South Beach Diet

[Ksandra]

Anyone here ever tried it? I'ma try and lose a good 30+ pounds before the wedding (I got over a year and a half so no rush), and figured I'd might give the diet a shot. Currently signing up for the gym and going to go there everyday after work. Right now I'm going to be limiting the amount of food I eat, but still the same things I eat. The problem with me and "eating healthy" is I'm not very good at sticking to it because I never know what to make. The South Beach Diet sounds appealing because it gives recipes and tells you what to eat for each phase n' such, which is the kind of thing I need.

Not sure if it actually works or not though, and not sure how good it is for your body to do it.

[Drex]

Main problem with the south beach diet is the first two weeks, where you basically eat jack and shit. After that, there's really nothing special about it, it's just a normal diet that focuses on having you eat the right shit and exercise. Just remember: while what you eat is very important to weight loss, you won't see results without regular exercise and lots of patience.

[Jefe]

Just eat healthy + exercise, unless you have some weird decease, you'll lose weight/get fit. Remember that depriving your body of the nutrients it needs to function properly is a bad idea. Only desperate and uninformed people get into this type of diets and shit.

[Devolver]

South Bronx Paradise Diet is the only way to go...imo...

[Vandole]

South Bronx Paradise Diet is the only way to go...imo...

You fool! It's south bronx paraCITE!

[Tristam]

30lbs is a serious commitment, even over a long term. I would wait for a while on the diet and start with making exercise changes for now in the short term, if you dive into a diet and exercise program together you run the risk of fatigue and soreness kicking your ass early and losing enthusiasm. Just from the way you put it, limiting what you eat + exercising every day (five days a week is alot to start) will make you very tired very fast depending on what you do. Especially when starting out, give your body a day off every now and then to recover.

Once you make exercise a habit that you're sure you can stick with, the I think you can focus on the diet changes. Whenever I change training regimes (right now I'm offseason, so doing more weights and less cardio) I get insane food cravings and it's pretty much impossible for me to plan a diet.

[MrW]

You really need to look around and do some research. Eating is MOST of what you need to figure out when you want to lose/gain weight. Using a fad diet and saying you'll go to the gym everyday isn't the best way to go about it. Generally you'll see little results and morale will fall.

Raising your metabolism by eating certain foods at certain times of the day in certain amounts is a good start. Finding a workout routine with proper amounts of weight lifting + cardio is another aspect of it. Sleep habits also play a role.

[volcanicweather]

while what you eat is very important to weight loss, you won't see results without regular exercise and lots of patience.

Excellent advice - remember any sort of "crash" diet simply will not work long-term.

I'm not sure of your fitness level or financial status, but consulting a dietitian may not be a bad idea, nor hiring a personal trainer if you're not exactly a "self-starter".

The key for dieting is to find a plan which works for you and stick with it. A common method is to start a high-protein/low-carb diet along with rigorous exercise... this allows you to burn fat but keep your energy level high so you can build your cardiovascular health. However, the big drawback to this style of eating is it can be high in fat/saturated fat and sodium so be careful. Ideally you will stick with this diet for a few weeks until your cardiovascular system is fit enough to handle more intense workout regimes, which will allow you (and sometimes will even require you) to eat more healthy carbs and a more balanced diet.

The biggest key, and where many people falter, is they go back to consuming unnecessary "junk" carbs, especially in liquid form, such as juice, soda, and beer. Stay as far away from these as possible. Water is your best friend and will be for the rest of your life if you wish to maintain a healthy diet, but milk is also great for you and a can or two of diet soda on occasion is even fine.

Something I have used which has really helped me is the mantra of "don't eat until you're full; eat until you're 'not hungry' anymore". I find eating sporadically throughout the day is better as I can pace myself because I tend to gorge myself when really hungry with unhealthy foods.

I'm not a dietitian, so take what I have to say at face value. Some of the South Beach meals are quite healthy, others not as much. Best of luck =)

[Mulligan]

Your weight times ~10 = the number of calories your should eat a day to maintain your current weight.
Total every calorie below the calories per day youre supposed to eat and every calorie you burn exercising. 1 lb of fat lost is equal to about 3500 calories. So divide the amount of calories you didnt eat plus the number you burned by 3500 and thats how much weight you lost that day.

