You mentioned previously that you've decided to do intermittent fasting. What schedule do you follow?
I was planning to not eat until noon and be done eating by 8 pm. I never made it passed 11 am last week and starting eating around 8 a few times last week. I will make it today til noon today.
You need to do a lot more reading on diet and nutrition and not follow myths or you will be spinning your wheels and going in circles. Go to any bodybuilding forum and read the stickies on diet and macros. Provided you are meeting your protein(muscle maintenance) and fat(hormonal balance) daily maintenance levels, a calorie is a calorie. The time and frequency you decide to consume such calorie is also irrelevant with a few exceptions which are way beyond the scope of this thread.
You should eat many times a day but small portions. Not eating for hours is bad as the body will react and start to store food for the hours it will receive nothing. Your body should have the impression that it will receive food many times a day. Then this bad reaction of storing food will not exist. But give low calorie food, like vegetables, chicken. When I started I ate 6 times for day with 3hours between each session. I never had hunger although it was less then 750 kcal a day. Lots of pills too (magnesium,calcium, omega 3, vitamines) A lot of things I read here are pure nonsense. I was under doctors surveillance all the time with check ups every 2 weeks.
If you have unlimited time and willpower, then my answer is, use a combination of eating less and exercising more to create a daily caloric deficit of 10% or about 250 calories. To eat fewer calories, you ‘probably’ have to have less sugar, simple carbs, alcohol and more protein, vegetables and water. To exercise more, I would suggest 6 days a week of EPOC workouts, either Insanity-like (bodyweight, plyo workouts) or mod/heavy weights (mainly big compound moves, alternate push/pull days, superset upper/lower) or a combo of these two. But if you are like me, and most people I know, its not that easy to live with that calorie deficit. Compliance is tough with lapses in willpower and busy schedules. So you need a more realistic answer, but the issue here is that not every suggestion you hear will suit you, so a lot of trial & error is needed. Here are some things that work for me. 1. Intermittent Fasting – I usually skip breakfast, don’t eat lunch until 12pm or later (don’t believe the cereal company hype that it’s the most important meal of the day) 2. Get Used to Feeling Hungry – to maintain a caloric deficit you’re going to have to get used to being hungry for at least part of your day. I find it best when I sleep and in the AM hours. Its nasty to start but gets easier quite quickly, and fasting has documented health benefits. And one big positive for me is that this hunger makes me mentally much sharper (that alone is a great reason) 3. Train in the AM – I find it better to train first thing, because I have fewer excuses, the gym is quieter and I believe in fasted training. During/after training I am also less hungry 4. Eat Protein – try to eat protein at every/most meals and for many snacks, because it makes you feel fuller and it combats muscle loss. My go to lunches are egg & roast vegetable omelettes and chicken salads, and dinners are steak & mixed vegetable or fish & green vegetable 5. Fight Muscle Loss – with a caloric deficit, understand that you will be fighting against muscle and strength loss (but that’s ok as muscle isn’t your goal here), but you need to eat protein & do strength execises to minimize the loss. Having muscle also burns more calories 6. Exercise Smart – it takes time & motivation to train, so I aim for maximum efficiency, doing 3x sessions a week of heavy weights for 75-90 minutes (varying rep ranges, freq changing exercises & angles) and the cardio I do is HIIT sort of stuff (like fast body weight circuits, exercise bike sprints, etc). I do other stuff like MTB, skiing and golf but I know these have limited effects as they are low heart rate stuff with no EPOC 7. Drink Water – you should try to drink 4 litres a day. It keeps you hydrated for your exercise sessions and makes you feel fuller. I can be boring so experiment a bit, with cold water, ice water or adding a dash of syrup or some extras like lime/lemon/orange/mint leaves 8. Drink Lots – water is boring for me, so I try and mix it with Berocca (break the tablet, 2x 400ml) then creatine (teaspoon in water 400ml), then 3-4 cups of tea (x250ml with artificial sweetner, not the best I know). This, plus the appetite suppression from the morning gym/exercise, usually gets me through to lunch 9. Food Diary – this is a big pain and a lot of work, but if can keep one for a week you may be enlightened with what you discover (write down & measure everything, be honest and precise) 10. Food Tips – there’s lots already written above that you can try. I find complete abstinence