Change of Plans - Lets Count Calories!

I have spent so much time and effort hunting down healthy recipes and meals, shopping for organic food and reading labels so we get a minimal amount of high fructose corn syrup. What is high fructose corn syrup anyway??? And then I read THIS article about a nutrition professor who, out to prove himself right, ended up proving himself wrong. He lived on an 1,800 calorie diet of Twinkies, Hostess cakes and all things junk food for a period of ten weeks. And guess what happened? He lost weight, thats what happened! Not only that, but his bad cholesterol went down and his good cholesterol went up. Hmmmm.

Now, I don't for one second think that eating nothing but junk food, no matter the caloric intake, is good for you over a long period of time. BUT, I do think that the age old, simple as pie method of eat less calories, lose weight idea is really worth a second look. I also think that if you want something, eat it! Just eat it in moderation and exercise.

A pound = 3,500 calories. Either gain it or lose it. Simple as that. To lose a pound a week, you have to cut out 3,500 calories that week. So, if you normally eat 2,000 calories a day, that's 14,000 calories a week. To lose a pound, cut your weekly intake down to 10,500 calories. That's 1,500 calories a day.

OR eat the normal 2,000 calories a day/14,000 calories a week and exercise off that 3,500 calories to lose your pound. Keep in mind that if you are maintaining your current weight on your 2,000 calorie a day meal habit, you aren't burning any extra calories with what you're doing. You will need to do some extra exercise to burn that 3,500 calories.

Go for a walk every day. Play Kinect (I kind of like this one ;). Take up running. Do P90X. Jog. Rake leaves. Shovel snow. Mow the grass. Clean house. Yoga. Zumba. Kickboxing. Cardio. Aerobics.

So, we are switching gears and just counting calories for a while to see how that works out. When I go grocery shopping, I am only looking at the calories part of the nutrition label. (sneaky things that they are, make sure you pay attention to serving size and calories per serving - they will trick you every chance they get!) After having looked at fat grams and ingredients for so long, this has proven to be a real challenge to me. But, I'll get over it, I'm sure.

Bossman is using an online calorie counter at FitClick. He can list everything he's eaten that day and it will calculate how many calories he's taken in. He can add favorite foods and input foods that aren't already on FitClick. He loves this. I hate it. I can't seem to get in the habit of recording every single thing I eat every day. I almost feel restricted for some reason and I want to go out and be "bad" and eat chocolate till I explode. I just kind of keep track in my head and I'm okay.

We've been doing this for a month or so and I did one of those things online where you put in your age, weight, height, amount of exercise, etc., and it calculates how many calories you should eat per day. Mine came to something like 1,600 - 1,700. So, I've been keeping my caloric intake down in the 1,400 range to lose weight. Much to my suprise (and let me tell ya, I love it!), apparently I am more active than I anticipated and/or my metabolism is higher than I thought. My britches are way loose all of a sudden. Cool, huh?!

So, I'll update you on our pilgrimage though all things calories. I'm also planning to do some reviews on some lower calorie foods that we've found. I'll give 'em a yay or a nay. I would love to hear some things everybody else is trying!
~Bosslady

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