Weight Loss Fund Raiser CHAT THREAD

[Bigrig]

Hey All,
Just thought I'd share some advice i had from my doctor
Firstly he recommended anyone trying to lose weight should have blood tests, including thyroid, just to rule out any health issues (so am going for my blood tests on sat).
Also, he has highly recommended the CSIRO Wellbeing Diet Book - the only diet book he would ever recommend.
Basically it is pretty flexible, but recommendations are:
- High protein, low fat diet
- Red meat 4 nights a week, fish twice and chicken once.
- 2 fruit servings a day
- 1 high fibre cereal serving a day (weetbix, all bran etc)
- 2 wholemeal servings a day (rice/pasta/potato/bread)
- plenty of veg (almost unlimited)
- high fibre lunch (egg/ham/salmon/corned beef etc with salad in wholemeal bread/roll) or veg soup
- plus only 2 units of alcohol a week (ie 2 glasses of wine)

Thats kinda the key points anyways . . . so after a steady loss of 0.7/0.8Kgs per week over the last 3 weeks, i'll see how i go on this

Is anyone else trying a specific weight loss program?
I was surprised by the high protein stuff - i always thought chicken was better for being 'healthy'.
I know a few people who have done Jenny Craig type programs and lost 15-20Kgs in a few months . . . but its not cheap (i think around $100 per week, plus you have to add some stuff to it).

Trace

Thanks for the info mate.

Chicken is a high protein meat, but chicken fat is up there with the absolute worst of saturated fats - causing high cholesterol and coronary blockages etc. Fish is great, but sometimes a bit expensive and boring without a nice sauce (which stuffs the purpose of having fish). I take that Fish 'Super Concentrate' (3ml per day) which has about the same intake of omega3 as about 500 grams of fish - a lot of fish!! (omega3 is the stuff your brain is made up of/uses for function).

Vegetables are always high on the agenda, but the problem these days is we tend to boil them, thinking that's the best way to cook them for health. Problem is, cooking leaches a huge amount of the natural nutrients out of the vege's and what you left with is a lot of starch in things like potato, sweet potato, pumpkin, etc. Starch is just a complex sugar and if not burned, will simply be stored for later use as fat.

Losing weight fast like on Jenny Craig is based on 'shocking' the body into action - fast weight loss is NOT healthy nor is it usually sustainable post the completion of a program. Remember, we are all physiologically different - we metabolize differently, we absorb/break down/utilize nutrients and chemicals differently, we have different lifestyles and irrespective of what the literally thousands of diet programs out there suggest, what works for one, may and generally will not work for another. Put it this way - you can google this as its on the web - take biological identical twins (single egg, not paternal twins) who consume the same food, same diet, same exercise routine etc - they both 'may' sustain a nearly identical weight, but one may develop gout from eating tomato and the other doesn't, etc - why? They are 'identical' twins? The reason is even though they are twins (not chimera's either - they are hideously rare and obviously need to be excluded) is all the above - their genetic makeup is essentially the same, but their DNA is not, and even subtle changes (0.00001%) in DNA will affect their physiology. Remember again that we share 98% of the same DNA as rats!!!! So it doesn't take much of a change to completely affect the look, the way we process, etc.

Some people battle weight their whole life - go to a party and watch some skinny bloke plowing through a carton of heavy beer (about 8-11 grams of sugar in each bottle - two to three full teaspoons to make it easier to comprehend), eating cheese and crackers, dips etc whilst you're sitting there thinking I'd be as big as a house if I ate like that. Solely because they process differently. It certainly does NOT mean they ate healthy on the inside (usually quite the contrary), but again, as a western civilization, we have a fixation that "thin is healthy" -- wrong, wrong, wrong!!

You'll have a weight that is right for your build etc and you may find (just like me) that you are going to have to prepare yourself for a life long change of having the occasional (5+ times per week) meal replacement drink etc to keep the weight off. I played A grade and representative rugby league and couldn't get over about 95kilos (fit) when playing, but now have to realise that 95 kilos is a real achievement for me - I stopped playing and went to 125kgs!! I don't want to be that big again, and I don't want to do 20+ hours of intensive training per week either, so there has to be a compromise - and that is diet and lifestyle.

Sorry for the hideously long winded response. Try to find what's right for you - have a look back at some of the earlier posts in this thread for vege's and fruit etc to steer clear of, certainly increase your protein intake, and reduce the fat and carbs wherever you can - don't forget, many type 2 diabetics (my father and I'm sure some people on the forum) are more susceptible to fats than just sugars - both need to be watched and reduced where possible.

For me, I'm a terrible breakfast eater - that is, I don't have it as I'm milk (and soy) protein intolerant. That doesn't mean I don't like them! lol. It means I don't process them and I get physically sick. As I'm not a 'get up and make toast' kind of guy (and that most bread is high in sugars), I simply stopped having brekky - that's bad!!! So now I have a meal replacement shake - the Rapid Loss one - high in protein, still has simple sugars, but low and no fats and heaps of vitamins (I take a multi vitamin also). This is great as I found I used to Hoover late morning and into lunch, but now not feeling overwhelmed by hunger die to having something at breakfast. Due to injury, I have done literally nothing but change my diet through the last 4 weeks, and have lost just over 12kgs!! I am now replacing two meals with supplements, grazing through the day (smaller snacks, more often). I had roast pork with baked vege's last night, so I'm not completely changing my life - it needs to be sustainable and realistic!!!

Good luck with it.