Diet help please

yogi beer

Hi All,
So I recently emigrated so I'm trying to get a fresh start on everything, including getting down to my desired weight.
I'm 6'0 male, 22 years old and 270 pounds. I went on an absolute binge the past couple of years and piled on a load of weight, but I'm finally getting rid of it.
I'm starting back up in college in late september, early october and it's my goal to get down to 200 pounds by that time. roughly, i need to be loosing about 4 pounds a week. I know you may be saying it's too much to loose in such a short period of time, but thats my target, i want to stick to it and it gives me drive to get to it.
The past week i've been consuming less than 1000 calories a day, around 500 today I believe (had a chicken wrap in the morning and chicken noodle soup this evening). Also, I should say I'm mad for my diet coke. is it ok to have a bottle of this a day or do you think it will interfere with my weight loss?
I've signed up for a gym membership 2 days ago and have gone the past 2 days and plan to go everyday from now til september.
what I need to know is what sort of exercises i should be doing to reach my goal and how much of it I need to do per day. (how many calories burnt etc.).
also diet-wise, what are some low calorie foods I can get in the shops?
Im trying to cut down the carbs aswell, so should I get some whey protein too?
Any info relevent to loosing 70 pounds by early october is welcome.
thanks for your time.

robertjack780

You should take some fiber foods.Drink plenty of water as well.Take honey with lemon in hot water in the morning..

Stench Blossoms

What your doing is unhealthy and not sustainable.

Read the stickies.

fatmammycat

You could probably lose plenty of weight with a MUCH better diet than the one you are currently attempting. You could have eggs for breakfast, steamed/baked fish and veggies for lunch, a chicken wrap for dinner, pieces of fruit throughout the day, that sort of thing.
It takes no time at all to wrap a salmon darne in tinfoil and bung in the oven for half an hour, or whip up an omelette with finely chopped peppers or asparagus. You could make a pot of chilli and freeze some portions. You don't have to have it on rice, we eat ours on shredded Iceberg lettuce with some grated cheese on top and it's delicious, yet low in carbs. For a light easy dinner buy a duck breast and pan fry it, slice thinly and layer onto a bed of shredded white cabbage with some hoisin or plum sauce. There are thousands of recipes out there you can try that will allow you continued weight loss, without robbing your body of vital nutrients.

What you seem to be eating at the moment is pretty awful and will do you or your body or indeed your weight loss no good long term.
2 litres of diet coke a day is pretty awful too; I'd give it a miss.

Torakx

Diet Diet Diet!
Thats the key and i dont mean diet in the sense alot of people do aka starve yourself.

It took me alot of reading and experience to realise you can exercise your heart out and not put on or lose much weight.
I have an issue gaining weight,especially fat.Muscle is slowly improving thankfully.

If your really determined to do this fast.you could look into a ketogenic diet.
But before considering drastic things like that.
You should seriously relook at your diet.Anything that goes into your body has an effect on it.
You could eat salad all day then destroy your insides drinking processed drinks and food.

Try the natural method.Consume only natural foods and drinks.
Everything made by your own hand including drinks.Whole foods,green foods lots of water or herba tea.no toxic substances like processed sugar etc etc.

Thats been my life for the last year or so, due to a health issue i must stick to this type of diet.
My body seems to get enough of what it needs and im getting stronger and fitter with a run nearly every day now.
Problem for me is my diet burns so much fat i think im not eating enough fat and calories to keep up.
And i eat pretty much every 2-3 hours.
In between im munching on nuts and yogurt.Feels like im constantly eating and only going for a run every day to 3 days.

So im thinking its all about the diet.Get that spot on and take the exercise in moderation, you wont need to set limits then or deadlines.You will naturally drop to a healthy weight(at a healthy rate more importantly) and feel much much better than if you had strained your body and immune system with extreme methods.

