Routines are key for me for keeping some order and key for long term weight maintenance. Even more important is customizing your routine for you and not some internet meme.
The short story: Get a food plan that works for sleep and health. Stick to it. Modify if needed. Steer clear of internet myths, unless you've vetted the popular ideas yourself and they work. Then do that.
I can say that I definitely have daily routines, slight adjustments, and a few emergency back up plans.
What's working for me:
Regular Routines,
Daily routine variances, holiday, vacation time
Rock solid base plan that holds up during major or minor emergencies.
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| Routines and habits in long term weight maintenance |
Typical week day
5am rise: ( 6-7 am on weekends)
Activities :Weigh myself, record on My Fitness Pal, shower, feed cats, take thyroid meds, make eggs & kale in coconut oil, sea salt and coffee. Maybe full fat coconut milk, maybe not. Clean up from cooking, check stove burners. Grab lunch and dinner. GO.
Breakfast: 6 am-
Stuff I do for myself: Continued learning: I listen to podcasts while I get ready
Prepped items: Grab pre-assembled lunch, already packed in lunch bag
Transition time: (variances) Drive myself, teens to work/school OR ride as a passenger in a vanpool OR drive the van pool myself. I might listen to more podcasts or if I'm not driving, I'll read twitter, IG, Snapchat , read other blog posts, news or visit with my vanpool peeps.
Variation: Some days, I'll even start work on the commute if it's hands free- planning, strategy. I'm salaried, so this happens. Nothing terrible, but needed on some days. It doesn't stress me out. I'm a morning person. Some great discussions can take place.
A quick note, now that you know my schedule:
*****I work most of day - Please NOTE: You are on camera at my house and you will meet local neighbors and police that will fast track your trip to jail if you show up uninvited to my neighborhood with the intention to commit a crime.****
Exercise Walk in the morning with my moderate paced walking group. This is my lunch time. 30-40 mins
Exercise variance: Holidays and vacation: Walking fasted before breakfast. Sleeping my walking clothes, sneak out while everyone is asleep. Cook breakfast when I return.
Lunch: 10:00 am
Myth buster: I eat lunch at 10:00 am in about 5-10 minutes and sit at my desk or stand at the break room. Nothing bad happens to me when I do this. Really. I don't need a Hallmark style 30 minute lunch break where I sit on my butt routine. I need to stand or get up away from my computer.
Be sure that you are customizing your activity and food for you and not some internet popularity meme.
Meetings: and work assignments Start at 9:30 and could go all day or 30 minutes. Sometimes sitting sometimes moving. I might eat more or less depending on my schedule. I drink 2 more cups of coffee in the AM at work. Before 11am. My work routines can vary so much.
Possible variance: If I'm more physically active. I keep tinned smoked oysters, coconut oil, and coconut butter, and olive oil at my desk for additional fuel. I also have access to a salad bar, where I can add protein, my own olive oil and some sea salt. This works well if I need to move my lunch earlier or later. I can excuse myself from my work meeting and eat or add some coconut milk into my coffee. Or just wait.
At lunch, I eat most of my vegetable and vegetable like fruits (tomatoes, avocado) carbs, with 3 oz of protein, think grass fed burgers on big a$$ salads with or without olive oil. Always salt. garlic sea salt or pink salt. Lots of multi-colored veggies at this meal.
I also have half a serving of 85% chocolate and/or measured out raw coconut butter most days. Sometimes I skip this.
Dinner: Last Meal of the day, 12:30 to 2pm depending on meetings and assignments. One non-starchy veggie- think sautéed broccoli slaw and 2 oz protein. Some olive oil, maybe. Small serving, very low carb.
The rest of the day 1pm to 6pm- Water, drink to thirst
Myth buster: Skip breakfast and eat carbs late in the day on an IF approach- this works for a lot of people, but not me. Nope, I thought so at first, but now realize that I feel better and get and stay leaner if I put my carbs up front in my day. This may have contributed to my weight gain over the last year or so.
Myth buster: You can still hang with family and friends at late dinners and just drink water and visit. Please- no matter when you eat, you do not have to shovel crap food in your face, late at night, and drink booze just to fit in or make someone feel better. Just like I didn't smoke pot to fit in at school because everyone else was, you can control what does and doesn't go into your body.
Put yourself first. Nobody else is going to pay your health bills, for your new larger size clothing, or your emotional pain of weight reagin. Get a mirror and look in it. Do what you need to do. No apologizing, no explaining, just action.
Make yourself feel better and don't feel pressured to eat the SAD or eat at times you don't need or want. Your fake friends will fall away, your close friends will get it.
Look around you, many people are NOT well doing this routine- late night eating. Spend a lot of money for crap food and painful expensive diseases are the outcome.
