Dietary Diary for October

In June of this year, I weighed about 165 pounds and had a belly-measurement of 38". On September 29th I weighed 148 pounds and had a belly-measurement of 35". I don't know about you, but those numbers look pretty good to me.

I did this all by changing my diet. I didn't join a gym (but I do try to work out at home.) I didn't join Weight Watchers. I don't put my food into Zones. I just make smarter decisions about the foods I eat.

And I decided to write out my diet (what I eat) for the world to read and scrutinize.

Now I've read plenty of diet books. While there are quite a few that are really good, there are some that are just plain scary. For me, the book that made the most sense was The Abs Diet, which my diet is based on.

I recommend this book for these reasons:

1. It simply has you replace the bad foods with better foods and teaches you how to eat better.
2. You don't have to count calories or Zone your foods or check off boxes for protein, fats and carb consumption.
3. You get to eat more often. Yes, it's like an "eat when your body tells you to" diet.
4. Instead of just telling you to exercise (most books spend a page or two telling you this) the Abs Diet shows you things you can do.

While The Abs Diet is my book of choice, other good books are The South Beach Diet and The Mediterranean Diet. The Zone Diet is okay, but reads more like a medical journal than a diet book.

Along with changing my diet, I'm trying to incorporate three days of weight/strength training at home a week. Plus, I don't walk as much as I should. Only 30 minutes a day and I haven't been doing that. Which I should change this month. And for exercises, I'm using The Abs Diet: The Get Fit Stay Fit Plan and bits of 8 Minutes in the Morning.

I don't know if this will be a daily series for the month, but I hope to get enough posts in about it to show what I've been doing. And if this inspires someone to make better changes in their life, then the time I spent writing it was worth it. Feel free to leave comments or contact me.

Foodstuffs

If losing weight is 90% what you eat and 10% exercise, then getting rid of the bad foods in your life is the most important thing to do. And I'll admit that it can be hard to do, especially in our processed world where we worship at the throne of Convenience and regard health as a four-letter word.

Below are the changes I've made. When I say I had a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for lunch, I'm not talking about two slices of white bread, regular peanut butter, and regular jelly. (That combination will have your body storing a lot of carbs and sugars for day or weeks to come. And it's stored in your belly fat.) But really, the changes I made, for the most part, are slight. But I believe that, taken as a whole, these changes made a huge difference in the rotunda I called a belly.

Sugar
This past spring (March/April 2007) I started to cut back on my sugar consumption. I stopped drinking pop and eating candy bars. For a while I did indulge a bit too often in Chocolate Cake. Even without the Pepsi's and the Kit-Kats, I didn't lose weight. The problem for me was table sugar. I could easily drink a couple pots of coffee a day, and I'd spoon spoonfuls of sugar into each cup. It wasn't until I stopped with the sugar that I began to lose the weight. And today I have very little desire for cake or candy, and no desire for pop. (I firmly believe that if you want to lose weight, that you are serious about it, that you have to get rid of as much sugar (processed and granulated, not the natural sugars found in fruits, for example) as you can.

Banished the White Breads
I replaced the typical white bread with Organic Whole Wheat. Any decent diet book will tell you that Whole Grains are the way to go. I get Organic bread for one simple reason: it doesn't have High Fructose Corn Syrup, which I'm trying to avoid. Most store brand and national brand whole wheat bread has HFCS, but most of the ones labeled "Organic" don't.

I also use Whole Wheat tortillas instead of the regular flour kind. I've seem some whole grain bagels, too, but some varieties (Thomas, for one) had HFCS in it.

Dairy
For milk, I use 1%. Yes, it has some fat, but our bodies need some fat. (Fat doesn't make you fat. At least, in moderate amounts, some saturated fats wont. Trans fats are another animal. Or rather, plant-type. Avoid trans fats at all costs.)

I also eat a lot of yogurt. (Usually in a smoothie with fruits.) I get fat free yogurt which, surprisingly, has fewer grams of sugar than its fatty alternative. I also get the brand (which seems to be local - Lucerne) that doesn't have High Fructose Corn Syrup. Yoplait and Dannon tend to have HFCS. Read the labels.

Margarine/Butter is tricky. Real butter has a lot of fat, but the substitutes have a lot of partially hydrogenated oils. I don't use a lot of butter/margarine, but I do have a tub of "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" (which is a misnomer, since I can believe it's not butter.) It has a few grams of polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, which are the good fats.

For other dairy products, I usually get the 'Light" variety (i.e. cream cheese.) I'm not a huge cheese eater, so regular fat cheese is okay with me.

Jelly
Most jellies add sugar (including HFCS.) I usually get the sugar free jam. (I have a jar of Smuckers sugar free blackberry jam sitting in the fridge. It says it has Splenda in it, so the jury is still out on that.)

Peanut Butter
I switched to the "Natural" peanut butter. (Skippy, for example, has a pre-stirred variety.) The reason: no partially hydrogenated oils.

Energy Bars
I keep a few Clif Bars in my car for when I get hungry when I'm not at home. (And it keeps me out of the Jack In The Box drive thru. I love Clif Bars because they taste good, don't have high fructose corn syrup or partially hydrogenated oils, and are a good source of fiber.

Breakfast
It was hard for me to start eating breakfast. Before this summer, I considered breakfast to be a few cups of coffee before lunch. Now I have something to eat every morning. Usually cereal with half a banana.

I don't eat oatmeal. I refuse to eat oatmeal. I can usually get a spoonful or two down, but then it wants to come back up. So I tried to find a brand of cereal that had a decent amount of fiber. Besides Raisin Bran, which I'm not a big fan of. So I get Smart Start by Kelloggs. I wouldn't say it's my favorite, but I can eat it. And Smart Start also has the dubious distinction of being the only food I actively eat with high fructose corn syrup. (It's listed in the ingredients near the middle, so it's not a lot. (And you can't completely avoid HFCS.)

Baked, Not Fried
I've always preferred baking. You put something in the oven, and come back later. (Or in the infamous words of that infomercial, "Set it and forget it!" But when I do fry, I use olive oil (and I read that flaxseed oil was better for you.)

Smoothies
I take 5 or 6 ice cubes, 1 cup yogurt, 1 cup milk, and frozen or fresh fruit and blend it up. It makes about 3 cups, which I drink every few hours.

Bisquick
Maybe it's just the box I have, but I found trans fats listed on the nutrition label. I a supermarket where it's getting harder and harder to find trans fats (which is a good thing) my box of Bisquick has it. Which isn't a good thing. So I don't use it.

Fruits and Vegetables
I'll admit I don't get enough vegetables in my diet. My Smoothie gives me a serving or two of fruits. So I'm trying to find ways to get more of the good stuff in me.

Water
I'm trying to drink a lot more water. Since I also drink a lot of coffee, which is a diuretic, drinking more water will keep me hydrated. Which is always a good thing.

Endnotes

I'm not a doctor, nutritionist or dietitian. I'm just a guy who has been losing weight. As always, consult a doctor before starting a diet/weight loss program, especially if you're considerably over-weight.

And since the above are my opinions (based on books based on research) check things out for yourself.