Black coffee and the odd doughnut . How I focused on eating healthier.

“Well, you wouldn’t to weigh more than that”.

This was my recollection of something I was told by my doctor while at the same time being warned for high cholesterol and a minor liver abnormality

The problems, we reasoned, just might have something to do with a lifestyle that included larger than healthy levels of alcohol and certain types of food.

I’m not sure what it was, but a doctor telling me my blood pressure was potentially high and I had some health issues came across as catastrophic to me and I could understand why he seemed so calm in the face of my mortality.

The recommendation was to focus on diet and exercise. With my mortality firmly in focus, I suddenly felt the motivation to take this seriously.

Over the following few months I made changes to my lifestyle to be more active and healthier.

So far, it seems to be working. I’ve dropped weight and feel better.

At its root, the steps to take for a healthier lifestyle focus on calorie intake and output. I sought to make myself fitter and to change my intake. This post focuses on what I have found the hardest to control, what I eat.

My strategy

Whenever I had previously sought to get healthy it has usually been by exercising more. I had left the calorie restriction alone because I enjoy food. This was the big change I sought to make.

The plan I outline below follows some essential guidelines;

Count calories

Kill carbs.

Alcohol is a carb. Sorry.

Limit your eating window

Don’t worry about some indulgences.

Food

I sought to restrict calories in a few ways.

First, limit carbs. The more it was about food the more I come to the view that carbs are the enemy. My diet sought to eliminate as much as possible bread, chips, grains and so on.

That means eggs without toast, no rice, no pasta, and having to work a lot harder to figure out what to eat.

Thankfully, this is a great time to be alive. My meals now include:

Dinner

• a lot more salad, I have enjoyed utilising a lot more ricotta and feta as well as eggs with my leafy greens
• Nadia Lim’s saag recipe which is essentially spices, onion, spinach, and tomato blended together.
• Cauliflower rice and Kojac rice (godsends) though I have also found it easy enough to just eat citrus by themselves without rice
• I also regularly use stevia as a dessert option with yogurt and frozen fruit. Stevia is awesome.

Lunch has been a little harder so I have some staples I turn to:

• I happen to quite like canned tuna, not everyone does but this has been super helpful for me
• Cup a soups (they do have carbs but it’s a very low calorie)
• Yoghurt
• A lot of tea and coffee
• Sugar-free hot chocolate
• Ordering eggs from cafes with no toast (there’s often cafes around that do reasonably priced eggs)
• Keto bread, it’s more expensive but a godsend if you miss bread as I do.

Breakfast (and intermittent fasting)

Here’s the big shift. I’ve started doing intermittent fasting. This means I stop eating at 8pm and don’t start again until 12pm. Honestly, it’s been a challenge, but the hardest part is actually stopping at 8pm. Once that clicked into gear I felt like I had more control and it ended by late-night snacking.

Through the day I survive on black coffee and tea and this has worked surprisingly well.

The key benefit seems to be calorie restriction, I simply have less time to eat meaning I end up eating less. Keeping stricter time’s also helped me feel more in control of my life and makes me motivated to keep things sensible. Couple with carb restriction and the settings are getting good for a healthier lifestyle.

One thing I would say if anyone is reading this and thinking it sounds hard, I do find that even just sticking to the evening helps. Even if I do make a deliberate decision to go for breakfast, I’ve still limited my eating window.

Calorie counting

This is the final piece of the puzzle for me. I can’t swear by it enough. The practice of counting calories sounds pedantic but I’ve found that the habit of logging food keeps me focused on keeping my eating reasonable. It means I eat smaller portions, limit intake and make different choices.

You don’t need to be precise, guesstimate quite a bit when I can’t find the product in my Fitbit app or am really busy. It doesn’t seem to matter, it keeps me focused on what I am eating which does two things.

First, it focused me on what I am doing meaning I fee more in control of my choices and more likely to look for a healthier or less calorific option. And second, it helps me budget through the day.

Knowing I have 1000 calories left let’s me make choices to exempt myself from my rules and indulge a little. If I know I can get away with a chocolate bar I can have it. This is better than having one, not knowing the impact and assuming e written the whole day off.

I still fall off the wagon, so to speak, but the general approach is working.

Alcohol

Oh dear. This is the hard one. I made the intentional choice to heavily restrict alcohol. A lot more diet drinks, tea, and coffee instead.

I still have a drink, but I’ve tried to focus on making a deliberate decision to go out for a night as a treat, rather than having a few beers or wines on a Friday after work every week.

This has probably been the single largest calorie reduction from my week and, honestly, I feel great.

Conclusion:

I’ve found this system manageable for me and it has given me a huge amount of confidence in my ability to control myself.

I feel like I have more mental disciple over watching and calorie intake and that makes me feel more confident about myself. The added benefit is that I am also losing weight.

The big problem has actually been that I now don’t fit my clothing. This presents a bizarre incentive. I can spend money adjusting clothes and buying new ones or I could go start eating and drinking again be happy, overweight and wealthy. Life is weird sometimes.

So the formula that works for me, in sum:

Count calories, even if just ballpark, do it, don’t worry if you miss some things or blow a limit, just get in the habit of logging and keeping track of what you're doing.

Kill carbs. They’re the delicious enemy. Keto bread, eggs, stevia, protein, fat are your allies.

Alcohol is a carb. Sorry.

Limit your eating window — set times to end eating and try to stick to them. You can also set a time to start eating again as suits. Again, missing a beat here or varying the rule isn’t as important as thinking about and trying to stick to an idea of a limit.

Don’t worry about some indulgences. I had a doughnut for breakfast the day I wrote this. It was awesome and broke most of these rules. But I kept logged it and kept a track of my eating and ended the day in an estimated calorie deficient and feeling great.