Help Me Become A Healthier Person Please - Part 1

[DawnToDusk]

Howdy,

For a while now I have been wanting to get in shape. I finally got around to it because its time for me to go back to school and I kind of need to get my act together. At first I had no idea how to go about becoming a healthier person but then I read kyleb's post and I felt like a lot of my questions were answered and pointed in the right direction! But I have some more questions and would like some help if you guys can.

It might help you if you knew a little more about my past and my past phyisical history. In high school I played recreational sports. I wasn't really really into all this varsity stuff and what not, but thats fine if other people like it! So anyways I played rec sports for about 10 years straight. I had practices and games and overall I was skinny. Well not skinny. I guess you could say how runners are long and lanky. That was pretty much me because most of the sports I played was soccer. During high school I weighed 165lbs. Fast forward to today. I am now 22 in college and will be finishing my last year at college. While at college I have had a great time but it has obviously taken its toll. I party a lot and drink a lot of alcohol. I also played a lot of poker where I just seem to be sitting around and the only physical activity was clicking my mouse. I now weight 185lbs. I finally said it was enough when I started to get winded going up a flight of stairs.

After reading kyleb's post I feel motivated and I can accomplish any goal as long as I work at it and keep honest with myself. For now I have a general goal: to add lean body mass and drop fat pounds. As I learn more about having a healthier lifestyle and how to obtain one I will refine it so it isn't so vague (if I need too? that sounds like a pretty good overall one).

My first question has to deal with food and supplements. I am a little overwhelmed. It has been mentioned to me by other people (who are for the most part in shape) that eating smaller meals throughout the day will help regulate your body weight. Kyleb even says it in his post too and posts a chart to help you keep track of what you eat. Logistically, since I am still in school, what would work best for me is eating 4 times a day. I plan on eating between 10am-1pm, 1pm-4pm, 4pm-7pm, and 7pm-10pm. Now I plan on eating 2000 calories a day but just don't see what concievable meals I can eat 4 times a day that keep me withing those limits!

What would really be great is if you guys/gals could suggest some good meals that I could eat four times a day that would keep me within my 2000 calorie limit. And just saying "Well I would eat a carb mean now, and then a protein meal then" doesn't help me very much. Like I need examples. I can't just walk through the store (yet at least) and point to foods and say "Thats protein. Thats carbs. Eating this for one of my meals will help me stay withing my 2000 calorie limit."




My last question has to deal with supplements. More precisely thermogenics. I was looking for an ECA stack (I read up on them and the side effects and effects of ephedrine and I don't believe I will suffer from the negative effects, if so I will stop) but I am under them impression that ephedrine is illegal/banned. But I searched on google for ECA and found places that are selling them. Are they legally selling them? Are they selling phony products that don't work? Do you have a preferred company who makes ECA's that you take (there are so many companys who make them)? How often are you taking an ECA a day? (I THINK I read somewhere that people take them 2-3 times a day but can't find where I read it again so would like to double check and not do something silly like kill myself from taking ECA 3 times a day) When are you taking ECA? (IE when you wake up, before a work out, and before you go to bed)



Thanks a bunch guys! I really appreciate you reading my post and helping me out! I will post a log and let everyone follow along with my progress if you wish!

[Efourdee]

You should be preparing your own meals. Its going to be much easier to shed fat if you count your calories and control your macronutrients.

Heres a random day of meals:

eggs and oatmeal for breakfast
salmon brown rice and asparagus for lunch
Protein shake and Oats before the gym.
A post workout shake.
Turkey Breast with Sweet Potatoe and Vegatables.
Cottage cheese, flax oil and Spinach before bed.

These are just a few examples, but they are all healthy and because you are preparing them you can decide how many calories to make each meal.

[dethgrind]

How tall are you? How did you come up with 2000 calories? You should use one of those calculators to figure out your basal metabolic rate. Read the FAQ for good links on what to eat, in particular berardis 7 habits and the one on foods that make you look good naked.

When eating several times a day, you sort of redefine your concept of "meal". Sometimes a meal for me is a cup of cottage cheese and an apple.

Stay away from ECA stack at least for a while until you sort out the foundation. Once you're dedicated to a solid diet and workout routine, start to look into it. You can buy it online but they don't ship to every state I don't think. Also, they usually add this guaxxxxx crap that you don't want; it's kinda hard to find pure ephedrine, but it's still out there. IMO you should really know what you're doing before you start doing drugs to help you out.

[DawnToDusk]

My BMR is 1967 or something like that so I just decided to round up to 2000 and make it nice and even.

As far as ECA goes I thought this is something a lot of people took at the beginning of their efforts to start to live a healthier lifestyle. Maybe I miss understood but once you are mostly lean body mass don't you stop taking this supplement? I thought the ephedrine was meant to increase your metabolism overall which would help you start to burn those fatty deposits.

[dethgrind]

ECA is not just for beginners, its for anyone trying to lose fat. I personally don't recommend it for true beginners cause there's a lot to know about it, and you should really be focusing your efforts on figuring out your diet and workouts right now. I found some good discussion and links on the bodybuilding.com forums. This is a decent starting point: http://terracotta2.googlepages.com/fatloss

I also recommend throwing in a couple healthy snacks a day to get your 4 meals up to 6 or more.

[Machmood]

Hey man, i am a certified personal trainer, and am very knowledgable on all the new supps. I can help you outline a diet and workout program that fits you. My aim name is Machmood869, look foward to hearing from you

[thirddan]

machmood...do it in this thread please...for the benefit of the rest of us that read the forum...

[Machmood]

no problem, ill write up a quick post about the diet first. i could write a 10 page post about this, so ill be vauge and highlight the key terms that u can search on ur own, along with some links, so first ill go over diet. Id like to point that DAWNTODUSK put it best, its a lifstyle change,at first it may seem difficult, but its really not. Everyone has to eat right??? its just what u decide to eat taht really matters, with a few cahnges, you can change ur physical and MENTAL health in no time

[Machmood]

Basicly when it comes to diet you really only need to know one term, thats "Eating Clean". This refers to eating quality carbs, lean proteins, and staying away from processed foods and carbs. Quality carbs include whole grain/wheat, brown rice, oatmeal , and oats. Lean proteins include low fat ground beef/turkey,fish,chicken, and some types of red meat. You hear about this all the time on those nutrisystem commercials where they talk about the glycemic index. Below is an article that really explains it, if ne one has ne questions feel free to im me pm me

http://ezinearticles.com/?Eating-Cle...&id=377634

[Machmood]

ill put up some REALLY!!! easy recipes that i use for dinner, as this is the meal people struggle with to get a healthy,easy cheap meal. As for my breakfast and lunch its prettty much the same everyday, but i change it up some, keep in mind im trying to gain lean muscle mass, so my meals r pretty big..Breakfast

Breakfast
-5 eggwhites and 3 eggs made in an omeellete or sunny side up

-3 pieces of whole grain or wheat toast(pepridge farms has the best

-1 bowl of kashi 'protein" cereal with lowfat milk

-1 cup of orange juice, no sugar added