Monday:
6:30am 3 glasses of water with my vitamins
7:45 Nutragrain bar
11:45 protein bar 31g or protein 300 calories
1:30 orange juice 12oz
2:15 Turkey sandwich at subway with sun chips
4:00 apple
6:00 chicken salad with cranberries and crackers 160 cal 25 fat ca
9:45 salad
10:15pm tilipia with brown rice and organic pinto beans
I had 1 gallon of water today, starting to get hot and humid in texas
Tuesday
6:45am whole grain cereal, water and vitamins
10:30 banana
12:00 Protein bar
2:00 3 bean/corn gourmet to go lunch with crackers
3:15 peanut butter 32 grams and a apple
5:30 orange
9:30 big salad, 1 chicken breast, half a avacado, asparagus, and brown rice, with crackers and goat cheese
1 gallon of water drank throughout the day.
Let me know what your take is on my eating habits.
6:45am whole grain cereal, water and vitamins
10:30 banana
I would add some protein to your breakfast, either eggs/turkey bacon and eat the banana with it.
Ok, good, you have them recorded. I don’t have time to go over it now, but later tomorrow or thursday. I will say you need a protein source with each feeding, especially breakfast. No way should you go the first half of your day w/o protein.
The other thing I can say is that your meals are ass backwards–breakfast should be the biggest meal of your day, not the last meal before you go to bed. Let me ask you a question: which meal do you think has the most time to be burned off by activity? Also, a big last meal primes the body for storage, not mobilization. A big first meal stokes your metabolism to burn hotter.
So this is all the input you have for me?
Im eating ass backwards?
Oh dear.
Your thread probably dropped and no one noticed. Sorry 'bout that.
I think the idea was to take an honest look at what you’re currently doing, and then try and make small, manageable changes that you can do consistently to continue making strides towards your goal.
So, let me create a list of small changes, and let me know which you think you can implement into your daily life on a regular basis:
- Switch from cereal to eggs for breakfast.
- Have that large salad for lunch instead of dinner.
- Switch from nutrigrain bars to protein bars.
- Plan your meals during the weekend so you don’t end up eating junk food.
- Limit your fruit to the morning, and snack on nuts in the afternoon.
- Have a source of protein with every meal/snack.
#1; Ideally, you want a source of protein with every meal. The fats in eggs are also healthy, and surprisingly filling. Eggs make a good breakfast because they’re healthy and they keep you full. Cereal spikes your insulin, which, depending on your insulin sensitivity, means the energy gets shuttled into your fat cells
#2; Same thing Aragorn said- you want a large breakfast and lunch and a small dinner.
#3; nutrigrain bars are high in simple carbs and not much else. Protein bars aren’t as healthy as real food, but they’ve got protein, they taste good and they’re usually moderately filling. If you could pack a snack, that’d be better, but… small changes.
#4; Except the protein shake, Sunday’s diet pretty much sucked. Which is cool, because it gives us a picture of what you’re changing from. If you plan the meals, you’ve got a better shot at eating healthy foods instead of making poor food choices out of convenience.
#5; Eating carbohydrates causes an insulin spike, regardless of when you eat them. Insulin shuttles nutrients into cells. Insulin sensitivity is your body’s willingness to shuttle sugar in the bloodstream into muscle cells instead of fat. Your body has the best insulin sensitivity in the morning, right as you come out of a fasted state (and right after a workout too, but that’s a topic for later). Fruits are healthy, and it’s good that you eat them, but they can also have harmful effects and cause you to store fat. So have them in the morning. Nuts are protein and healthy fats- good to eat as a snack in the afternoon.
#6; Ideally, you’d be eating small meals six times a day, with a portion of protein at each meal. This helps keep your body in an anabolic (muscle building) state. However, three squares and some snacks are okay for right now. in general though, the more and the more evenly you consume protein (up to a point) the better your diet will be. It doesn’t ALL come down to protein… but protein is a staple of every lifters diet, and you won’t get too far without it.
You don’t need a ton… just more. We’ll get specific later, but right now, the more protein you eat, the better.
I hope that helps clarify some things. Try and implement a few of these things into your daily life and see how that runs.
Well sorry man. I haven’t slept since 3 days ago. Cut some slack for crying out loud. I just forgot about the thread for a bit to concentrate on not losing my job or my degree.
What Otep said.
