Diet - Help!!

fitness2010

I'm a regular poster on boards and the fitness forum but I've decided to post this under a different username.

I'm a young male (early 20's) who's currently trying to lose body fat, get fit and just generally look good. I'm currently living at home with my parents.

My problem is as follows - I'm currently on a fairly high carb diet. For example bread in the morning with tea, sandwich or something similar at lunch, meat and potato's and some veg for dinner. On a normal day I'd have about 3-4 cups of tea with sugar and a few snacks.

On various occasions over the last 12 months I've tried to change my diet. For example today I tried to replace the bread in the morning with fruit. Over the last few weeks I've cut out the snacks and dropped the tea to 2 cups a day.

Any time I try to change my diet I get unbelievable hassle from my parents. It's a dysfunctional relationship to say the least. They see the carb diet as being "bulk" and replacing it with fruit as being stupid and as a result I have "no bulk" in my system.

I take protein shakes 2 - 3 times a week.

My parents are both intelligent people, which in this case is almost a double edged sword.

To explain the situation a bit further - when I was 16, 17, 18 I was very ill due to anxiety and lost a serious amount of weight. I dropped to 7 stone at one stage. Subsequent to this I sorted most of the issues out and went from 7 stone to 10.5 - 11 stone over about 6 - 8 months (all went on as fat). I'm still trying to get this fat down and muscle on in it's place. I suppose my parents are worried that I'll end up in a similar situation to before (7 stone). I'm not anorexic, the severe loss of weight was a side effect of the anxiety.

I've dropped from 19% body fat to 13% body fat over the last 12 months and made reasonable gains in lifting etc... The gains are still completely meager in comparison to what I could be lifting but nevertheless they are gains. I'm still about 20mm fat in my stomach. I haven't dropped any weight in this time! My weight varies between 67.5 - 70kg and still does. I actually want to get my weight up to 75kg in time but as muscle rather than fat.

My problem is that I just can't seem to be able to change my diet because of the hassle I get from the parents.

Any suggestions on how I could address this?

Mellor

I'm not trying to be rude, but if you are old enough to make your decisions and you should simply tell your parents this.

If they are reasonable intelligent they should be able to grasp calories in calories out. Explain that you aren't dieting and are going to eat the same calories.
Show them that two slices of toast with butter is the same calories as 3 eggs.
Oats are a better bf than cereal
that you are dropping spuds, but having brocolli and extra chicken instead.

Show them after a month or two that you have dropped body fat, but remained the same weight. If they are smart, they'll figure out that this means extra muscle, and is obviously more healthy.

fitness2010

Mellor wrote: »

I'm not trying to be rude, but if you are old enough to make your decisions and you should simply tell your parents this.

If they are reasonable intelligent they should be able to grasp calories in calories out. Explain that you aren't dieting and are going to eat the same calories.
Show them that two slices of toast with butter is the same calories as 3 eggs.
Oats are a better bf than cereal
that you are dropping spuds, but having brocolli and extra chicken instead.

Show them after a month or two that you have dropped body fat, but remained the same weight. If they are smart, they'll figure out that this means extra muscle, and is obviously more healthy.

Thanks for the comment.

Unfortunately neither of them are particularly interested in fitness. My mother thinks a bit of a belly is a nice thing!!

I totally agree with you but like I said it's a dysfunctional relationship. Believe me I'm working on this but I need to get it into their head about the diet without having to solve very problem within the relationship.

They fail to grasp the idea of the different effects certain foods have on people. The diet I'm on at the moment is more that likely spiking my insulin levels all over the place and could cause me serious problems. I can't get this into their heads... Both are very intelligent people and are at the top of their respective fields but just don't grasp the whole area of nutrition. Plus my mother herself is overweight probably by about 3 stone. I reckon she's just over 12 stone and should be just over 9 stone. She's roughly about 5'1". Probably well over 30% body fat.

Perhaps going to a nutritionist would help?

Mellor

To be honest, I'd just do it. Start eating the way you want. Leave some of the spuds on the plate, bigger portion of chicken etc.

Most of the bad carbs are from snacking, make sure the food you buy yourself is ideal and clean.

Make your own dinner

Barry.Oglesby

Just quickly, (I'll make no comment on your personal situation) you want to get to 75kgs but are looking to diet?

You can't do both. Pick one. If you want more muscle, keep eating as you are and lift more.

fitness2010

Barry.Oglesby wrote: »

Just quickly, (I'll make no comment on your personal situation) you want to get to 75kgs but are looking to diet?

You can't do both. Pick one. If you want more muscle, keep eating as you are and lift more.

No it's not that I'm looking to diet. I'm looking to change what I eat (i.e. my diet), clean it up etc...

So you're saying that the high carb diet is ok, lift more and I'll get where I want to be?

Basically train through the bad diet? Is that not pretty much one of the fundamentals - you can't out-train a bad diet?

TommyKnocker

While most Joe Soaps should not try to out train a bad diet (as they would lack the time, dedication and motivation to do so), it is possible to out train a bad diet.

e.g. Michael Phelps



And his avarage daily diet



Google this. I was amazed that any serious athlete, never mind a world record smashing olympic athlete would put this kind of junk in to their body. But I suppose if you need to eat 12,000 calories a day to support your training regime, then you can be a little lax


M

Red Cortina

Just throwing my 2c in.

Can you try and make the changes that you are looking to implement to your diet one at a time? So instead of eating just bread for breakfast, I would try and eat the bread with eggs/rashers and maybe some tomato. To be honest I dunno would eating just fruit for my breakfast stand me in good stead and I am female. Trying to eat meals which have some protein, fats and carbohydrate in every meal would be a good way of explaining to your parents that you are trying to eat a more balanced diet.

I can sense the frustration that you have towards your parents in your post but I think that you should also accept that your parents obviously really care about you a lot and just want the best for you.