Dieting again - advice

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Hello all,

First a bit of background.

Last Summer ('09), I graduated from college at a relatively portly 6’1" 246 lbs. I was 21 at the time, but in relatively good shape outside of my weight. I have decent height, so I effectively “spread it around,” but I noticed that my jeans were getting tight so I had enough of that. I nipped it in the bud and managed to shed 31 lbs. to a trim 205. For me, 205 looks pretty good, even if I’m categorically “overweight.”

Anyway, during this time, I was a fresh college graduate. I was living at my parents’ house, and bored. Very bored. I was looking for work, but besides that, I had no real goals. I’m almost positive that this motivated me to lose the weight. I had no job or girlfriend (both at the time, and I have both now), so I had to focus on SOMETHING after waking up (besides looking for work).

I played Dek hockey 1-2 times a week for 1-2 hours each time. Once was usually a practice, and another was a sanctioned game by a local league. This no doubt helped facilitate my weight loss, but that was really it in terms of physical exertion (besides doing things around the house, etc.)

My eating habits were pretty simple. Water whenever possible (OCCASIONALLY skim milk in a cereal bowl). Fruits for snacks instead of a frozen pizza, vinagerette/balsamic dressing and salads WHENEVER I’d go out (chicken usually, sometimes steak if I felt like cheating a bit). Wheat bread instead of white. I was pretty religious about it and it only took me 3-4 months to lose 35 lbs. I was very pleased with myself.

Cue getting a job. Cue getting a girlfriend (love her to pieces). The comfort factor started to set in. I moved out on my own. No longer could I tell my mom to specifically buy things that were conducive to losing weight just for me. My family eats unhealthily as it is, so she would go the extra mile to help me in any way she could even if she wasn’t eating properly herself.

I started grocery shopping for myself, naturally. This made things worse. Frozen, 750 cal. personal pizzas, frozen chicken wings, TV dinners, etc. I would still buy apples, bananas, low-fat yogurts, etc., and I would eat them, but I could never tell myself “Okay, just an apple tonight before bed and nothing else.” I used to have that discipline. Now it is lost.

Fast-forward to today. I’m back at 231, so I’m still not where I was at my peak, but the waist line is starting to tighten again. I want to stop this while it’s a manageable 25 lbs. and not 40 lbs.

Any ideas on how to shop smart at Wal-Mart? Keep in mind I’m living on my own and I’m not really motivated to “cook” all that often. I’m on a budget, but I am certainly willing to spend a bit more if it means I can lose this weight effectively.

Thanks.

2

First of all, go to sparkpeople.com and join the SDMB group there!

To shop smart, the usual advice is to shop the periphery of the store, not the inner aisles. This gets you to the produce, meat, and dairy sections and keeps you away from most of the packaged crap.

3

I love those little 80 calorie yogurts. I also try to keep 3 or 4 varieties of fruits on hand so if I feel the need for snacking, I will hopefully go for the plum or nectarine instead of something worse for me. Candy bars go in the freezer when I have them so that if I want it I have to gnaw on frozen chocolate for a while. (This works because turns out I’m also lazy about my sweets eating) I keep a couple bags of different frozen veggies around so that I can add a big dose of them to whatever my dinner is.

4

First suggestion - will do!

I’ve noticed this as well. I’m pretty good at not buying any crappy snacks (potato chips, cookies, etc.), but what kills me is eating whatever is in my fridge or cabinet (usually a frozen, high-calorie TV dinner, etc).

5

Thanks for the advice. I LOVE those 80 calorie yogurts. They’re suprisingly tasty for how low-cal they are.

I think my biggest issue is to buy fruit, fruit, and more fruit. If I have a bounty of fruit available, I will be motivated to eat it quickly because it’ll be good for me AND it’ll go bad.

Any suggestions for dinner? Keep in mind…I’m not one to prepare a 3-course meat/potato/veggie. I MAYBE do this once a week, and that’s a big maybe. Eating out isn’t an issue (even Sheetz…they try to hide the healthy stuff, but it’s still there, no doubt about it).

