Hi!
Sorry it's a long post. I'm Portuguese and we like words... I'm currently away at family's house. It's been somewhat difficult, even though I eat about half of what I used to only a couple of weeks ago. I've been reading about Newcastle and want to give it ago, once the holiday season is over (in about 3 weeks). There isn't much point in starting before, as it will be too difficult to keep to it. However, would there be any benefit in doing one meal with the shake before I start the 12-week course?
For the questions:
1) The Newcastle document says 3 shakes plus 200 calories of actual vegetables, but in other places it says just the 3 shakes. Which is it?
3) If it's 3 shakes plus 200 calories in vegetables, does one have three meals as recommended, in which one is 400 cal, or does one have 4 meals a day?
2) I've only seen three shakes available: banana, strawberry and chocolate. Is that right? I'll avoid the one that says vanilla, as I hate vanilla. (I'm in the UK, as I've seen from other posts that that makes a difference).
3) Do I need to wait for an appointment with the gp to start a diet plan?
4) I've seen there are people who have done not shakes but real food. I always cook from scratch, are there any useful guides I can follow? I like chocolate, but I'm not a huge on sweet food, and having three banana, strawberry or chocolate shakes every day sounds dreadful. It'd be great to have one actual meal, but the same effect as the shakes. I like the shakes because of their simplicity and life is very very complicated at the moment.
5) Will this also lower high cholesterol? I really would rather not have statin!!!
6) One thing is a diet to lose weight, the other is a diet to maintain weight. I absolutely do not have time to be counting calories. Any useful guides for vegetarians out there that you recommend? I'd like to use the 8 weeks to have a plan in place.
I've always found it extremely difficult to lose weight and had no problem at all putting it on. I've done calory counting, lots of exercise and other things back when I weighed 79 kg. It took me forever to get to 75 and then depression and life kicked in and I just gave in to the frustration, which is why I'm where I'm at now. I don't want that to happen this time, so I'm looking for a sustainable way to go about it, but even right now I'm feeling very frustrated, as two weeks the changes of eating a lot less carbs than before, and a lot less food in general, but increasing in vegetables and fruit on the plate and walking exercise has done 0 to my weight. Nothing at all. And there'll be days when it even goes up. I accept that this only means I'm not doing it properly, as I'm not actually counting, so maybe I eat less but there's still the same amount of calories (not that that adds up in my head, when portions have been dramatically slashed). But it sure does not feel encouraging and it is extremely frustrating. Even without changes, the adding of 1 hour walks should at least prevent me from gaining weight, but I'm eating a lot less as well, and I've followed the advice of reducing carbs and making sure half my plate is vegetables.
Sorry it's a long post. I'm Portuguese and we like words... I'm currently away at family's house. It's been somewhat difficult, even though I eat about half of what I used to only a couple of weeks ago. I've been reading about Newcastle and want to give it ago, once the holiday season is over (in about 3 weeks). There isn't much point in starting before, as it will be too difficult to keep to it. However, would there be any benefit in doing one meal with the shake before I start the 12-week course?
For the questions:
1) The Newcastle document says 3 shakes plus 200 calories of actual vegetables, but in other places it says just the 3 shakes. Which is it?
3) If it's 3 shakes plus 200 calories in vegetables, does one have three meals as recommended, in which one is 400 cal, or does one have 4 meals a day?
2) I've only seen three shakes available: banana, strawberry and chocolate. Is that right? I'll avoid the one that says vanilla, as I hate vanilla. (I'm in the UK, as I've seen from other posts that that makes a difference).
3) Do I need to wait for an appointment with the gp to start a diet plan?
4) I've seen there are people who have done not shakes but real food. I always cook from scratch, are there any useful guides I can follow? I like chocolate, but I'm not a huge on sweet food, and having three banana, strawberry or chocolate shakes every day sounds dreadful. It'd be great to have one actual meal, but the same effect as the shakes. I like the shakes because of their simplicity and life is very very complicated at the moment.
5) Will this also lower high cholesterol? I really would rather not have statin!!!
6) One thing is a diet to lose weight, the other is a diet to maintain weight. I absolutely do not have time to be counting calories. Any useful guides for vegetarians out there that you recommend? I'd like to use the 8 weeks to have a plan in place.
I've always found it extremely difficult to lose weight and had no problem at all putting it on. I've done calory counting, lots of exercise and other things back when I weighed 79 kg. It took me forever to get to 75 and then depression and life kicked in and I just gave in to the frustration, which is why I'm where I'm at now. I don't want that to happen this time, so I'm looking for a sustainable way to go about it, but even right now I'm feeling very frustrated, as two weeks the changes of eating a lot less carbs than before, and a lot less food in general, but increasing in vegetables and fruit on the plate and walking exercise has done 0 to my weight. Nothing at all. And there'll be days when it even goes up. I accept that this only means I'm not doing it properly, as I'm not actually counting, so maybe I eat less but there's still the same amount of calories (not that that adds up in my head, when portions have been dramatically slashed). But it sure does not feel encouraging and it is extremely frustrating. Even without changes, the adding of 1 hour walks should at least prevent me from gaining weight, but I'm eating a lot less as well, and I've followed the advice of reducing carbs and making sure half my plate is vegetables.
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