Advice with my nutrition plan

[princessbee]

Hi everyone,

 

I would really appreciate it if you more experienced and knowledgeable types could help me out with some advice on the diet I've been following.

 

It's vegetarian (obviously) with as little gluten and dairy as possible. I work in an office during the day and so a lot of my selections have to do with what is suitable to keep in my food box under my desk and in the work kitchen fridge. It has to be realistic. I get up at 6.30am in the mornings to do an hour of poledancing then duck off to the gym for a 20-minute intense interval cardio session on the elliptical then into the office. After work I am often at either a dance class or a commissioned job in my other role as showgirl, or I'm doing my weights sessions. So I don't have a lot of time to pre-prepare food and the kitchen facilities at work are limited (microwave and fridge).

Bearing that in mind, I would enormously value your advice and input.

 

I'm female, age 26, 5'3" and naturally curvacious with my problem spots being the tummy, thighs and hips - my measurements are 35, 28, 36 making me a size 8-10 or medium.

I want to strip off my excess fat, I am estimating it at about 5 - 10 kilos worth.

 

Four weeks ago I decided that cutting alcohol out of my diet was imperative to my goals. I decided to have a cheat day once a week on the weekend but that admittedly turns into a day and a half, or two days sometimes. Also my showgirl job sometimes there is pressure to accept a few drinks from a client to appear sociable but I'm going to cut that out and stick to the one cheat day only.

 

If you're still with me after all that long introduction, good on you! Thanks.

 

Here is an example of my daily eating plan this last four weeks, allowing for alterations and adjustments as time went by:

 

Pre-workout:

Max's HP+ Protein Shake - 110 calories

 

1st meal:

Bio-dynamic fat free yoghurt (less than 200g) + single serve satchet of unsalted almonds, pepitas, dried pineapple and apple and sultanas - 327 calories

2nd meal:

Carrot and celery sticks with organic houmous - 71 calories

3rd meal:

Miso soup - 90 calories

4th meal:

125g tin unsweetened corn + 125g tin of mixed beans (red kidney, baby lima, chickpeas, great northern) + low-fat dijonnaise - 160 calories

5th meal:

2 corn cakes with weight-watchers cottage cheese - 80 calories

6th meal:

steamed vegies (cauliflower, broccoli, carrots) with a baked vegie burger/schnitzel/pattie with vegan onion gravy - anywhere from 250 - 450 calories

 

Averaging around 2 litres of water per day, 4 on weight-training days.

 

I have noticed some changes, although I think it's too early for really dramatic changes yet, but I think I could do better.

 

I have felt there is not enough fibre and so I have started adding 10ml of psyllium husks dissolved in 150ml of water in the morning, an apple with first meal (which sometimes is salt-reduced baked beans), will be cutting the dijonnaise from the bean mix, removing the fatty vegie burgers and replacing with grilled tofus, adding green beans, spinach and asparagus to evening steamed vegies, removing the gravy, the corn cakes and cottage cheese.

 

I am also resolving to really stick to alcohol and other cheats only one day a week.

 

I am also considering adding T2, Cellmass Creatine, Fubar...

 

If you can see room for improvement, whether small or big, please do let me know. I have kind of been teaching myself and am stumbling in the dark a bit. Is there a particular order or time of day I should eat some foods in? What is the diet lacking and how can it easily be added?

 

MANY THANKS!

[princessbee]

ps: I should mention I only do my weights twice a week as advised by the woman who set my program, an amazing ex-gymnast/pro-cheerleader now highly talented poledancer and personal trainer - so I don't want to get into excessive amounts of calories, I aim for about 1500 per day.

 

I try to do my interval cardio 3 - 5 times per week.

[Daywalker]

Hi Princessbee,

 

welcome to our forum

 

 

Your diet seems okay.

 

What works for me for weightloss is always raw food. The more raw i eat, the leaner i get.

 

Another thing to keep in mind when dieting is to vary the calories over the days. Set a goal, like 1500kcal in your case, and sway 20% up and down on different days, making for 1500 per day average. A refeed day (sounds better than cheat day ) now and then is also advisable.

 

I'm not a fan of low carb, but when i cut, i keep my carbs low in the evening.

 

And: ask teanyrican what she does for weight loss

 

Good luck with your diet, and have fun!

 

 

Oh, P.S., i saw your intro, maybe you might want to reconsider your weight training, too. I'm a fan of doing heavy compound movements as often as possible with moderate intensity (no failure) for fat loss. Check the training section

[princessbee]

Thanks for the fab advice

 

Only one problem... I'm really not a raw food person!

 

I prefer my food hot and cooked - even if it's just lightly steamed vegies - to salads. I can't stand most lettuce.

 

I have been thinking of keeping the corn cakes in with avocado, cucumber, tomato and baby spinach on top instead of the cottage cheese. Most supermarkets around here have mini packs of steam-ready vegies you do in the microwave. Emphasis here on foods easy to take and keep at work... although I'm thinking about getting a cooler tonight!

 

do you have some suggestions on raw foods or ways I could get more fibre into the diet around breakfast time?

 

TAAA!

