mindstalk: (science)
mindstalk ([personal profile] mindstalk) wrote2022-09-06 12:22 am
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new diet, one month in

On Aug 5 I decided to change what I ate. How has that worked out?


So, I decided to get way more fiber, both for its own benefits and as a proxy of a healthier diet; also (later) more potassium; to eat way less red and processed meat, and maybe land animal fat/protein in general, due to heart/cancer risks. Generally moving in a pescatarian/Mediterranean direction.

Change was successfully made. I haven't bought refined bread, or raw land animal meat, once in the past month. Daily diet went from refined bread and pork, with sometimes beans or whole wheat pasta, to oats/whole bread/whole pasta/potatoes and various legumes. Haven't eaten as much salmon and sardines as expected since I ended up just having many vegan days. No eggs, milk, or cheese purchased; I did experiment with soy and pea milks.

I've sometimes gotten hot cooked chicken from Wal-mart (comes in nice small package, like just two thighs) and eaten out somewhat (especially al pastor tacos), but every few days, not daily pork/beef/chicken/sausage like before.

Possibly a bit more daily fruit, thanks to the fruit salad hack. Probably not more green/orange/red vegetables, still variously 1-4 servings of spinach, broccoli, carrots, or tomatoes (and not much of the latter.) Mexico's dubiously clean produce doesn't help there.

And the change has survived one change of kitchen, too.

So for all that, are there any visible health effects? Meh. The most obvious change was 2.5 weeks of painful gut protest, assuming that wasn't from a flawed water purifier. Next most obvious is being to go 12 hours without eating, more easily. (If you don't eat because you're not hungry, is that actually intermittent fasting?) No obvious changes in energy or sleep (not that I felt I was suffering before.)

Pants starting to feel loose today despite making sure I had my belt on the tightest hole. It'll be annoying if I shrink around my hips faster than the belly bulge itself.

I didn't weigh myself or do any bloodwork before the change, so I won't be able to judge changes there, unless I actually shrink enough to need a smaller belt or something. If anything, I'd thought before that maybe I was getting bigger (fiber to gas bloat, maybe.) Mostly I'm just assuming from research that this sort of diet is healthier. (Also better for the environment and animal welfare, but that wasn't the motivation.) (Neither was losing weight, though I'll be happy if it happens via belly shrinkage.)

Biggest mental effect is thinking about food... not in an obsessing about what I'm not eating way, but imagining fiber scraping out my intestine, or looking up benefits, or looking up plant milk stuff. (Thus how I learned pea milk exists. Was surprised to see it at Wal-mart Express.)
mtbc: photograph of me (Default)

[personal profile] mtbc 2022-09-06 08:13 am (UTC)(link)
I've done a fair bit of reading (years ago) on this kind of dietary stuff and had no idea that pea milk exists.

Though, I haven't gone so far as to largely drop dairy. While today's lunch is broccoli, basa, maybe brown rice, I had whole milk with granola for breakfast.
mtbc: photograph of me (Default)

[personal profile] mtbc 2022-09-06 04:19 pm (UTC)(link)
Aha, thank you, that explains it, I'm rather out of date on such stuff.

Basa's also sold as swai. Fish, I hazily recall it often seems to come from SE Asia.

[personal profile] anna_wing 2022-09-06 11:00 am (UTC)(link)
You've made a good start, congratulations! This is a major lifestyle change you're making, it will take a while to bed in.

You'll only lose weight if you are ingesting fewer calories than you expend in your daily activity, regardless of the details of your diet, but yours already sounds both tastier (to me, anyway!) and healthier. Everyone is different in terms of where exactly they put on or lose fat, and in what order, but non-stretch clothes are a decent proxy for assessing fat loss.

I've heard about intermittent fasting, but don't know anyone who does it in real life. 12 hours sounds like a normal period to me. Dinner at 7pm, breakfast the next morning at 7.30am.
Edited 2022-09-06 11:02 (UTC)
mtbc: photograph of me (Default)

[personal profile] mtbc 2022-09-06 11:48 am (UTC)(link)
Ordinarily I do 16:8, basically two consecutive meals of the day but no others. [personal profile] mst3kmoxie does some several-day cycle with up and down days but I've never been inclined to follow.

[personal profile] anna_wing 2022-09-07 09:26 am (UTC)(link)
"Rebound" tends to happen when people do unrealistic crash diets, with huge cuts. Those tend to be unsustainable, and in the case of weird fad diets, often actively bad for you, nutritionally. I have a friend who has the problem the other way round - chronically underweight because she just has a very low interest in food, and trying for years to get up to a healthy weight. She keeps complaining that she has "tried so many diets and they don't work" (it's maddening). But she does the same thing over and over again: changes her daily diet and eats more, hits her target weight after a short time, and then drops everything and goes right back to the (non-)eating habits that got her underweight in the first place. The concept of changing her eating habits permanently just doesn't register.

A small daily deficit of a few hundred calories, probably wouldn't even make you hungry, especially with healthier, more filling food, like you're eating now. That will allow gradual weight loss (500g a week is a sensible rate), gradual reduction of appetite in tandem (since a lower body mass needs fewer calories to sustain it), and generally, a permanent re-set in your weight and eating habits, with no "rebound". But it does take time and sustained attention. I gained 18 kg over 30 years, and lost it in 18 months little by little. Adding exercise helps with both reduction and maintenance, and as a bonus your strength and fitness improve at the same time.
Edited 2022-09-07 09:29 (UTC)
pianogurl330: Swift playing piano with her cat walking across it./Never be so clever, you forget to be kind (Halloween:Sally ಌ The Perfect Pumpkin)

[personal profile] pianogurl330 2022-09-09 09:46 pm (UTC)(link)
Sounds like you have had a good start! I never knew pea milk exists!