Amy's weight loss diary

Ooh, that sounds really yummy! I think I may have to try this tonight.

About how much of the brown sugar and yogurt do you use?

Also, good work with the photos!
 
Tonight precisely, I used an apple (103g- 3.63oz), 30g sultanas (1.06oz), 10g sugar (0.35oz), and I meant to use 160g yoghurt (3.64 oz) but accidentally poured 169, and given the consistency I probably should've opted for more like 80g (2.82oz). (Google conversion is my friend :D )

And thank you :)
 
Hehe. This may make me a nerd, but having weights for food seems to make it easier for me! (And my food scale does grams and oz - I normally use grams anyway because it's more accurate!).

This is also helpful given my experiments in baking - volume can be so finicky but mass doesn't change ;)

I think I'll try this tonight though!
 
Having weights for food makes it so much more accurate, and makes me feel better about the whole process. Have you seen that video where she weighs oats and peanut butter, and the eyeballed cup/ spoon versus the scale is an 82 calorie difference? Yikes.

(I do grams because that's all I can do- I was brought up in Australia and we converted to metric nearly 20 years before I was born, so "feet" makes me think of the things you put shoes on, "stone" makes me think of rocks, "pound" makes me think of money or hitting things, and oz makes me think of Australia- Land of Oz)
 
Hehe, I do pounds for heavier things, but for cooking grams just works better!

And yeah... I watched the video you're talking about and it's crazy. Not to mention that food labels can be off by as much as 10% in either direction for nutrition. 10% of 2000 calories is a lot!
 
Wow, I didn't know that. That's potentially scary and damaging to my weight loss efforts. (Although presumably in theory if I was eating 10% more than I thought- I rely pretty heavily on nutritional labels- then my weight loss would stall and I'd just cut some calories)
 
Food diary time.

Friday 13 May

Breakfast: 45g of oats, made with water, topped with 100ml of milk and 80g raspberries. Cup of tea with 52ml milk. Subtotal: 236 calories, 11g protein, 38g carbs, 4g fat
Snack: apple (113g). Subtotal: 56 calories, 13g carbs
Lunch: roast potato (199g potatoes, 6g olive oil, under a gram of pepper, under a gram of salt, 1g of dried rosemary, 1g of dried thyme) with a side of sauteed veggies (10 sprays Frylight, 134g onion, 5g garlic, 180g zucchini, 149g mushroom, 100g tomato). Subtotal: 324 calories, 14g protein, 54g carbs, 8g fat
Snack: 74g kiwi fruit. Subtotal 36 calories, <1g protein, 7g carbs, <1g fat
Snack: 2 rye crackers, 50g of Branston pickle, cup of ice tea (198ml concentrate). Subtotal: 128 calories, 2g protein, 26g carbs, <1g fat
Cup of tea with 59ml milk. 20 calories, 2g protein, 2g carbs, <1g fat (and 1% of aim)
Dinner: Soy marinade chicken with 50g basmati rice. Subtotal: 596 calories, 27g protein, 70g carbs, 23g fat.
Dessert: 103g apple, 30g sultanas, 10g brown sugar, 169g Greek yoghurt. Subtotal: 314 calories, 10g protein, 56g carbs, 4g fat
Dessert 2: 8g (last of the) chocolate. Subtotal: 43 calories, 4g carbs, 2g fat.
Total: 1757 calories, 70g protein, 276g carbs, 44g fat, you-don't-want-to-know on sodium. Total split 15% protein, 62% carbs, 23% fat.

Weigh in tomorrow morning. And hopefully gym.
 
Yummmm baked apple is the shizzzz.
Good luck with your weigh in today, babeee.

Also, what is the video where the woman is weighing out food/eye balling it?
 
Here's the one: (it doesn't really tell you anything that I haven't already said- weighing is more accurate than measuring and there can be some horrific results if you mismeasure)

Down another half a kilogram today (it's gone from "I can count the marks between 65 and 69 but the 70 one's definitely after", to the marker being dead on 69). I was a bit disappointed to be honest, although it's about what I'm eating. I was hoping that last week's drop was a blip because of the binge. (Actually, I'm sort of hoping that today's continued slowdown is a result of all that sodium yesterday, but I digress) I said to myself that I'd recalculate my calories when I'd lost 5kg (as it's about 1/3 of the way, and it's a roundish number- well, 10 is a roundish number but I don't have enough of those). It'll be interesting as those numbers go down how well I can stick to the program, because my appetite's unchanged. I'll have to make some tweaks to my food.

