Weight-Loss 3 months till summer challenge

Weight-Loss
sounds great. I'll have to enter what I eat into fitday. I don't know any other way to calculate fiber intake. I hope its included on that site.
 
I believe that fitday do calculate fiber for you.

I actually dont use fitday or one of the similar food diary sites on a regular basis. I really hate to count calories (since it introduces a psychological danger zone for me) - but I do stick to very healthy food. I do stick to a very repetitive diet. I have a basic food plan that I repeat every day and I slot in one of a handful of main meals.

When I set up the new food plan I do all the sums with pen and paper - looking up all the values on the internet.
 
Just a quick reminder that the week runs from Monday to Sunday so you only get points for activity done on those 7 days. There isnt really a half point situation generally - so for instance - I drank quite a lot of water when in hospital on Friday but I had no way of knowing that I had enough water so I could not claim the points.

I hope that everyone is getting in their fibre. If anyone is wondering about how to get their fibre in - cereals are often great as are fruit and vegetables. Tins of baked beans are wonderful - so a light meal of a tin of baked beans on wholemeal bread toast would make a huge difference. My other secret weapon in fibre consumption is having a pear as a snack.

I have never needed to resort to it - but fibre supplements do count for the challenge.

I know that some people swear by specialist cereals.
 
Thanks for the fiber tips! I really needed them. Today was an awful day as far as fiber for me. It is surprising to realize how little I got in. I am not usually a cereal eater, but I think I'll swing by the store tomorrow and pick up some high fiber stuff. I also like the bean idea.

I think this challenge is going to make me do a complete overhaul of my usual meals - toast in morning, crackers as a snack, lunch is usually a sandwich with an apple. Dinner varies more, so that's a plus.

Peg
 
It is amazing how many people eat out of habit with no real consideration of whether we are eating in a balanced way - and think that we are doing fine.

I thought that I was eating in a nutritionally healthy way for many years - but I have certainly improved things over the past year. I have spoken to quite a lot of doctors on this forum that have realised that there was room for improvement in their own diets once they sat down and did the sums. We can even know the rules but that does not mean that we apply it to ourselves.

It is as easy to follow a good habit as a bad one.

I last balanced my food plan between pages 81 and 83 of my diary. I think that the summary was on page 83. If anyone is stuck for ideas they can look there and see what I eat and how much fibre it gives.
 
omg, i try soo hard, but i cant seem to break the 25g of fiber/day marker.. 21g, no prob...
I just cant seem to find any more fiber and still have calories left over to do it with...
I might have to resort to taking a fiber supplement in addition to my multivitamin.
 
That is good Jonny as it has allowed us to identify an area of your habitual foodplan than has room for improvement. I am sure that you will feel the benefit as the balance is optimised. I now eat far better than I used too and am full of energy too.

As I understand it - the problem with fibre supplements is that they cost quite a few calories. I have never needed to resort to them. My fibre is often sky high with all my cereal, fruit and veg.

I had a tin of baked beans as part of my main meal today. That is 18.4g just in the beans for 210 calories. I am just tucking into an evening snack of two pears.

It may amuse you to know that in the last challenge that set this for a week - my friend Dawn misread the question and was aiming for and hitting 50g per day. I know that she used a high fibre cereal to get consistently up that high. She got quite a bit of teasing for making that mistake!
 
The third mini challenge that I am setting for us runs for 1 week from Monday 28th April until Sunday 4th May. It comes in two parts - the first part being dietary and the second part pertaining to exercise. I again freely admit to having cut and pasted aspects of this from other challenges.

Dietary aspect:

Protein is important in any diet, whether you're trying to lose weight or not.
Studies have shown that getting enough protein is an important componant to losing more fat and less muscle. The following article goes into more detail.

Protein + Exercise May Promote Weight Loss

Remember, meat isn't the only way to get protein. Fruit, vegetables and legumes (lentils and beans) also have decent amounts of protein. You can also get protein from protein shakes or protein powder. Dairy and eggs also have protein.

This week's bonus is to eat at half your weight in lbs in grams of protein. So if you weigh 200lbs, you should eat at least 100g of protein per day. You should get most of your protein from lean protein like chicken breast, fish, lean cuts of beef, etc, as opposed to fatty protein. Generally, 1oz of lean meat has about 5g of protein. So you would need to eat about 20oz of lean meat to get 100g of protein. 2 sunpoints for each day

If someone has their protein each day of the week they will earn 14 sunpoints.

Exercise aspect: – same as last week
I will give 0.5 sunpoint for every 15 minutes of exercise completed during the week. The weekly maximum is 5 hours.
If someone did 5 hours of exercise (or more) across the whole week I would give them 10 sunpoints.
Any form of exercise is acceptable - cardio or strength. I personally do a lot of exercise walking and this certainly counts.

This means that everyone has the opportunity to earn up to 24 sunpoints over the next week.
 
I notice that people havent been updating their scoresheet for a while - is anyone still doing this challenge?

