Let me start off by saying that I hate the concept of dieting. Diets can be good for some people, but usually only work for as long as they are on them. What you need to sustain your weight is a lifestyle change, and those are hard.
What does that have to do with me? Well I was doing really well at this time last year. I was the skinniest I had been since high school, felt great, was starting to move down to pants sizes I barely remembered. Then I moved into Minneapolis, my social life expanded, and I fell right off the exercise bandwagon. I didn’t notice it at first since I wasn’t weighing myself and I thought all the walking I was doing would keep the weight off. I was wrong.
This weekend I got on the scale for the first time in quite some time, and I was appalled. I weigh almost 20 pounds more than I did when I first moved to Minneapolis. Now, part of the problem is going out way to much, part is portion control, and a good part is a lack of exercise. These are all things I am aware of and can fix if I put my mind to it.
The problem is that I want to lose those 20 pounds at an accelerated (yet safe) rate. So I’m putting myself on a diet. First of all, I’m going to bring back the no-meat pact that I made in September, only instead of no meat for an entire month, I’m going to stop eating meat during the week. This means that from noon Sunday (come on, you have to have bacon at brunch), until Friday at dinner time, I will not be eating meat. I’m going to start eating more beans, more dairy, and other alternative protein sources. Secondly, I’m going to avoid eating pasta for the entire month of February (an exception will be made for Mac N Cheese tour). This is going to be one of the toughest challenges for me. I love spaghetti, ravioli, and every other type of pasta you can think of. It’s my go-to main course and I think that has to change. It just has too many carbs and I tend to eat way to much of it. Hopefully forcing myself to learn to cook alternative dinners will help me expand my cooking horizons and help me cut back on the amount of pasta I cook once February is over.
So I’m technically putting myself on a diet, but I consider it a short term solution with what I hope are long term implications. I think reducing my meat intake to 2-3 days per week will be huge, and of course broadening my cooking horizons will be a fun adventure. I intend on raiding the Minneapolis Central Library for cookbooks this weekend.
Finally, I have joined a gym, and my friend Nicky will be making me go until I start making it a habit. Of course I have been going three times per week without much effort since I joined two weeks ago. I even went to Cycle to the Movies on Saturday and biked for a hour and a half. This is the really important step because I don’t want to have to limit what I eat forever, and I know that once I get myself to where I want to be again, if I keep exercising and eat a reasonable diet I can keep it there.
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Nice, Conner. My go-to, healthy simple meal is:
Brown Rice (made with organic chicken stock) & sauteed spinach. I saute the spinach in a tiny bit of olive oil, garlic & balsamic vinegar. It’s healthy & great.
Also, this goes without saying: stay away from processed foods. I’d image you have a no corn syrup rule…but in case you don’t…that could help a lot.
I’m working on: not eating after 7 (eventually 6pm), eating a protein rich, but healthy breakfast, portion control & cutting out as much sugar as possible each day. Burt’s addicted.
Good luck!
Oh, I like it, and I have spinach I just bought that I need to do something with.
I’m pretty good about the processed foods thing, I don’t buy them, and I’m OK about declining them when they are available other places. And I try hard to avoid corn syrup, another thing I rarely purchase. It’s pretty easy for me to avoid buying, since 90% of my groceries are whole foods.
I think pasta is my last bastion of excessive calorie consumption. If I can limit that I’ll be doing great.
I’m in the same spot as you. Last winter saw me ready for a tri-athalon and then everything went downhill….
Back at it now, my starting point is not drinking or going out on weekdays. This usually helps me get the diet back on track and spend >8 hrs at the gym per week. I can drink like 5 birthday cakes worth of beer on a good night.
Next goal is the gym rat badge.
For some more great sources of plant-based protein sources: http://www.experiencelifemag.com/issues/october-2007/healthy-eating/garden-variety-protein.html.