New goals (calculated from ):
BMR: 1500.5
Calories (rounded to nearest calorie):
  • Maintenance: 2326 calories/ day
  • Minimum (to lose a kilo a week) 1226 calories/ day
  • Maximum (to lose half a kilo a week): 1776 calories/ day
Protein: Pitching at 25% (towards the high end of standard guidelines), which at 1776 calories is 111g a day.
Carbs: Pitching at 50% (towards the low end of standard guidelines), which at 1776 calories is 247g a day.
Fat: Pitching at 25% (middle of the range standard guidelines), which at 1776 calories is 49g a day.
 
I'm doing a little bit of googling as I'm worried about my cut in calories and whether I can maintain it. I'm not advocating nor planning to go on this diet, but this is quite interesting:

I might look into that and try some more of it. I have a massive appetite (I can out-eat most guys I know), so restricting my calories further is going to be a challenge. I don't want to go hungry, and will have trouble going hungry/ not eating regularly because of my blood sugar issues.

Plus I need to drink more water. I drank two very large glasses of water before I had breakfast, cut down on the berries and the milk, and am absolutely stuffed full right now. I probably don't drink enough water in any case.

I think I might start recording how much water and other caffeine-free liquid I drink. I think I need accountability there too. My calorie counter reckons I should be drinking between 2.7 and 13.5 litres a day (what?!!!)- I'd guess I drink somewhere between 1.5 and 2, and I can see 2.5-3 being realistic.
 
I think I've overdone this water thing already. Drink constantly and you shouldn't feel hungry, right? Well I'm not hungry, but I do feel a bit sick. Reckon I've had about 1.5 litres of water today (I didn't measure the first two glasses, so estimated, have measured the rest).

And I probably should be hungry, it's lunchtime. This will take some getting used to.
 
Lunch: this is a bit of an experiment as I'm consciously looking to lower my calories now. See how filling I find this.

It's 108g potato, boiled, with 159g steamed zucchini, 70g tomato, 120g light cottage cheese, pepper, paprika, and mild chilli powder. The cottage cheese on top of hot stuff has gone a bit funny (looks funny, tastes fine), but this is really, really nice and quite filling. 203 calories, 16g protein, 32g carbs, 2g fat, 11% of sodium allowance. (As compared to a typical lunch of rye bread, cottage cheese, tomato and spices- 245 calories, 12g protein, 44g carbs, 2g fat, 48% of sodium allowance)
 
I take back everything I've ever said about drinking water not being good for losing weight. I've eaten way less than I normally would have done by this time of day, and I haven't been hungry. Maybe this cutting calories thing isn't going to be so bad.

Also, sometimes I hate living across the road from a pub. Apparently there's been some sort of soccer on? (I make it my job to not give a **** about these things). They've been singing outside my window for about three hours, and if it weren't a group of about 20 burly blokes I'd go out and give them a piece of my mind. Especially with the rounds about "f*cking whores". Charming.
 
I think I'm officially losing my mind. I've had under 1200 calories today (1153 at the moment) and I'm not hungry. It's about 9:20pm, I'm tired, and I want to go to bed, but I'm not hungry. A very small, stupid part of my brain is telling me it doesn't matter if I'm a little under 1200 today as I'm usually so far over, It goes against everything I tell people here but I can sort of see it right now.

Water is defintely good for weight loss. As is eating a lot more cottage cheese than I had been before today. My appetite is under control... the problem is I eat mostly low calorie density foods and so this leaves me with a big deficit. Maybe I should eat to my new minimum from now on? (or at least have that in the back of my mind as a possible plan and see how it goes)

I'm a little bit concerned that my macros are way off what I want them to be. Currently sitting at a 22:63:14 (P/C/F) split. Not sure how important it is but it bothers me that I have these goals and I'm nowhere near them.
 
