Criticize My Diet Plan

[Brian-M]

One of my goals for this year is to lose weight. I finally got around to writing up a clear and concise diet plan, and would appreciate any input that might help improve it.

If someone can think of a better name for it than the one I came up with, maybe it could become the next popular fad-diet!

Looking up other threads about diets on this forum, I see some mention of a 5:2 diet which I hadn't heard about before today. I suppose my diet is similar to that because it involves intermittent fasting, but unlike the 5:2 diet the fasting isn't done on fixed intervals and can (theoretically) be avoided altogether if you can get your weight down without fasting.

The Astable Diet
In Seven Easy Steps​

Step 1, Choose your desired weight

Make it reasonable, pick the highest weight at which you think you can be both happy and healthy. An unreasonable weight-loss goal can be counter-productive. Remember, you can always set it lower at a later date.

Step 2, Plan for occasional “fasting”

If you want, you can plan a true fast, where you consume little more than water. But a more healthy approach would be a semi-fast, where you consume low-calorie snacks in place of meals, such as a piece of fruit or a small tub of low-fat yoghurt.

The exact details aren't important, as long as you're consuming far fewer calories throughout the day than you normally would. Pick a type of fast that you're comfortable following. Remember, you can always change the details of the fast later.

Step 3, Prepare a digital scale for daily use

A digital scale ensures that there's no ambiguity interpreting the results. Pick a convenient place where you can leave the scale without it getting in the way, so you won’t have to make an effort to get it out and put it away every day.

Step 4, Weigh yourself each morning

Weigh yourself when you first get up each morning, before you eat or drink anything.

Step 5, Set a weekly target

Take the first morning’s scale reading and round it up to the nearest pound or half-kilogram. This is your first week’s target. Keep the most recent weekly target written down somewhere it can be seen when you weigh yourself. (Writing it on a Post-It note works well.)

Step 6, "Fast" on any day you exceed your weekly target

This step ensures you lose weight. Hopefully it’ll also encourage you to develop the habit of watching what you eat, in order to avoid having to fast all the time. Adding an exercise routine to the diet will help keep your weight down.

Step 7, Reduce your target weight each week

Until you reach your desired weight, reduce your target by one pound or half a kilogram each week. If you’re struggling with the diet, hold off from reducing the target weight until you feel you’re ready to lose more.

The diet does not end when you achieve your desired weight! The only thing that changes when you achieve your desired weight is that you no longer lower your target weight.

Personally I intend to reduce my target weight by 1kg (2.2lb) each week to begin with, because I've managed to lose weight at that rate in the past (but I didn't stick with my old weight-loss plans so ended up putting it all back on when I fell back into old habits).

But I wrote down half a kilo each week in the plan because I'll probably switch to that later when I begin to approach a more healthy weight (and it's probably a more realistic goal for most people).

The idea for this plan comes from something I once came up to keep the weight off when I got down to my desired weight. (But I never did get down to my desired weight, and so never put the plan into action.)

(Part of what spurred me to write this up now is that I got myself a new scale last week. I got tired of the old one displaying ERR because I weighed slightly too much for it to measure. But now I'm slightly under the weight that causes it to produce that error... but nevermind. I like the new one better. I don't have to slap it hard with my foot to activate it, and the backlit display is a lot easier to read.)

 

[MikeG]

An interesting approach.

Personally, I don't think that the psychology of dieting is helped by weighing yourself every day. Once a week seems more than sufficient for the purpose. The problem is that weight does vary, and if it can be a simple matter of whether or not you have sat on the toilet before you weigh yourself which determines whether to fast or not then your decision to fast can be seen as almost arbtirary. Besides, this turns fasting into some sort of punishment, which is far from the way I view it. I see it as an enabler, allowing me to eat a normal diet 6 days a week. So, a positive rather than negative view of the fast.

Given that you are likely to be fasting every week anyway, why not just establish a regular pattern?

 

[Puppycow]

I'll tell you what worked for me:
1) Buy a 5x8 notebook and write down everything you eat. Set a target for how many calories you want to consume each day and add up the calories. You will have to look some things up at first, but you can make some notes on the inside of the front cover for stuff you eat a lot and it gets easier. In making your target, you can calculate your base metabolism for a starting point (see here). Set something a few hundred calories short of that to lose weight. If you exercise too, it helps. Don't expect to lose weight every day. I agree with the weekly goal thing.

2) Add some kind of exercise to your plan. Whatever suits you. I bought a pedometer and made sure to walk at least 10,000 steps per day. I also joined a gym and later started running. Whatever works best for your schedule.

I never fasted but I was able to lose weight this way. Your way may be better for you, but you have other options.

 

[Brian-M]

Personally, I don't think that the psychology of dieting is helped by weighing yourself every day. Once a week seems more than sufficient for the purpose.