I’m almost positive that a big reason for this is my girlfriend telling me that she loves the way I look anyway. What’s more, I know she means it. That’s probably my biggest bane. I just need to convince myself to do it for me and not anyone else.

6

My wife loved the way I looked at 200 pounds. She really loves the way I look at 175 pounds. She will go absolutely nuts when she sees me at 165 pounds.

I loved the way my wife looked when she was 112 pounds. I still love the way she looks at 120 pounds even though she has, as she puts it, some “wobbly bits.”

My point is that, absent a particular fetish, people love the way the person they love looks regardless of their weight. “I love the way you look” means “I love you and you’re not absolutely gross yet.” Your girlfriend will love the way you look when you’re 205 pounds more than she loves the way you look at your current weight.

7

I’m not meaning to be snide but don’t buy that stuff!!

Some better, easy options –
Protein 1: fully cooked, grilled chicken in the fridge case

  • mix into bagged salad.
  • fry some onions & peppers and roll up with grilled chicken in whole wheat tortillas for quick fajitas. I’m nearly certain Walmart sells “fajita mix” – frozen onions and sliced peppers bagged together. All you have to do is heat it up in pan with the chicken.

Protein 2: Frozen cooked shrimp
-Buy some tortellini in the fridge or freezer case, cook as per directions and top with some shrimp, that you defrosted by frying in the pan with garlic and frozen peas, and parmesan cheese (literally, take 5 minutes, while the water is boiling).
-You can also use Shrimp for fajitas as described above.
-You can also just stir fry the shrimp which whatever veggies you like and have handy, with a splash of oil, and soy sauce, garlic, ginger powder.

8

Allow me to make what I said more clear. Of course, she would probably start to be turned off/disgusted if I was 275+. What I meant is that she tells me she can’t even tell the difference (nor care) between ~225, 200, etc. I’ve no reason to doubt her, but yeah I see your point.

9

I was actually looking into the first option. Seems like a great, cheap, fast idea. Thanks!

10

Hmmmm, I think if she actually saw the difference while you were moving in the downward direction, she’d be able to tell :wink: . My husband was in the process of losing weight when we met, bottomed out for our wedding, and has now put a few “comfort pounds” back on. I love him to bits. But I can tell :slight_smile:

Maybe you’d have more luck with dinners if you made easy things in big batches? Pots of soup? Crock pots of stew? Healthy casseroles? You can keep half in the fridge for leftovers over the next couple days, and freeze the rest. As long as those things aren’t cream-based, they’ll be pretty healthy.

11

I totally thought she would, but she didn’t really seem to care when I was ~225 and dropped to 205. She told me she noticed, but she said that a difference like that is not even a big deal.

She didn’t mean that to DEMEAN me, of course, but rather to say that she wasn’t at all concerned.

Either way, she’s a woman, so I must be mindful… :wink:
Yeah I think that’s what i’m gonna try to do. Re-heat whatever I make. Probably not a bad idea.

12

Seriously. You can’t eat that shit if you don’t have it in your house. The self control it takes to not buy junky food is about a bazillion times less than what it takes not to eat it. Make sure you aren’t hungry when you go shopping.

My wife and I went veganish and I have lost ten pounds in three months without really trying. I am sure that part of that is that I have also made a greater effort to avoid the work vending machine and being more full from fruits and veggies, but no doubt avoiding the extra calories from dairy and meat has helped. No ice cream means (rarely) any dessert anymore.

One meal we have fairly often that is pretty easy to make is beans and rice in tortillas. Just cook up some rice and then mix in some black and red beans, diced tomato (canned if you like), and diced red onion and heat it all up together. Throw it all in a whole wheat tortilla and you have a good meal. Throw some chili powder or hot sauce in there if it is too bland for you.

Quesadillas are also pretty easy to make. We usually just chop up whatever veggies we have on hand, throw in some beans, and saute them for a few minutes to get them tender. Put them in a bowl, put a tortilla in the pan and add some cheese and veggies on half the tortilla and then fold it over. Flip it over for a minute to get the cheese all melted.