You’re going from 6:30 am to noon with no real food. no source of protein, and hardly any calories. Your dinner is healthy but your biggest meal of the day should be breakfast.
You’re only eating a little protein. You want to eat protein with every feeding. You want to try and spread your calories evenly throughout the day instead of only having a couple big meals. Most of your carbs should be in the morning, most of your healthy fats at night. This is because carbs are better metabolized in the morning and immediately after a workout. Doesn’t mean you can’t have any carbs at night, but they should be mostly from fruits/veggies instead of grains/breads/rices.
You’re probably not hungry in the morning, but you need to eat regardless. A quick fix is to get some whey protein powder, some milled flax seed, and some fruit. I’d suggest Biotest’s protein powders. 2 scoops of protein, 1 serving or two of flax seed meal, blend it or stir it and chug. Then grab a piece of fruit. It would be much better to eat some eggs, ham, fruit, any solid food with protein in the morning, but the shake works in a pinch, and as a back-up plan.
You’re eating often, which is good. You’re drinking lots of water, which is good, and no soda, also good. And your meals are pretty healthy, which is good. You need to work on getting each meal/feeding as nearly equal in calories and protein as possible, you need to get protein for breakfast and with every meal, and you need to get most of your carbs in the first half of the day. Carbs in the evening should come from fruits/veggies.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say that you should only have fruit in the mornings, simply because fruit is vitamin filled, fiber filled, and healthy. If you want to get ripped, then maybe limiting fruit is a good idea but for the beginning stages of fat loss I wouldn’t worry about it as much. But grains, definitely need to be limited late in the day.
I appreciate the advice.
The main problem I have is switching my big meal from supper to lunch.
I never know when I am going to be able to stop for lunch being the biggest reason. Being a driver, I don’t always get time for a lunch; I do take a cooler with me and pack it with appropriate food now a days. I usually can take a break somewhere between 2 and 5 to stop and eat.
I will start making my breakfast more weightier.
Yeah, basically Murphy’s Law happens. Snacks for midmorning and mid afternoon are good–beef jerky is prime stuff, and protein bars work well.
Other thing is since you pack a cooler (good man btw) get a shaker bottle and blend up a protein shake for one of those snack times. Then just chug it and you’ll be set to go. Beats fasting.
How’s your training schedule look? Diet is a huge chunk of the puzzle, but still only part of it.
[quote]douglas41 wrote:
I never know when I am going to be able to stop for lunch being the biggest reason. Being a driver, I don’t always get time for a lunch; I do take a cooler with me and pack it with appropriate food now a days.[/quote]
You might also try making some lettuce wraps that you can eat while you drive (hopefully, I’m not really familiar with driving UPS trucks). Take some iceburg lettuce, through some grilled chicken in them, and voila, an easy, no mess meal. You can add spices, sliced veggies, etc to flavor things up.
Welcome Douglas
Aragorn gave you one hell of a primer to T-Nation. DITTO ON ALL THE ACCOLADES ARAGORN THAT IS SOME INSPIRING PROSE.
Douglass I’m a relative newbie myself and I can tell you from experience there are some terrific guys (and gals) on this site who are gracious with their time and advise which can make all the difference to someone starting out. There are also folks here who will t-off on you, but overall the suggestions and advise can help you transform your physique, if you listen and start to learn.
Aragron suggested you read the stickies, if you had, and you understood them, and you followed the links in these stickies, you would know why he says your eating is ass backwards. Your last couple of posts with your meals suggests your protein intake is not sufficient to allow you to grow muscle, if that is your goal.
Read the beginning stickies, again. And good luck to you, i look forwarcd to reading about your progress.
What about training?
Alright guys, I have changed my eating habits for breakfast.
I have been making a 3 egg omelette with spinach, onions, bell peppers, tomato and a little cheese.
After that I try and have a whey protein drink with some fresh fruit in it.
As far as my training goes, when I get home from UPS, about 8:30pm, I do my bike for 20 minutes and then every other day my weights.
Bench press,dumbells, and squats.
I usually do 3 sets each. I stuggle to do the last set usually.
Question- when do i raise the weight, when I can successfully do all 3 sets without a struggle?
Mmmmm…makes me hungry just thinking about it. Good choice.
A good rule of thumb is yes, when it gets easiER to complete then raise the weights.
Let’s see your routine.