2024 New Years Resolutions

[Limewater]

You are clearly going to "do keto."

If you do it properly, you will lose weight. You will also have halitosis, low energy, you'll feel like crap, your legs will feel dead if you try to run, and your grocery bill will go up.
I would say that it will increase your risk for heart disease, but it doesn't really sound any worse than your current terrible diet. You may even come out slightly ahead by carrying less weight.

It won't be sustainable and when you quit in a few months and go back to your current diet you'll gain all of the weight back.

When someone suggests a more plant-based diet, why do you automatically assume that "plant-based" means "plant-based meat alternatives?" Don't over-complicate things. It just means eating plants.

I don't make New Years resolutions. If I need to change something about myself, I start when the need arises. So far in my life, that day has never been January 1st.

[Raging Justice]

I mentioned trying keto to a nurse once. It's probably worth noting that I was asking as someone who is a diabetic, and she was firmly against doing it. So that's one vote against keto.

[prfsnl_gmr]

I don't make New Years resolutions. If I need to change something about myself, I start when the need arises. So far in my life, that day has never been January 1st.

+1

[REPO Man]

Well, if not keto then what? Paleo? Atkins? Please don't say veganism. Most vegan options are way beyond my budget.

Though TBH I probably won't start a diet for awhile now. I'll definitely wait until I get paid next week and I've whittled down my remaining groceries that lack compatibility with most halfway decent diets. Like if I can't have sweets I want to at least finish the open pack of Nutter Butters I have in the fridge in lieu of throwing them out. And if bread is off the table I want to finish off the brioche-style bread I have.

Plus proper research will take awhile and in rge meantime I'll just focus on working out.

[MrPopo]

Well, if not keto then what? Paleo? Atkins? Please don't say veganism. Most vegan options are way beyond my budget.

The "eat less food" diet. Take in less calories than you currently do.

[marurun]

Eat more plants and less meat. Eat less processed food and more food that’s not processed. There’s no name for that other than a healthy diet. Eat more brown rice and beans. Eat carrots and cucumbers and bell peppers as snacks. Eat fruit, for crying out loud. When you do eat meat, try to make it chicken or turkey if you can. Eat canned tuna occasionally. Eat bread with fiber in it instead of white bread. If you’re short on time make 4 servings of something less processed when you have to time and eat the remaining serving as leftovers when there’s a time crunch.

I’m not stating this because it’s easy to do. Eating proper amounts of healthy foods is really challenging for some people (people like me). There are lots of emotional issues involved in eating, for example. But you don’t need an XX diet to eat better. If you need a label for a diet to be able to do it the root of your problem probably isn’t your diet.

[Ziggy]

Well, if not keto then what? Paleo? Atkins? Please don't say veganism. Most vegan options are way beyond my budget.

Here's a general rule: If the diet has a name, don't bother.

Any diet with a name might help short term but will always fail long term.

Loosing weight by controlling your diet isn't a hard thing to figure out (that doesn't mean it isn't a hard thing to do). Everyone already knows what to do. Cut out sugar as much as possible. This includes things that turn into sugar, like pasta. Cut out as much bread as possible. Limit or cut out fruit juice. No sweets. No soda. Boosting your protein in each meal will go a long way, getting the most amount of protein with the least amount of calories. And control your portions (Google can probably help determine this based on your age and weight). Even if the rest of your diet is perfect, you can wreck it with too large portions. This paragraph alone is usually enough to loose some weight and probably feel better too.

The food pyramid is bullshit. I don't think there's an agreed upon thing, but if you do an image search for "healthy food plate" you should get the idea. More than a quarter of your dinner plate should be vegetables. And an equal portion of some kind of protein. If you only want to loose weight, then any meat is fine. If you want to be healthy, then look for meats that don't use antibiotics or hormones on the animals. Organic, if possible, but it's expensive. A step further in the healthy direction says to really only eat poultry and fish for meats. Red meat and pork is bad for you. And heavily processed meats are generally bad. So no sausage, bacon, cold cuts, etc. You can fill the rest of your dinner plate with a carb if you must, but keep the serving as small as possible. So the general idea is this: Don't make half your plate mash potatoes, 49% meat, and one bite of vegetable.

For lunch, if you can't have bread, cold cuts or processed foods (like fast food or microwave stuff) then what the hell are you suppose to eat? I'm not being funny, that's really how I feel about it. But I know the answer, it's just that it takes a lot of effort. You have to eat lunch the same way you eat dinner, which means you will have to prepare foods to take to work for lunch. I know some people that do this, and I have to give it to them for the dedication to eating right. But if you can at least eat decently for lunch, like no fast foods or soda, and have a healthy plate dinner then I think that's well enough for most people.

I had a stretch were I was lucky enough to have a mini fridge right next to my desk at work. I made sure I was always stocked with fresh fruit and vegetables. I don't like many veggies cooked, but I like most of them raw. And I also kept nuts around. So for a while, I didn't even eat lunch. I just snacked on fruit, veggies, and nuts all day long. This is an amazing diet, if you can swing it. I never felt hungry, so I didn't have to eat lunch. And since I didn't eat lunch, I didn't do that too much too fast thing. So I'd feel better through out the day.

For breakfast, you're own your own. I usually don't eat breakfast. For the few times I do, I don't beat myself up over what I'm eating since it's rare.

A vegan diet isn't the only thing beyond your budget. Eating healthy is expensive. Hot pockets are a much cheaper meal than preparing quality food. But the fact of the matter is that cheap food is crap food. Stuff that is overly processed, with chemicals that don't break down in your body, or meats loaded with preservatives, antibiotics and hormones, should be avoided. The nutritional value and portions wont mean anything, if you're eating heavily processed foods you are going to feel like shit no matter if you're gaining or losing weight (but you'll probably be gaining it).

