Having trouble starting, looking for advise!

becomingbeautifultoday

I want to start a low carb diet, but I'm having trouble just starting, I keep going, "okay, tomorrow's the day!"... everyday. It's also difficult when my partner wants to have meals like pasta or take away, because I cave for the easy option! It's so bad, I know! What are some easily prepared meals that I can have when he has pizza or something? And how can I motivate myself to just DO IT! and get started?

DCarney

In my experience, you have to want it bad enough. If you aren't 100% committed to doing it, you won't. Maybe make small changes to your nutrition until you find that you are "all in" and then go to low carb. I am not much help in the low carb department, right now I am in the bulking phase of a program and I have high carb nutrition. I wish you well and hope that you can find the inspiration you are looking for.

59gi

Some motivation:

This:

http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2012/06/when-a-calorie-is-not-just-a-calorie/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_calorie_is_a_calorie

FatFreeFrolicking

I want to start a low carb diet, but I'm having trouble just starting, I keep going, "okay, tomorrow's the day!"... everyday. It's also difficult when my partner wants to have meals like pasta or take away, because I cave for the easy option! It's so bad, I know! What are some easily prepared meals that I can have when he has pizza or something? And how can I motivate myself to just DO IT! and get started?

I agree with DCarney. You have to want it and be 100% committed to the lifestyle change.

When you say low carb, how many grams of carbs do you want to aim for a day? How many do you currently eat?

I started eating between 200-250 g carbs a day. I've cut back to only 90-120 net carbs a day. Eating 90-120 g carbs a day may not be considered low carb to everyone, but for me, it is.

Don't try to do it all at once. You will get overwhelmed and it will feel more difficult than it actually is.

When your partner is eating pizza, make your own homemade english muffin pizzas. Use low carb english muffins, low carb tomato sauce, and cheese.

smartyart

Hello.. I reccomend just making it past the first 3 or 4 days with no/low carbs. This is about the toughest time. If you can make it past that, you will be good to go. Try to set some weight loss goals and reward yourself.. for instance... set a goal to lose 10lbs and then have whatever you want to eat.. then make another goal of 5lbs, so on and so forth. You have to make reasonable goals and just stick to them. If you really want to lose weight, I say do this for 30 days.. once you see progress, it will be easier to keep it up until you reach your goals. Losing weight is not goint to happen over night and it will not happen with inconsistency. I hope this helps!

becomingbeautifultoday

Thanks guys! I've done the low carb one before with my mom (who's an expert at it!), so I know I can do it, it's just making that dive into it and getting started. I just need to bite the bullet.

SharonNehring

Try going with a moderate amount of carbs first, 80-120 range, which will get you looking at food labels and counting carbs. Once you have that down, you can begin decreasing carbs again. This stair step method takes a little longer but makes it a little easier.

I aim for no more than 135 gm carbs a day, no more than 45gm in a meal. If I want to snack (which is always) I aim for 30 gm at meals and keep the rest for snacks. Overall, I usually get 100-120gm a day.

The key to success with low carb is that you must increase your protein and healthy fats intake to replace the carbs you aren't eating. The first couple of weeks are the hardest. Frankly, until I figured out what I was doing, I would have eaten cardboard I was so hungry.

Daily exercise is very important too. Getting your body moving after meals helps to burn off those carbs you did eat.

sandryc

It can be hard to give advice on the best practice for you because everyone is an individual and what works best for me might not be suitable for you.

A really good book on doing a low carb, moderate protein/fat is The Insulin-Resistance Diet--Revised and Updated: How to Turn Off Your Body's Fat-Making Machine. I find the information about how to make sure you are balancing your carbohydrates with protein and what to eat very helpful. When I eat according to those guidelines I am not hungry, find it easy to stay below my calorie cap and my mood and general health is improved.

My own plan:

In general I eat about every 2-3 hours during the day. Almost all of my food is whole grains, vegetables, fruits, lean protein, dairy and healthy fats (like olive oil or avocado) I avoid highly processed foods and grains (like white rice, white flour, sugar) as a general rule. But there are no forbidden foods. If I want something badly I will just have a bit and track it. Last week I was desperately craving fried cheese curds so I went out and got some for lunch and ate a vegetable heavy dinner so I could stay in the calorie guidelines ... lost 4.8 lbs this week even with the fried food splurge.

sandryc

((Some motivation:

This:

http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2012/06/when-a-calorie-is-not-just-a-calorie/ ))




That is a really interesting article, thanks for the good read.

becomingbeautifultoday

Thanks for all the advise guys! How do you guys feel about meal replacement shakes? Maybe for just one meal of the day? What are some good ones? I've used a few before, but they all had a terrible chemical after taste.