Exercise: 10-15 minutes walking break, slow and EZ, only if I have time.
Gym: afternoon or weekends. 2X per week. I have lots of fuel in the form of subcutaneous fat and I can burn that so no shoveling food in my pie hole. Myth for me :pre and post work out food consumption. No need. Constant eating. Probably made me fat in the past. Being "fat adapted" means I can have a whole lot of energy.
Exercise variety: I'm going to paddle a kayak 35 minutes, hop off, snorkel and swim for 30 minutes, hop back on, paddle another 45.
Big breakfast, lots of protein, fat, veggies.
Big Lunch: Big salad, lots of protein, vegetables, olive oil
Dinner- eat according to hunger, within my food template
Evening routines: pick from one or two
ALWAYS: pack lunch and dinner for the next days, deal with dirty dishes, get outfit ready for next day
- light house cleaning
- batch cooking veggies or protein
- errand running
- light gardening
- TV watching 1 hour or less, usually on demand, early in evening, 2-3 days only.
- Reading
- listen to podcasts
- play with cats
- Look at snapchat and vine
- Visiting with neighbors or friends
Ready for bed
- Take 2 tbs of Natural Calm with water (magnesium supplement)
- Rinse face, brush teeth
- Read a bit.
I have set bedtimes so that I can try to get 7-8 hours of sleep. I have to say no a lot to driving late at night or parties. That's okay. If people mean a lot to me and I want to visit, we can do so at another time or I can come early and leave early.
Emergencies: Carry a packet of coconut butter or portable food (jerky, tinned seafood, nuts if you eat them). I'm always willing and able to fast for a while. There are huge advantages to being able to burn your own body fat for fuel compared to a high carb diet and constant hunger and cravings.
Hope this helps to see what a day is like for me right now. As time goes on my routine will change.
I hope everyone reading this is not falling prey to random holiday food showing up and eating willy nilly on a processed food template and time schedules. Explain to them that your doctor says..... no late night eating, no processed junk. While travel sleep schedules can vary, food consumption can and probably should remain in within limits- IMO.
What didn't work in the past:
Eating all foods, all the time
Eating WW processed foods and expecting weight loss
Eating late at night with friends and family
What routines have changed for you from overweight/obese/morbid obesity so that you can maintain your loss?
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| Routinely walking at Moonlight Beach cannot be wrong! Sept 2016 |
good post , if people followed your model , monitored the results and adjusted as needed , success would eventually be achieved. Congrats
ReplyDeleteThank you so much for sharing this. I really continue to learn from you. I, too, have moved away from always needing to sit down when I eat. Some of my meals are like snacks so I don't need to sit. I appreciate your explaining your activity level as well as how many ounces of meat you eat with your meals.
ReplyDeleteI recently was talking with a friend about travel and food. For her food is wrapped up in the experience of travel. That's not the case for me, and this reminds me of another way we can customize our own food templates.
This was a most helpful post, to be sure.
Great stuff, thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteThank you David, Ali, and Larcana. I know eating all day works for some. But for soooooo many, another way may be needed. Best of all it's inexpensive and relatively easy to make small or big changes, then track and observe.
ReplyDeleteI only know 1 person in real life who does seem to do better ( excluding Medifast or post gastric Surgery ) on really small 6 meals, some sort of metabolic thing. Everyone else does a lot better when they stop snacking and start fueling with more defined food
Many of the folks I met at LowCarb USA found the same thing. After getting food template set in, there's no true hunger for hours anyway. Ultra marathoners are using similar strategies with great results. It's also individual.
OMG, I can still remember how hungry I was after that awesome kayak/ snorkel trip in Hawaii and how freaking good my huge chef's salad was. But when I was done eating, I was done eating. And I had stocked my condo with lots of on template foods.
OOOH, the other thing is that when you decide before hand, the junk just does not matter. It's not on your plan, so you will not be eating it. The mental pain is gone. You can deal and not struggle.
I'm back to cleaning my house now. Thank you all for stopping by the blog.
I think the several small meals thing can be a big help to people who previously ate 24/7. It is a time for them to learn how to not eat all the time. To learn how to eat at meal time only. So, I think that might be a normal stage.
ReplyDeleteAs you wrote, I thought a lot about stages. How it is important to evolve.
I am not talking about people who have a routine for three days and then throw it all away.
I am talking about a slow and steady, positive, self help evolution.
I used to have to eat a pretty full breakfast (a couple hours in advance) to be able to do several exercise classes back to back without falling apart, shaking. Eventually my body adjusted and I was able to eat smaller amounts. I know I am not alone, that happened to others taking those same classes.
I agree routine is so, so important. Great self help tool.
Really enjoyed this post.
Good post, which is helpful to so many.
ReplyDeleteA good share.
All the best Jan