So say youre 200lbs. You need 2000 calories to maintain your weight. If you eat 1500 calories and burn 500 calories working out, you would lose 1000/3500lbs or .29lbs a day.

Using this site, Calorie Counter Database - Free Online Diet Program,
and eating whatever i wanted that totaled below my calorie goal I lost about 25 lbs in 3months.

You dont need specialty diets to lose weight. You just need to know what youre eating and how much you should eat. There are probably better ways to do it but this really helped me even in the long term when deciding what to eat. Losing weight just comes down to how many calories you are below the number required to maintain your weight. I still ate pizza and cheeseburgers, i just didn't drink soda anymore and i stopped unnecessary snacks. I hope this helps.

Oh and as the post above me says, drink water or seltzer! Most people dont realize how most drinks destroy their diet.

Edit: I should also note that this method isnt totally exact. Using the spreadsheet i created i calculated i should have lost 5 lbs in the time i actually lost 9.

[Quixon]

FWIW I am not one who would recommend a FAD Diet. However, South Beach did work for my dad. He follows it strictly, and goes to the gym for 1 Hour Every Day. 1/2 Hour Cardio -> 1/2 Hour Moderate Weights.


It is as simple as Mulligan posted though. The biggest pain in the ass is tracking what you intake each day, without eating the same damn monotonous things. The website posted seem to have a nice database to help you along though.

[Ksandra]

Your weight times ~10 = the number of calories your should eat a day to maintain your current weight.
Total every calorie below the calories per day youre supposed to eat and every calorie you burn exercising. 1 lb of fat lost is equal to about 3500 calories. So divide the amount of calories you didnt eat plus the number you burned by 3500 and thats how much weight you lost that day.

So say youre 200lbs. You need 2000 calories to maintain your weight. If you eat 1500 calories and burn 500 calories working out, you would lose 1000/3500lbs or .29lbs a day.

Using this site, Calorie Counter Database - Free Online Diet Program,
and eating whatever i wanted that totaled below my calorie goal I lost about 25 lbs in 3months.

You dont need specialty diets to lose weight. You just need to know what youre eating and how much you should eat. There are probably better ways to do it but this really helped me even in the long term when deciding what to eat. Losing weight just comes down to how many calories you are below the number required to maintain your weight. I still ate pizza and cheeseburgers, i just didn't drink soda anymore and i stopped unnecessary snacks. I hope this helps.

Oh and as the post above me says, drink water or seltzer! Most people dont realize how most drinks destroy their diet.

Edit: I should also note that this method isnt totally exact. Using the spreadsheet i created i calculated i should have lost 5 lbs in the time i actually lost 9.

Holy shit thank you, that's exactly the kind of thing I needed. I knew to start drinking water and to avoid like chips n' stuff, but I'm the kind of person that really needs a plan so "eat healthy" never worked for me because that's too vague. Hopefully I can stick to just counting calories so at least I can still eat the things I normally do, just less of it.

[Stiker]

Really good advice.

I pretty much do this. Count calories and keep a consistent workout routine. I like this method because you don't corner yourself into only eating certain things.

Sure you need to eat the healthier stuff, but you can also eat the things you like on occasion and not have the huge diet crash. Also you can find healthier ways to eat the things you like as well.

For instance, I love Chiptole. Had a huge craving for it for lunch one day. So before I decide to leave for lunch I Google "Chiptole Calories" just to see what I'm about to do to myself and found: Chipotle Nutrition Facts Calculator 2.0 - How healthy is your Chipotle?

Normally, I would get a steak burrito with rice, hot sauce, lettuce, cheese, and guacamole. That's a nice 900+ calories. Now instead, do a burrito bowl, take off the guacamole and cheese, you are left with a 383 calorie dish. Now it isn't the healthiest thing to eat, but it is better than the whole big burrito.

You can extend this to a lot of things. If I want a coke now -- I'll get a coke zero or diet coke instead. Again, not completely healthy, but a better choice.

It isn't an exact science, but it is a good way to maintain a healthy lifestyle and not a temporary diet. You aren't starving yourself, you get to try some different things to eat/cook too. Most importantly you can have the occasional guilty pleasure and not feel like a failure. Also you can have a "bad eating day" and still be ok as long as it isn't constant (in fact, varying your calorie intake can actually help you as your body doesn't "get used" to your new eating style and can slow the weight loss down).