13

Why are you buying stuff that you know is bad for you to eat? You can’t gorge on frozen pizza if you don’t buy frozen pizza. You need to not bring that stuff in your house to begin with. When you go shopping, just don’t buy stuff you don’t want to have as a part of your diet.

I think your biggest challenge is finding quick ready-to-eat meals that are also healthy for you. You need something to replace frozen pizza and TV dinners- cheap, hot, satisfying food that you can keep indefinitely and that takes minutes to prepare.

You may have to experiment, but I can tell you what I do. Once every week or so I make a stew of some sort. I make a huge batch, and can usually freeze five or six servings in tupperware. After a few weeks, you end up with a pretty good variety to choose from. These take the role of TV dinners- when I need a quick meal, I just microwave one of those instead. Usually I’ll zap some frozen veggies along with it, and I’ll have a quick, cheap, relatively healthy meal.

My other go-to meals are a half-can of beans with a whole-wheat tortilla, frozen veggie burger patties on a whole-wheat English muffin (I buy a pile of English muffins and freeze them,) and those flavored tuna packets wrapped in a whole-wheat tortilla. I have no shame making some microwaved frozen broccoli to go with it- I know frozen veggies are not the best, but if it is between that and no veggies, frozen is better.

Unless I’m cooking for guests, when i’m at home I try to take the attitude that food is fuel, and when I shop I try to choose the best fuel possible. I try not to put anything in my cart that doesn’t contribute nutritionally to my well-being. If I really need a bag of chips or a soda later in the week, I can go out to the corner store and make that happen, but I don’t need to be planning for it. To keep things fun, I’ll try stuff like packing healthy bento boxes to take to school or buying a vegetable I don’t usually cook with and challenging myself to find a use for it. But mostly I try to think of meals at home in utilitarian terms.

That said, you need to make sure the diet you are planning can represent permanent changes. You need to change how you eat forever, and if you get too drastic what you come up with is going to be unsustainable.

14

Sign of failure.

15

And remember, “no frozen pizza” and “no TV dinners” is really cheap.

You asked your mom to buy stuff for you to lose weight. Why can’t you buy those things yourself? Ask her where she used to get them, maybe.

If you really can’t cook anything other than frozen dinners, Healthy Choice and Weight Watchers make frozen dinners. I don’t know about Wal-Mart, but just about every supermarket I’ve ever shopped at has carried them. They’d at least be a better choice than the unhealthy frozen dinners you’re eating now.

Some vegetables freeze well, others don’t. Frozen vegetables are cheap, especially if you get the store brand, and easy to make, especially if you have a microwave. Try some and see what you like.

Pasta with marinara sauce is a healthy meal, if you don’t eat too much of it, is cheap, and is dead easy to make. You could also add some ground meat (I’ve found that ground beef and ground turkey both work) for pasta with meat sauce, and it wouldn’t be much harder or more expensive. Don’t get cream or cheese sauces for pasta, stick with tomato or herb based sauces.

Not every meal has to have potatoes (though Grandpa will probably come back and haunt me for saying that, let’s just say he would have disagreed). Rice and pasta are easier to prepare, and can be kept in the pantry for longer. You can get whole wheat pasta and brown rice, which are generally healthier than potatoes and aren’t much more trouble than regular pasta and rice to cook (though brown rice does take longer).

16

The biggest reason people eat is because they’re bored.

You don’t have enough to occupy your time so your eating mindlessly.

First of all you lost the weight once, so you can do it again. That’s always a big worry, people think, “I’ll never get it off”

I strongly recommend joining a gym or YMCA or something. This will get you into physical fitness.

You don’t have to want to be a muscle dude, the fact is most Americans are out of shape. You need to start NOW strengthening your heart. You can live without your bulging biceps but you can’t live without a heart.

Get some books on tape, some music and start doing aerobics. Start one hour a day, five days a week, is your goal, work your way up to that.

By listening to music or books on tape, you take the boredom out of working out.

Another trick is keep food in the house to a minimum. See I’m lazy, if I have to go out and get food, I ain’t going, but if that chocolate cake is calling me and is only four feet away, it’s gonna get eaten :slight_smile:

It’s not what you eat but how much. It really is calories in, calories out.