Do speak out if you are trying and having difficulties.

If there is no feedback an no-one updates their scoresheet - I will not set any further mini-challenges.
 
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Hi Omega!

Haven't checked in for a while, but am still trying. I didn't lose last week, but really improved my fiber intake! I can't believe how much more full I felt with all that extra fiber. I was surprised that the scale didn't go down, but I will keep working on it. Also, I slipped in my water intake. So this week I am going to try to keep up my water and fiber.

Your new challenge will be just that for me, and a big one! Again, like the fiber I don't know how much protein I consume on a daily basis. So, I've lost two days of this challenge so far, but I aim to succeed for the rest of the week!

Peg
 
Hi Peg

It's good to see you - I was beginning to get lonely again.....

Nutrition is such a strange thing. We go along and think that we are doing ok with it - but when we start doing the sums we see where our problems are. A little fine tuning is often needed to set things so that we are getting enough of the good things.

It is one good thing about having a very repetitive diet. Once I do the sums - I can have a good idea that things are balanced just about right if I do not veer too far off the course.

Both water and fibre are important for your diet. It is well worth keeping up both these behaviours and they work well together to keep you regular, healthy and feeling full. It is actually possible to eat a lot of fibre and get constipated if you are not drinking sufficient water.

Protein is one where I do have to tweak things though. I had been in the habit of cutting my afternoon protein hit - and it did mean that the numbers werent quite as high as they should be. I reintroduced the protein hit yesterday - so it will be interesting to see if I lose any weight. I suspect that I have got into the habit of nibbling away those calories in extra honey shreddies (a cereal that I love and eat like junk food!)

Take care
Love
Margaret
 
I notice that people havent been updating their scoresheet for a while - is anyone still doing this challenge?

Do speak out if you are trying and having difficulties.

If there is no feedback an no-one updates their scoresheet - I will not set any further mini-challenges.

Hi Margaret, sorry i'v been away for a while.. i had zero warning on a 2 week business trip with extreemly limited internet access.
Just got back, and i even lost weight while i was gone (not much lost, but at least none gained).

I'm back now and hope to get back on track and start posting more often.
 
Jonny - Great to see you back too. I know how easy it is for things to crop up. No sooner did I start setting the mini challenges and promise you a new one on the following Saturday when I was taken into hospital on the Wednesday, had emergency surgery on the Thursday and was not released from hospital until the Saturday afternoon English time. Luckily I was still able to set the challenge when I got home and due to time zone differences - it probably seemed like it was there on the Saturday morning! A close shave!!!

Well done for losing weight while you were away. It is great that you are still working on your project.

The challenge this week is to get enough protein. We all know that we have to eat some protein - but as with other things - it can be quite hard to get it at the right level. If you are looking for ideas - feel free to check out my diary. I list my food each day.

In all honesty you would benefit from adopting all the challenge behaviours over the long term. They each should help you fine tune your diet so that you provide your body with high grade fuel. We already knew that a healthy diet was not just eating everything that looked appetising - if you could do that we would not have got big in the first place. A healthy diet is so much more than simply making your daily calorie total come to a certain magic number too.

Take care
Love
Margaret
 
So I'm feeling frustrated. I have worked hard these last few weeks improving my diet as part of the challenge, and trying to take what I have learned into the coming weeks. I feel my diet has really improved - I'm sure it still needs lots more work - but I'm feeling much healthier without so many sugar cravings.

This week I have spent 12+ hours landscaping, went on a 3 mile walk, and worked out at the gym 3 times totaling 2.5 hours. I am achy sore everywhere.

But, not only did I not lose, I am actually up 2 pounds!!! I am quite grumpy to be back at my starting point. I actually thought I'd see a big drop on the scale number this week. Ugggghhhhh.

I'm not giving up or losing motivation, just wanted to vent my frustration. There, venting done.

Peg
 
Hi Peg

I am sorry that you are not getting the weightloss that you deserve. Weightloss is a strange thing in that we would like to expect that things would go down in a nice predictable manner. In fact there are a lot of factors that effect our weight - things like water retention, time of the month, toilet activity. It may interest you to check out the weigh every day club. I post my weight there each day and you will see that a lot of people have weeks where their weight does not go down or may even go up - despite them working really hard.

My body is acting a bit oddly this month (probably due to post operative shock and the excessive gain that I experienced) but I have a definite track record of my body operating on a 4 week cycle where I lose all my weight over 2 weeks of the month, start retaining water a week before TOM and spending two weeks struggling to get back to my pre-TOM low.

Your body is bound to be appreciating the effort that you are putting in - and it will work so much better on all the quality fuel that you are giving it. Naturally we have to ensure that the calories are hitting about the right level for weightloss - but I am sure that you will be doing that.

It is really great that you are not getting the same sugar cravings. This will not only help weightloss but things like the state of your teeth and complexion.

I do not count calories on a day to day basis - but I solve that by sticking to a pretty repetitive diet and calculating the calories and other nutrient values when I adopt a new food plan.

