triggsta

The fat on meat is some of the healthiest fats you can encounter, as is the fats from nuts, avocados, and olives, among other things. Fat doesn't make you fat and any good diet WILL have fat incorporated into it.

Casein protein. You can get it pure protein powder form or in milk products. I generally have a cup of greek yogurt as my pre-bed meal. A lot of people do cottage cheese, as well.

I log all my supplements. Most of them don't have any calories, but things like fish oil and my pre-workout do. If it's medicine because of an injury or something, I wouldn't personally worry about it. Otherwise, I don't generally take medications anyways.

If you are on the shorter side, 50+% could be pretty close. Unfortunately, the most accurate way to measure BF is going to be a body scan (bodpods are good but can sometimes give outrageous numbers) or hydrostatic water weighing (this is probably the most preferable and money-saving while also the most accurate). Honestly,…

Especially if you were eating continuously at a low level, your metabolism has probably slowed down. You need to speed it up by increasing your calories if not permanently then at least incorporating "refeed" days into your diet where you eat high carbs and high calories. For me, I do this about once a week so my…

It's changed. At one point Nutrisystem was perfect for me. Now it's simply eating at a deficit and at good macro levels for the person I am so I can continue cutting fat. Eventually I'll be able to start eating at a surplus and gaining MUSCLE yum

I wear my vibram barefoot shoes (multisport type) to the gym now. I like them because they have no cushioning so I really feel sturdy when doing my exercises (especially squats and lunges and the sort).

Yep. Start eating more. Eat at a maintenance level if you are at your end goal. You may see an initial blip on the scale but then your body will adjust and maintain at its current level.

Congrats! Those are some great NSVs! I love when I buy clothes and then suddenly one day they fit when they couldn't before. One of my favorite gym shirts was a size L that I could never wear. Now it's too big! But I wear it anyways :)

I eat 188g(ish) of protein a day. 50/30/20 macros. I try to limit protein consumption to only 1-2 scoops of protein powder. Can be hard, but I get to eat lots of eggs and meat so that's pretty awesome.

I would ditch these forums and go to bodybuilding.com and ask there. The site revolves around people looking to bulk up and they have a ton of information available.

Or... Chicken Salad Black Beans Fajita Veggies Salsa of Choice Guacamole for 510 calories, 44g of Protein, 42g of Carbs, and 21g of fat. Sprinkle on some FF cheese or FF Sour Cream at home if you have it.

I thought shakeology tasted absolutely nasty. Nothing beats a clean healthy meal. Something you can actually CHEW.

I just want to say don't be alarmed if you see a weight gain at first. Your body is going to need time to adjust to the sudden changes and even on a deficit may gain weight. It probably is muscle, but either way you're probably not going to gain too much muscle on a deficit trying to lose weight. But lifting heavy is…

The program is 6x/week but quite frankly you can add it in however you see fit. I don't think you can find it on YouTube; it is available through BeachBody. The workouts range from 15 minutes (HIIT workout) to 60 minutes (regular turbo fire workout). They're definitely quite fun.

Nutrisystem helped me simply by giving me tools to eat healthy. Eventually I weaned off of it and now I eat clean on my own. Nobody created my diet. Through a lot of trial and error, I found macros that work for me, for what I am trying to achieve. It's all about a healthy lifestyle. There will not be on diet that is best…

I would have to put my research socks on to find you the articles (and I'm exhausted), but what I do is stretch if the muscles are tight or sore, but make sure it's not static. No bending over in a hamstring stretch for 20 seconds without any movement. The only exception to this for me is calves. I stretch those often…

I have my own fat burning stack: omega-3, CLA, L-Carnitine, and green tea extract taken 3x a day plus caffeine tablet (if no PWO) once a day.

Amazing work! Congratulations on your dedication to this :)

Figure out what you enjoy doing. For me it's running and weight lifting with the occasional hike and bike ride. Some people don't like running. Some like doing gym boot camps or classes like kickboxing. I would suggest if you're working out at home, find a good fitness dvd. p90 (probably not p90x unless you feel fit enough…

If you are looking for ways to change it up... 1. Pyramid. Do like 10 seconds on, 20 seconds off, 20 seconds on, 40 seconds off, 30 seconds on, 60 seconds off to wherever you want to go and then back down to 10 seconds on, 20 seconds off. 2. Change your ratio. 10:20 would be a 1:2 ratio (for every second on, double that…

Agreed. Listen to what your body is telling you. It will let you know when you've gone too far or are doing too much.

They have been supportive so far. I've been doing much more bodybuilding stuff lately, though, and I have a feeling that there will get to a point when they say I'm getting too muscular. I show pictures of my idols, people who I wish to look something like, to friends and family and they just think it's gross. But I've got…

Definitely enjoying this read. Thanks!

Honestly? I would say that you have a lot of things going in your life right now. You sound like you're doing decent with your diet, but there are a ton of things in your life causing stress and exercise would only exacerbate that. Most likely, a walk every day would do wonders right now. On walks, there's no one there to…

My boyfriend joined the army. He was already fit, but now he's doing extremely well with the physical training. He got placed in the top training group with the best trainer and now he's pumping out 75 pushups in 2 minutes, 13:40 2-mile run, and decent in sit-ups. If he increases his sit-ups, he'll be able to receive a…

I use endomondo with all my workouts. Mapmyrun just never cut it out for me (and why have a ton of apps like mapmyhike, etc. or whatever?!). I used to use RunDouble (has a C25k program you can purchase), but endomondo just simply had more stats I enjoyed. The HRM features were enticing, as were the custom interval trainer.…

As a psychologist, rewards work a lot better than punishments for conditioning. In a way, you could think of your Psycho motivator as one or the other. Either you reward yourself with Psycho when you hit weight, or you continually punish yourself until you hit weight. Think of it as the former. The major problem with…

Yes, http://bodyspace.bodybuilding.com/triggsta/ I'm starting to only use this site to track calories and that's it. As much as I respect people starting out dieting, I'd rather interact with people who have the same goals as me (bodybuilding). I don't get that much, here, so I interact on BB much more.

I know you said you're doing only face shots, but even if you show absolutely no one else, I suggest taking full body (front, side, back) shots because when you get closer to goal those pictures are going to be a huge motivator. But, back to the important thing: Awesome job! You're doing fantastic :)