Looking for detailed meal and exercise plans to follow
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Anonymous
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Any advice for a diet/fitness newbie who's failed several times due to lack of knowledge / information overload? I've hit 160 lbs (height 5'7), fattest I've ever been. I feel absolutely disgusting every time I look down at my belly and thighs. I want to succeed at this but I don't know how.
I don't make anywhere near enough to hire a nutritionist or personal trainer. I've tried researching online and am overwhelmed by all the vague and conflicting information out there. I don't have time to become a fitness expert, and I don't know how to choose between the hundreds of workouts available from hundreds of different trainers, hundreds of recipes that all claim to be healthy, etc. I need a clear formula to follow for both diet and exercise. Does this exist? With workouts, everything I try is either way too hard, so I overdo it and give up or too easy, so makes no difference. I don't know how many minutes I should be working out per day, how many days per week, and what is the right combination of HIIT, running, strength training, yoga, and so on. I'm ok paying for it, but I don't want access to a library where I have to choose myself what to do each day. I want a clear plan to follow. With food, I really want to eat fresh rather than signing up for a service that sends prepackaged meals. But I really struggle to put together a healthy, easy-to-make meal plan each week (which also will fill up my perpetually hungry husband, who can eat twice as much as me and still weigh less, and picky kids). Eating the same few basic things doesn't work for us(plain chicken or salmon with salad seems to be a mainstay of every diet). I know I'm supposed to avoid carbs and processed crap, but when I have to come up with something for lunch and dinner every day, we end up defaulting to unhealthy choices. I would love to have like 3 weeklong seasonal meal plans that I can rotate. Again, happy to pay for it. Thank you in advance for your advice! |
Anonymous
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Weight Watchers - WW app has it all. What and how much to eat, recipes, coaches and groups, access to Obe fitness with lots of workouts to choose from, podcasts, social media support group with postings, ongoing articles with helpful advice.
I'm down 30 - kept it off for a year Good luck. |
Anonymous
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Here is a basic meal plan. It’s not perfect but it should get you pretty close.
Oatmeal with berries Glass of milk Hard boiled egg Green salad with olive oil and vinegar Add a proteins such as chickpeas, salmon, chicken, falafel Popcorn Snack of some nuts and a piece of fruit. May be a cheese stick. Serving of protein with lots of vegetables and a small side of rice or corn or whole wheat roll. I’m sure this will get tons of negative feedback but this has worked for me for many years. Good luck. |
Anonymous
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On exercise: get the peloton app. Join “hardcore On the floor” on FB or Instagram. She drops a calendar every month for daily workouts pulling from peloton strength classes on the app . This takes all the guess work out of lifting/how often/what muscle groups. Add HIIT cardio to this stack 3x week - just 20 min HIIT runs 3x week and you’ll notice a difference.
On food: get lose it app and start logging what you eat so you have a better sense of how much you’re going over your calories daily. Tracking is a PITA initially but you start to figure out what a real serving is and how to stay w/in your goals. Ditch processed foods and shoot for high protein foods that will fill you up. |
Anonymous
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You don’t have to avoid carbs. You should eat a balanced meal for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. You could have cereal, yogurt and fruit for breakfast; pasta with a few lean ground beef meatballs and tomato sauce plus a salad for lunch; and chicken, potato, and vegetables for dinner, and you would be fine. I would focus on including all the food groups with an emphasis on fruits and vegetables. I wouldn’t get hung up on carbs (I know that’s not what the diet industry wants you to believe). You should also make sure you are finding ways to eat foods you and your family enjoy.
Snacks should be fruits or vegetables or maybe a handful of nuts. Not packaged stuff like chips or granola bars. This is what works for me! |
Anonymous
Oh i guess I should have caveated this if you’re really starting from scratch- -Cereals and yogurts shouldn’t be loaded with sugar -Don’t dump a ton of cheese on your pasta or load your salad with dressing -Prepare the vegetables and potatoes I mentioned simply with some olive oil and salt and pepper or spices- not a ton of butter, sour cream, and cheese, etc. -Spend time learning about portion sizes and you can eat most things happily! |
Anonymous
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Honestly, the best thing is not to follow a detailed plan but a lifestyle.
Here are probably the best principles I've found to lose/maintain my weight. Eat only 2 or 3 times a day. I eat lunch and dnner, with an occasional snack in between if I really need it. No late night eating. Stick to one glass of wine with dinner. I have coffee with a splash of cream in the am, and then I eat a good lunch and good dinner. Meals should all have complex carbs, fat, proteins. If you are going to have a high carb snack or meal, combine it with some protein and fat. My go to lunch is a slice of sourdough with turkey, avocado ,spinach and tomato or eggs with veggies cheese avocado. Dinner is whatever we eat as a family---tonight is greek style chicken with couscous, roasted veggies, salad. Cut out sugar and replace as many white carbs with complex. Cut out artificial sweeteners as well. Use a little stevia if you need to taper. Eat a lot of vegetables--make them half the plate at least. only moderate amounts of fruit. High quality protein: fish chicken lean cuts of beef ...you know the drill. Main fats should be olive oil, coconut oil, avocado nuts eggs. Butter okay too, just keep in control. Avoid take out/restaurant food unless very simply prepared so you know you're not getting tons of seed oils, HFCS, etc Cut out sugary coffee drinks. Walk, 30 minutes twice a day if possible, or 45 minutes once a day (bike, job, etc also good) and lift weights or yoga 3x/week. You can find all classes online. add a ittle activity thrghout the day. |
Anonymous
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I have the be honest: Your post is filled with all sorts of excuses about why you haven’t/can’t/won’t lose weight. It’s almost as if you’re reveling in this view of yourself as someone who is inexplicably, hopelessly out of shape because it’s All So Complicated.