Stick with it and keep up the firm control of your food and regular exercise and the weightloss will happen.

Take care
Love
Margaret
 
The fourth mini challenge that I am setting for us runs for 1 week from Monday 5th May until Sunday 11th May. It comes in two parts - the first part being dietary and the second part pertaining to exercise.

Dietary aspect:

I am sure that we have all heard of the concept of at least 5 portions of fruit or vegetables being central to adopting good nutrition.





Some interesting information about fruit and veg:




My challenge to you for this week is to make sure that you have 5 portions of fruit or vegetables each day. 2 sunpoints for each day

If someone has sufficient fruit and veg each day of the week they will earn 14 sunpoints.

The wonderful thing is that fruit and veg generally contain fibre and some protein – so if you are trying to continue the good habits that you have developed in previous weeks – some food ticks a number of boxes.

Also – since fruit is naturally sweet – it can help to satisfy sugar cravings.

Exercise aspect: – same as last week
I will give 0.5 sunpoint for every 15 minutes of exercise completed during the week. The weekly maximum is 5 hours.
If someone did 5 hours of exercise (or more) across the whole week I would give them 10 sunpoints.
Any form of exercise is acceptable - cardio or strength. I personally do a lot of exercise walking and this certainly counts.

This means that everyone has the opportunity to earn up to 24 sunpoints over the next week.
 
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Hi Margaret,

Thanks for your words of encouragement. You are so sweet! I think I am going to start tracking my weight so I can see if there is any pattern to my weight loss. Maybe I won't be so annoyed if I can look back like you do and see that it is part of a cycle.

Also - thanks for the links - good info on why it is important - and I loved the one that goes in depth about the fruits/veggies. I bookmarked it for future reference. I like the challenge! Thanks for always thinking up creative ways to help us in our weight loss efforts.

Peg
 
Hi Peg

I am more than happy to help you focus on your project. So many people make a mistaken assumption that a calorie is a calorie - and as long as the numbers add up to give a magic number they are eating sensibly for weight control. We think that we know the basics - but my diet has certainly improved as I have lost weight and become more knowledgeable.

If you check out page 108 of my diary you will see that I get the pattern of weightloss that I outlined above. I literally talked one of my chums through the duration of a challenge because she didnt believe me because as luck had it - I did ok in the challenge.

http://weight-loss.fitness.com/weight-loss-diary/15690-omega-s-journey-108.html

A lot of experts say that we shouldnt weigh every day - and it certainly wouldnt suit everyone. Having said that - it certainly suits me and it certainly suits some of my chums.

I keep a spreadsheet and I keep info on what I weigh (so I can see the daily weight variation), eat, exercise plus things to do with toilet habits and medical / period info. It has helped me pinpoint some food that work particularly badly for me (irrespective of calorie content) and which food works particularly well. I have an amazing track record of weight loss with a baked salmon meal which is not particularly low in calories compared to some of my other meals. I think that it works out that I lose weight about 14 times out of every 15 times that I eat it. The weightloss might just be a fifth of a pound - but that kind of track record is still pretty amazing.

I gain weight every time I eat cheese no matter how small a prewrapped factory measured slice. I suspect that is because of the sodium content of cheese.

Take care
Love
Margaret
 
Hi Margaret,

I just checked out your diary - wow! I am amazed that not only do you have a ledger of daily weights, but how you also link it to what it happening in your life. I find it very encouraging. And, I can't wait until I have enough data that I can look at it and see what is happening as clearly as you do. That's a great idea! Thanks for sharing it.

I did really well today. I ate healthy, got in exercise, and almost made my water quota. Just going to keep chugging along. Didn't weigh in - I thought if I saw 190 again I'd get depressed and be bad.

Hope your weekend is going spectacular!

Peg
 
Hi Peg

My weekend is going well thanks. I hope that yours is too. I have just got back from my morning walk (6.6 miles today) and the weather stayed pleasant throughout.

Well done for another good day with both nutrition and exercise. That will get you to where you want to be. Try not to get too depressed at the number on the scale. I can assure you that I was feeling pretty slim long before I got to see numbers like 190. It is just a point on your journey and you pass through it to get to where you want to be.

I am pleased that you like the idea of my spreadsheet. It certainly works for me to treat my weightloss project as a scientific experiment and capture as much data as possible. You dont always know how things will pan out - but it certainly is interesting when you start spotting patterns. If I did not understand how my weightloss followed certain patterns (that I have little control over) I would be more inclined to feel disappointed during the weeks when I can now predict that nothing will happen. It helps me to tailor my expectations to suit the likely events. As it is - I can see that my weight is generally taking a downward trend and I can handle the short term gains. We all get day to day fluctuations.

Now that I have been on my project for over 14 months - I have quite a lot of data in my spreadsheet. Not every weight gain is easily explained - but it is fun trying to understand why the body reacts as it does.

Take care
Love
Margaret
 
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