Posts by thermal

Agreed with GI-Jane.  You can lose weight doing cardio alone, assuming that you are not eating more than you burn.

If you have been losing and you've reached a plateau, you should try mixing it up to get out of that rut.  Add a resistance routine, or start looking at your diet.  A mix of cardio, strength and food is the best way to lose weight, so don't limit yourself to just cardio, you will see much better results if you use all three.

Woah, that's a lot of Splenda! (to each his own, lol)  As soon as I read "sugar free chocolate syrup" I thought "That's silly, cocoa powder is sugar free, why would you need crazy diet-chocolate when natural cocoa is great on it's own"  Cocoa powder is like 15 cals for a tbsp, and low-fat or fat free (I can't remember exactly how much fat is in it).

I would add milk instead of water, and you do have to stir like hell, but cocoa, sweetener and liquid can be pretty damn good, and is way better for you than a hot chocolate from a coffee shop.  You could also add it to coffee and make a mocha.

If your body could cleanse itself, you would be dead.

So it's a waste of $90.

Don't increase your deficit!  Just keep on with what you are doing, and perhaps eat more.  I know running kicks up my metabolism like crazy, so it's possible that you are burning way more than you think and the tools on here are telling you, if you are actually feeling hungry than you should definitely eat.  It's really hard to train your hardest if you aren't fuelling your body correctly.

You are at a healthy weight for your height, so I would stick to training, eating well (but enough) and the weight loss will come, just give it time (plus you may find that with training, you tone up without losing weight and are happy with those results instead!).

Also, three weeks isn't really all that long, so wait a month (at least) before you decide if your program isn't working.  It takes your body time to catch up with you.

What kind of space do you have at your place?  You could pick up some dumbbells and a yoga ball and do a whole slew of exercises with those and your own body weight.  Check out the fitness forum for some exercise ideas and try and make a workout that you can do in your bedroom/living room.  Make sure the routine is hard enough to get you sweating, if it's super easy you won't see any results and you'll just be wasting your time. 

Also, try to kick up your heartrate when you are doing the stuff you already do, if you do about 45mins of walking a day, try and get it into 30mins by picking up the speed.  Getting your heartrate up is a good way to get your metabolism going.

Good luck!

First, your BMR is 1870 a day, or CC tells you that your total burn (without exercise) is 1870?  The CC tool does not calculate BMR, just overall burn, BMR is what you would burn if you were in a coma, not moving or talking or anything.

So, let's assume that your overall burn estimate is 1,870.  That's  13,090 a week.  Let's say you exercise 4 times a week burning about 500 calories a session (you can adjust this as needed).  That's 2,000 calories.  So now you are burning 15,090 calories a week.  If you want to lose 1lb a week you would need to eat 11,590 calories or about 1,655 a day.  I think it's easier to estimate on a weekly basis, rather than adjusting every day, then you can have a consistent meal plan.

Here's the formula:

(Overall burn * 7 + total weekly exercise  - desired weightloss * 3500) / 7 = average daily intake

Try tracking this for a few weeks, if you are losing less than you thought, than the estimate for your overall burn may be too high and if you are losing more than it may be too low, adjust accordingly.

Original Post by missnhopkins:

when you fit your first size 2 [though you are rather short so perhaps one would best say a 0] then you will understand the "punishment" the XS crowd puts ourselves through. it's worth it -- unless you hate getting looked at and looking hot in absolutely everything. it's amazing to eliminate *every* trouble zone and to replace it with muscle and a tan.

Oh wow, you must have a very fulfilling life of being XS and fabulous and having everyone think you're amazingly hot.  As an FYI people don't hate you because you are hotter, or thinner, but because you are miserable and vapid and shallow and unable to use the shift key.

PS Skin cancer and day-glo orange bodybuilders are not amazing, in fact they are sad and ridiculous (respectively).

That's silly, last loves are most important, otherwise you would be with your first love forever.

First loves are the most life changing and the most educational, but rarely the most important.  Middle loves are also changing and educational, but generally not as much as the first because you have already done alot of those 'relationship' things before.

Original Post by karozel:

@thermal -- she's trying to do "low-carb" according to the question title.  That means grains are limited as are starchy vegetables. 

I have a feeling it's fairly difficult to do low-carb and vegetarian at the same time. 

 Vegetables are carbs by their very nature.  Green vegetables are carbs too, they contain far more carbs than they do protein or fat, check out the nutritional value some green vegetables:  Green beans are 75% carbs, spinach is 50% carbs, lettuce is 75%, asparagus is 60%, brussel sprouts are 75%.  Let's look at some legumes:  peanuts are 11% carbs, edamame are 30% carbs, split peas are 70%.  So 200 calories of split peas and 200 calories of brussel sprouts have the same amount of carbs, fats and proteins, it really doesn't matter which one you eat.

Sorry, how again are legumes 'starchier' than green vegetables??

And I didn't suggest any grains. 

I'm an omnivore, but I get my protein from lots of sources, because there are a lot.  The person you are paying to train should work around what you are willing to eat.

Try eating legumes for protein; beans, lentils and peanuts all have tons of protein and complex carbs (peanuts obviously have lots of fat as well, but there are lots of legumes that are low fat).  There are lots of protein powders that are made with soy proteins, whey (which is made from milk, so if you are thinking of cutting the milk, then whey is not for you), and egg.  Tofu, obviously.  Getting a large variety of food will make it easier to get lots of protein, so trying to do a ridiculous body-building diet while trying to become a veg*n is probably not going to work so well, since those diets are generally made up for omnivores (or straigh up carnivores).

Why can't you eat coloured vegetables?  That sounds really silly.  Certain coloured vegetables have different nutritional content.  Where are you getting this diet from?  Your trainer?  If it's not from a registered dietician (NOT a nutrionist, because you don't need any education to call yourself a nutritionist...I'm a nutritionist, you're a nutritionist, if you want) then I would really rethink cutting out entire groups of food.