Dont worry about college that will come and go.Think about your diet for the next 40 years or so imo.


ps, i have no idea about calories.I just know if you eat good you will be healthy.
To me the only food to buy in the shops are mostly unpackaged or as close to unprocessed as possible.
I buy whole chickens,whole vegetables,no grains at all.Plain yogurts, for snacks i use yogurt, also popcorn now and then and 80% cocoa chocolate bars.
Eggs in abundance and the only veg i really get is greens like broccolli and spinach to go with the chicken and eggs.

Not sure how much help all this text is, but i really am feeling the difference since i mainly focused on exactly what i eat instead of trying to run myself healthy.
The food taking priority made a massive difference.I cant stress that enough.The more you focus on healthy food the better you will be is my thoughts.

pps multi vits might not hurt if you go the route i did.

madma

dont kid yourself by thinking you'll go to the gym every day. after a week you'll be sick of it, and you'll also do damage as you need to rest.

if you cant give up the diet coke cut way back on it theres no evidence that it interferes with weightloss i think but its best to drink loads of water and maybe have the coke at the weekends.

i used to drink a fair bit of diet coke but rarely do now, and every now and then get a can of it rather than a 2 litre bottle as you'll find you'll drink it out of bordom. you'll feel much better with the water and after a while enjoy it and not miss the coke

saraocallaghan

I find when I cut diet coke out of my diet and then have a relapse I feel horrible. It actually gives me stomach cramps so I try to avoid it.

If you don't like plain water, could you put a slice or two of lemon into it to give it a taste? I drink my water from the cooler at work and find I can go through 2 liters a day, easy!

It is hard to cut diet coke out of your life but it makes you feel so much better.

brownej

I'm not an expert and have no qualifications in this area but I'm going to throw in my 2 cents anyway.

If you're only consuming 500 calories a day that is not healthy.
Even at that I think you are probably underestimating calories. The wrap should have nearly 500 calories in it on its own.

I know it's easier said than done but removing junk food from your diet is necessary. If you don't have it in the house then you won't snack on it. You will probably need something else to snack on like nuts or fruit. Definitely try and avoid things like biscuits or rice cakes. the reason I say to avoid rice cakes is that there would be a temptation to scoff the entire packet.

From a general diet point of view you shouldn't crash diet. You need to change your overall diet to a more healthy one and adjust the portion sizes as required.
Porrige or museli is good for breakfast and is easy.
Dinner and lunch should be lean meats, manage portion size for carbohydrates (most people overestimate these big time) and eat your veg. (Brocolli is really good but carrots and peas and things that are green are pretty easy to cook too).
Avoid sauces in jars as these tend to be full of sugar. Try and make your own from scratch. It's actually quite easy once you get in to it. If you take sugar in tea or coffee try and cut back or stop. DoubleMochaChocaLattaChinos from Starbuck or wherever with whipped cream are obviously a no no. Black tea or coffee with a splash of milk is all you need (or no milk).

Your exercise will depend on how fit and able you are now. If you are completely unfit try walking first of all. You can increase the distance and intensity pretty easily and as you get better able for it you can start jogging for portions of it. Before you know it you'll be running long distances.
If you join a gym make sure you talk to a trainer and get them to give you a program and then revise it every month or so. Generally if you have a program you have something structured to work around so that you're not wandering around the gym aimlessly. Chnaging it regularly stops ou from getting bored and keeps your body guessing.

Try and find a sport you might enjoy or classes that you can do. It can be easier to do these things if you're in a group.

When you start it can be useful to set some realistic goals so that you have something to aim for.

For losing weight the important thing is getting your diet right. Crash dieting is not a good idea. You need to change your diet in general to something healthy that you can maintain long term. Portion control is very important.

Best of luck with your weight loss.

Oh and I forgot to mention. Booze is pretty bad calorie wise.

hilton

Low carb diet is the best.
Walking and building you to 60 minutes 3 days a week and after you lose 20 pounds start adding other types of exercise.
Follow the diet closely. It will work

MikeC101

I went from 105kg to 75kg in the space of about 5 months, so a loss of 30kg = 66lb, so it seems achievable to me.

