More than a bit confused. Uhhhhh...help?

HugeAkman
HugeAkman Posts: 5
in Health and Weight Loss
Hi all!

I have started an exercise regimen for the first time ever, as well as monitoring my caloric intake, which the website and android app make very painless. I have never been very active; not counting my teenage years as all of that activity was accompanied by extensive drug use =P but all of that nonsense ended quite a while ago.

Currently I am a student and writer so my lifestyle is predominantly sedentary and is likely to stay that way. I have been regularly exercising (though I'm only in my third week of this whole endeavor) and for the most part have been under my daily calorie goals, minus a few missteps which I'm going to chalk up to impetuousness and "growing pains", so to speak, but even with those few missteps I have been consistently under my weekly goal. My worry is (and I'm a big worrier so apologies if this entire post seems silly) that my efforts are being hampered by inexperience, and thus being made ineffective.

Usually I am very good at poking around the google machine and forum posts to find the answers I'm looking for, but the more I search these forums the more confused I seem to get. It's unending numbers and acronyms; I don't know what a lot of it means and when I do figure something out I'm unsure if it even pertains to my situation. This has become frustrating and I just want to flee to the streets and scream at something; my neighbors, their baby, low flying planes, a rake, and possibly every cake everywhere, always.

Is this post still going?

Yes it is.

My wish is for someone, or even multiple someones XD, to peruse my diary and offer up some advice; am I on the right track, cut back on carbs or fat, more exercise, different exercise, etc. Minus my few bad days, as I'm well aware of what I did wrong there. I'm not really worried about gaining muscle just yet, I'm more concerned with general weight loss. My first week or so I was basically finishing off my last shopping trip (remember, poor student) as best I could, and the food I have logged from Monday (the eighth) and today is more indicative of the food I'll be eating for the next month. I also would like to keep swimming as my main form of exercise, so if someone says that's not doing the trick, I'll probably cry a bunch...or scream at your baby.

Pleas, please, please help! I'll be your best friend.

Almost forgot, my liquid intake is mostly water and I haven't been logging it since it doesn't seem to affect my totals. Am I wrong for doing this? Also, at what point am I overdoing it, i.e. drinking too much water.

Replies

  • charitas32
    charitas32 Posts: 58
    Hi, the only things I could pick out from your diary were that you might be mismeasuring fats ( not sure that is an actual word) one tablespoon is 3teaspoons , and the difference for me measuring on a normal spoon instead of a measuring one I can level off accurately is quite a lot. Also are you overestimating your exercise calories, check the values on other sites for swimming, personally if I spent an hour in the pool there is no way I'd be exercising at high intensity for all that time.

    Do the exercise you like and you'll keep doing it, personally I walk and I push myself to walk at a speed were I am breaking a sweat. Oh and at the risk of sounding like your Mum more fruit and veg, it will fill you up and give you valuble micronutrients.

    Most importantly keep going and note what is normal for your body and what feels good. I have found I lose the predicted amount of weight over 2wks, but can have a very small or no loss one week and that low fat higher carb makes me the ***** from hell
  • HugeAkman
    HugeAkman Posts: 5
    Thanks for the input! I have been pretty diligent about measuring my food, and if anything I'm underestimating the amount of time spent in the pool, though I am just using the measurements for swimming/calories burned from the MFP app, I'll check around and make sure these are accurate. Oh man, fruit and veg seems like such an easy thing, but I keep forgetting about it, I'll hit up the grocery first thing tomorrow. I tend to buy frozen veg because it keeps longer; do you know if this is much worse than fresh?
  • HugeAkman
    HugeAkman Posts: 5
    p.s. we are now best friends. :laugh:
  • meshashesha2012
    meshashesha2012 Posts: 8,329 Member
    why you no eat food? seriously though i'm not sure how sustainable 1400 cals is going to be for you unless of course you plan on eating your exercise calories back. keep in mind the most success will be with a plan you can follow for the rest of your life in order to maintain the weight rather than just focusing on the weight loss.

    - more veggies are probably going to be needed as well as more protein. protein will help you feel fuller longer. so maybe think about adding eggs, avocados, nuts, and greek yogurt into your diet.

    one easy way to get veggies in is to pick a few fresh vegetables that you can make into a salad. make a huge salad for the week and eat this with several of your meals. you can get fairly cheap produce at farmer's markets.
  • lidiflyful
    lidiflyful Posts: 28
    Frozen veg is absolutly fine, and better value for money then fresh as you will end up throwing half of it away (I am an ex-poor student...now a poor full time worker!)

    I know its confusing as a first time 'Dieter' but you will get there, it seems to me like you are making the basic rookie mistake...your've been pushing for 3 weeks and nothing is happening so whats going wrong? why bother?

    Don't worry! Your body WILL get rid of the fat, if you keep doing what your doing it will have no other choice! Your've been sedentry for most of your life and your body needs a little time to ajust thats all. The longer you go without excerise the longer it takes to come off because your body isn't convinced yet that this is a perminant change, once it realises it needs to adjust to your new routine the weight will fall off! At the moment it thinks after afew weeks you'll give up the ghost and go back to your old habits. Well its wrong, but you need to convice it that it's wrong!

