So....What's the Program?

I get asked all the time what 'program' I'm on.  "Like....is it Weight Watchers, or Beach Body, or ...what, exactly?"


How about the old-fashioned, "move more, eat less" program?  Because basically, that's what I'm doing.  But since I've been asked for details, I figured I'd just put them in a blog post that I can direct folks to, and I won't have to keep repeating myself. :)

Disclaimer: I am not a doctor or dietician, or any sort of medical professional. Everything I write on my blog is from my own personal experience and should not be used as medical advice. Always check with your doctor before changing your diet or exercise routine.

My 'program', if you will, consists of several elements I've picked up from quite a few sources over the years, combined with a whole lot of common sense.  Here are the basics:

1)  I limit myself to a certain number of calories a day, and I track everything I eat. 

It may not sound like much, but tracking is an incredible tool that really helps you learn how your body works.  It doesn't matter that you are (blank) years old, I promise, if you track your food, you will learn more than you could ever imagine about how you've always fueled yourself.  And you will find as you go that your body runs on quite a bit less fuel than you ever thought possible. 
I use an app/website called My Fitness Pal to track my food. You can find it at www.myfitnesspal.com.  It's free, extremely helpful and user friendly, and if you decide to use it, by all means...add me, so we can encourage each other! Just make sure you let me know where you know me from, or I may not add you.  My user id is phoenixpromise. If you let the My Fitness Pal (MFP) app calculate your ideal settings for you, then it will tell you how many calories you should be consuming every day, based on your current weight, your goal weight, and how many pounds you want to lose each week (zero, one, or two.  There is no bigger option, nor...judging from past experience...should there be).  As you lose weight, it will recalibrate every so often, and drop your calorie limit down to compensate.  Currently, I'm at 1200 per day, and I think that's probably the lowest, because it hasn't recalibrated in about 40 pounds.  And my goal every day is to use as many of those as possible without going over...it's that simple.


There are many apps you can use to track your food and calories, MFP just happens to be the all-around best I've found, and I'm very happy with the caloric info it provides. But you don't have to go all high-tech, if that makes you uncomfortable...many people keep a hand-written journal of their daily intake.  Either way, it helps you stay accountable to yourself, and that's the most important thing.  The drawback to that method, however, is that it will not automatically track your calorie intake, so you will have to look up everything manually if you go that route. 

2) I eat five small meals a day, spaced about 2 1/2 to 3 hours apart.

There is a lot of science behind this, but basically, eating like this keeps your metabolic fire stoked so you're burning more efficiently at a higher intensity, which means you're getting more fat-burning bang for your buck with each mouthful.  It also means that you're actually getting hungry before it's time to eat.  That may sound funny, but I went my whole life saying 'I'm hungry', but never actually knew what real hunger pangs felt like.  Now, my body signals me when it's time to eat...not the other way around.  The last thing is that because you're eating so frequently, you're sending a signal to your body that it's going to get plenty to eat, so it doesn't need to shut down into 'starvation' mode, which can happen to folks who (like me for years) do things like skip breakfast and/or lunch and live off coffee and diet coke.  *shudder*

3)  There is a specific structure or formula (if you will) to each meal, and I stick to it.

 Breakfast:  1 serving of fruit (citrus or melon)
                    2 ounces protein


My typical breakfast is 2 eggs, either scrambled, or fried with Coconut Pam, and 1/2 grapefruit.


Mid-Morning:  2 oz. protein
                           1 c. greens
                           1/4 c. fruit or veggies as garnish (think 'salad')


My protein for all meals other than breakfast is either fish or fowl related, with an occasional pork chop thrown in at dinner.  I highly recommend staying away from red meat as much as possible if you're trying to lose weight, the fat content is just too high for more than occasional consumption.  Typically, I eat a half a turkey patty for my protein, it's roughly between 1 1/2 to 2 ounces.  And for a long time, I used fresh spinach for my greens, but I got burnt out on it, so now I generally eat green beans. :)  My fruit depends on what looks good in the grocery store....usually strawberries or blueberries, but right now, neither looks good, so I'm going with grapes.  I count five for this meal, which is 52 calories...and just the right amount of something sweet to offset the rest.


Lunch:  Same as above, with the addition of a 1/2 c. complex carb


Complex meaning either a potato, or occasionally wild or brown rice.  Sweet potatoes are always the best bet...there's practically no better, more nutrient-rich food source on the planet.  I eat half a small sweet potato every day, with nothing on it.  If you bake it, it's sweeter...not sure why.  Stay away from all simple carbs, like bread and pasta, though...they convert straight to sugar in your system.


Mid-Afternoon:  Same formula as mid-morning.


You do not need to eat the exact same thing every day (although I do).  You are welcome to switch your meals around, as long as they pretty much follow the same parameters.  But one of the reasons why I don't switch, is because I learned a long time ago that if your body likes a particular thing, and it's working, then there's no reason to change it.  What I eat works for my body, so I'm not going to change a sure bet.  Besides, the more my meals stay the same, the less I think about food.  My meals become what they were meant to be....fuel, and nothing more.  I will say though that I do cover my bases by taking a multivitamin every day...just to make sure my body's getting all the nutrients it needs.


Dinner:  2-3 oz. protein
               1-2 c. veggies (2, if it's salad-related)


Here's where creativity lies.  This is the meal I look forward to every day, the one meal that changes!  This meal flexes a bit, depending on how active I've been that day.  I'll talk more about that in a minute, but a typical dinner for me is a fillet of some fresh fish or chicken, and a nice side veggie or stir fry...or perhaps a hearty salad, with some grilled chicken or fish in it....yumm!  The possibilities are endless....just stay away from the carbs.

