On food and exercise

[yendi]

While overeating tonight, I came to a conclusion about why no diet really works for me.

Diets are aimed at folks who eat because they are hungry, or eat absentmindedly (i.e., they eat a combo meal at McCraptastic for lunch without even tasting it, because it's there). I do those, of course. But I also eat because I enjoy food. I love new tastes, new textures, new combinations. And if I know something is yummy, I find the idea of wasting it to be a shame. If there are fifty pieces of sushi on a platter, what kind of person would I be if I let one of those go to waste (yeah, we all know what layer of hell I'd end up in, if I believed in it).

But I don't stop there. I also eat because I'm bored. I eat because I'm nervous. I pig out when I worry about someone, or when I'm having a shitty day.

That's the reason Atkins came as close as anything to working for me -- it allowed me to do all that. If I didn't actually like food, it would have been a perfect diet for me.

But in the end, any diet that says that all the wonderful sauces, all the desserts, every fucking potato dish, etc, are verboten, just ain't something I can handle.

I need to be realistic. I can cut back on food to an extent, as I've done in the past. But exercise is what I really need to focus on. Cleaning my room out today revealed my old dumbbells (I call 'em Dick and Dubya). Fifteen military presses with 'em revealed how far I have to go. But this is summertime. I can actually take a couple of hours during the day to hit the gym, like I used to. I'm not expecting the flab to melt away (with the current layer I've got on my gut, I'm not sure the sun could melt 'em away that quickly), but I know that going is a hell of a lot better than not going.

Comments

[yendi]

Sorry 'bout that -- definitely avoid the next one, then.

[voltbang.livejournal.com]

Dude, on valenties day, you should send this post to a plate of pasta.

I'm with you. I like to eat, and it's raw dumb luck that I've got a metabolism that lets me get away with it as much as I can. Someday that may stop and when it does, I'll balooon out. But while I do some portion control, the key for me is exercise. Keeping my metabolism going. Get those dumbbells working. Pump Iron For Pasta.

[yendi]

Heh. Funny enough, pasta, although a food I will gladly eat (and enjoy) isn't one of the ones I tend to crave. That said, yeah, I'm doing my damnedest to get that metabolism going.

[mfree.livejournal.com]

We are in exactly the same boat... except I don't have a few hours a day to hit a gym.

What I'm doing (and I'm announcing this in my own post before I hit the sack) is to set my alarm clock for 5:30 so I can get 20 minutes or so of hard pedalling in on my exercise bike and a few reps on the weight set... give my oh-so-sluggish metabolism a swift kick in the ass in the mornings so I don't sit in my office converting every ounce of breakfast to "cold storage".

[scottopic.livejournal.com]

Exactly - I've lost 12 pounds this year - which isn't phenomenal, I know, but since Phaedra has me going to the gym, the main point was so I can eat what I like and minimize the increase in fat and health risk. The weight loss was a bonus. I'm now more fit than ever, and still usually eat what I want. I've also curbed my appetite so I tend to want foods lower in fat and make it a habit. Really.
It's all a matter of will.

[yendi]

*nod* the last time I really managed to lose weight, I wasn't dieting. I was just avoiding meals like fast food burgers and vending machine snacks, and getting more exercise. I wasn't even really consciously trying to lose weight, just trying to be healthier. I'd love to have that experience again.

[shawnj.livejournal.com]

As you know, I've been struggling with the same thing. And, like you, I've come to the same conclusion. Now, to figure out how to add exercise back into my life :)

[libidoergosum.livejournal.com]

lemme know if you need a workout partner.

[yendi]

Shit, I think your workouts would kill me. :-) Let me get some ramp-up practice first.

Re:

[libidoergosum.livejournal.com]

I'm not going to put you through something that SSG Holmes would dream up... just the same exercises.... I offered because it's just a little easier to push yourself when you've got somebody there that won't let you quit. Not that you would quit or slack off... it just makes it easier, and a little more fun.