It’s really not: Eat less crap. Move your body more. Fruit + veg at every meal, with carbs and fat used as decoration, not the main event. Drink lots of water. Find an exercise you like, and try it at a level where you don’t hurt yourself. If it gets too easy, work harder or try something else. There’s no one magical formula for weight loss, where if you don’t follow it exactly all your efforts are doomed. You know what you have to do. Either stop whining and do it, or learn to love your body the way it is now. Both are valid, but the excuses are tiresome. |
Anonymous
| Really really good advice on this thread OP I hope you're following some of it! |
Anonymous
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I would stop researching fitness plans and such and just start showing up at the gym and trying things. You can walk on the treadmill for a bit, use a bike, try an elliptical, maybe a rowing machine. You'll find what you like. Try walking or jogging outside, too. Start just moving your body for 30-45 minutes a day five days a week. You should feel like you are exerting yourself, but you don't have to go nuts to give your heart a good workout.
Do you have a Fitbit or other fitness tracker? I aim for cardio or peak heart rate for about 30 minutes a day. Once you have that going, add some basic strength training moves, bicep curls, chest press, squats, sit ups, planks, and aim for 15-20 minutes 3-4 days a week. Start slow, don't hurt yourself. Typically, once you get moving, you will get motivated to do a bit more and you'll have some specific questions. Then you can search the internet or ask here. But fitness has gotten a bit crazy and 90% of it is unnecessary. Just get your heartrate up and add some strength training. The end. |
Anonymous
Its not that complicated. If you're not working out a lot, then you need to start. There's no magic combo of minutes, HIIT, etc. Just get moving. Try to be active every day---walking a couple miles, and some strength work. It can be any number of different things because in the end, your effort is going to pay off in the kitchen, not the gym. But if you want a program tell us if you go to a gym or work out at home or what. What do you like to do? do you bike, like yoga, etc? there are a million ways of staying in shape. Basic principle is move every day, do cardio 3x and some weight bearing 3x. As for food: you can cook almost everything. Just double the veggies and half the carbs and cut the sugar. let your husband eat the carbs and extra toppings if he's hungry. You dont have time? Do a meal kit where you cook: I really like Sun Basket, Green Chef and Gobble. All have relatively healthy choices. But you can also find a million recipes online. Here's what we had this week, for a family with somewhat picky kids, and a spouse who likes to eat. All served with a large salad, nothing complicated... rice bowl night: brown rice or cauliflower rice; black beans; shrimp, avocado, cilantro, salsa, etc. Everyone adds what they want (one kid likes it in a tortilla, fine). med. chicken-sauteed ground chicken with garlic, peppers onions, on couscous with feta and tomatoes and greek yogurt grilled salmon salad with lots of veggies quick bibimbap (beef, rice, spinach, carrots, cucumber, etc). black bean soup (kids put chips, sour cream cheese on it) Chicken sausage with peppers, onions tomatoes on pasta (I made zucchini noodles and regular noodles) roasted sweet potato, kale and black beans on brown rice with avocado and tahini sauce turkey cutlets scallopini style whole wheat pasta with broccoli, chickpeas, garlic, pine nuts and raisins. mushroom tacos- i sautee portabellas, serve with corn tortillas, rice, black beans, cheese, etc. |
Anonymous
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I wouldn’t worry about the exercise right now - just walk as much as you can.
To lose weight you need to focus on putting yourself in a calorie deficit. Focus on that. Find a TDEE calculator and figure out how many calories you should be eating and then aim for that. Eat the same breakfast every day and meal prep your lunches so you’ve got two healthy meals covered for now. You can incrementally work your way up to dinner. Honestly dinner is tough if you’ve got little kids so focus on breakfast and lunch for now. Breakfast (push this back as late in the day as you can) 1/3 cup oatmeal w cinnamon mixed in Scoop protein powder 2/3 cup plain yogurt Handful blue berries Lunch: Lean ground turkey w taco seasoning Black beans Tomato sauce Corn Bell peppers Grilled chicken Steamed spinach 1/3 cup white rice 93 percent lean burger Tjs low carb wrap Roasted broccoli (watch the oil on this!! Use spray olive oil sparingly) Roasted potatoes (same on the oil) |