Well, I've got the scale in the bathroom anyway, so it's no problem standing on it before I take my morning shower. I had intended to write down my weight every day in a notebook but I've decided that's not really worth the effort. (Checking the notebook, I skipped weighing myself three times out of the eleven mornings since I got the new scale.)

The problem is that weight does vary, and if it can be a simple matter of whether or not you have sat on the toilet before you weigh yourself which determines whether to fast or not then your decision to fast can be seen as almost arbtirary.

I have noticed that my weight can vary quite a lot from one day to the next, (sometimes by more than a kilo) and while the decision of which days to fast is fairly arbitrary in this system, it's the averages that matter. The less you eat on non-fast days, the less often you have to fast on average.

Besides, this turns fasting into some sort of punishment, which is far from the way I view it.

I prefer to think of it as negative reinforcement rather than punishment.

Plus it's also a challenge... how often can I avoid having to fast without effectively fasting anyway?

Given that you are likely to be fasting every week anyway, why not just establish a regular pattern?

Because if the fast-days aren't dependent on how much I eat the rest of the time, I'll still often end up giving in to the temptation to eat too much on non-fast-days because there's no immediate incentive not to. To compensate for that (so I can still lose weight fairly quickly) I'll need to have more fast-days, making the diet even more unpleasant.

 

[Brian-M]

I'll tell you what worked for me:
1) Buy a 5x8 notebook and write down everything you eat. Set a target for how many calories you want to consume each day and add up the calories. You will have to look some things up at first, but you can make some notes on the inside of the front cover for stuff you eat a lot and it gets easier. In making your target, you can calculate your base metabolism for a starting point (see here).

That sound like a lot of annoying calculations. Part of the reason that this kind of weight-loss plan appeals to me is that there is no calorie counting involved.

Plus, how do I get figures for everything I eat? For example, if I go to the local bakery and order a Vietnamese roll like I did today, how do I know how much calories are in it? I'm not even sure exactly what ingredients are on it let alone how much of each.

(Although, I do recognize most of the things they put on it. Pork, lettuce, carrot, cucumber, chilli, ect. But there are a couple of things I'm not entirely sure of. Plus my memory might not be complete. Did they put beetroot on or not? I honestly can't remember.)

2) Add some kind of exercise to your plan. Whatever suits you. I bought a pedometer and made sure to walk at least 10,000 steps per day. I also joined a gym and later started running. Whatever works best for your schedule.

I have done exercises with dumbbells before while trying to lose weight. Light ones, lots of repetitions. Switching between exercises that use different muscles until the timer goes off. It worked pretty well for me, so I was thinking of going back to that.

I also bought myself a second-hand exercise exercise bike fairly cheaply last year, but haven't used it much since then. I put it in the living-room last month so I can use it while watching TV, but I haven't really been using it. Maybe I can do the bike one day and the dumbbells another.

 

[Puppycow]

Plus, how do I get figures for everything I eat? For example, if I go to the local bakery and order a Vietnamese roll like I did today, how do I know how much calories are in it? I'm not even sure exactly what ingredients are on it let alone how much of each.

Sometimes you just have to make your best guess, but often the internet helps:

http://caloriecount.about.com/calories-rice-paper-roll-meat-shrimp-i111995

Is that what you ate?

I guess it depends what is easier for you, fasting or looking a few things up, writing a few things down and using a calculator (your computer should have one).

 

[GlennB]

Just a personal take on this, but I'd find the idea of a day fasting very demoralising. Maybe allow plenty of salads and raw veg on those days instead?

Good luck anyway.

 

[Brian-M]

http://caloriecount.about.com/calories-rice-paper-roll-meat-shrimp-i111995

Is that what you ate?

No, it was more like this" http://adamenoch.wordpress.com/2012/09/03/the-student-survival-guide-part-1

(I usually have one about twice a week. It's a lot cheaper than the Subway across the street, and more healthy than the Hungry Jacks on the corner.)

 

[Octavo]

Just a personal take on this, but I'd find the idea of a day fasting very demoralising. Maybe allow plenty of salads and raw veg on those days instead?

Good luck anyway.

I often fast for a day, although seldom by choice and have found that once you are used to it, it's pretty easy to go a whole day without any food at all.

 

[Dr. Imago]

I'll tell you what worked for me:
1) Buy a 5x8 notebook and write down everything you eat.

Studies show that tracking what you eat is the best way to lose weight.

http://archinte.jamanetwork.com/article.aspx?articleid=1485082

Even better (and as this study suggest), download a free app like "LoseIt" and track it using your smartphone. Not endorsing any particular program, but this one allows you to scan barcodes, enter your weight, and track your calories telling you when you will reach your target goal.

Be fastidious and vigilant and you will reach your goal.

Good luck!