[ewtikins.livejournal.com]

Other problems with Atkins include that the lack of carbs means a lack of insulin response, which is okay except that without an insulin response you don't really get much tryptophan crossing the blood-brain barrier, and without tryptophan crossing the blood-brain barrier your brain can't really make much serotonin... so eventually your willpower just flies out the window.

If you do have some of the sugar metabolism issues that Atkins tries to deal with, I would suggest making use of the Glycaemic Index and trying to stick to the lower end of the scale for the most part (2 or 3 high-GI foods per week are not going to kill you if you are eating low-GI the rest of the time). This might be a little less restrictive than Atkins, although it is more work.

Different things work for different people. Experiment.

Exercise is definitely key, you are on the right track with that. Try to fit in some exercise that does NOT involve the gym - go for a 20-minute walk every morning or something - so that when you suddenly don't have time for the gym, you are still being reasonably active.

One of the best things anyone can do, IMHO, is to keep a food diary for about a month. Enjoying your food is good, but do you need to eat ALL the sushi to enjoy it? or are there other issues about wastage in there? Writing down what you have eaten (every morsel!) and why you ate it (good food, hungry, bored, nervous, worried, low blood sugar (this is different than 'hungry'!), tired...) enables you to get better at being able to tell whether you need to eat, or whether maybe a short walk or a bath or 5 minutes of deep breathing and silent meditation would help more. Write things down religiously and then go back and do some detective work to sort out what is really going on; then decide what you can do differently.

Another thing that I find helpful is to make sure that I get enough healthy food, rather than trying to restrict less healthy food. Making sure I am getting 2 or 3 servings of fruit per day and 5 or 6 servings of vegetables really doesn't leave so much room for the 'bad' stuff, and encourages me to really be organised about what I am eating and when so that I make sure I get my quota of vegetables in. It is a trick, but it works, and it also makes me try new things and broaden my range of vegetable dishes. Yay!

Hope this helps.

Good luck!

[yendi]

Thanks! I actually have always had a pretty good approach on the healthy side of the platform, as I love most veggies and fruits. I think the food journal is a good idea -- one of my constant cheats has been to grab a vending machine snack, rationalizing it by saying that I only had toast or whatnot for breakfast. Completely forgetting the donut I grabbed as a snack when I came into the office and saw the box sitting there, or similar temptation. By the time I'd remember, I'd have eaten all of the Doritos, too.

[thebaronofmspg.livejournal.com]

The key things that we've learned over the past few months, when it comes to dieting and weight loss:

- do it for the right reasons. do it for you. don't do it to just
lose weight. do it to feel better.

- set the right expectations at the outset. this crap didn't
come on overnight, it won't come off that fast either. focus
on doing the right things and enjoy the healthier you and
when the weightloss happens, it happens.

- make it forever. you can't "go on a diet". that's for folks
who wanna lose 10 lbs to fit in a dress or something. it's gotta
be a permanent lifestyle change to result in permanent
weight/health change.

- more is better. the last thing you wanna do is withhold food.
instead, eat more foods that are better for you (fruits and
veggies) that fill you up and push out the calorie-laden yummy
things. eat several smaller meals throughout the day -- don't
just eat the 'big 3'. i eat when i'm hungry, i just don't eat
a triple with cheese heavy all or general tso's chicken or
15 krystals anymore because i let myself get so hungry i am
unstoppable.

- always pre-eat before going to a restaurant. have an apple. they
*ALL* give you 2-3 times or more the amount of food that is
appropriate because that's what 'merkuns want -- the cheapest
most plentiful food they can stuff in their gullets.
eating before you go will take the edge off and help you put
1/2 that crap in a to-go box BEFORE you eat. Or, better yet,
split a meal w/ shadesong or the munchkin when she
gets back). That is usually what anexstacy and I do
when we go out and it works really well. and it's cheap too!

- think more about what you CAN have than what you CAN'T. it's
all about attitude. use your curiosity about cooking and food
exploration here. play with what you can do with various
veggies. do what i did and have 'weird fruit/veggie of the week'
purchases to explore new tastes and textures.

