#dietician

The Routine:

I’m giving away this basic diet plan that many dietitians give out and many athletes, such as Michael Phelps, use. I really don’t care if you do it or not - I can’t make you work hard, and once you adjust it isn’t hard work.

Talk to your Doctor:

If you’re reading this then chances are that you already have concerns regarding your diet. Be sensible. Especially if you have a known injury or condition that might impair your ability to exercise or eat properly. 

The First Thing To Do:

Make sure that you are actually overweight. Females in particular tend to deem themselves overweight when they aren’t. Check your BMI. If you can’t read your BMI properly from a lack of know how, don’t Google it! This is something for you to ask your GP/Doctor/Nurse to check out. Keep in mind that nurses can only give advice and opinions. To my knowledge they aren’t qualified to give educated and fully informed advice to someone.

Step #1 - Moderation:

I can’t say anything more than moderation is the key to this diet. You need to limit how much you eat and how often you eat it. Not the things you eat. 

Ideally you should be eating 3 small meals a day and 3 snacks throughout the day. But I can’t tell you how much you  should eat. If you are around 95 kg then I would recommend about 15-20 grams of whatever you want for breakfast, to 30-40 grams of whatever you want for lunch and dinner.

You should be eating once every 2-3 hours. So if you wake up at 10AM you eat 15 grams of cereal and by 11AM, perhaps eat a snack (such as a banana) and by 1PM you should be eating 30 grams of lunch.

But it is all dependent on how much is actually best for you. You should figure out how much you eat and adjust it accordingly. 

Youcan have things like McDonalds every now and again. Once a week isn’t even horrible. You have to stick to eating 30-40 grams of whatever you want and instead of ordering fizzy drinks you order the light/zero equivalent of them. If you order juice instead; that is better. But people tend to go full-pelt into their diets too fast and then just crash.

Step #2 - Exercise:

Exercise is the Yang to moderation’s Yin. You need balance in life. 

The minimum anyone should really be exercising, in my opinion, is 4 times a week.

If your goal is weight loss you shouldn’t be hitting the weight bench. Lifting adds muscle, so just lifting weights is not ideal. Even if you mix in weight lifting with cardiovascular exercises such as running, it isn’t great because when you gain muscle it makes it difficult to determine how much weight you have actually lost.

I’d recommend you do four 30 minutes + (dependent on how fit you are) sessions of cardio a week. Running and swimming are both examples of cardio exercises. 

I, personally, prefer swimming. When you have good swimming technique swimming is generally much better for your body, can burn higher rates of calories when you swim for the same amount of time you run (although this is dependent on how good of a runner or swimmer you are) and it is generally better for your metabolic system.

Step #3 - Hobbies:

A hobby can be really beneficial to getting in shape. It makes exercise fun for those who don’t think it is. Hobbies don’t have to be serious, here is a list of hobbies that are fun and are labelled on how intense of a sport it is. (Keep in mind this is my opinion on the sport’s intensity - it might vary in your experience):

• Longboarding/Skateboarding. (Light)
• Archery (Light)

• Tennis (Mild)
• Badminton (Mild)
• Surfing (Mild)

• Kickboxing/Thai Boxing (Intense)
• Judo (Intense)
• American Football/Rugby (Intense)
• Swimming (Light/Mild/Intense - Controllable)

Enjoy:

Feel free to use this, or not to use it. I hope it helps!

It’s been eight days since I started the modulen nutrition drinks and it’s not been easy. I thought I wouldn’t care about not eating sandwiches or pizza and that I wouldn’t mind smelling all these foods that I can’t eat, but I was very much mistaken; the smell of cooking roast dinners or take aways is almost torture sometimes because I want so badly to eat it but I know that if I do, I’ll be back in the hospital again in no time. Because part of my small bowel has narrowed due to inflammation (a stricture), I can’t handle solids moving through my gut at the moment. Other than the modulen, I have been able to handle soup but I don’t want to try anything more substantial without guidance from my dietitian and GI. I’m hoping to see one or the other next week (my biopsy results should be back by then) but I haven’t received an appointment yet so I may have to call them midweek to find out what I’m meant to do once my modulen runs out. I hope I won’t be continued on it (or any other nutrition drinks for that matter) and that they’ll say a free-fluids diet for a few weeks. I know I can handle soup without experiencing any pain or other symptoms so fingers crossed.

(Post also available on WordPress)