[9nines]

On a quick lunch idea:

 

For work lunch, something quick that I make at least three times a week, is an assortment of frozen vegetables, whole grain bread and a prepackage cup soup. I just place a serving of its vegetables in a plastic bag, bundle them and place in my refrigerator the night before. I then take them, bread and packaged soup to work and just place on desk. Since they are fully thawed they cook within 2 minutes in microwave. I add hot water to soup and I eat.

 

On daily calories:

 

You might be eating too little for your activity level. If so, you might be gaining fat, as your body lowers its metabolism to guard against the low calories and be more inclined to store fat.

 

WIth your activity level being high, I would add some high starch food to your diet. Your body can regulated them better and will not sense it is starving, allowing your metabolism to increase. I have this down fairly well now so that when I eat a high starch lunch, I can literally feel my body increase in energy use (I become fairly hot and feel much more awake an energetic, right as I eat a lunch centered around starches.)

 

On the cheat day.

 

Sorry to sound rude but quit doing cheat days. First, if you are restricting calories to less than you need, on otehr days, your body will siege that cheat day and store most of it as fat. For example, I remember reading a study, based on prisoners of war, where a doctor found the fastest way to gain weight for the POWs was for them to fast one day and then eat lost of food the next, back and forth because the body senses it is starving one day and overly stores fat the next as you eat more.

 

Also, I think the cheat day (I am hearing more of it from person trainer talking about diet, lately) is just a comfort crutch for people and an easy sell by trainers, diet specialist etc. When I hear people advise it, I often ask, would you tell an alcoholic or cocaine addict to just drink or snort one day a week or would you realize if they do, just as the food over-eater, they will never change their ways.

[Daywalker]

On the cheat day.

 

Sorry to sound rude but quit doing cheat days. First, if you are restricting calories to less than you need, on otehr days, your body will siege that cheat day and store most of it as fat. For example, I remember reading a study, based on prisoners of war, where a doctor found the fastest way to gain weight for the POWs was for them to fast one day and then eat lost of food the next, back and forth because the body senses it is starving one day and overly stores fat the next as you eat more.

 

Also, I think the cheat day (I am hearing more of it from person trainer talking about diet, lately) is just a comfort crutch for people and an easy sell by trainers, diet specialist etc. When I hear people advise it, I often ask, would you tell an alcoholic or cocaine addict to just drink or snort one day a week or would you realize if they do, just as the food over-eater, they will never change their ways.

I disagree.

 

The REFEED day is advantageous, because:

a) After dieting for some time on restricted calories, your body adapts to that and it gets increasingly harder to lose more weight.

b) No one talks about doing a refeed every other day, without eating in between! I agree that you'd get fat this way. A proper refeed is done about once per week, and you continue to eat the other days, with a swaying amount of calories.

c) It's a psychological help for many people to be strict on all the other days. You have one day were you're allowed to eat as much as you want.

 

To be clear, a refeed is not the same as a cheat day. A refeed day is done with clean, healthy food, only in unlimited amount. On a cheat day, anything goes.

In my opinion a healthy diet should be the goal, but that includes also the psycholgy of eating. If you hate every bite of the "healthy" food you eat, i doubt it does you much good.

[Guest]

I agree with the carbs thing...nothings wrong with carbs...even high carbs so long as they aren't refined...just make sure you don't eat too many late at night

[princessbee]

You might be eating too little for your activity level. If so, you might be gaining fat, as your body lowers its metabolism to guard against the low calories and be more inclined to store fat.

 

WIth your activity level being high, I would add some high starch food to your diet. Your body can regulated them better and will not sense it is starving, allowing your metabolism to increase. I have this down fairly well now so that when I eat a high starch lunch, I can literally feel my body increase in energy use (I become fairly hot and feel much more awake an energetic, right as I eat a lunch centered around starches.)

 

Thanks for the advice, 9nines. I'm going to ask the nutritionist about cheat days as there's always so many conflicting opinions on things but in terms of some high starch food, what would you recommend?

 

I have been paranoid about eating too much, but my daily count is often coming in well under 1500 and that's been of concern for me too.

 

Could I please have some advice from anyone on some good carbs to eat during the day? I'd rather stop them by 5.00pm, at least but have been thinking more and more about including some earlier in the day, particularly around breakfast. But this leads me to another query, that I will make a new post for...

 

Thanks to all of you!!

[9nines]

 

Thanks for the advice, 9nines. I'm going to ask the nutritionist about cheat days as there's always so many conflicting opinions on things but in terms of some high starch food, what would you recommend?

 

Plain (no added condiments) corn, potatoes, or brown rice.

 

For example today I had about 1 and half servings each of asparagus, sweet green peas in pods, and broccoli centered around medium sized, microwaved potato and about 200 calories of a high starch soup (corn, beans etc.) Sometimes I center similar meals around corn or brown rice, instead of a potato.

 

Potatoes are one of the most filling foods, get sugar into your blood fairly quickly to help stop the hunger signal. And are high in fiber to continue a full feeling. I feel very full for many hours, after such a meal.

[princessbee]

thanks 9nines, I really appreciate it.

 

It's pole practice time for me (don't tell anyone I'm sneaking away to the computer) and I've put a mound of brown rice on. yay.