Starving!

pocketac3s

Hi All,

I've posted here before about my diet in regards to my workout - which at the moment is going well, but I'm hungry nearly all the time!

My main goal is to loose weight, Im 5'10 and 14st - I used to be 12.5 so thats the target, so naturally loadsa of cardio is required.

Hit the gym 6 times a week, working my muscles 3-4 times (sometimes going two days in a row on weights as certain muscle groups feel like they can handle it e.g. biceps,shoulders etc..)On the days I use weights I also do just under an hour of cardio(half hour run,15 cycle,5 cross train & 10 row)on the days I don't do any weight training I just do the cardio. I do all this in the morning or early afternoon (having no job has benefits!)

My breakfast (or before I goto the gym) consists of boiled egg and a bowl of bran flakes, lunch is some sort of meat/tuna wrap and dinner is steamed veg with chicken or fish.

The thing is I'm starving all the time, in between meals I try and snack on fruits but it dosn't really satisfy me, after dinner I become extremely hungry and again having some fruit just dosn't cut it for me, its like I have a craving for carbs - which I've tried to cut out of my diet in the form of bread (before hand different types of breads where the conerstone of my diet). I caved in tonight and had EIGHT(or 16 cuz I doubled up) cracker sandwhiches with ham,low fat cheese & lettuce at around 11 to satisfy the hunger, obviously this isn't good for loosing weight - what can I do to keep myself full while achieving my goals?

I've seen some people who say having 5 small meals works a treat, but Im starting back in my job and this isn't too practicle - I was thinking of having an extremely large breakfast, big lunch, small dinner and see how that goes - but would that just leave me in the same place being hungry in the evening?

Thanks to anyone who read through all that - Im not very good at condensing what I'm trying to say - any advice is appreciated!

davyjose

It seems to me like you're not eating enough. I don't know what you work at, but there are few jobs I can think of where you can't even get 10 minutes between breakfast and lunch for a quick snack. And again, I'm not sure what time dinner is at, but if you don't have time between dinner and bedtime to eat, then you're going waaay to long between meals.
Seriously though doing weights and eating little is quite counterproductive.

celestial

So..let's see - you do weights plus almost an hour of cardio, or around an hour of cardio on non-weights days, six days out of seven...and you wonder why you're starving?!

That is a lot of exercise and recovering and fuelling that level of activity is gonna require calories - and lots of them - meaning lots of food! And yes you are probably not eating enough between meals - you should be eating every 2-3 hours 5-6 times a day. Snack on nuts and/or veg.

For pure fat loss you don't need almost an hour of cardio on top of weights, if your weight training is intense. Most people wouldn't do all that cardio on top of a hard weights session. You can't not be hungry with that amount of exercise all through the week, especially if you are leaving too much time between meals and snacks.

pocketac3s

Do you think the simple answer is the right one?Just eat more? I've been doing that program for just under a month and havn't lost any weight - actually stayed exactly at 14st - so I thought less is best, maybe it was christmas and what not - I could have been burning off the beer as fast as I was taking it in!

My work are slave drivers - its a call centre, so sit down and talk crap all day - 1 break.Im not back for a bit, but when I am theres no way I can eat the 5 smaller meals. Do you think if I eat more of the right stuff and keep up the excericse I'll start dropping pounds and not feel like I'm starving?

mack1

first off, well done on progress so far, keep it up.

A couple of things:
- you may not be eating enough, training 6 times a week is a lot, you'll be burning a lot of calories and so you should be eating plenty (but good). How many calories are you eating per day, I dont usually measure, but it may be of use to you to measure your portions and find out exactly how much you're eating. You should also calculate how many calories you need, there is info in the stickies at the top of the forum on how to calculate this, you should only be eating about 15% below this for fat loss, eating too little will actually hinder fat loss.

- Eating 5/6 times a day will be of great help. Breaking meals up so that you are eating every 3-4 hrs practically eliminates cravings. I don't know what you do but there are VERY few jobs where you cannot achieve this. I work in a typical office, it just takes a little planning, but cooked chicken breast, canned tuna, nuts etc are all great for in work. You should REALLY try to do this if you are looking to lose weight, I would avoid the 2 huge meals idea, a reasonable big breakfast is fine but you should be eating more throughout the day.

- When you are hungry you should be careful what you snack on, for example the cracker sandwiches are NOT good, crackers are complete and total muck - everything bad wrapped into one food, processed carbs, high in kcals and little nutrition - bread would be better! But better again would be some protein, again a chicken breast (or even a chicken salad) or some tuna would be ideal. These will keep you fuller for longer.

- Go easy on the fruit, it is not a free for all guilt free snack, they dont call it natures candy for no reason. While it is not as bad a refined white sugar, it still contains a lot of natural sugar, which has the same end result, in a nutshell - sugar goes in, insulin spikes, you're golden...short time later insulin crashes and you back to where you started or worse and then go eatin crackers.

Hope that helps!

celestial

Post up a typical full day's eating, your meals sound good but better to lay it all out.

To be perfectly honest though my advice would be to cut down on the training to 4-5 times per week for a while - why not do weights for 45 mins-1 hour 3 times a week plus say 20-30 mins high intensity interval training 1-2 times a week? That is what I would recommend and I would be very surprised if you didn't stop feeling so hungry, but most importantly once your diet is sorted it is enough training for fat loss.