from anything I really like is tough, so I do a lot of moderation. I try to be good 80-90% of the time, and balance out the bad meals/snacks either before or after on the same day. My tips are: a. don’t drink calories (juices, soft drinks, sugar in tea) b. moderate alcohol (mainly at weekend, only occasional benders and always balanced out) c. avoid simple carbs (like bread/pasta/rice/potato and breakfast cereals, but I will have a croissant on Sunday, or a pizza with healthy-ish toppings and leave the crust, or a smaller portion of rice/naan with a curry) d. substitute sugar (if you crave sugar/chocolate then this can be a hassle, I will indulge but only after something big and healthy like an apple or a portion of frozen berries which are surprisingly low in sugar) e. add spice (add spice to meat & vegetable dishes to liven things up and slightly assist calorie burn, I like Mex, Thai and Indian spices) f. meal prep (I am not a extreme prep-er, but if I cook something I usually make leftovers for another 2-4 meals, these can be kept in the fridge for 2 days and will be something I go for when I want something fast, as its easy to microwave & I hate wasting food, I cook up masses of roast vegetables and freeze about 30x 120g bags at a time) g. blend stuff (with a Nutribullet or similar, easy to use and clean, don’t get a juicer as they are a pain to set-up/use/wash-up, great for getting enough vegetables in your diet, easy to add fresh fruit and frozen berries, also oats and ice water h. find good snacks (for me its high protein/low fat greek yoghurts, protein bars, frozen berries and protein shakes, spend a rainy Sunday doing a supermarket recce once and it could be 2 hours well spent) I also read about a guy once who always had to snack after dinner, and it was killing all the benefits of his strict diet and being good all day. So he would freeze low-calorie juice into a Tupperware container, and every night he would sit in front of the TV, scrapping and eating it with a spoon. It would take him two hours to finish it. He wasn’t really hungry and didn’t need to eat again. I think it was breaking boredom and the motion of eating (rather than what was actually consumed) that mattered more and it worked great for this guy.
I did a good search and this was the first link. This article and others claim that you can eat more protein calories than crabs because of thermic effect. https://www.bodybuilding.com/conten...ries-out-a-weight-loss-myth-or-the-truth.html ... more at link about thermic effect... The Verdict The same two people eating the same number of calories each day may experience drastically different results based on their food choices, types of exercise, and daily activity. So, is CICO worthless and outdated? No! The CICO equation still needs to be involved in your diet planning. You must take in fewer calories than you expend to drive weight loss. However, it's important that your diet plan doesn't stop there. You must consider the macronutrient composition of your diet, your exercise choices, and your daily activity levels, too. By taking everything into account, you'll be able to plan for optimal progress. References Halton, T. L., & Hu, F. B. (2004). The effects of high protein diets on thermogenesis, satiety and weight loss: a critical review. Journal of the American College of Nutrition, 23(5), 373-385. === now it could be bullshit like most of the supplement industry. but, ever since I did an atkins thread here in 2003 and did lose weight while still eating a ton... I began to think its more complex than calories in vs calories out. I think there are food interactions at well. Part of the reason I am willing to bet on this intermittent fast thing is because it gives me an excuse to not eat a big meal with my wife and kids late in the evening.
by the way I just gave cartmm's post a like because I just read it. but really there are many great posts on this thread.
Mostly awful advice with some seriously dangerous crap . Pls do not drink 4 litres of water a day! This could kill you.
Making a sudden change to not eating before lunch is indeed hard. If it continues to be difficult you can try to have your breakfast each day a bit later than your previous day. And thus gradually shift the timing of your first meal of the day. Another "trick" is to drink water during the morning when you get a hunger feeling. You should drink plenty of water anyway, especially during the morning as you get somewhat dehydrated during the night. Having a bottle of water, plus a glass, sitting on your desk is best because it reduces the hurdle to drink some. You don't need to get up and walk to get something to drink. Of course can you also drink coffee and/or tea, as long as you don't put any sugar or milk in it. However, each of us is different, so the amount of liquid that we feel comfortable with varies. Avoid advice such as "you must drink x liter/gallons of water per day".