Without wanting to bore readers with my life story, let me just say that after cutting out cans of coke and some sugars (because these made me hungry, or at the very least less full), I did the following:
- Cut out soft drinks altogether replaced with water or green tea.
- Cut out 99% of bread.
- Went from skimmed to semi skimmed milk (which I though had slightly less sugar content percentage wise).
- Tried to eat meals that made me feel full without having too many calories.
- Tried to have regular meals – four meals a day of no more than 400 calories each.
- Avoid desserts and processed sugar as far as possible.
- Avoid anything with diet written on it, these are usually high in sugar which means you must starve yourself because if you don’t the excess will be stored as fat.
- Ate what I wanted at weekends but trying to avoid the avoids above where possible. We usually gave an Indian curry with half rice half chapati, once a week.
- Tried to avoid snacks – having a snack is a sign that my diet is wrong the meals should fill me.
- Start the day with breakfast – either eggs and bacon or porridge with skimmed milk, sometimes kippers.
- Try to eat protein rather than carbs. As I discovered the books in the book review section of this blog, this encouraged me further.
Anyway it worked I went from 17.5 to 16 stone in a few months. More importantly that has been my weight for over a year, a weight at age 49 I last weighed when age 25. I have gone from 38 inch waist to 34 inches, XL to L in chest size, and feel there is probably a lot more to come, all without dieting.
The reason why I have not lost anymore is I find snacks in the office too appealing to be able to abstain every day – I have no willpower whatsoever. If I’m hungry I eat, the key for me is to try to eat something that makes me feel full.
Future blog entries will cover meal ideas and cover the next stage where I get to fifteen stone which is my next aim.