Chocolate solves everything. I'm now (or will be when I finish this) over 1200 and the safe minimum I set myself. Food diary time. (Tomorrow I must get back to the gym, hopefully I'll sleep properly tonight. Thankfully the yobs seem to have gone home)

Saturday 14 May

Breakfast: 45g oats, 60g frozen raspberries, 76ml milk. Approx (didn't weigh, based on subsequent weighing of water in glass) 670ml water to drink. Subtotal: 204 calories, 8g protein, 33g carbs, 3g fat, 26.8mg sodium (2%). Split P16/C67/F17.
408ml water. (16.3mg sodium)
Lunch: 108g boiled potato, 70g tomato, 159g zucchini, 120g cottage cheese, pepper, paprika, mild chilli powder. 369ml water. Subtotal: 203 calories, 16g protein, 32g carbs, 2g fat, 274.2mg sodium (18% of allowance). Split P29/C60/F11
Snack: 95g plum, cup of tea (259ml water), 37ml milk. Subtotal: 56 calories, 1g protein, 12g carbs, <1g fat (1%). No sodium detected. Split P13/C82/F5
Snack: 120g apple. 60 calories, negligible protein, 14g carbs, negligible fat. Interestingly, split 3/95/2
Dinner: serve of orange-lemon spiced chicken with 50g couscous, 205g raw carrots and 375ml drinking water. Subtotal: 561 calories, 36g protein, 80g carbs, 10g fat, 242.4mg sodium (16% of allowance). Split P26/C57/F17
Dessert: 60g frozen raspberries and a serve of my homemade ice cream. Subtotal: 67 calories, 2g protein, 6g carbs, <1g fat (1% of allowance), 14.5mg sodium (1% of allowance). Split P15/C76/F9
Nightcap: 7g Cadbury bourneville cocoa with 210ml milk and a teaspoon (under a gram, estimated as 0.6g based on calorie reading it should be giving me) of sucralose. Subtotal: 98 calories, 8g protein, 11g carbs, 1g fat, 49mg sodium (3% of allowance). Split P36/C49/F16.

Total: 1252 calories (71% of new allowance- 1776, and 26 calories over new minimum), 74g protein, 191g carbs, 20g fat, 623.3mg sodium (42% of allowance). Split 23% protein, 62% carbs, 14% fat. Not sure how much, if any, of a problem this is.

Pleased, albeit slightly baffled, by my eating today and that I've eaten so little with no discomfort.
 
Damn. Forgot to add. Total water consumption (presumably including in some of my food) 2508.2ml. Which I'm pretty happy with.
 
Amy, looking at your new nutrition goals you don't need that much protein, at your weight and taking your lifting routine into account you need between 82.8 and 90 grams.

When I work through my nutrition requirements with my nutritionist what I need to eat is based in grams calculated from current bodyweight and training program. I have a minimum protein level, maximum fat level and the rest up to my calorie limit is carbs.

PS who won the soccer game (FA Cup) I was to tired last night to stay up and watch :D
 
Thanks for that, I'll alter it (is 20% more reasonable?). I'm sort of stabbing in the dark with the nutritional guidelines a bit. I read somewhere that more protein is good for not losing/ gaining muscle (and I certainly don't want to lose too much muscle, although if I want to gain I'll think about it after I lose the weight). Is my fat (I had 14% today) too low? I'm not really trying to eliminate fat or anything, I just have low fat things because I'm used to them (and generally prefer them) and they're lower calorie.

Man City won the FA cup, and Man United won the premier league. Manchester's probably going to be noisy tonight (although at least everyone's happy, I suppose, rather than some stupid United/ City rivalry)...

Edit to add: 20% protein gives me 93g assuming I eat at 1776 calories. Presumably less if I pitch it lower (I have no idea if this very low business is going to become a trend, it wasn't a huge imposition today). I've adjusted to 20-60-20, and I'll see how I go.
 
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that sounds ok, my fat levels are set really low at 20 gram but my nutritionist said that if I wanted to go for the cut bodybuilder look I would have to drop it to 15 grams lol. She had to consult a colleague who specialises in weight lifters and bodybuilders to get my nutrition right so you shouldn't need to cut fat as low as I do.

Hubby will be happy when he wakes up he is a United fan (He is English)
 
The United fans around here weren't too pleased about the FA Cup- they were all cheering for Stoke, lol (I live across the road from a pub and the lyrics "with a nick nack paddywhack give a dog a bone, why don't City **** off home?" must have been repeated several dozen times over the course of a few hours).

I must go to the gym today. I sort of wake up in the morning and think "blah, I don't wanna do anything", which leads to me not doing very much. And I should probably go soon so I can get my shopping in, I'm running stupidly low on vegetables which I'll need for today. I also want to try cauliflower rice- it's a low carb/ raw food trick but it's significantly lower calorie than regular rice, it looks like, even if I have a big serving. Could be interesting, because cauliflower is one of a very few things that I hate. Like :puke: hate.
 
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