Dietary issues

[Egor81]

Hello,

I have been on a health kick for a while now. Lost quite a bit of weight to start with but now at a stalemate. I do intense exercise but my problem seems to be food. I do not think my food choices seem bad but I am not losing weight even with the exercise which I have been doing for several months now.

Generally I will have granola and yogurt for breakfast, salad for lunch and then a cooked meal at night. I also have 2 whey protein shakes which are low carbs. I was told I should not eat so much fruit then it was in not having enough calories! I am getting quite frustrated with it. I don't have much time to prepare foods and the shops do not seem to have much variety for healthy items on the go. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

[Cooper27 Administrator]

There are a few things to think about:

1) do you weigh your portions out? Granola can be quite heavy on calories, and I always find people pour out more than a portions worth.

2) do you do any weight lifting? Could you be gaining muscle? Take a waist measurement too to keep an eye on inch loss, or maybe use one of those body fat analysers

3) consider whether you're consuming hidden calories, like juice, condiments and sugar.

Keep a food diary for a few weeks, and note down water consumption too. It might help you to pull out hidden calories.

[Egor81 in reply to Cooper27]

Thanks.

I was weighing food to start with but stopped. It could be that has slipped.

My measurements have reduced slightly but very, very slowly. Maybe I am expecting too much too quickly, I am not sure. I will do the diary though and start weighing again see if that helps. Thanks.

Can not having enough calories really be an issue?

[Cooper27 Administrator in reply to Egor81]

It can if you're eating way less than you're burning. If you're at the gym every day and burning 3000 calories but you're only eating 1500, it will have an effect.

I wouldn't take measurements too often. It's easy to get hung up on thinking you should be losing an inch a week or so, but as long as it's going down, that's what matters!

[ebtmad]

Try eggs for breakfast with wilted spinach. A really good low carb alternative to granola which is high in sugar. Also look at your portion sizes. If you have lost weight you may not have scaled these down accordingly.

[Venusflytrap]

If you are training hard every day, your muscles might not have time to recover and so be holding onto water to protect themselves. I was told I would have to go every other day if my main aim was to lose weight. Although the inches came off fine. At the very least choose different exercises so that you are using different muscle groups on alternate days. Personally I am not a fan of whey drinks or any kind of smoothie drink because I would rather eat the foods as I find that more filling and so more satisfying. Are you sure you are trying to reach a weight which fits your BMI, height and body shape? And not trying to go too low? Are you eating enough for your level of activity too? These are all things that have caused me problems in the past.