By diet alone, the weight doesn't come off fast enough for most people. So if you want to jump start losing weight, then exercise is where it's at. Running and biking are two of the best activities you can do. You have to burn calories, and these are two of the easiest ways to burn the most calories. If you bike to work, that may not be enough (to lose weight). You have to burn more than you take in to lose any weight. You can Google your age and weight to find out what your heart rate should be and for how long to make a good work out. You can run around the block for free, but a lot of people don't like to do that (myself included). If you have the space, you can get a small treadmill from Amazon for like $250. They fold up and can take up minimal space. And they usually have a spot for a tablet. So you can binge watch a series or listen to music to make the time go by. But again, Google what your heart rate should be to make the most of the activity. Or Google a running schedule or whatever. I was once aiming to run on a treadmill 5 days a week, but a few co-workers (that go to the gym regularly) cautioned me not to because you will burn yourself out. At least, if you go from nothing to immediately 5 days a week. Three days a week was recommended to me.

All of the above isn't some random stuff I tell people, it's actually what I'd like to do for myself. You can take it or leave it, I don't care. I have done all of the above in the past, but my diet and exercise has been shit lately. I was waiting until after the New Year to start making these changes. Not as a New Years Resolution, I think those are dumb. But because I don't want to deprive myself of the awesome holiday foods that only come once a year.

tl;dr - Just by making the above obvious choices will go a long way to losing weight and feeling better. There's really no need to force yourself to adhere to some strict diet and rules, or counting the calories of each meal, and all that BS.

[REPO Man]

The problem with making meals ahead of time is that I work two jobs and they're both on opposite ends of the day. On my mornings off I usually try to catch up on the sleep I miss most nights, especially if I'm off from my afternoon job that day. And on my afternoons off I usually do all the chores and errands I blow off the rest of the week. The big one is doing laundry, though that's more of a summer chore since a nearby motel lets me use their laundry room. When they're closed I usually figure something out. So usually I'll make a special meal for my nights off, though that's usually a pizza. Whatever I don't eat, assuming I don't eat the whole thing, gets put in the fridge and I have that for breakfast the next day.

I think the easiest meal to make ahead of time, for me at least, both involve my slow cooker. A go-to is chicken noodle soup, though if I'm removing carbs I'll need to swap out the noodles for something without carbs (in this case probably something made from veggies). Another is this recipe for turkey tenderloin and gravy, which I could serve over veggie pasta, probably. Though there's a good chance those aren't THAT healthy, even with apropos substitutions.

Like I said, I'm very picky, which is not something everyone can just "get over" and can't always be dealt with by "toughing it out". Some folks are wired that way and most well-meaning advice is like trying to run a Mac OS program on Windows by smacking the side of the desktop. That's why I'm looking for dietary changes that will still leave me with something to eat.

Thankfully a few things aren't too difficult for me, like swapping out regular bacon for turkey bacon. I already pretty much don't eat red meat, except for pepperoni (which is a mix of beef, pork and chicken). And if the turkey tenderloins (the nutritional info for the Butterball brand tenderloins is over here) and gravy is an adequate dietary staple (within reason and with the right substitutions), I bet it'd slap hard over some mashed cauliflower.

[REPO Man]

But seriously, what's everyone's resolutions? I don't want this thread getting derailed on one of mine, and not just because no one's commented on my card game idea.

[Limewater]

I disagree with the assertion that a healthy diet will be expensive compared to one built upon hot pockets.

My local grocery store has a 12-pack of Pepperoni Hot Pockets for $14.99. They tax food in my state, but ignore that for now.
That's 12x310 calories (3720), 12x10 (120) grams of protein.

2lbs of long grain brown rice is $1.50 with 20x160 (3200) calories and 20*3 (60) grams of protein.

Lentils are $2.59/lb, and each lb has 13x120 (1560) calories and 13*9 (117) grams of protein.

2lbs of brown rice is about 4.78 cups. We'll round down to 4 cups, even though it's a lot closer to 5.

Four pounds of lentils plus two pounds of brown rice comes out to $11.86.
That's 9440 total calories and 528 grams of protein.

That's about 18 calories per gram of protein for the lentils and rice, compared with 31 calories per gram of protein for the hot pockets.

The lentils and brown rice is also a heck of a lot more food than the frozen convenience food, with lower fat and a ton more fiber. Granted, you'll probably want to spend the $3.14 cents you save on some seasoning.

I enjoy meat, but it is rarely the most economical choice for a nutritional profile, outside of bulk packs of chicken leg quarters you can get sometimes.

You can do similar comparisons with lightly salted or unsalted peanuts and rolled oats. They can really form a very cheap base upon which to build a healthy diet.

REPO, even if you think these things are completely untenable with your sensory difficulties, they are comparatively very cheap to try, and tastes change over time. If you try these things and can't find a way to tolerate them then you're out a few dollars.

EDIT: Also, peanut butter and jelly sandwiches on whole wheat bread are really good and portable. Natural peanut butter is a lot better than the processed stuff. The only ingredients should be peanuts and salt, and you should have to stir it when you first get it mix in the oil that has separated. You wouldn't want this to be your whole diet, but it integrates fine as a component of a healthy diet.

Also, you really need to learn to eat vegetables. If you are looking to lose weight a really solid strategy is to begin each meal by drinking a lot of water and then eating at least 6 ounces of cooked or raw vegetables before you allow yourself to eat anything else. I firmly believe that vegetables should be half your plate and should be the first thing eaten if your goal is to eat healthy and lose weight. I would not suggest this if your goals are different.