~Dr. Imago

 

[Skwinty]

http://www.dietdoctor.com/lchf

"Do you want to eat real food (as much as you like) and improve your health and weight? It may sound too good to be true, but LCHF (Low Carb, High Fat) is a method that has been used for 150 years. Now, modern science backs it up with proof that it works.

There is no weighing your food, no counting, no bizarre “meal replacements,” no pills. There is just real food and common sense. And all the advice here is 100 percent free."

 

[Damien Evans]

It appears not to contain Nandos.

This is a mistake.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

Weighing yourself every day is a bad idea. Your weight fluctuates daily, regardless of whether you weigh yourself at the same time under the same conditions. Psychologically, it's a good way to seem like you're failing. Weighing yourself once a week is more reliable, and less demoralising, and therefore better for maintaining your diet.

Regular fast days is a better idea - 2 non-consecutive days a week is reasonable, doable and, most importantly, will do you no harm medically.

1kg a week is a lot of weight to lose. It's easy to lose that kind of weight in the first couple of weeks of a diet, but that's because you mostly lose water retention. 1lb a week is a large amount to lose, and is roughly what you can expect on the 5:2 diet. Even so, everybody's metabolism is different and you could end up losing as little as a fifth of a lb a week. And just because you could once lose weight at a high rate doesn't mean that you still can. Your metabolism changes as you age. I myself used to be able to eat absolutely anything and, even without exercise, I wouldn't put on weight.* Now I have to watch what I eat, even though I get plenty of exercise. That was a real shock to the system, I'll tell you.

You're much better off setting yourself a small goal than a high one. Small amounts of weight loss are easier to maintain and, more importantly, healthy. I think that 1kg a week would actually be an unhealthy amount of weight to lose. And, again, there's the psychology of it. If you set yourself an unrealistically high goal, then you're only setting yourself up to feel like you're failing.

Also, don't expect consistent weight loss. It can come and go in fits and spurts. Dieticians say that you shouldn't believe that you've reached a plateau and need to re-examine your diet unless you've weighed the same for 4 weeks in a row. The body's a complicated machine and it's not just a case of energy in - energy out.

Just a personal take on this, but I'd find the idea of a day fasting very demoralising. Maybe allow plenty of salads and raw veg on those days instead?

On the 5:2 diet you don't eat nothing on the fast days, but you limit yourself to 500 calories if you're a woman and 600 if you're a man. What I've found works (yes, if you couldn't tell from the rest of my post, I'm currently on the diet) is to make vegetable soup. It can be very filling with relatively few calories.

And then you can add shirataki noodles. They're relatively expensive, have no taste whatsoever, and have the consistency of rubber, but if they're surrounded by something flavoursome, then they're fine. I'd recommend the thin ones. The point to them is that they're not made from eggs, ect. like most noodles, they're made from a Japanese plant and, as such, they're 98% water, and the rest is fibre. They weigh in at 5 kcal per 100g. So they fill you up, but don't add much at all to your calorie intake.

That's what I had yesterday for 600 calories and it was filling enough that I even woke up feeling full and didn't have breakfast until I'd been up for 3 hours. Oh, it tasted delicious, too, and was full of vitamins and fibre.

*I'm 5'6". I used to live with a guy who was 6'2". We'd both have all of our meals together. I'd eat twice as much as him, and he was fat and I was so skinny people thought I was anorexic (my weight fluctuated between 7 and 8 stone). And it's not like I was eating non-fattening stuff. We used to, for example, make huge bologneses with masses of cheese on (we'd get through a block of cheese in about a day and a half), and before serving we'd stir half a pack of butter into the pasta.

 

[TeapotCavalry]

I'll tell you what worked for me:
1) Buy a 5x8 notebook and write down everything you eat. Set a target for how many calories you want to consume each day and add up the calories. You will have to look some things up at first, but you can make some notes on the inside of the front cover for stuff you eat a lot and it gets easier. In making your target, you can calculate your base metabolism for a starting point (see here). Set something a few hundred calories short of that to lose weight. If you exercise too, it helps. Don't expect to lose weight every day. I agree with the weekly goal thing.

2) Add some kind of exercise to your plan. Whatever suits you. I bought a pedometer and made sure to walk at least 10,000 steps per day. I also joined a gym and later started running. Whatever works best for your schedule.

I never fasted but I was able to lose weight this way. Your way may be better for you, but you have other options.

This. For me, dieting is all mind games, and a few things that can really disrupt the normal flow and demoralize you are regular weighing and fasting. Also, setting a goal can backfire when you haven't reached it by the deadline. I'm not saying don't set goals, but be careful there. I have daily goals, and when thinking long-term, then maybe a fantasy/goal somewhere in the unspecific distant future.

