Not new to fitness but new to NF!

[Maiwen]

Greetings for the mystical land of Canada!

 

I have been creeping the NF forums for a bit now and finally decided to make an account and introduce myself. It seems like a great community!

 

Where to start?

 

I am a 26 year old female human who's been changing her life around for the last 2 years. I was overweight and unhappy and decided to make a change for the better. 

I went from 5'6" 201lbs to 159lbs and I would like to ideally get down to around 145lbs of pure strength  !

 

I am still trying to lose some body fat but it has become less of a preoccupation for me as I have recently fallen in love with powerlifting. I decide that I want to get stronger and maybe one day compete in a meet. I am currently lifting weights 3X a week doing a 5X5 style workout. On non-liftings days I do stuff like running, yoga and swimming. 

 

My biggest issue with my quest to fitness has been the nutrition side of it. I have intense sugar/carb cravings that can sometimes ruin me emotionally after I binge. I am working hard to better myself and find out what my triggers are. 

I am still trying to figure out how many calories I should be eating in a day to gain strength without getting extra body fat (I have more than enough to spare ). I have been using myfitnesspal to track my food intake for a couple years now but I feel that I have just been lost in all the information the internet has on how much I should be eating. Any help/advice is more than welcomed for this! 

 

I am still trying to compute all the information on this forum about classes/challenges and everything else but I wanted to introduce myself and say hello! I think that is enough words for now - I am not that interesting to read about!

 

Cheers,

 

Maiwen

[Basement Cat]

Welcome to the rebellion, fellow Canadian!

 

Ah yes, the math part of fitness: food intake! Here is a link to a calculator I love to use. I've been getting really great results with it. It definitely gives a good idea of how many calories you need to maintain/reduce/increase your weight, depending on your needs.

 

If you are not sure of how much time you spend doing each activity, I find it better to underestimate than overestimate. Still, try to be as accurate as possible.

 

Good luck and keep us posted!

[Maiwen]

Welcome to the rebellion, fellow Canadian!

 

Ah yes, the math part of fitness: food intake! Here is a link to a calculator I love to use. I've been getting really great results with it. It definitely gives a good idea of how many calories you need to maintain/reduce/increase your weight, depending on your needs.

 

If you are not sure of how much time you spend doing each activity, I find it better to underestimate than overestimate. Still, try to be as accurate as possible.

 

Good luck and keep us posted!

 

 

Thanks for the link! I will definitely try and see if it helps me out in my quest. 

[shufflin_rollin]

Hey! I just joined NF as well! 

 

I also had huge struggles with sugar and carb cravings - not even realising it for many years until I tried cutting it out. For me, I personally cannot deal with calorie counting and any kind of food tracking. It feels like instant restriction and will almost definitely trigger me to binge or make poor food choices.

 

My way of cleaning up my diet was to try paleo (which I'm still in the throes of doing!), but before I did that I did an 8-week sugar detox. In Australia there's this lady called Sarah Wilson (and she runs a great blog on healthy eating) and she has this program called 'I Quit Sugar'. Usually I'm averse to 8-week programs of any kind but this has some great principles on how to get your body to stop craving sugar. 

 

The main principle is to 'crowd out' your diet with healthy foods (with a huge emphasis on healthy fats) - to keep you satiated and train your body to run off fat instead of carbs for fuel. Since there is no calorie counting involved you can simply focus on NOT having sugar - it doesn't matter what else you have as long as it's clean. 

 

It was hard but I found it was one of the few things that worked for me!

 

Another great resource is the book "It Starts With Food" if you like to know the science behind what you're doing before you do it. I'm stubborn in the sense that I don't like making arbitrary changes to my diet unless I can understand exactly why I'm doing it. 

 

Good luck with everything and huge congratulations on your progress thus far! 

[Maiwen]

Thank you for the awesome and informative post! 

 

I'll definitely be looking into that book. 

 

I've finally done the plunge and decided to try paleo (80/20 most likely). I got rid of EVERYTHING in the house that was not approved. This week has been going really well. I'm actually cooking more and finding my meals more flavourful. 

 

I agree with you on the calorie counting. It's such a chore! I decided that because I am trying to build strength I will keep an eye on my carb intake to ensure I have enough but I will just eat when hungry! 

 

Hope everything keeps going well for you