Google is your friend. Anything + calories will get you a good estimate of what you are eating.

Excercise also is key. I shoot for 4 days/week, but I make sure I do at least 3 days/week no matter what for at least 30 minutes. Running/jogging is of course great, but starting off with walking isn't bad either. Doing anything active is good. Going shopping in a mall, going bowling, playing volleyball, etc, etc work as well. Find something you like so you can stick with it easier.

Also, you will likely lose a bunch of weight really fast, but don't expect that to continue. I lost about 15 pounds in less than a month and have now slowed down. The slow down is when a lot of people get frustrated and quit, but the fact is your body has just adapted. At that plateau point, monitor your weight no more than weekly (daily is so bad and messes with your head), do it the same time every week as well. Ideally, you want to be losing 1 lb/week, but that obviously won't always happen. The trick is to ensure you aren't going too far in the opposite direction consistently (so if you gain 2 lbs one week, you shouldn't panic).

I remember when I asked my doctor about weight loss (he specializes in it and what I'm saying is coming from him) and he had a chart he gave me. Basically it was a graph with two blue lines sloping down very gradually week to week. You wanted to make sure you stayed within those blue lines to promote the gradual loss and most importantly stay away from a big gain. However, if you went too far either direction, you started over. So after my big loss, I started over.

Anyways, best of luck and just stick with it. Once you start the habit it becomes a lot easier to do.

Edit: BTW, that link you posted is awesome Mulligan. Definitely going to use that.

[Kiro]

Man I wish I had that calculator thing a few years ago. All I did was watch what I ate, eat smaller portions and stay active. Wasn't really keeping track of how much I lost a month, but I lost plenty.

[Kael]

Anyone here ever tried it? I'ma try and lose a good 30+ pounds before the wedding (I got over a year and a half so no rush), and figured I'd might give the diet a shot. Currently signing up for the gym and going to go there everyday after work. Right now I'm going to be limiting the amount of food I eat, but still the same things I eat. The problem with me and "eating healthy" is I'm not very good at sticking to it because I never know what to make. The South Beach Diet sounds appealing because it gives recipes and tells you what to eat for each phase n' such, which is the kind of thing I need.

Not sure if it actually works or not though, and not sure how good it is for your body to do it.

You and Zudarm are getting married? Congratulations Pep nips! :D You guys are a cool couple to hang with. I am happy for you

[kisada]

imo the simplest thing you can and should do is to stay away from sugar (as well as the obvious culprits like fast food burgers and fries). sugar is pretty much the #1 killer of the body's metabolism, so once you stop eating candy and drinking sodas, it becomes significantly easier for the body to speed back up. a couple years ago i used to drink sodas every day (along with fast food). but once i stopped with sodas and gatorades and other junk like that, my metabolism got back on track and i naturally lost 15 pounds, even while still eating fast food a couple times a week. nowadays i still don't eat as optimally as i could, but staying away from sugar keeps me from gaining those 15 pounds i lost. i should add that i do exercise routinely nowadays, but i didn't at all when i lost about 10 of those pounds.

imo, and since you've got 18 months anyway, the best thing to do is to make gradual steps to your diet and daily routines. for me, soda was easy to drop cause my eyes bulged once i realized how much sugar they had. but the rest is much tougher. things like developing a good exercise routine and keeping it are very tough. for me at least, the mental discipline required is pretty difficult, cause i have so many things to do and i'm very easily distracted. i don't know how it is for you (or anyone else reading), but if you're like me and have a hard time keeping exercise routines, i suggest just trying something once a week, then adding on more and more till it's regular. breaking out of habits or creating new ones is a very difficult thing to do for humans. but slow, gradual changes, especially in the case of exercise, make it much easier to integrate. whatever it is you do, just keep up with it.

