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Looking for a new "diet" plan...

3K views 66 replies 24 participants last post by  drgenie 
#1 ·
I've done weight watchers. I can stick with it for awhile and then I fall into bad habits.<br><br>
i need something that will really force me to change my habits but still something i can do slowly.<br><br>
I'd like to lose like 50 pounds. eeekkk! i know. it's a lot. but i'm sick of being fat.<br><br>
any suggestions?<br><br>
btw i have 3 little girls that i have to feed. it needs to be kiddo friendly as well.<br><br>
TIA!
 
#3 ·
I'm pretty excited about a book I picked up at the library yesterday called <i>"Eating for Life."</i> If you saw the book, you'd recognize it. It's by Bill Phillips, who wrote Body for Life, which everyone and their grandmother seems to have read.<br><br><b>Cons:</b> it seems be geared more towards weight lifters who do a little bit of cardio, but I think if you add a couple more servings of complex carbohydrates, the plan will work for distance runners. There's a "commercial" tone to the book. He mentions brand names a lot.<br><br><b>Pros</b> it seems easy to follow and there's no calorie counting. It's all commonsense stuff that I just needed to be reminded of. The recipes look easy to double or triple for a larger family.<br>
It promotes:<br>
Six meals a day, three of which are smaller "midmeals"<br>
Brown rice, not white, and that goes for all other carbs<br>
A protein is the size of your palm, a carb is the size of your fist<br>
Lot of veggies<br><br>
It seems to be getting me into a positive and clean eating mindset, which is good.
 
#5 ·
My suggestion is no specific diet plan. Try to eat 2-5 servings of fruit, and 2-5 servings of vegetables a day-- whole grains, and lean proteins. Limit sweets. Your Calories are naturally limited. Eat small amounts every few hours instead of traditional meals.<br><br>
Thinking "diet" is likely to throw you off. It's better to focus on eating healthfully, and as you do that-- chances are the weight will start to come off.
 
#6 ·
I agree, QN, but for some people it is easier to do what you say if they have a plan that helps them meet those goals.
 
#7 ·
My favorite program by far is Weight Watchers because it teaches/reinforces healthy eating and portion control. If it's been a while since you've done it, maybe check it out again?<br><br>
I will say I lost tons of weight (and became a vegetarian) many years ago with the Fit for Life diet. It's a little too low on calories IMO, but it will really cleanse you in the first few weeks and could jump start your weight loss.
 
#8 ·
I would check out all the WW plans. They have core and flex and rumoured for the new year is a brand new plan that is more of a combination of the two. No diet is going to change your bad habits. It is going to take work on your end to get past your bad habits, or learn how to manage them and be responsible for them, which WW does. You can have an ice cream sundae, you just got to factor it in to your points!
 
#9 ·
I've done WW 3 times. The first time i lost 65 pounds and get preggers with #2. 2nd time I lost 10 pounds and got preggers with #3 (6 months after dd2 was born).<br><br>
i did it last november through may and i lost 30 pounds or so. I've gained about 10 of it back.<br><br>
The problem is that I"m nursing my 16 month old still about 4-5 times a day so it's hard to factor that in plus the activity points. I just found that I could wiggle myself through WW too much.
 
#10 ·
they have a WW program for nursing women i thought, no?
 
#11 ·
Well there's your problem right there! No wonder you don't like WW: every time you do it you get pregnant. <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="http://www.kickrunners.com/forum/images/smilies/biggrin.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="Very Happy"><br><br>
I think the challenge you're going to face is that no diet plan can account for the calories expended from nursing in a precise manner. (WW just gives you more points to eat, right?)<br><br>
Is a nutritionist an option?
 
#12 ·
WW gives me roughly 10 points for nursing. but she fluctuates nursing- somedays it's 3-5 and some days it's all frickin day.<br><br>
I'm just so blah with WW. I guess part of it is that I know that with it I can still eat crap and lose weight. I know if I want to be an athlete that I need to respect my body more and look at it from that stance but being the weight I"m at I have a hard time taking myself seriously.
 
#13 ·
I can relate to that. I could stand to lose fifteen pounds of bodyfat. It's been slowly creeping on because although I run, I don't eat to support the running-I've been eating lots of fatty and refined foods lately.<br><br>
Again, the book I posted above contains commonsense stuff that most of us know anyway and I wouldn't pay money for it. It's not that hard to remember the plan. I think I was attracted to it because it focuses on low-fat and nutrient dense foods that support an active lifestyle. I like the focus on eating for fitness rather than just losing weight.<br><br>
Anyhoo, I hear ya' about wanting to respect your body more and it's athletic capabilities. That's exciting!<br><br><img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="http://www.kickrunners.com/forum/images/smilies/smile.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="Smile">
 
#14 ·
I'm going to try to get the book from the library but if the waiting list is too long I"ll just buy the darn thing. I just know my body is truly capable of doing more. I just want to get to the place where it can.<br><img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="http://www.kickrunners.com/forum/images/smilies/biggrin.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="Very Happy">
 
