My patience is running out.

EIREKAJANE - i dont understand how you cannot find enought healthy calories to eat in a day, i could list them as long as BOTH arms, i dont get what you are struggling with.

eating 1200 calories is not very healthy and not sustainable, you said it in your owns words that you are struggling to do it. you must find a healthy balance for yourself and i feel your sanity!
 
erikajune said:
I always put sliced almonds in my salad. I have either soup or a sandwich for lunch with a salad (usually with a bunch of cucumbers). Always a non-fat dressing.

I almost always have 3/4 - 1 cup of yogurt (non-fat) for breakfast with two different fruits on the side (usually an orange or a banana or a cup of raspberries or grapes). Or Cinnamin Puffins (that crap is nasty).

I LOVE granola but have been avoiding it because of the carbs. You think that's ok to throw it in my yogurt?

In the afternoon I have either celery with peanut butter or Wasa crispbread with light Laughing Cow cheese spread (that stuff is actually good! I was afraid to try it!).

For supper I have either chicken (baked with a tiny bit of grated cheese and salsa on it) or wholegrain battered fish or eggs with half a plate of baked veggies.

It seems my carbs are rediculously high everyday. They are usually in the 160ish mark and I'm lucky if my protein hits the 60s. My fat is pretty good, between 35-50 per day. Or at least I think that's good?
Click to expand...

You know, after reading through your posts again, I think I see what might be wrong. And, unfortunately, there aren't enough cats in hats to fix the problem. But, seriously...

I think you're trying too hard. You're just thinking about this waaaaay too much. Don't worry so much about how many carbs or grams of protein that you're eating everyday. It just seems like you're driving yourself crazy by trying to get everything so perfect; low carbs, just enough protein, lean meats, etc.

Eat whateeeeever you want - just do it in moderation.

Eating celery and baked vegetables is fine, but it has to be driving you crazy. Eat some pizza, chug some Pepsi and down a piece of chocolate cake every once in a while. There's nothing wrong with that. But, if you try and eat such a super healthy, unrealistic diet that is filled with bland vegetables and tasteless meats, it's just going to drive you crazy.

I hate hearing it so much myself, but..."everything in moderation" - even the healthy stuff. Personally, if I didn't kick back and eat some shitty junk food every once in a while, I would've quit trying to lose weight a looooong time ago.
 
Ah, thank you so much you guys. It IS driving me crazy. I weighed myself this morning and gained back 3 lbs. I've been trying SO HARD. SO DAMN HARD to eat really healthy and I work out, too. And to see that gain when I've done nothing "bad" really, really hurts my motivation and my confidence. I feel like I'm never going to "get" this.

I'm struggling to figure out why it seemed so easy when I lost the first 80+ lbs. I didn't even count calories then! LOL Maybe you're right - I am probably obsessing.

Ben, I am completely uncultured when it comes to food and I hate to cook - probably because I'm uncultured. It is hard for me to come up with different things to eat.

Chef, the only thing that isn't driving me crazy is my baked veggies and celery. Those I could eat every day for the rest of my life. LOL Everything else - coming up with new things, etc., is driving me crazy. I don't really get bored or sick of food - I'm used to eating a lot of the same things - it used to be McDonald's, now it baked veggies and chicken breasts. LOL

And I do allow myself to cheat. Every Friday I eat whatever I want. I usually end up eating 2500 calories those days....

Kara - non fat because well, it has no fat, LOL. I'm a little afraid to eat all those calories in a DRESSING. To me it's like drinking away my calories. But I'll try that out.

I'm going to find an idiot proof healthy cookbook and try some new dishes this weekend. Who knows, maybe I do like Salmon. LOL

I really appreciate everyone's input. I know I must sound like an idiot. I'm really not! I just grew up eating food out of boxes so I need to learn.
 
You know ... if you're willing to try things, that's all it really takes. :)

And the other thing is, if you're happy eating the same thing every day, or the same 4 or 5 things every week, then there is NOTHING wrong with that. Don't feel like you have to eat fancy or fix up new things every week. I do it because I love to cook and I love to experiment. But at the same time, I eat the same thing for breakfast EVERY SINGLE DAY. :D

And it's easy because I know exactly what I'm going to eat, it tastes good, it's not fancy-schmancy, and I can eat it w/out thinking about it in the morning before my brain has engaged. :)

So if you come up with 5 or 6 things for dinner that all have close to the same amount of calories and that are simple to fix, then you can just interchange them depending on what you're in the mood for. It also makes shopping easy, because you know exactly what to buy each week at the store. :)

So say you were to make a list and say every week you're going to have:
baked chicken breast and veggies
baked salmon and veggies
an omelet with veggies on the side
a hamburger (yes, you *can* have a healthy hamburger)
tacos (yes, you *can* have healthy tacos, too)
spaghetti with sauce and veggies
a free day to eat whatever you like

YOu don't have to assign days to them. You can come home on Monday and say "today I feel like spaghetti". And boom - you've made a decision for dinner because you're working from a short list and you know you have the ingredients in the house. So you make it and cross it off your list. Tuesday you come home and go "gee, tacos sound good". Boom - another dinner decision. No stress, no fuss. And so on the rest of the week.