    For example this time 2 years ago 28 pounds lighter, I stopped excerising completely for a year (I feel in love and got complacent, never again!) and put the 28 pounds back on, I a took up running last christmas to try and shift it quickly. I went from couch potato to 10K runner in 3 months...I dropped 1 pound in those 3 months.

    yes 1 measly pound.

    but I kept going, and suddenly over a course of about 2 weeks I dropped a dress size (roughly about 7 pounds I wasn't weighing myself then)

    I convinced my body it was a perminat change because I just kept going, regardless of what the scales thought!

    MFP is making sure you eat cosiderably less than your usualy intake so no worries there, as for excersies you will be able to guess with experience how many calories you burned, as long as you are out of breath for 30 minutes during any workout your doing fine! and trolling the internet will only get you so far, no one else has your body so whatever you read is going to be slightly different for you, and it's so easy to get confused!

    Please please keep going, don't give up!

    I hope I was some help
    Lydia x
  • AnneC77
    AnneC77 Posts: 284
    Thank you for making this post as the information is helping me too lol. Good luck! x
  • bathsheba_c
    bathsheba_c Posts: 1,873 Member
    Hey. The first thing I noticed was that you aren't eating enough! The best day I saw flipping through your diary was August 1, followed by July 31 (you need more food on that day). If you are logging exercise, then you should try to keep within 100 calories on either side of your target.

    I would also try adding more vegetables.
  • JFray0427
    JFray0427 Posts: 94
    Hi, I didn't check your diaries, but I thought I would share some things that I did to help get my weight loss jump-started, so to speak. I am one of those people, that anything "white" (ex. white bread, white rice, potatoes, pasta, etc.) and sugar causes me to gain weight like crazy. I have done the south beach diet twice now (the first time being about 8 years ago). I currently combine the south beach diet, calorie counting, and exercise. You can purchase the south beach diet book off of amazon cheap.

    Phase 1 of south beach is 14 days. It changes the way your body digests carbs/sugars. For some, this is very difficult. I feel that anyone can do anything for 14 days!! Phase one: nothing "white" (see above), no fruits, no sugar. Lots of lean meats, eggs, veggies, and low fat dairy. I typically lose 10lbs during phase 1. After phase 1, you can integrate fruits and breads back into your diet, but the bread must be whole wheat. They make a lot of stuff now with whole wheat!! Even pringles and hamburger helper! lol

    I also want to mention that I don't get enough calories during phase 1 according to MFP, but I don't get hungry either. I eat something approx every 4 hours while awake. It is much easier to reach your calorie goal after phase 1 when you start adding fruits and whole wheat back into your diet.

    Also, I like the diet, calorie counting, and exercise!! It is a lifestyle change and doesn't cover up the real problem, like with diet pills. After you stop taking them, the weight comes back and usually worse! I LOVE MFP because it becomes part of your life and holds you accountable! After phase 1, treat yourself! I usually "treat myself" with something like ice cream or some type of carb like french fries or cheeseburger every two weeks or so. It's been about 7 months since I started phase one and found myself "falling off the wagon" with my food choices, so I re-started phase 1 about 4 days ago and have lost 3 lbs already!!

    As far as swimming goes, it is one of the best ways to exercise!! It is easy on the joints and your body weight is your resistance! Keep up the good work and it will pay off!! Hope this helps!
  • Tenar13
    Tenar13 Posts: 49 Member
    Frozen veg is perfect generally very fresh and easy to keep - so don't worry about that. For me what made the difference was doing some strength training (pilates) which has really toned up my muscle and hence as the fat dissapears so does the wobble :-) But the key is to ensure you are eating less than you burn and if possible maintain lean body mass by managing keeping your protein high enough.
  • HugeAkman
    HugeAkman Posts: 5
    Wow, wow, wow! Thanks so much to everyone. This is a great community of supportive folks and I appreciate it to no end. I am also a bit of a nerd (music / games) and spend a lot of time at sites like kotaku, gamespot, destructoid, pitchfork, lastfm (endlesstirade@lastfm) stereogum, etc...and those forums are absolutely teaming with negativity and hate, so much so that I was starting to think of "teh internets" as a giant bridge, and all of the people as that nasty troll that lives underneath XD

    Anyway! Thanks again for the tips, I understand that it's early in the game for me and i'm shaking off twenty plus years of sloth and irresponsibility. This is absolutely a change in my life that I intend to keep (more on that once I finally finish my profile info =P ) and with the people around here giving so much love and support, it should be considerably less frustrating and effective.

    You all deserve a big hug...and perhaps a medal of some kind.

    <3<3<3
  • HugeAkman
    HugeAkman Posts: 5
    @AnnieMC77 - Heh, no problem. Added you this morning, hit me up if you ever need some support or just an ear to bend!

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