I'm starting a diet, and need to bounce my ideas somewhere, so here it will be. The 4 hour body (http://fourhourbody.com) slow carb diet (SCD) is the diet of choice, as well as implementing some other ideas from 4 hour body.
Background
I'm 35yo male, 6'5", weighing 110kg, mostly athletic body, at least 10-12kgs ago. Since I was 18 and had reached my full height, my weight has fluctuated between around 92kg's and 110kg's. 92kg's was when doing 6 days a week very physical sport, and eating/drinking well. I looked way too skinny when at 92 anyway. 110 is the max and I've hit that mark about 3 times including now. I've rarely actually dieted, but have often looked after myself, by playing a lot of sport, getting in the gym, and eating OK. I've always drank too much, mainly around weekends. Since quitting competetive sport 5 years ago though, I've done very little to keep fit, and have also dieted worse. During a recent stressful period, my diet went way south, with no limit on bad snack foods, and also drinking way too much. In the last couple of weeks the factors of stress are thankfully behind me, so I decided it's time to lose these bad habits.
The Harajuku moment
In 4 hour body Tim Farriss talks about a moment where you decide "this is it, I need to change." Interestingly, this came off the back of our stressful period, moving house. With finances tight, having to sell and buy at the same time, 2 kids to look after, the stress was all over us. Now we've moved, we have a few minor renovations to do. I've always been money first, style/quality/features second, but I'm seeing a slightly different light now. We are aiming to stay in this house a very long time, so we really want to make sure we don't buy inferior things that we see deteriorate within a few years. The old house we bought a lot of "this will see us through the next few years" products, but now I want things I'm happy with 20 years from now. This thought process then shone a light on me. I'm going to be in this house in 20 years, but how healthy will I be? I'm dealing OK with eating/drinking too much right now, but if I eat bad and drink a lot for 20 years, I'll have some serious health issues. What about 40 years? I still want to be kicking strong at 75, but what chances will I have if I'm not looking after myself now?
Slow carb diet (SCD)
OK, so I need to change. I'm listening to my favourite show, The Adam Carolla podcast, and Tim Ferriss comes on as a guest. In a short amount of time, he hits the interview with about 5 fascinating tidbits from the 4 hour body, and I'm hooked. I get the book and have now read it.
SCD is all about cutting out grains/white foods, such as bread, pasta, rice, as well as minimising sugar, dairy and fruit, at least 6 days a week. Day 7 is amazingly a day off the diet, so once a week, you can eat or drink as much as you like, with very few rules. This instantly catapults it past most diets, as they don't get reward for hard work. For example, my wife recently started a diet, but she can't eat anything/drink anything until she reaches her goal weight, which may be many months from now. With the 4 hour body diet, your next day off is only ever 6 days away, so you can always keep going that extra few days while adding cravings to a list of things you'll have on the day off.
Apparently this diet works for weight loss, so it's a great plan. Worst case scenario it's too hard or I don't lose weight, but at least I've kick started my next 20 years, and have some fresh ideas about how to eat/drink.
My plan
4 hour body gives lots of other tips too. There are simple (yet effective) excersizes to keep doing. There are some weird ideas about cold water/showers/baths/ice packs which is worth a try. There is also sections on extra supplements (I won't be doing this just yet), sleep help (not a real issue for me), and other advice around alcohol, timing of eating/excersize, and even sex.
So my 6 days will look roughly like this:
6:30am - Wake up, have 500ml of icy water, make sure kids are OK if they are up
6:32am - Shower, first hot water, then 3+ minutes pure cold water (I'm awake now!), get dressed for work.
6:45am - Cook breakfast, usually 2 eggs, 1 cup beans, 100g spinach, veggies, probably with a meat for added flavour/protein. Currently it's one sausage, but I'll need to review this down to a leaner meat I think.
6:55am - eat breakfast. So the big idea here is 30g of protein within 30 minutes of getting out of bed, which is covered if I keep to the plan.
Until 12-12:30pm - 2 coffees no sugar/milk, plenty of water. No snacks needed with the big breakfast.
12:30 - heat up stir fry/some meat with veggies, beans and spinach on side
Until 6pm - 1 or 2 coffees, more water. No snacks needed
6pm - final meal, whatever family is having minus bad stuff, plus some good stuff. Sometimes seperate to family (although wife is on high protein diet too, so might have what she's having)
8pm - do light excersizes from 4 hour body
9pm - 1 or 2 glasses of wine some nights, this is allowed on the diet
10pm - ice bag on neck for 30 minutes
11:30 - Almond butter to reduce blood sugar problems overnight, sleep time
Final thoughts
So that's the plan. I will be blogging updates only about every week or where I see fit. As my current recipes/knowledge of what to shop for are so far non-existant, I hope to add some recipe ideas/purchase ideas here, and progress reports of course. My initial aim is to get through to the first day off without crumbling to cravings.
So my initial starting weight is 110kg. I won't do measurements, but safe to say I'm a little tight in most of my pants, so it'll be pretty easy to feel inches lost there. I'm actually about due for new jeans, so it'd be good reward to cut some weight before buying some at a lower size. No real goals as per weight, but I would expect to be under 100kgs within a couple of months if I stick to this and if the diet works. I'd also expect to be feeling fitter/stronger. I'll weigh myself every Saturday morning, which is cheat day.
All or nothing, lets do it!
PS. Started writing this post on Tuesday, the day I started the diet. I'm posting it Friday, after finding a home for it. This doesn't mean my cheat day is one day after I start dieting, I have been doing the diet 4 full days before.
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