Occupying much of my thoughts lately has been my dieting. I'll happily report that since last week I weighed in at about 93kg (205 lbs) just before I started my gym session. But somewhere along the line, I knew that I would hit a plateau, as my body became used to the lowered food volume I was putting into it.
That plateau has arrived. Yesterday, when I checked my weight, I had lost a measly 800 grams, or about 2 pounds. OK, so that's not that bad. And I was sick last week and didn't diet for 2 nights. But to my ears, these are hollow excuses.
So I've started the "Write down what you eat" diet. Not really a diet per se, but rather a log of what I eat every day, no matter how minuscule. With these come some calorie calculations (precise where they can be, but otherwise a rough estimate using the wonderful internet).
Lets look at damage today:
Breakfast: Banana, Small (70); Salmon Onigiri (191); Bacon Bread (250 [estimate]), 2 cups of coffee (120 [estimate, no-cal sweetener, light powdered creamer])
Lunch: 2 McDonald's Hamburgers (502), Chicken McNuggests (254), Veggie Juice (68)
Dinner (Projected): 150g Chicken Breast, spiced, pan-fried in 2 tbsp Extra-Virgin Olive Oil (215+30+80), small Japanese-style spinach/beans/hijiki (30), Veggie Juice (68), Yakult Drink (67)
CALORIES: 1945
Yeah, the Micky Dees was a bad idea. But that said I can cut 200 calories there pretty easy and still feel full. Also, the extra bread in the morning, when I've already had a banana and an onigiri was extravagant. From this current total, by eliminating the bread, and switching the nuggets for a side salad (about 50 cal including the dressing), I can cut out about 400 calories.
OK, so it's not that I'll be eating this everyday. Some days I WILL be over 2000 cal. Other days, I'll be well under, closer to my 1500 cal/day goal. The point of the diet diary is to keep track of my eating habits, not to meticulously count calories. This helps build up not only a knowledge of how many calories a variety of foods have, but also how to cut out the unnecessary calories and still feel like I've eaten a good amount.
4 comments:
Hey Mike,
Although your mathematically configured "less calories = weight loss" will work for a while, you will hit a plateau. [Whether this is actually is, who knows? You may have quite a bit more you can lose.]
But eventually, when you knock down your calories enough, your bodies starvation response will kick in - i.e. you'll actually start storing and saving more fat because your body thinks there's less food around.
I'm crap for counting calories, I'm not mathematically inclined, so I used other portion sized methods.
I'll send you a buncha dietary links, since you seem to be getting into it. You can read through and see if anything clicks/works/makes sense to you.
Later.
Obviously, that should be "I use other..."
Me am English teacher.
Oh, and in short, the way to overcome the starvation effect/metabolic sticking point is intentionally overfeeding occasionally. Or the "free day/free meal" concept.
Which works for both metabolic and psychological reasons.
Again, I'll send ya some links and whatnot.
Yeah. I was mentally prepared for hitting the plateau. That's where I figure regular exercise needs to come into play. So to that end, I'm thinking about hitting the gym at Wel Sunpia. It's pricy at 700 yen a pop, but then I'd only be going 2x a week.
I think it's at about 1100-1200 calories that your body goes into starvation mode, but I'm looking at about 1500 on average with the occasion dive into gluttony. Much like our hunter-gatherer ancestors lived :)
I'm also hoping that the occational McDonalds will trick my brain into thinking YAY FAT! I was looking at the new McRib. My god it's horrible. The normal sandwich is as many calories as the Big Mac, but with more saturated fat, and the double McRib is a monstrous 850 cal. Add fries (450). amd a coke (160) and that'd be all my planned calories in a day.
And the shit of it is I'd still feel hungry later on...
...upon further review, it should be "Whether this is actually it" not "this is actually is" and "body's" not "bodies."
How the hell do I earn a paycheck?
Why yes, I am killing time, why do you ask?
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