and taste great.

[maverick_15]

Two things here are of benefit- the fact that you know you aren't in shape and the fact that you're prepared to exercise and do something about it. I will caution you against overdoing it - if it's been a while since yo've exercised properly you don't want to injure yourself by overtraining. Just to emphasise what the others have put, you can make yourself a perfectly acceptable dietary plan just by putting some thought into it in advance. What you don't want to be doing is running around late for work thinking "Shit, I haven't got anything in" because that's when you'll slip.

[ThePigDog]

TY all K+

I am trying my hardest yeah, I haven't exercised in a while so I am trying to take it easy just a little bit each day and push it up more and more until I am doing a decent work out.

I've started a blog stating what I am eating in a hope that writing it down will make me look back and see what I am eating and be able to spot my mistakes.

if you are interested at all please feel free to have a peek http://helpmeloseit.blogspot.com/ and feedback is of course appreciated

[Roach-Rampino]

I've started a blog stating what I am eating in a hope that writing it down will make me look back and see what I am eating and be able to spot my mistakes.

if you are interested at all please feel free to have a peek http://helpmeloseit.blogspot.com/ and feedback is of course appreciated

This is a great idea mate. I will add it to My Favorites and help out where I can....and give you a nudge if you start slacking! Another great tactic for motivation is to get your missus to take a few photos of you in nothing but your pants. Everytime you get tempted to stray or can't be bothered training, get the pics out and get back on track.

Good luck,there's plenty of support on here from us guys in the Gym so if you run into probs just holla.

[ffrr]

with regards to weighing yourself.. I wouldn't start doing it every day or you may find it'll end up playing on your mind all day... I can't remember where I read it but you're better off weighing yourself in the evenings as it gives you a more accurate measure... I weigh myself every 2 weeks as I'm not currently trying to loose that much weight but shift a bit of body fat instead, I have a diary with all my measurements too (arms, chest, waist, legs).. with regards to your blog, that's a good thing to do as it keeps you dedicated to what you are doing... good work, keep it up!

[Roach-Rampino]

I usually weigh myself 3 times a week: Monday, Wednesday and Friday. This way I can see how the weekend affects me etc. You should always weight yourself at the same time of day.

[maverick_15]

I do it in the evening before tea on a monday. As ffrr says, taking measurements is also a good way of seeing what difference you're making because if you work out then you may be burning fat but building muscle and some people get disheartened when they don't see themselves losing as much as they would like. It's not all about weight!

[super mike]

"For tea I had a salad with a chicken breast, sliced and pan fried, no oil or butter or anything like that." - This is a great meal, you can always cook twice as much chicken and whap that in a tupperware box with some salad/steamed veg. saves money on subway and much healthier. You could go and buy a bag of nuts (unsalted!) to snack on during the day.

[ThePigDog]

"For tea I had a salad with a chicken breast, sliced and pan fried, no oil or butter or anything like that." - This is a great meal, you can always cook twice as much chicken and whap that in a tupperware box with some salad/steamed veg. saves money on subway and much healthier. You could go and buy a bag of nuts (unsalted!) to snack on during the day.

yeah subway was a big boo boo I was real huingry as I missed breakfast and so I though its better than mcdonalds or burger king or any of those other sinful places

as for nuts I got a bag yesterday for snacking on and they were great didn't feel hungry all day!

[Ganty]

Just caught up with your blog mate, keep it up. Let us know how the weigh-in goes eh?
(I'm going through what you are currently - it's good to read to know other people are doing it too!)

[ThePigDog]

thanks for your feedback, I am absolutely pooing myself about the weigh in as I dont think I have lost anything but I could surprise myself, I have gut out everything bad for me now so no fatty foods and not snack food so now my diet is sorted (i hope) i just need to stick to it and hit the gym

[ThePigDog]

One thing that did concern me slightly is something I was told about my diet from a friend, apparently the ingredients that I have in my salad: lettuce, cucumber, tomato, radish, Carrot and celery are all negative calorie foods. This means that it takes more calories to digest them than that are actually in them so this means that the only calories that I am getting are from breakfast and the meat of choice in the salad. My friend told me this could be dangerous as I would mean that my calorie intake would be taking a huge dive from the 2500+ it was before to about 500 or even less.

anyone know if this is right or complete rubbish.

[Ganty]

One thing that did concern me slightly is something I was told about my diet from a friend, apparently the ingredients that I have in my salad: lettuce, cucumber, tomato, radish, Carrot and celery are all negative calorie foods. This means that it takes more calories to digest them than that are actually in them so this means that the only calories that I am getting are from breakfast and the meat of choice in the salad. My friend told me this could be dangerous as I would mean that my calorie intake would be taking a huge dive from the 2500+ it was before to about 500 or even less.

anyone know if this is right or complete rubbish.

From what i've gathered, there is no such thing as a "negative calorie" food. I was once under the impression that celery was of that label, but read on the news (MSN news, somewhere I believe, sorry I can't link!) that it's absolute tosh. I'm no nutritionist mind...

[Roach-Rampino]

I'm not the right person to answer this as I have no idea.

Just to say I'm reading your blog daily and am pleased you are keeping this up.

Remember when it comes to advice on training and diet, what works for some will not necessarily work for others. It's up to you to tweak your regime and experiment to see what gives you better results. I am always talking about health and training, read what I can and decide for myself what I believe and don't. You cannot learn enough about health and nutrition and it's actually very interesting to see changes in your body and general wellbeing when you alter your diet and training regime.

[ffrr]

I sort of understand what you mean about negative calorie food, ie fruit and veg... is your friend a nutrionist though?

From what I have read vegetables, especially, contain very little calorie content, but they are full of lots of other "ingredients" that you do need. I think CzarJunkie posted this link, and I posted this link with regards to finding out the complete makeup of foods, calories and nutrional values. Use the search bar to find what you are looking for.

With regards to dieting, it was always been recommended not to crash diet, ie cut down what you eat by say half - or cut out one particular food group altogether like bread/carbs as this puts your body into what's called shock/starvation mode which puts stress upon your body as it tries to compensate by either storing fat or possibly making yourself ill. I know this is a harsh comparison but think about those poor kids in third world countries, they don't eat but have huge pot bellies. It's just the way the body works.

Keep you range of foods wide, and try to loose around a few pounds per week only, loose too much and you'll find that after a few weeks you may not be getting anywhere with regards to loosing weight. It sounds like a paradox but the more you eat (as in proper nutrional value foods), combined with regular exercise WILL make you loose weight.

Also avoid chucking yourself in at the deep end and think you have to do "this" by such a time or "that" by the end of the month, it might not happen and when it doesn't you will feel bad... I've been there myself and I'm sure others here have too... just take your time and think of what you are doing as more of a change in direction for the better, for the rest of your life.. lol.. sounds like a crazy cult sale pitch but it isn't really, once you get through, I'd say, the first three months you should start to feel and see the benefits/changes.

I find allot of people think the term "diet" is simply not eating or starving yourself! It couldn't couldn't be further from the truth. "Diet" in my eyes is more of "body maintenance" eating the right foods to keep you healthy, ie your heart, skin, blood, bones etc... these all require nutrients which you obtain by eating and drinking.

Also try reading some books on nutrition to help yourself learn about why you should be eating healthily, I have read loads, and I'm currently reading several. You can read all the forums in the world but you will only be given a small percentage of all the information required with regards to what you are seeking. No offence to anyone here that's put their time in to help :) ...