How To Review Your Diet So You Don’t Fail

I am 3 months into my diet and I have lost about 30lbs so I am quite happy with my success. However I have noticed that lately I am consuming more calories.

This is common when you start to diet where you start off well and then end up starting to go over your allowed calorie intake.

If the reasons you are going over your allowed calorie intake are not identified and corrected your weight loss will halt and can even start gaining back weight.

While my weight loss has not stopped I have been up and down in the last 4 weeks and not making the progress that I had planned to make. Therefore it is time for a diet review.

Diet Review:

I have keep a very close account of my daily intake and the foods that I have consumed for this very reason. All I need to do is look on my blog and I can quickly identify where my problem lies.

This is one very good reason to document your food intake well.

Here is a record of the the average daily calorie intake for the last 9 weeks.

I had an issue back in the week of February the 1st to the 7th where I consumed 1998 calories a day. I correct that with the following week of a low average of 1558 calories. Then after a good week from February the 15th to the 21st I started consuming more calories.

The next week I when from 1712 calories to 1870 calories and then a big jump to 2107 calories. I made some what of a correction in the following week of March the 8th to the 14th with an average of 1878 calories a day only to go back to another increase to 2081 the following week.

Average Calories Consumed Per Week:

2081c Mar 15-20
1878c Mar 08-14
2107c Mar 01-07
1870c Feb 22-28
1712c Feb 15-21
1558c Feb 08-14
1998c Feb 01-07
1731c Jan 25-31
1724c Jan 18-24

I have worked out my weekly averages so I have my calorie numbers available at all times and I know where I am at.

So now what had to do is identify where, when, and why I am going over in my allowed calories and take measures to correct this.

I have reviews the days that I have gone over my calorie intake and identified 6 areas that I need to deal with.

Where I Am Breaking My Allowed Calories:

1. Going for pizza with my chess friends on Thursday night or after Saturday steetmeeting.
2. Treating myself to Haagen-Dazs chocolate & dark chocolate miniatures.
3. Going to a friends home for a meal.
4. Having fellowship lunch every 2nd Sunday morning at the Vienna church building.
5. Snacks at the Friday evening Bible study.
6. Taking high calorie food that is given to me like chili rellenos.

With each of these cases where I am breaking my allowed calorie intake I have come up with a solution that will stop me from breaking my allowed calorie intake.

How I Will Deal With Where I Am Breaking My Allowed Calories:

1. When I go to chess club on Thursday or to Saturday street meeting I will take snack food and not have pizza.
2. I will only have Haagen-Dazs miniatures where I have some one else to give half o the miniatures to so I can cut the calorie intake from 720 down to 360.
3. When I go to friends to have a meal I will need to take my own meal.
4. When I have fellowship lunch at Vienna I will take my own lunch.
5. When I got to Friday night Bible study I will take my own snacks.
6. I will pass on high calorie foods that are offered to me.

Additional Steps I Am Taking:

1. This week I am going to lay off yogurt dip with the sweet peppers as that is adding a lot of calories to my snacking.

If I can keep under 11,900 calories for the week I will add the yogurt keep back next week. To the right I have 2kg of peppers (400 calories) ready for tomorrow.

2. I have bagged up the last 5 chili rellenos (200 to 300 calories each) and they are gone into the freezer.

The plan is to allow myself one a week on Sunday if I keep a 1700 average the past week.

3. I have removed 298 calories from today’s snacks.

4. At the end of each week I will be reviewing how I have done and look at any days where I have gone over 1700 calories and take corrective measures.

5. I am going to commit to plan to workout on Sunday.

6. I will be reviewing my workout to see if I need to add some more calorie burning. I have considered going from a 5km run to 8.5km run and/or adding to the distance I am riding bike.

I have started this week out with a 3088 2790 calorie day so I have going to have to be hard on myself to get below 11,900 calories for the week.

Also I am leaving for Chilliwack, BC for 3 weeks on March the 30th so I am going to have to apply these solutions to my meals their also.

Yes — I am seriously committed to losing weight!