and one more thing about eating: i don't really count calories when i go out to movies or to eat dinner with my friends and family. doing so would ruin it for me. i do, however, make sure to buy the right things when i'm shopping for home. as a few suggested, low carb, low fat, and as low calorie as you can get foods are the way to go. what i did was i hunted around the supermarket until i found a variety of things i could eat that were pretty safe. things like soups, chicken and turkey products, etc. are the basis of my diet. when it comes to snacks, try things like lightly buttered popcorn and also whatever fruits and vegetables you can put peanut butter on.

as long as your home eating is stable, eating bad stuff every now and then is acceptable and not only will it not ruin your diet, it's a lot more manageable as well as enjoyable. if you eat like a robot all the time then it's a lot more tempting to just drop it altogether. however, if you're allowed to cheat every now and then, there's a lot less pressure on you to continue.

one last thing: once you've been able to develop and maintain a steady routine as far as eating and exercise, then see how your progress is taking you. if you're good with it, don't change a thing. but if you thing there's room to improve, first look for more ways to burn calories, and if necessary, nazi out what you eat (things like straight chicken/turkey/fish).

30 pounds is an achievable goal but it's quite possible to overdo it in unhealthy ways.

[Ryany]

It mainly comes down to calories in vs. calories out. Most diets just go with different strategies to go about that. The slower you lose weight the better. (and the less likely you are to burn-out) A few things that could be done without even changing how much you eat could be replacing regular soda with diet soda (if you haven't already). There are plenty of low-fat lines of things such as cheese, meat, milk, yogurt, etc. which all have less calories for the same amount of food. Just doing sacrifices like that can add up to a lot of weight lost over time.

One site that I feel has a lot of very good and un-biased information on many health-related topics is.
ExRx (Exercise Prescription) on the Net

Your weight times ~10 = the number of calories your should eat a day to maintain your current weight.

According to that, I'd need 1700 and I can say with absolute confidence that the real number for me is 2700 (I've been keeping strict track every day for over 8 months.) My only significant exercise is lifting weights 2 days a week at the gym. I would say it would be more like weight x 12 to weight x 15 for most people. (which is still a generalization because it depends on how much of your body weight is lean body mass since lean body mass burns more calories than fat)

[LinktheDeme]

crash dieting does work to take off the bulk of the weight after the month or so you do it you just need to start watching what you eat how much you eat and work out continously.

Most people only crash diet and then go back to normal eating patterns and then wonder why they are putting on the weight.

I crash dieted and went from 190ish to 150ish in june and i've maintained that weight by regularly working out,watching what I eat and no longer drinking pop ( I drink diet though) I'm in a frat though so I can't avoid drinking less than at least 10 beers a weekend . . . at least ;o

Also the most helpful thing I learned is CHEW YOUR GODDAMN FOOD

By chewing your food to the point where its like liquidish even a little bit before, taking smaller bites, and eating slower you can DRASTICALLY decrease your appetite (also seemed to help my heartburn as well) instead of just shoving everything in your mouth. Psychologically if it's in front of you, you feel forced to eat it or if there is a variety you take a little bit of everything and end up taking a shit ton. Just keep that in mind.

Smaller portions + allowing your brain to catch up with what your eating does wonders

edit: Also i know people say crash dieting isnt healthy but I lived off 400 calories of nearly no fat based products for 2 weeks and im still alive :O

Though I did it over a school break where I had low contact with people and germs because im sure not eating well will lower your immune system you just have to be smart about it imo.

edit2: WIIIII FIT is a amazing for having a personal trainer to watch your progress. There are more accurate and expensive routes but this is really the cheapest most convinent otherwise I'd suggest getting the proper equipment.

[archibaldcrane]

Having a goal of working out every day is admirable, but the important thing is that you don't feel defeated when you miss a day or two. Feeling like you are "on" or "off" your diet/exercise plan is dumb - your diet is a day-in, day-out calorie consumption plan, you're always "on" it, even if you ate a bucket of fried chicken the night before.

Weight loss is a gradual thing and no day or week makes or breaks it. Just keep that in mind and keep plugging away. It's a marathon, not a sprint.

Also if you don't mind, what do you weigh at the moment?

[LinktheDeme]

Also if you don't mind, what do you weigh at the moment?

You don't talk to that many girls do you?

women that are underweight are still overly sensitive about saying how much they weigh

[Kiro]

No matter what weight women are they never want to say what they're at. Kinda stupid, but whatever. Almost the same with age.