I was excited to see this weeks chapter was solely on nutrition. Over the past year I have steadily learned about basic nutrition to see what would help with my goals. My goals were and still are to cut fat and build lean muscle. Before I realized that i wanted to make a change, I didn’t care about what,when, and where I ate. I LOVE food so before I was smarter with it, I would eat whatever tasted best and was satisfying at the time. an example of 3 meals I would eat in a day would consist breakfast: pancakes(loaded in syrup) with bacon and eggs with a chocolate milk. Lunch: pizza roles and nachos with a soda. Dinner: fried chicken, mashed potatoes, gravy, and a roll.I would get fast food quite often too, at least once a week. Also I snacked in between when I was board. So you get the point how much bad stuff I used to eat! I then thought if I eat that stuff, I just need to exercise often and I would lose weight and be healthy. I was dead-wrong about that and learned nutrition and your diet is the number one thing to making a change for your health and weight. I began to reduce the amount of processed carbs, fried foods, desserts, and fast food, while cutting out snacking. There’s no specific guidelines I follow besides trying to eat as clean as possible. Natural foods can only do mostly positive so I stuck with that and can honestly say I feel and look better. I will still eat out, have occasional desserts, and snack but limit it big time and not make it a regular thing. For me it is impossible to stop eating sweets/ fried foods forever at this stage in life so limiting is the option that i will stick with for now. For dinners I always a protein (chicken,turkey,red meat,or fish) with a veggie and rice on the side. Lunch is usually tuna or a protein shake. Breakfast is usually eggs or some toast with fruit along with a daily vitamin.
While reading the chapter, a few things caught my eye that I never knew. The fist thing was the importance of water. I drink lots of water so I happy to see how much it does for us. I drink it to avoid dehydration since I get headaches. However, I did not know drinking too much could be bad as it flushes your system, it flushes essential sodium and other essentials. The second thing that caught my eye was the importance of carbs. Before this chapter, I always heard and thought that carbs are what make you fat. I was wrong and learned they are essential, especially for energy. Refined carbs may be what I was thinking about, but carbs also help the functioning of internal organs, nervous system, and muscled. Looks like no carb summer has been called off. The last thing that was new to me was the super food section. I always thought they were just healthy foods that were all natural. I soon learned that super-foods are just foods that can positively affect your body when consumed. I had no clue salmon was one as it contains omega-3 and is great for your heart. This is big for me since I am a huge seafood guy.
My goal has been going swimmingly stuck in quarantine. There’s not much to do so I look forward to hitting my at home workout. My diet has been good for the most part, besides the occasional sweet my roommates have. Bored eating is so tough in a time like this, but these past few days I have been battling it. I will not be able to build as much muscle without a full gym, but lifting body weight will help cut fut and overall better shape. Fresh air is now a blessing to get, so I did my first run around the block today and hope to make it a daily thing. I haven’t been able to get a recent picture of myself in my house so here is another throwback of me playing football in high school. I hope everyone is safe and healthy!