I started paying attention to my eating when my trips to the gym were getting more regular. So I had to make sure to get the right balance of macronutrients. Like Puppycow, I kinda bought a notebook (it was actually a web-and-android-based free service myfitnesspal.com, because I'm trendy like that, and paper is lame) and started writing down what I'm actually eating and how much. It's tedious at first, because you have to look a lot of things up (eggs, fruits, vegetables etc), but most stuff is labelled with kcal/g, so it's a matter of using a calculator and adding it up. Plus certain web services have a huge database of foods. And it doesn't hurt to buy a digital kitchen scale.

What's great about that is that you don't have a goal that can mess you up when you miss it, you live day by day and if you eat a few hunderd kcal less than your daily maintenance, you're set. You will lose weight. And if you happen to overeat one day, just take a walk or a run and it balances out.

But I would also recommend an exercise plan, and instead of losing weight, the aim would be to lose fat - meaning that the arbiter of your looks wouldn't be a scale, but what you see in the mirror. Build muscle and build up your metabolism, and it should be easier to lose fat that way. And when muscle replaces fat, you might weigh roughly the same or even more, but look more fit, have more energy and perpetuate the healthy lifestyle. Plus if you love food as I do, it's great to come home from heavy lifting session and eat basically whatever you like, because your maintenance for the day is around 3000kcal

 

[TjW]

Small things that worked for me:
Ten or fifteen minutes of exercise in the morning. Situps, jogging in place, that sort of thing.
Instead of getting a goodie, I walked around the block. Or if I was at work, around the parking lot.
I found a lot of my eating was boredom, not really hunger.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

I found a lot of my eating was boredom, not really hunger.

Oh, that's another thing - the body isn't as good at saying when it's hungry as we think it is. It's also very poor at telling you when you need a drink. If you do find yourself hungry, it's worth having something to drink instead and waiting 20 minutes. Could be that you were actually thirsty.

 

[Red Baron Farms]

Criticize My Diet Plan

OK, here is my criticism.
1) There is no part of your plan that describes the type of food you will be eating.
2) There is no mention of exercise.
3) Fasting makes you hungry and lowers your metabolism, all else equal. You'd be fighting against your nature.

I would suggest:
1) Throw away or donate to the food bank any and all snack foods. No crackers, no candy bars, no potato chips, no soda pop, no cheetos, no "munchies" of any kind. When you go shopping, don't buy them. Completely eliminate them as an option. If you buy them, eventually you will eat them, so never buy them.
2) Do buy lots of fresh fruits and veggies, especially ones you can eat raw. When you get hungry, eat them, as much as you like. When you get thirsty, drink water, or unsweetened tea/coffee. You can drink unsweetened fruit juice, but only with a meal, not because you are thirsty.
3) Cook your own foods as much as possible, and don't add sugar or lots of oil to them. Try herbs and spices instead, until you find seasonings you like.
4) Figure out an appropriate exercise plan you can live with. It could be as simple as getting a dog and taking it to the park for walks twice a day. Or maybe buying a boat and going fishing 2-3 times a week. Or going horseback riding. Or going to the beach and looking for cool shells. Or bird watching hikes. Maybe start a garden. For city folks, maybe dancing, or visiting museums. Combinations of all of these? Whatever interests you enough that it isn't "work", instead it is fun. Don't bring snacks.
5) Holidays you can eat whatever traditional treats you like, as long as you cook it yourself. Only holidays though.
6) Fasts are for when you get sick and don't feel well enough to exercise. Then fast or partial fast until you are well enough to exercise and your appetite returns.

 

[MikeG]

......
3) Fasting makes you hungry and lowers your metabolism, all else equal. You'd be fighting against your nature...........


6) Fasts are for when you get sick and don't feel well enough to exercise. Then fast or partial fast until you are well enough to exercise and your appetite returns.

Unsupported assertions. Do you have some evidence for these claims?

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

3) Fasting makes you hungry and lowers your metabolism, all else equal. You'd be fighting against your nature.

Not true.

People on the 5:2 diet actually don't eat more than usual on non-fast days. And, if you specifically mean on the fast day, then it's perfectly possible to fill yourself completely while eating only 600 calories. In fact, if anything, it causes you to get used to eating less, and people often find that after a while of being on the 5:2 diet they eat less than previously on non-fast days, too. Not everybody, not always, but it's not uncommon.

And the reason the 5:2 diet works is that reducing your calorie intake for 2 non-consecutive days out of 7 isn't enough to slow your metabolism. You do not go into starvation mode.

 

[Squeegee Beckenheim]

Oh, and...

When you get thirsty, drink water, or unsweetened tea/coffee. You can drink unsweetened fruit juice, but only with a meal, not because you are thirsty.

I drink Sainsbury's sugar-free cordial with Sainsbury's sugar-free lemonade. The lemonade itself doesn't taste very nice, but just a dash of the cordial and it's lovely. As this works out at about 6 kcal per pint, I feel free to drink as much of it as a want, when I want. It's cheap as chips, too.