Eating Guidlines

I’ve been watching what I eat and counting my calories for months now.  I use a website called Loseit.com to track my calories and exercise and it helps me keep track of what I’ve been doing and gives me a little hint of motivation to keep moving forward with my “diet”.  I absolutely HATE when my calorie count goes into the red, it’s almost embarrassing, even if it’s only me that sees it.  So even on the weekends when I cheat, I try to have as little in the red as possible. But just counting calories isn’t enough to lose weight, you have to eat stuff that is good for you.  All the chemicals and crap that is in most of the food we eat today is just slowing our systems down and sadly we don’t usually get the nutrients that we need. Now I’m not saying that I only eat that which is 100% perfect for me, and I do cheat from time to time, but I have a set of “rules” that I like to follow when I plan my weekly meals.

• Fruit in two different meals.  That’s not necessarily 2 servings, I usually eat one, or more than one serving those two times.  

•  Vegetables in two different meals.  Same goes for this as does with the fruit, but I usually end up eating even more vegetables at about 2 to 3 servings just at dinner.  Now this doesn’t mean veggies that are covered in processed cheese or tons of butter.  I do spice them up, but I try to avoid unneeded extra calories.

•  Protein in three meals.  I prefer it to be a meat protein, but egg is just as good to me.  I don’t usually go for the “complete” proteins that combinations of foods can provide me because that’s just far too much thinking for me.

•  Nuts in one of my meals, whether it’s cooked in or raw.

•  5 small meals a day.  Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner and a snack between lunch and the other two.

•  Avoid simple carbs for dinner.  I eat carbs for breakfast and lunch, but if I havn’t done some sort of workout that night, I won’t eat carbs for dinner unless I was a special occasion.

•  Whole Wheat/Whole Grain.  During the week I opt for whole wheat pasta’s and whole grain breads.  The more fiber the better. I am that crazy lady at the food store comparing the nutritional information  of all the breads against each other.

•  Loseit.com. As I said before, I log my calories and have myself on about a 1500 calorie budget.

•  Water, I drink at least 2 liters of it a day.  I usually forget to drink my water on the weekends, and I can really tell the difference.

•  One cup of coffee a day.  I can’t give it up, so I only allow myself one cup a day.

•  Processed sugar in only one beverage/meal a day, and only 2 packets of it.

•  Green Tea.  I have been trying to work this in to my diet more and more, but I try to drink one cup of it at night with my dinner.  I love green tea with jasmine, but I’ve also been drinking this Chinese dieters tea that is supposed to clear our your colon.  I do believe it has been working, but I could do without the cramping it causes.

•  Greek yogurt.  Everyday for breakfast and I beef it up with berries (whatever is on sale that week) and whole grain granola. It’s so filling that I’ve not needed my snack between breakfast and lunch lately.

•  Cheat on the weekend.  I cheat horribly on the weekend, but I think it’s necessary. If you only ever ate food that was great for you and didn’t allow your self a giant slab of chocolate cake from time to time, you would not only be miserable, but you would fail horribly and end up just eating what you want anyways.

I also eat the same thing for lunch all week because it makes it easier to keep track of calories without slaving over my food plan and I don’t mind eating the same thing so it’s no big deal.  The only thing I ever got sick of eating was tuna noodle salad.  Two days of that and I’m so over it.  I also made whole grain mac and cheese with whole grain noodles and flour and it was AWFUL.