And next Monday you start the list all over again.

Maybe if you're feeling adventurous one night, you say "gosh I want to try something new" and so you hit the web or you look up something in a cookbook. Or you even post here and say "Hey everone - I have ground turkey at home. What can I make tonight that's simple?" and then you run with it.

Or you aren't feeling adventurous and you stick with the same thing as last week ... no fuss, no muss.

The thing is, when you're not used to cooking and you've never done much of it before, you (not you specifically, but in general - people) tend to blow it out of proportion. Oh my god I can't do that. I can't make fancy stuff. I don't know what dicing or mincing means. I CAN'T COOK!!!!!!!!!

And then they freak and then they don't even try. :)

But all cooking is, at it's most basic, is taking food and heating it until it's done. Everything else is details. :) And I"m happy to share recipes and ideas - I can cook simply or not. If you give me a list of ingredients, I can give you probably 5 ideas of something easy and quick to make ... and I'm happy to do so. :)
 
I may just take you up on that!

1) I LOVE spicy. The hotter, the better. I need some spice ideas.
2) I love chicken & turkey, any beef, pork. I haven't tried ground turkey but I will try it! It would be nice to know how to prepare meat other than baking it plain. I would like to make fish (that's not out of a box) but I don't know how to cook it or how to flavour it. I would like to try salmon or any other fish for that matter (but I cannot buy a whole fish from the market and cut it up. Ew.)
3) Vegetables I know I like: broccoli, mushrooms (LOVE mushrooms, I could eat them all day), brussel sprouts, asparagus, cauliflower, tomatoes, bean sprouts, corn, baby corn, potatoes, onions, spinach, lettuce, reg/green/yellow peppers. I don't like any sort of bean and I don't like cooked carrots & pees. Raw peas and carrots are awesome though.
4) I love all pasta dishes. Probably why I am overweight. LOL I just bought lots of wholegrain pasta.
5) I would love to try tofu but have no idea how to cook it or what do with it at all. LOL

I don't like cooking with fruit or eating something with a fruit taste (like orange chicken or putting strawberries in my salad). For me, fruit should just be eaten as is, or in a pie. I don't like cottage cheese by itself. I tried to like it but, ew. I don't like tuna. It smells like cat food and tastes worse than it smells.

I don't like sweet tastes.

I don't know if that will inspire you at all, LOL, but that's really how plain I am.
 
I think I love you. :)

Anyone who is willing to try new stuff and who loves spicy hot food, I can work with!

Ok, let me come up with a few ideas and some basic recipes for you. What I'll do is post them to my diary and send you a link. :)
 
Ok, this is a REALLY simple recipe that you can make with salmon. It sounds complicated, but it's really simple - and the whole thing will take you less than 20 mins.

When you go to the grocery store, get a whole salmon filet from the fish counter. It should look something like this when you get it:


Take it home and with a really sharp knife, cut it into about 2.5 inch pieces until it looks like this:


Those should be about 3oz each. Keep the skin on the bottom.

Take each filet and sprinkle it with some salt, and some cayenne pepper (maybe about 1/2 tsp) for spicyness. If you have cajun seasoning, use that instead of the salt and cayenne. Squeeze a little lemon juice over the top.

In a frying pan (if you have a cast iron skillet that would be awesome, but a regular frying pan will work), put about 1 tbsp olive oil and turn the heat to medium. Don't let the olive oil start smoking. If it smokes, pour it out and start over.

When the oil is hot (test it by dropping a tiny piece of bread or something into it and it should sizzle nicely. If it's not sizzling, it's not hot enough.

When it's sizzling, lay your salmon filets in the oil, skin side down. Cook it for about 5-6 mins, then slide a spatula under each filet and flip it over for 3 mins.

Take the filets out of the pan and set them on a plate. They will continue to cook for a few minutes on the plate - that carryover heat from the skillet.

In the meanwhile, roast your veggies like you normally would.

Serve the salmon with the veggies. The skin should be nicely crispy and you can eat it if you like, or you can just cut the salmon off the skin (I don't like the skin myself, so I peel it off and give it to the cat! :) ).

This is so easy and so yummy. It's a really simple way to fix salmon and it's something you can do in less than 30 mins. You can put any spice you want on the top ... cajun seasoning, lemon pepper, taco seasoning, anything that you want to experiment with. I like cajun seasoning best.

Once you get confident with cooking it, you'll know the timing and you can make a little pasta on the side and serve it with pasta, maybe with a little spicy tomato sauce. :)
 
That sounds great. I'm going to try it this weekend. Thanks, Kara!
 
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