I cut out bread, pasta, potatoes, rice (not religiously though, probably had a cheat meal every two weeks or so), upped my protein, fat and vegetable intake. I didn't count calories for the first few months, then later I started being more precise with what I ate - probably hitting about 1800 calories most days.

Exercise wise I did weights 3 to 4 times a week, a fairly basic workout with dumbbells (squats, bench press, rows, some other stuff) and interval training of 30 mins or so (possibly not all that high intensity) on the days I didn't do weights.

Found the whey protein handy for keeping my protein intake high, handy after a workout too. I'd have had diet drinks a bit alright, mostly Coke Zero, though I started to phase that out in favour of water, green tea, coffee after the first few months.

Your calorie level seems really low, like I said I was on about 1800 and dropping a lot of weight each week - lower than that and I don't think my body would have been fuelled enough to push hard on the weights / cardio.

madma

MikeC101 wrote: »

I went from 105kg to 75kg in the space of about 5 months, so a loss of 30kg = 66lb, so it seems achievable to me.

I cut out bread, pasta, potatoes, rice (not religiously though, probably had a cheat meal every two weeks or so), upped my protein, fat and vegetable intake. I didn't count calories for the first few months, then later I started being more precise with what I ate - probably hitting about 1800 calories most days.

Exercise wise I did weights 3 to 4 times a week, a fairly basic workout with dumbbells (squats, bench press, rows, some other stuff) and interval training of 30 mins or so (possibly not all that high intensity) on the days I didn't do weights.

Found the whey protein handy for keeping my protein intake high, handy after a workout too. I'd have had diet drinks a bit alright, mostly Coke Zero, though I started to phase that out in favour of water, green tea, coffee after the first few months.

Your calorie level seems really low, like I said I was on about 1800 and dropping a lot of weight each week - lower than that and I don't think my body would have been fuelled enough to push hard on the weights / cardio.

thats serious weighloss fair play..

im struggling to shift weight myself, carry it upper body = belly, and chest etc..

did you do any cardio or just weights? i do cardio inthe gym, running, rowing, bike and cross-trainer and ahve only stated back lifting weight just the free weightd and bar for bi-ceps.

MikeC101

madma wrote: »

thats serious weighloss fair play..

im struggling to shift weight myself, carry it upper body = belly, and chest etc..

did you do any cardio or just weights? i do cardio inthe gym, running, rowing, bike and cross-trainer and ahve only stated back lifting weight just the free weightd and bar for bi-ceps.

Cardio wise I did about 2/3/4 sessions of the following a week (all on the cross trainer set at 7 or 8 - although I assume this differs depending on the brand of cross trainer)

3 mins warm up at a steady pace, followed by all out (and I mean absolutely gasping for breath all out) for 15 seconds, 45 seconds of recovery at a lower pace. Repeat the 15/45 for 15 more times. 5 mins cool down at a steady pace at the end. I sometimes changed to 20/40 seconds if I felt up to it.

Or else 3 mins warm up, then 30 seconds all out, 1 min steady pace, 45 seconds all out, 1 min steady, 1 min all out, 1 min steady, 1 min 30 all out, 1 min steady, 1 min all out, 1 min steady, 45 seconds all out, 1 min steady, 30 seconds all out, 5 min cool down.

Collapse onto couch. Collapse onto ground if unable to make it to couch :pac:

Doesn't take a lot of time but you really have to push hard on the sprints, my take on it was if you weren't wrecked afterwards, you weren't doing it right.

Edit: To be honest I don't really know what impact it had on my weight, diet is the key there, but I assume it burned off a few extra calories and I think it definitely made a difference to my fitness - I was able to run up a few flights of stairs in work without getting out of breath when previously I'd be gasping after slowly walking up them.