A book I would recommend is UltraMetabolism by Dr. Mark Hyman. It totally changed the way I think about food, and was one of the most helpful resources when I started losing those 60 pounds after college.
My current favorite cookbooks: The New Moosewood Cookbook (and all Moosewood cookbooks) and Bittman’s Kitchen Express.
Thank you for the article and book suggestion Kaeti.
Good luck!! My job/lifestyle requires me to remind you to find a Basic/Level 1 yoga class in your area and try it out! You’ll sweat a ton, meet new people, and maybe even do something awesome (like go upside-down).
I have two recipes to share! They’re both really easy and are made even easier with the use of a stick blender (my new most favorite kitchen gadget). The first is for creamy (but dairy-free) spinach soup that serves 4-6 portions, and all measurements are approximate:
3 red potatoes (small-med, peeled + chopped to 1-inch pieces)
1 large bag spinach leaves
1 large yellow onion, chopped
2-3 stalks celery, chopped
2-3 carrots, chopped
2 c. vegetable broth (low sodium)
olive oil (optional: add 1 T butter)
salt & pepper
nutmeg
mustard powder
Saute onions in olive oil until translucent (I let them get golden at the edges), then add celery, carrots, and potatoes and cover. Let that work for approx. 5 minutes, then pour in veg broth and add all seasoning (dashes only for now, but don’t be afraid to get generous with the mustard powder). Let simmer until potatoes are soft. Add spinach and cover; let wilt completely. simmer another 5 min., then turn off heat and blend until smooth. Season to taste. Optional garnish with parmesan shavings.
The second recipe is stupid easy and delicious, and will kill a sweet craving in an instant! Here it goes: APPLE SAUCE. Grab apples (whatever kind — doesn’t really matter), and maybe some pears if you’re feeling courageous. Core and rough chop. Place in pot. Cover with water until fruit is just submerged. Bring to boil and reduce to simmer until fruit is mushably soft. Remove from heat and blend. Add copious amounts of cinnamon, chopped candied ginger, or ginger syrup to taste. Return to heat and simmer until significantly reduced (depends on the apples you use — at least 20 min, probs less than an hour). You’ll know thickness is correct when sauce begins to spatter & pop. Great hot or chilled.
All the best & enjoy!!
Awesome, thanks Becca. Not sure about the yoga thing, I know it’s good for you and I should take it up, but for right now I’m not quite sure I’m ready for that. But the recipes, especially the soup, look fantastic. I’ve made apple sauce before and love it, I need to do that again.
Cutting out beer on weeknights helped me a lot.
I’d also recommend not giving yourself a hard deadline to lose the weight. They’re rarely realistic and always disappointing. If you keep making good choices, it’ll come off when it comes off.
Completely agree with the hard deadline, but without a goal in mind I tend to slack, but I am writing down my weight daily, so at least I can tell if I’m making progress.
I feel like a shitty person for admitting this, but I’m always secretly happy to learn when men struggle with this, too. I weigh more than I’d like to right now, and I always imagine that it’s such a “women’s problem.” Or if the problem itself isn’t specific to women, then the sense of disappointment and decreased self-worth that comes with weight gain seems to be primarily attached to women.
You can do this. Hell, maybe I’ll start trying again, too. I get myself in these awful-awful-awful mindsets that say, “Well, I’m just gonna fail anyway, so why bother trying?” Really counter-productive.
Thank you for not setting a hard deadline and emphasizing a safe rate. Also keep in mind that as you get closer to your goal, it’ll get harder to lose those last few pounds because your body will have adjusted to the changes you’ve made. It took me 15 months to lose 80 pounds and the pace definitely slowed down towards the end.
You probably already know this, but variety is going to help you out a lot as far as not getting bored or frustrated. This goes both for activities and for meal choices. You might also want to look up some good high-fiber foods to try along with the plant-based proteins. High-fiber will help replace the sense of “fullness” you were getting from regularly eating pasta.
Good luck!