You might note the absence of dairy in my meal plan...that's because I'm lactose-intolerant.  Even if you have no problem with dairy, if weight loss is the goal, you'd do better to limit it for a while.  Don't believe the hype: dairy is fattening.  Most of it comes from cow's milk...and cow's milk was designed to help baby cows grow in to big cows...not to mention all the hormones and steroids that the cows are subjected to in order to increase their milk production.  I do use raw butter occasionally, however...it's a great natural source of fat. And I do add the occasional bit of good cheese here and there...generally in a nice veggie omelet on the weekends.




As you can see, as a whole, it doesn't look like I eat much food at all in the course of a day.  That's because I don't, compared to what we have become accustomed to as 'normal' standard meals.  But if you eat this way, you will find after the first couple of days (during which time your brain is screaming at you that you must be nuts), that it's more than enough food to keep you satisfied.  And then you will marvel at how much extra you were eating at every meal that your body didn't need, and how you can't imagine how you didn't gain much, much more than you did.  Our bodies are simply miraculous, adaptable creations that we don't give nearly enough credit to.

4) I eat as clean as possible.

This may be the most important food-related item.  Clean eating means as close to nature as possible.  No processed foods, no added gravies, dressings or condiments covering everything up. (Yes, this means salad dressings, too...but that doesn't mean you can't get creative! I use lemon juice a lot, and vinegar and oil is always great...no sugar!)  I stay away from processed meats that are full of hormones and nitrates.  I stay away from canned foods with their high sodium counts.  I stay far, far away from sodas.  Nothing that contains salt or sugar.  And nothing that contains sugar substitute, if I can help it...that stuff is just as bad, if not worse.  Clean means like it came from nature, or as close to nature as possible.  I always try to keep that in mind.  And once your palette is used to clean eating, you will never be able to eat any other way, I promise.  You won't miss the salt or sugar, and you sure won't miss any of the other junk!

5) I drink at least 8 8 oz glasses of water a day (64 oz).

Water is so important in so many ways.  If food is our fuel, water is the lubricant!  We have to have it, and when we give it to ourselves properly, every single system in our body responds in a hugely positive way. Everything moves and flows, and it's a beautiful thing.  Besides...water has zero calories, and definitely don't want to drink my calories! My rule: if a beverage has calories, it's too rich for my blood....and even if it has no calories, if it's not coffee, tea, or water, it's probably not clean, anyway...so why would I want to put it in my body?  Pretty much all I drink any more is coffee and water...with the occasional cup of hot tea thrown in at night.

6) I move.  Every day.

This may be the most important one of all.  It doesn't matter what you do, or how long you do it.  The important part is that you do something. Don't worry about it being too little...if there is one thing I've learned on this journey, it's that All Forward Motion Counts.  That is my mantra, and I live by it every day.  There have been days when I was lucky to get a 15-minute walk in to the main hospital building and back.  That counts.  At least I did something that day.


Along with your food, MFP also tracks your activity when you log it in, and adds whatever calories you burn back to your total calories for the day....which means that the more you move, the more you can eat!  That is why, on days that I have a BIG burn, I treat myself to something like a taco salad, or maybe a wrap that has more calories than I would typically have calories for.  Likewise, if Keith wants to take me out to dinner one night, I can make sure I burn enough calories that day not to have to worry about what I order off the menu.  Doesn't mean I don't have to make healthy food choices, though.  I still want to eat as clean as possible....always.  And it doesn't mean that I have to eat ALL the extra calories I earn, either.  There are many days when I end the day with a couple of hundred calories still in my account...but they are there, if I need them.  And because I don't want to eat too few calories (which is just as bad as too many), I do try to eat the majority of them.


Even though MFP will track your activity, there are other apps that do it better with less work, and if you use one that works in tandem with MFP like the Runkeeper app I use (www.runkeeper.com), it will track your activity and feed the results directly into MFP for you!  Again, Runkeeper is free and easy to work with, and tracks many different kinds of activities for you.  If you use it, add me, so we can help keep each other accountable and encourage each other, too!  Don't forget to let me know how you know me when you add me, or I may not add you.  My user id is phoenixpromise here, too.  Which brings me to the last item...

7) I make myself accountable.  I tell people what I'm doing.

The more folks that know what you're doing, the more you are going to not want to mess up. The more folks you tell, the less you will want to let them down.  And soon, it won't be about letting them down so much as it is about letting yourself down.  Accountability is very, very important.  I started out just letting a few close family members know, but soon it started branching out to friends and co-workers. I started blogging for the same reason, and word started getting around.  The more I lost, the more it fed the accountability monster until people were calling me.  "Hey, I heard you were losing weight....what are you doing??"   That's how I got my running buddy, Sheila.  That's how my friend Lauran started running races with me.  That's how I've managed to build up such a great online and real-time network of support....because that's how that accountability gives back. On the days I'm down and dragging (like the beginning of this week), I talk about it, and it helps. My friends and co-workers see it, and encourage me.  My family sees it, and they are able to do things to help me stay on track.  Accountability is probably the keystone to the whole thing.


So....there you have it.  My 'program'.  Mainly just common sense, really.  Just put down in writing, so you can get a handle on it.  And it's pretty easy too.  The biggest thing is that I don't put more in my body that it can use or burn in a day....and I try to put in less, so that it can draw from the excess I currently have stored.  If I'm doing this every single day, then there is no room for failure.  I may not lose ten pounds this week, but simple math will tell you that eventually, it must come off.  And it has, every time.  As long as I put in the work, the results will show it. If not this week, then certainly next.  And I can wait. :)


Hope this is helpful to you! If you try it, let me know how it works for you!