Where Could I Possibly Be Going Wrong?

A

Ace06

New member
Hi, this is my first post on this forum, but I'm starting to get pretty anxious as I've been pretty disciplined with my diet, yet still am not achieving satisfactory results.

Any help would be greatly appreciated, so thanks a ton in advance.

I'm not losing weight to improve my health dramatically per se, rather I would just like to better my appearance for the summer and beyond.

I am 18 years old, I weigh 150 pounds, and am 5'10.5.

After several half-assed attempts at dieting without exercise and then crash dieting, I developed a plan which I thought was pretty well thought-out, but my results apparently say otherwise.

I've calculated that I'm consuming, roughly, 1600 calories per day, 185 grams of carbohydrates, and 20 grams of total fat. I believe I'm meeting my calcium/vitamin A/potassium/vitamin D etc. levels while keeping sodium low as well.

I'll be honest in admitting that I don't know much of anything about how the body works, and although my caloric intake looks low on paper, I'm rarely, if ever, hungry.

In the morning I eat some yogurt with oatmeal, and my mid-day snack is just a banana just to keep me going. I have two meals upon arriving home, spread out between four or five hours, each consisting of a grilled chicken sandwich with lettuce, a bowl of pineapple/watermelon, a mug of herbal tea, some light lemonade, and a bottle or two of water.

I feel quite full after these meals, and I rarely have to resort to any snacks. I am able to drink 4 - 6 bottles of water per day as well.

Shortly before bed, I do 30 minutes of cardio/weight training which is followed by a glass of milk, a bottle of water, a banana, and sometimes a handful of almonds. On a good night, I get 5 hours of sleep, but i do not overeat while awake.

I've lost roughly five pounds, but in the past few weeks I've pretty much stagnated and my belly fat (non-alcoholic beer belly) remains almost totally unchanged.

I have never really looked into my protein/fat/carb percentages or anything like that as I figured that a restriction on my calories + dieting would be good enough. Maybe my metabolism isn't stimulated? Maybe I'm filling up on carbs? I really don't know.

:rant:

Thanks again.
 
I'll be honest that I think the key rests in this: I'm not losing weight to improve my health dramatically per se, rather I would just like to better my appearance

After 20+ years of dieting so that I could "look better", and 20+ years of gaining and losing and choosing crazy diets, and 20+ years of being frustrated ... after all of that I realized that I HAVE to think about being healthy first. If you are healthy in what you eat and how you exercise, then the weight loss will follow. It took me until I was 40 to figure that out. Maybe you can figure it out a little sooner and
not waste as much time as I did. :)

Ok, so that said, I think the reason you're not seeing the movement you want on your weight is that you are already at a healthy weight for your height. 150 lbs at 5'10" is a BMI of 21.5, which is smack dab in the middle of the healthy range. When your body is already a healthy weight, you're going to have a much harder time losing more than someone who has extra weight to lose.

This is where the fallacy of "it's only calories" comes in. Because you can lose weight and get to your goal eating unhealthy food, but you can't build a healthy looking body with muscle definition, no matter how few calories you eat, if what you're eating isn't providing the proper nutrition for your body.

I think at this point what you want is not to lose weight, but to look better, right? To reshape your body so that you look fit and in shape, and not have the belly? And the only way you're going to do that is through eating healthy foods and exercising.

I would recommend working on making protein and veggies the main source of your calories. I'd suggest trying to keep carbs to 40% of your total diet, protein to 35%, and healthy fats to 25%. Start structuring your training with some serious weight lifting alternating days with HIIT cardio (20-30 minutes max). I think you'll be surprised at the effectiveness of this approach.
 
Kara, thanks a ton, I am looking into methods of upping my protein as I type this; any tips on how to modify my current diet?
 
I would be happy to offer some suggestions, but I'd need to know more about your situation. What kind of time do you have to cook and what kind of foods do you like to eat? Are in you school or working? Do you have a place where you can keep foods for lunch refrigerated or can heat them up?

Tell me more about your average day and I'll see what I can suggest.
 
Kara - I've devised a diet and would love some feedback. I haven't been one to count calories or measure out exact food totals, but with my weight loss stagnating, I've decided to give it a try.

I found a carbohydrate/protein/fat calculator, and played the the 40/35/25 numbers a bit before working out a diet which satisfied all of my daily needs.

- Two cups of skim milk and six slices of turkey after a workout; I now exercise first thing in the morning.

- Half a cup of almonds to satisfy my daily fat needs. I feel like taking in all of my fat in one sitting (nearly 30g) may be a bad decision, but I really don't know for sure.

- Two chicken sandwiches, made with brown bread, per day with no mayonnaise/ketchup added and only lettuce as a complement. The total amount of grilled chicken per day amounts to a ton of protein.

- Two small bowls of watermelon.

- Five bottles of water and two mugs of green tea per day.

- A banana and (3/4) a cup of nonfat yogurt when hungry.

I'm not really hungry ever, either.
 
VEGGIES. Where are your veggies?? :)

Ok, basically I'd say it looks ok, except for the veggies thing. Watermelon is yummy, but it's also 90% water. Not a whole lot of nutritional value there. And you can add veggies to a meal w/out adding a lot of calories or skewing your macros too much.

