Help?! Learning about nutrition.

shiec92

Hello,

Over the past couple of years I've lost 100lb and now trying to maintain here around 120lb.

Obviously I'm happy I've done this, to an extent. But I'm left with some fat/excess skin and would love to learn more about nutrition, food, macros to see if I can help myself get more lean.

Plenty to learn on exercise too, but advice everywhere but not so much on food.

Any help or advice? Books/websites/etc.

T.I.A

WalkingAlong

Wow, good for you! You look plenty lean now. No diet will change skin, really. Exercise might change your body composition. You're young so your skin could bounce back a lot given time, I'd think?

My book rec. would be New Rules of Lifting (original, not "for Women").

Good luck!

shiec92

Thank you

peachyfuzzle

It really depends on how much skin you have, but excess skin doesn't really snap back once it's been stretched too far. That's just something that we have to deal with by letting ourselves become the sizes we do.But, hey... I'd rather have some skin than an extra hundred pounds of fat on, right?

I doubt there's much fat left at 120lbs, but the only way you're really going to lose fat is by losing more weight.

There are some who believe in body recomposition which is a strictly monitored diet combined with lifting heavy. I believe it's something on the order of +250 calories on workout days, and -250 calories on off days. It's supposed to pack on muscle over an extended period of time. The jury is out on this method as I don't think it has been clinically proven to be effective, but I could be wrong on that point.

The tried, and true method is bulk/cut though where you eat a small amount of calories (a couple hundred) over your maintenance every day while lifting heavy a few times per week on a hypertrophy program. You'll gain both fat, and muscle, but then you'll start a cut cycle after a few months while still lifting heavy so you'll maximize the amount of muscle you keep while also maximizing the amount of fat you lose.

As for nutrition, you're looking to be somewhere in the ballpark of 0.75 gram of protein per pound of lean body mass, so if you're at 120, and around 25% body fat, you'd be looking at 90lbs of lean body mass meaning you'd need 67.5g of protein per day.

Apart from these basics though, you'd have to research more to find what is best for you. A lot of people swear by New Rules of Lifting, but there are plenty of other programs too. I'd highly suggest finding one instead of creating your own, at least for the first little while until you get more understanding of what you're doing.