BossArky

pocketac3s wrote: »

My work are slave drivers - its a call centre, so sit down and talk crap all day - 1 break.

Stop making excuses. I am often tied to my laptop, sitting there all day, often eating there if under time pressure.

• Buy a 200g pack of almonds. Munch a few per hour. Should last you approx 3 days.
• Buy a tub of grapes. Munch a few per hour. May last two days.
• Buy some bananas, apples, or oranges. Get used to peeling oranges at work.
• Buy some canned tuna. Get used to opening cans of it at work.
• Avoid starving yourself and resorting to packaged sandwiches when you are starving. Bread and sauces full of crap.
• Have a handful of nuts in the evening around 9pm, or some natural yoghurt.

Nelly23

Hey pocketac3s, Im in a very similar position. Im 6 foot 1, 14 stone and would like to get down to around 12.5! I also reckon I had a similar diet to yourself with nearly every meal containing bread of some kind! I just started my low carb diet and am finding it tough but with such a big it can only be expected!

Cardio wise...I am a bit less productive then yourself. I am stating back football which will mean 3 tough sessions of cardio and weights per week and the soccer season has a few games left so there'l be a soccer match as well so I'm happy out with my cardio.

The big problem I am having is getting variety in my diet...! have ya any tips? cheers!!:)

Pj!

Nelly23 wrote: »

Im 6 foot 1, 14 stone and would like to get down to around 12.5!

Is 12.5 stone not a bit low for 6 foot 1???

Nelly23

Forky wrote: »

Is 12.5 stone not a bit low for 6 foot 1???

I'm not sure but I would be delighted to get down to 13 stone! I'd say if I reached that mark I'd settle round there...wouldnt want to be a size 0 or anything like that...:D

pocketac3s

Hi All, Just a quick update.

The day after I posted my first post I had a major malfunction in the body department - I was absolutely knackered, did nothing all day so I decided to change the ole diet quick sharp, so far this week it seems to be working - full of energy and not suffering from hunger pangs.

Basically I've decided to cut the gym from 6 to 5 times a week and eat more. Monday, Wednesday & Friday is when I work on my chest and arms. Tuesday and Thursday is back, shoulders and stomach.

Each day I still do just under an hour of cardio - The same cardio felt alot harder on Tueday then it did on Monday and Today,but I'd say that'll normalize in a while.

Nelly23 I did some research into some diets and stuff and the Zone diet seems to be highly recommended, google Zone diet and you'll get loadsa recipes and stuff - stuff I havn't even heard of or will bother to make, but its good to have nevertheless. Well done on the football man, playing a match is a great form of cardio - I wish I was half decent at it as I'd be playing to, but I could never get my feet to work when playing - I'll stick with the threadmill.

Below is what I had to eat yesterday and I definately feel better. The zone diet advocates having three 500cal meals and 2 100cal snacks a day - I had more then that but am I right in thinking because of the amount of excercise I do that should be the case?Because of that I don't fully adhere to the zone plan - but the whole eating before you get hungry thing is quite good - have been feeling quite full over the past 3 days.

Breakfast:

Up at 8am

2 boiled eggs and a a bowl of Oatmeal

Goto the Gym

Snack: Can of Tuna and a Bannana

Lunch: Ocean Pie with Beans and a Yoghurt

Dinner: Two grilled chicken breasts with loadsa steamed veg

Snack: Ceasar Salad & and chocbar (I know I shouldn't have, but I had a craving - trying to ween myself off processed sugars)

Throughout the day: Bucket loads of water
Supplements: the ole multi-vitamin tablet and I take some Korean Ginseng after I get back from the Gym.I've heard some people say its just a quick energy boost while others say it helps recovery and what not - talk about confused. Anyone have any experience with this?

I don't really know that much about diets - I could probably stand to eat more but I didn't feel hungry yesterday and from what I believe a caloric deficet is what I need to lose weight - so any suggestions or observations are much welcome, hopefully I'll start shedding the pounds now.

Oh yeah, have an interview on Friday for a new job - so hopefully I won't have to go back to my hell hole.

BossArky

pocketac3s wrote: »

Basically I've decided to cut the gym from 6 to 5 times a week and eat more. Monday, Wednesday & Friday is when I work on my chest and arms. Tuesday and Thursday is back, shoulders and stomach.

You may get better results by including a heavy leg day on which you do squats, stiffleg deadlifts, lunges and calf raises. This will burn lots of calories, put on a few lbs of lean muscle on your legs, and burn fat aiding weight loss due to increased metabolism.

pocketac3s

Thanks for the advice BossArky,Do you reckon a full day is what I'd need? Because of all the running I've been doing I've found my legs have toned up considerably, I don't know if I need more mass as such but I do have a bit of a fat ass, reckon that'll help?

BossArky

If you do exercises such as squats and stiff leg deadlifts these will tone up your butt, hamstrings, quads, etc. I do a bit of running as well but don't think that is what will get me nicely toned. Sure, it will burn a few calories, but why not kill two birds with the one stone by doing the big leg exercises?

I assume you are doing standard deadlift, bench press, military press, pull ups (i.e. the "money" exercises) on other days?

Keep in the running for general fitness.