So how about this:
Instead of the skim milk and turkey, go for something like low fat yogurt and fruit (fresh fruit, not the yogurt with the fruit already in it - that has too much sugar). If you eat Greek yogurt, you can get 17g or more of protein per serving. My standard breakfast is yogurt and blueberries - blueberries are a superfood, high in fiber, and lots of vitamins.

The almonds seem ok. I personally want more bang for my buck, but that's just personal choice. I would more likely have something like 1/2 a peanut butter sandwich on whole grain, or 1/2 a banana dipped in almond butter.

Two chicken sandwiches, made with brown bread, per day with no mayonnaise/ketchup added and only lettuce as a complement. Why only lettuce? Add some tomato, some baby spinach instead of lettuce (much more nutrition), some avocado for vitamins and fat (you could cut back on your almonds to accommodate the avocado), some sprouts of some kind (practically no calories and lots of nutrients), etc. Load those sandwiches with veggies to make them really healthy. You can also have mustard of any kind. You can also add 1T of mayo (again and cut back on the almonds) because real mayo (not the light fake kind) has healthy fats in it.

As I mentioned, watermelon isn't a great nutritional choice. Don't get me wrong - I love it and can eat watermelon until it's coming out my ears. It's not UNHEALTHY, it's just not something you should use as your exclusive veggie. Why not have a mixed fruit salad with watermelon in it. Or an apple and an ounce of cheese (more protein). Or sliced veggies and some hummus dip (again, more protein). Even a can of low-sodium v8 is going to provide more nutrition than the watermelon. (FWIW, my favorite afternoon snack before working out is a can of low-sodium v8 and a boiled egg - protein and carbs to get me revved up for working out.)

The banana and nonfat yogurt is fine but keep in mind that bananas are carb/sugar heavy. You don't want to eat too many of them.

Also, this is a personal preference, but something you might keep in mind: I personally don't eat lowfat yogurt unless it's the Greek version. The reason for that is that most commercial lowfat yogurts contain a bunch of artificial ingredients and thickeners (in the form of gelatin) to make up for the reduced fat. I made a conscious decision about 2 years ago to avoid artificial ingredients and processed food as much as I could - so I would much rather spend the calories on full fat yogurt and know I'm eating real food. The only lowfat yogurt I've found that doesn't add stuff for texture is Greek yogurt which is strained. My fave is Fage 2% - 150 cals and 20g protein per 8oz serving.

Hope that helps some.
 
KaraCooks said:
The almonds seem ok. I personally want more bang for my buck, but that's just personal choice. I would more likely have something like 1/2 a peanut butter sandwich on whole grain, or 1/2 a banana dipped in almond butter.
Click to expand...

almond butter :iagree: hell yes.
 
Ace06,

I'd say that weight is not an issue with you. Im not sure what results your after but might I presume that you want to gain some muscle and lose some body fat?

According to info you gave, right now youre caloric balance is around:
11% fat - 46% carbs - 43% protein.

That provides plenty of protein already so I would NOT increase protein if I were you. The fats are low, but if this balance feels good to you then stay with it for a while but...

I have found the 40-30-30 plan to be more conducive to fat burning and muscle building (toning). 40% carbs - 30% fat - 30% prot.

The forementioned 40-35-25 plan is close to this.

Eat too little fat though, and your body may have a harder time metabolizing fat for fuel (ie burning it) research is ongoing on this.

Try exercising earlier in the day - not right before bed.

You need more sleep than five hours, go for at least 6 to 8 per night.

Try stepping up the intensity levels of your exercise. If you having a hard time with that you might want to increase the carbs and fat a bit and drop the protein down some.

Just for reference, for endurance athletes the recomedation is 50-60% carbs minimum. High protein diets will get you to lose weight (fat) but you can pay a price for rapid and unsustainable weight loss (even fat) so be careful.

1600 calories sounds a bit low to me but you should try to figure out you caloric needs based on your daily metabolism (search metabolic rate). Go too low on your cals and your workouts become so lame that they do very little or lead to 'over training syndrome' - much like anorexia it can take years to recover from.

Try eating (adding) a veggie salad with a teaspoon of dressing at your mid day. Gotta get those veggies!

Avoid sugar unless its NEEDED durring a long hard workout to keep you from tanking or passing out.

Nix the soft drinks.

Nix all white breads/starches (see previous exception).

Nix the "creams".

Eat more veggies.

Eat some meats but make it lean - toss the fast food buns in the garbage.

Avoid saturated fat in favor of UNsaturated.

Oatmeal is a super food!

Finally

You bite it , you write it! Record everything you eat for awhile.

In the end, if you calculate and count your caloric needs and metabolic rates accurately enough, with a planned 500-800 daily calorie deficit YOU WILL achieve your weight goals. But...

It gets tricky'r when you have other goals such as "toning" appearance or athletics thrown into the mix. Defining your goals are a key point. Sometimes its easier to separate your goals and focus on them individually.

At any rate, as one person already mentioned a good overall plan focusing on health may be the best approach. Healthy diet, healthy exercise, eventually lead to healthy weight and healthy appearance.

dougster
 
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