Like many who were pushed indoors when the coronavirus began its maniacal spread across US, I started working from home on March 15. At that time, I weighed 131 pounds. At my heaviest a year before, I was 155 pounds. In a year I lost 20 pounds; in the 10 weeks that I’ve worked at home, I’ve gained 5. Here’s the surprising and simple way I plan to lose 10 pounds by August.
But first, a little history and some lessons learned.
Losing weight by counting grams
That 20 pound weight loss was achieved gram by gram – literally. I was introduced to the concept of macronutrients and “counting macros” by a co-worker. I lost that 20 pounds by carefully weighing and measuring my food, planning, prepping and packing my meals.
The planning and packing of my meals wasn’t a big deal. The prepping was. Every single ingredient for each meal I weighed and measured in grams, and calculated for total calorie and macro count. This was tallied into my daily macro and calorie goals. Every day, I only ate what I prepped.
My weekends were spent shopping, chopping, prepping, cooking and packing for the week.
I did more math than I had since high school, adding up the combinations of fat, carb and protein grams that would provide the maximum amount of food portions every day, and still allow me a treat.
It was an effective but time-consuming process. Given that it wasn’t that simple, I’m not sure I’d do the same thing in my goal to lose 10 pounds by August.
Frustration then enlightenment
When I first started on my macro journey, I was confused and frustrated. I was drawn to the idea of counting macros because I could continue to eat real food (including my beloved sweets) as long as I made it fit my macros.
I bought cookbooks and scoured the internet for nutrition databases and calorie calculators. I learned more about serving sizes and nutrition labels. I educated myself on the calorie and macro content of the foods I enjoyed. I ate more vegetables and fruits, and was judicious about my snacking. I strategically figured out ways to literally have my cake and eat it too.
The act of weighing and measuring my food was exhausting, and almost obsessive. But through that process, I was enlightened about my overall nutritional and caloric needs.
Armed with this new information, I’m less discouraged about what I need to do to lose 10 pounds by August.
Working the numbers
I’ll be honest – the idea of weighing, measuring and tracking my food all over again to achieve this kind of weight loss is filling me with a bit of anxiety. I started this blog by retelling how I lost 20 pounds in a year, now I’m saying I’m going to lose 10 pounds by August when it’s already June.
Using simple math and science alone, the numbers tell me it’s doable. I’ve got about 10 weeks. That means I need to keep my daily caloric intake to about 1270 calories in order to lose about a pound a week.
Notice I said doable, not painless.
My surprising and simple strategy
I’m going to use what I learned about serving size, calorie content and meal planning over the course of the last year. With that, here is my strategy to lose 10 pounds by August.
That strategy includes building an eating plan that keeps me full, satisfies cravings, and keeps me at or near my daily caloric goal.
Include protein and vegetables or fruit at every meal
Gram for gram, protein keep me more full than any other food. Vegetables are also very filling, and low in calories.
Combining the two makes for a powerhouse meal. Vegetables might not be practical for every meal, (spinach and cereal?!), so fruit is a fine substitution.
Snack on fruit twice a day
Fruit has carbs. Carbs are energy. Fruit as a mid-morning same is perfect for getting me to my lunch hour.
I enjoy pairing pineapple and blueberries for my mid-morning snack. After lunch, a mandarin or watermelon is a nice juicy treat.
Plan to include 1 treat a week so as not to feel deprived
Sweets are my kryptonite. I think dessert should follow every meal. I’m also not fond of the thought that any kind of weight loss plan means I can’t have ice cream or a cannoli.
As a result of tracking all my meals every single day, I’ve learned if I pair one of my high protein low fat breakfasts with a salad for lunch, I’m left with a hefty amount of calories for the remainder of the day.
So long as my dinner is lower in fat, I can indeed have a delicious full calories treat when I want.
Eat to my hunger level and not over
Despite my best planning, it’s unrealistic to think that I will not have days when I go over my daily calorie count. Depending on what that overindulgence looks like, the next day I might not feel hungry at all.
That’s when eating to my hunger level will be important.
It’s a simple concept. If I’m not hungry for a meal, I don’t eat it. Or I only eat half of what I normally would, just to get the wrinkles out of my stomach.
My Achilles heal is eating the clock. By that, I mean if the clock says it’s 8am or noon, then it must be time for breakfast or lunch.
If I’ve overeaten the day before, I can pretty much guarantee I’m not interested in breakfast. I need to tell myself it’s okay not to eat that meal and instead, eat to my hunger level.
Eat my calories instead of drinking them
This one should be pretty easy for me. Except for my morning cup of coffee, I mostly only drink water.
But let me tell you about that morning cup of coffee. Even though I use fat free creamer and a sugar substitute, it still has a total of 64 calories and 7 grams of carbs. Double that if I want a refill.
Skipping that second cup of coffee saves me those calories, which I can then use on something else. Like whipped cream for my strawberries.
No taste testing
In a previous blog post, I mentioned how a forkful of this or that adds up. They all have calories that I’m not accounting for as part of my overall eating plan.
I’m terrible about taste testing. I eat just that “little bit” of something that stays in the pan after cooking, or is left on my boyfriends plate.
Those calories add up, just like “Just try a bite”. Think of them as Ninja-calories. They sneak up and bit you in the butt before you know it.
Drink loads of water
While all I drink is water, I know I don’t drink enough water. Yet water has overall tremendous benefits for your health and is a key component for weight loss.
Water is a natural appetite suppressant. In fact, when your stomach growls, you should first consider if you’re not really thirsty.
When I think I’m hungry, the first thing I do is think about how much water I’ve had during the day. If I can’t remember, then I haven’t had enough.
And by the way, water is necessary to burn fat, both from foods and stored body fat. That alone should encourage increased water consumption.
Grab a copy of my FREE Meal Plan Idea guide!
Keeping it simple
The idea this time around is that my attempt to lose weight shouldn’t require the level of diligence it did with counting macros. It’s the entire idea of that which makes me anxious.
This means, there are three things here I still have to reconcile: (1) how am I going know how much I’m eating without all the weighing and measuring, (2) how am I going to track what I’m eating unless I know how many calories are in my food, and (3) how am I going to know I’m making progress.
Serving sizes
Even without weighing my food, I can still eyeball a portion size using what I learned and what I know. I plan on using my own hand as my tool of measurement.
I already know that I’ll likely overestimate (we all do when it comes to portion size), so I’ll take a little bit off what I dish out.
Tracking my calories
The goal is to keep it simple. I eat my meals and my snacks and that’s it.
From tracking my food for so long, I already have an idea of how many calories my typical meals contain. For anything outside that, I’ll eat half of what’s on my plate or to my level of hunger.
Tracking my progress
Even when I stopped weighing my food, I didn’t stop weighing myself.
I did and will continue to weigh myself every single day.
My current weight gain was not a surprise. I saw the scale creep up bit by bit over time. I have no one to blame but myself. My sedentary job didn’t change and I still exercised every day.
What did change was how much I ate. I ate enough to but on 5 pounds in 10 weeks. Now I need to reduce that by twice as much to lose that weight plus another 5 pounds in the same 10 weeks.
My Challenge to You
Having a support system or surrounding yourself with a group of like minded people increases your chances of success.
Are you interested in taking this challenge with me? Drop your comments below and let me know! Let’s take this trip together and achieve our goals of losing 10 pounds by August.