- get plenty of exercise. the more smaller bouts, the better.
any exercise counts. park further away. take the stairs.
and of course, you can hit the gym, but don't underestimate
the power of small things - they add up and can help make up
for a day of the 'fuck-its' when it comes to the gym.


Atkins scares the hell out of me. Partly because I see folks who actually think that if they cut out the bread but order a salad with double-blue cheese dressing and blue cheese crumbles that they're going to lose weight. That's ludicrous! Yes, I realize that it's all about the execution and interpretaion, but that's a huge part of the problem. There is room for interpretation. You don't need hard and fast complex rules, you just need some basic ones and put some structure around how you consume food.

I'm also scared of it because of the fact that it can be medically dangerous. The brain runs not on ketones alone. And the truth is, it seems like a 'lose weight quick' scheme to me. Atkins generally results in an immediate drop of 10-15 pounds so it wins at the psychological level (immediate reward for trying it) and then the struggle later as it decreases is somewhat expected. But I don't believe that the Atkins diet is healthy nor do I think it is really appropriate since it isn't something that is you can use as a long-term eating strategy/lifestyle.

OK, so I said more than I expected, but, well, the last 9 months have given me a lot of time to reflect on the crap I did before and the new things I do now. Hopefully these will help you. Just don't give up trying lower-calorie alternatives. You can make some very nice sauces with a little starch and splenda instead of flour and sugar. You can make some nice desserts using fat-free lite sugarfree yogurt and berries. If you eat more low-fat low cal foods, then you can have a piece of that cake once in a while and your exercise will compensate for it (or you can add more to do that). But if you have already had rich fatty sauces, high-carb meals, McShitholes super-sized value gut-expanders, that exercise won't help you and the cake, well... you get the point.

Good luck!

[yendi]

Good points. Most are ones I've known in theory, but done a terrible job of applying. I've never had an issue with the big meal syndrome -- that was something I cured myself of last time I lost weight. But I've got to stop grabbing the vending machine snacks or other nasty stuff, and saying, "well, just this exception." Because instead of being a real exception, I end up eating three or four things I shouldn't in any given day.

Yeah, the dirty little secret of Atkins is that, in the end, it really only works because when you follow it correctly (and so many folks don't -- Atkins basically slaps you over the head and says not to even think about skipping things like spinach and broccoli, but most folks seem to only eat the meat) because it reduces caloric intake. Seriously, it's almost impossible to go above 1800 calories on Atkins.

Thanks for the tips. The pre-eating is one I really need to start working on (and I just bought some nice Braeburns, even).

[thebaronofmspg.livejournal.com]

Yes. It's difficult to apply them. I find now, on maintenance, is the toughest time for me. You'd think the hardest part of the program would have been to not eat ANYTHING but shakes and boxed meals for 26 weeks. But truth is, that was easy. Making good choices is the hard part.

The good thing is that the last 8 months or so helped me to de-program myself a bit. Get past the snacky snacky phase. I don't buy stuff in the machines anymore -- but the best thing is that I look at it and it doesn't look good to me anymore. I haven't stood there for minutes trying hard to find it, but just looking at it and surveying quickly, nothing says "YOU MUST HIT B10 NOW OR DIE!" so I guess that's a good thing(TM).

Pre-eating helps. I used it last night. I woofed down a meal replacement before we went to The Flying Biscuit last night for dinner. I was *STARVING*. However, when we got there, I had a salad, a biscuit, and anexstacy and I split a Southern Vegan Burrito. They gave us a solitary oat pancake w/ Apples on top for dessert, which was great. But I left satiated and not stuffed, didn't feel over-full and icky. If I hadn't had the meal replacement, I would have ordered a whole one for myself and eaten WAY WAY too much. I had a yogurt right before bed and was a-ok.

So, sorta like the Oracle said in the Matrix.... you already KNOW what you need to do. You just need to prove it to yourself that you can.

I'm sure you'll do great.

[tygerlilly.livejournal.com]

I know exactly what you mean. But have you ever heard of Body-For-Life? You eat 6 meals a day, 6 days a week, and on the seventh day you eat as much of ANYTHING you want.