#15 ·
You could also try one of the online sites that generates menu plans for you. I like having that kind of help, so I don't just grab whatever when I feel hungry.<br><br><a href="http://www.ediets.com" target="_blank">www.ediets.com</a> has a fee for membership, and they have a variety of diet plans you can choose from. I used it for 2 years and it was very helpful<br><br><a href="http://www.sparkpeople.com" target="_blank">www.sparkpeople.com</a> is free, and you can set up what sort of dietary guidelines you want, and it will generate menu plans for you.<br><br><a href="http://health.discovery.com/national-body-challenge/about.html" target="_blank">http://health.discovery.com/national...nge/about.html</a> has a National Body Challenge (next one will be starting in 200<img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="http://www.kickrunners.com/forum/images/smilies/cool.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="Cool"> that generates healthy menus. I still log into the 2007 one when I need an idea for a lunch or breakfast.
 
#16 ·
It seems like there are a lot of free tools online that can do the same for you as WW does or very similar. We just started a WW at work program and while I'm not doing it a lot of my friends are and that's how I know. If I need to gain better control of what I'm eating the best tool for me has been to write it down, either by hand or I use <a href="http://www.dailyplate.com" target="_blank">www.dailyplate.com</a>. It's that accountability that helps for me. Have you kept a food journal before?<br><br>
I like that website the best because it seems to have one of the most comprehensive databases of foods so that you don't have to always enter the information off the label of whatever you are eating. I am not sure if it will do menus for you or not but it will give you calorie recommendations depending on how many pounds per week you want to lose and you can enter your physical activity as well. There is a "gold" membership that gives you more tools for $30 a year or so but I just use the free site.<br><br>
Lisa
 
#20 ·
Ooo. The Daily Plate website is nice. I haven't looked closely at it yet, but does it allow to add your own recipes, and calculate the calories for it like sparkpeople does?
 
#21 ·
I think it does but I haven't used that feature very much. I think the number of ingredients you can list and the types of measurements (ounces, teaspoons, etc) are limited, but that may be different if you have the full membership. I bought a recipe program called RecipeCalc (I think) a while back ($10-$15--you download a 30-day trial version and then pay if you want to keep it) that I use instead if I need it to calculate the nutritional information and then just put it in as a custom food in on TDP.<br><br>
One of my favorite features is their list of previously eaten foods--you can keep it indefinitely and go back and pick everything you've eaten for the day without having to do a complete search again. You can also make a custom "meal" and then just click on that one time to put all the foods in that meal in your day's calories.<br><br>
The one thing I am a little leery of using on TDP is I think their calculations on the number of calories burned for a fitness activity run on the high side--about 20% higher than what my HRM will show. But I like that it has a very large selection of activities to pick from--but no nursing, sorry Bikegirl!
 
#22 ·
Cool, it's one of the features I really liked on sparkpeople. I have slacked off on keeping a record, mostly because I don't change what I eat much, and have been maintaining pretty well. I am generally within about 5lbs of a good weight for me.
 
#23 ·
You should look into the WW Core plan. It's all about good, healthy foods, with 35 weekly points built in for stuff not on the Core list. Like bread.<br><br>
You don't have to track points for stuff on the list (brown rice, veggies, fruits, FF milk, etc). It's really a good plan.<br><br>
That said, I do flex because it's easy for me. I find that just the act of tracking keeps me on track. I keep wanting to do core, but it's not very suited to eating out, and we do that a lot. There is a whole message board on Core on the WW site, check it out.
 
#24 ·
The only eating plans that are truly healthy are the well rounded ones that allow you to eat what you want in moderation but restrict cals (but not too much). WW is one, there are others. The key too all of them is sticking to them. If you do not stick to the plan, it is not going to work. If you don't stick to it the plan doesnt work.
 
#25 ·
MG is right. It's about making up your mind that you are going to get healthy.<br><br>
I used to weigh 255 lbs. One morning, I woke up and was tired of being fat. I got online and looked at WW. I had never ever in my life been on a specific diet. I had no idea what WW even was. So I used the website (no meetings then for me) and over the next year I took off 80 lbs, slowly and the right way. I changed my entire lifestyle. Did I have bad days/weeks? Yes, but throughout I knew that I was READY to make this big change.<br><br>
I still have weight to lose. But I've made some serious changes to my lifestyle, and lowered my cholesterol significantly, and now I can run 11+ miles at a time. There is no way in hell that I ever thought I could do that 6 years ago when I started WW.<br><br>
Now I'm not just saying WW is the way to go, simply that you have to be ready to commit to these changes forever. There are many healthy kid friendly recipes out there, and by helping your kids learn this stuff now, they hopefully won't have to go through the same struggles that you (we) are going thru as adults.<br><br>
I have not given up anything, food wise. I'll never follow some plan that outlaws anything. I eat ice cream, pizza, etc. But I plan for it, and do it in moderation. It took me YEARS to figure this out.<br><br>
You CAN do it. If I, the perpetual chubby one of all my friends, and eventually the fat one, can do it, so can you. But the key is being ready. <img alt="" class="inlineimg" src="http://www.kickrunners.com/forum/images/smilies/smile.gif" style="border:0px solid;" title="Smile">
 
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