muffinbunni's Journal, 26 September 2016

There come a time where observing your progress by weight alone will drive u nuts. Body fat loss is measured by taking measurements of yourself in various places such as thighs, hips, tummy, arms, chest, etc. and comparing them each week. The other option is to use body fat calipers. You could get slimmer but heavier(yes that sounds crazy but its true). Weight can fluctuate alot daily. Your method of observing weight needs some structure such as weighing yourself on the same day each week, early in the morning and taking that as your official weight. Any other weight you observe during the week should be merely for curiosity. What is your definition of "eating well" ? 

I'm eating higher protein, less carbs. for eg. breakfast would be 2 x eggs with 1 x tomatoe and 2 x slices of cheese. then I would have an apple for snack or some strawberries later on in the morning. I"ll have coffee but with sweetner and milk (I atleast want nice coffee :-). then for lunch I would have 4 - 6 provitas with peanut butter. I drink a lot of water. nothing else except coffee. I normally don't eat at night. then I would exercise and afterwards have my whey protein shake. I did get thinner but it seems asif my muscles are staying far away - and now my weight is up. maybe I should cut the provitas with peanut butter in total! rather replace it with veg like broccoli / cauliflower? I don't know anymore. my body def does well with high protein but now I cant seem to get the mix right. feeling like im wasting time and effort by not eating right and stuffing up my own results. If you can give me some advice on high protein and little carbs I would really appreciate it. im not a big eater. I cant have big meals. I decided today that I will stop weighing everyday. that traitor is not a good motivator :-) haha.. my name for my scale - the Traitor Motivator.. if you can give some hints and tips it would be greatly appreciated. 

Don't stress :) Firstly its really important to make use of your food diary to log all the food you eat so you can see your macros(amounts of protein, carbs,fat) consumed. I think it's time you adopted a "fasting" lifestyle. Its a way in which you fore your body to burn fat for energy. I would suggest that you start with following the 16:8 method whereby you only start consuming food from midday and you stop consuming food at 8pm so that you have a period of 16 hours with no food(most of which is spent asleep) and an eating window of 8 hours where you consume your food. During your 16 hours of no food, you are allowed to consume water, green tea, tea/coffee(minimal milk and sweetener), sugar free cooldrinks like coke zero. Do that for a week and then add "fast days" where you restrict yourself to 500 calories for the day. The trick here is to make meals to include low calorie vegetables like cabbage, butternut, mushroom, broccoli, spinach, cucumber, lettuce, beetroot, etc. so that you get to eat alot of food but calories are low. Read up on this method on www.thefastdiet.co.uk and join us on here. Some of us have fast days on Mon, Wed and Fri. Eventually you can do no food fast days although you may think its impossible right now. Take it one step at a time :) I always help people on here from my own experience of losing over 30kg since last year :) 

thank you so much. will def go and have a look at the 16:8 method. wont it kill my muscle building if I go to such low calories while still exercising? that my body actually uses my muscle tissue as fuel ? I also had a look at the blood group diet - Im B+ - so tomatoe and peanut butter both are to be avoided. think I will take a bit of it all and put a decent plan together. have my low cal day maybe on my resting day when I don't exercise at all. but I will def research and thank you very much for taking the time to help me!! 

No, that is a misconception. I've actually got more muscular whilst training and following this method of eating :) When you exercise in a fasted state you force your body to burn its fat stores for energy so you actually do want to exercise on a day you consumed lesser calories because you will be in a calorie deficit and the demand for energy by your body needs to be satisfied so the body digs into your bodyfat to provide it with the energy it is asking for as opposed to having a tummy full of food where the body burns the food and doesnt ever need to use up its fat. Hope that makes sense to you. I actually have days where I hit the gym after 36 hours of no food. Fasting also increases your Growth Hormone and as you know that is key for muscle building ;)