The average person needs about 11 calories per pound to maintain his/her weight.

Since you said you want to weigh 205, you should take 205 X 11 = 2,225 per day.

A simple diet is you stop eating once you hit this mark. I have a nice body and that’s what I do. My calories are limited to 1,800 a day, and when I hit that I stop. And yes, there have been a few times I reached that mark at 11am :slight_smile:

I am 99% certain that a young person who is overweight is bored (you sound under 30). So your real issue is not food, but mindless eating. Stop that behaviour and the weight will come off.

17

I dunno what to say other than reiterate other people. Cook big batches of meals and freeze them. Buy diet frozen dinners. Is it the idea of cooking that you don’t like, or the time? Because I’ve found that as long as I keep it simple, I usually can have a meal made in 20-30 minutes without much careful attention. The other day, I made some delicious breaded fish with a tilapia fillet, cornmeal, salt, pepper, and herbs. I fried it in a little olive oil until it got all flaky and ate it with a baked potato I’d made earlier. The best way to control your weight is to cook your own food. And I agree with Markxx. Stay out of the kitchen. Read outside, limit your internet and tv watching time. Or pick up a new hobby. I tend to do crosswords while watching tv. My mom knits. I find if your hands are doing something else, your mouth doesn’t want food.

I would also say that you shouldn’t be afraid to buy a little bit of stuff that’s bad for you. If eating a pint of haagen-daz once a week helps you get through the celery and carrot sticks the other 6 days, isn’t that better than suffering through them for a month and then binging on an entire carton of ice cream?

Keep a food diary. (Which is what sparkpeople is, but you can keep one in a notebook as well.) You don’t need to count calories or calculate points or anything. Just try to write down as accurately as possible what you’ve eaten. No “a handful of m&ms” or “a dollop of whipped cream” You will be surprised at how much you are actually eating. Get out your measuring utensils and dole things out that way for a while until you really get an idea of what a serving size is. Frex, most cereals calculate their nutrition info off of a bowl of cereal being one cup. Do you know how much one cup of cereal is? It’s not a lot. Many cereal bowls can hold 3 or 4 cups of cereal. Which is another thing to remember: portion sizes. Your stomach is approximately the size of your fist. Make a fist and look at it. How much food did you eat for dinner last night. Would it fit in the volume of space occupied by your fist? Try to avoid eating more than that at any given meal. Yes, this means you may feel hungry before the next ‘mealtime’. Prepare for this by having a snack of something like fruit, veggies, trail mix, cheerios whatever you like. (I’m partial to a little homemade granola mixed in with my 80 calorie yogurt) If you do things like this you’ll find it easier to avoid eating too much and and things you shouldn’t.

18

I’m not really inclined to agree.

There are plenty of ways (that have been suggested so far) that have nothing to do with cooking a 3 course meal.

Call me lazy, but I dislike cooking for one person.

19

Perhaps I should reiterate slightly. I’ve just begun dieting again, so my fridge/cabinets still have these items in them. Next time I go shopping, I was looking for ideas for potential replacements. Sorry for the confusion.

Thank you for the suggestions. Healthy Choice TV dinners are pretty good, but they are particularly expensive (more or less). I suppose one of those coupled with a piece of fruit or something would make for a pretty budget dinner that would last all night, though.

20

Yeah, it’s always been the portion size for me. Fortunately, while dieting, I’ve always been acutely aware of what a proper portion size actually is. Yesterday, while visiting home, my mom prepared a 3-course meal. Steak, potatoes, and corn. Rather than eat it all in one sitting in my apartment, I split it into two separate dinners, the second half of which I will eat tonight. It’s things like that which I need to do more consistently.

My biggest bane is probably snacking on something inappropriate instead of a piece of fruit, a low-cal. yogurt, etc.

As someone mentioned, boredom is a factor. I do keep myself quite entertained while living by myself, although this consists primarily of computer use. braces self for exercise ranting I’ve lost weight before without much exercise at all. Sure, it faciliates the process, but it is still very doable without running 10 miles a week.