Looking for Advice

iamjoesgurl

I am a fairly healthy person. I work out regularly, eat healthy and drink lots of water. I try to encourage others in my life to be healthy without pushing it on them (leading by example).

Because of my healthy habits, people often come to me for advice. So I'm turning to you on this one. A co-worker who go married this past summer (at age 36) is starting to think about TTC. She knows that her doctor is going to tell her to lose weight (she tells me she is obese). She came to me to ask for tips and I tried to encourage her with foods to eat and tips to be healthier, but she is vegetarian and doesn't like most of the non-meat snacks I brought up. Yogurt (gross), cottage cheese (weird consistency), nuts (too many calories - she says she can't just eat a handful), string cheese (ok), peanut butter (high calorie). She can eat veggies for some protein but what else should I recommend? I know that if she'd eat more snacks that are healthy, she'd eat fewer calories throughout the day.

TIA!

maribeth721

Honestly, these sound like excuses and simply a matter of will power. If you want to get healthy you need to commit to changing your lifestyle, which starts with your diet. If she refuses to even try this then she's obviously not ready to make the commitment to change her body and her health. Maybe you need to say that to her, maybe she needs some tough love. Here's some advice: Don't like yogurt? Try flavoring it with stevia and some berries. Don't like cottage cheese? Try the same thing. Can't eat just one handful of nuts? Pack one handful of nuts and put them in a baggy and bring them to work, then you will only have that serving available to you. Peanut butter is high in calories, but has a lot of good fat in it. It's ok to eat in small amounts. I have peanut butter a few times a week.

Things like edamame, egg whites, soy, whey protein (get all natural, I love making protein shakes), beans (i love black beans), chia seeds, quinoa, are also all great forms of protein.

catloverd

Vegetarians need protein since they don't get it from meat, which is our main source of protein. Some high protien foods are nuts, beans, seeds, tofu, soy products, and dairy (milk, cheese, eggs). From the sounds of it she's not a dairy fan. But cheese in general is good. A lot of granola bars have seeds, so maybe find some that are high in protien. If anything, since she seems really picky, she might just have to take a supplement. Especially if she plans on getting pregnant. 

Dieting doesn't help alone, you need to exercise as well. I would suggest for her to start a simple work out plan, 5 minutes a day can do wonders! She can do easy things like jumping jacks, jump rope, russian twists, kneeling push ups, marching in place, etc... Just walking 30 mins a day is said to have good benefits, so if she doesn't want to do any exercise, tell her to make it a goal to walk for 30 mins a day. 

iamjoesgurl

Thank you all. For the exercising, we had a conversation about how she said she can only eat 1374 calories a day. I suggested that she start exercising so that she could up the calorie count while still having the same results. (For example, walking 30-45 minutes a day at a fast pace so that she could increase to 1600 calories on those days.) But she basically said there is no way she can do that. She kind of does have excuses and maybe being honest with her (tough love) will be the only way to help. But I appreciate the snack recommendations so far and welcome any others you can think of.

iamjoesgurl

BTW xcalygrl - love your siggy pic! I was just there a few weeks ago (took a ferry from Bremerton to Seattle and saw that same view). I love Seattle!

catloverd

In Response to <a href="http://forums.theknot.com/Sites/theknot/Pages/Main.aspx/wedding-boards_getting-shape_looking-for-advice?plckFindPostKey=Cat:Wedding%20BoardsForum:238Discussion:b04d07e6-18b0-4e4b-819f-4932c11825b6Post:3073656d-d2c4-48b2-9d85-247bf35d7fbe">Re: Looking for Advice</a>:
[QUOTE]Thank you all. For the exercising, we had a conversation about how she said she can only eat 1374 calories a day. I suggested that she start exercising so that she could up the calorie count while still having the same results. (For example, walking 30-45 minutes a day at a fast pace so that she could increase to 1600 calories on those days.) But she basically said there is no way she can do that. She kind of does have excuses and maybe being honest with her (tough love) will be the only way to help. But I appreciate the snack recommendations so far and welcome any others you can think of.
Posted by iamjoesgurl[/QUOTE]

<div>wow, that's a really low calorie count.... and yeah it does sound like she just doesn't want to put the effort in. Is it because she doesn't have time or is it just a matter of she doesn't want to? I hate exercising, but I do it anyway and I usually do it while watching TV. So she doesn't have to give up her favorite shows or anything. Anyway if she doesn't listen to you, the doctor will tell her the same things, so hopefully she'll listen to him or her. </div>

jennylee813

It does sound like excuses to me as well, for both the food and the exercise. Tough love is the way to go,  but be warned, I think she'll just have more excuses. I know someone like this too.

It is a lifestyle change and it doesn't sound like she's willing. And to me it sounds like she's not even taking in enough calories to begin with. She sounds like someone who's stuck on the 'low calories must mean weight loss' train of thought, not realizing that if she isn't eating enough her body will go into starvation mode.

Likely her doctor will tell her tha same things, as well as to start taking a prenatal vitamin before conceiving, and to start a fitness routine (like walking) before getting pregnant. All of these things will make for a happy baby - maybe she needs to focus on that aspect??

s-aries8990

Can she play "games" with herself? I like some salad- but i can only eat so much before I get totally sick of it and never want to eat it again, so i force myself to eat my sald first or else before I can eat anything else. I do the same thing wtth myself with raw veggies. I'm not a huge fan of raw carrots and peppers, but they're my best bet (hate raw broccoli & cauliflower) so I tell myself I can't eat my yogurt (the fruit on the bottom Chobani- super YUM once you get used to it!) or my super sweet fruit like fresh pinapple until I eat the less super yummy stuff.

I feel like she is making excuses. I know I TOTALLY do sometimes, but at least I admit that I'm not trying hard enough. If she can set 1-2 hours a week aside to prep for the week, she'll be more likely to make healthy choices! It's much easier to grab a handful of pre-washed, pre-chopped lettuce in the morning than trying to totally prep it at 6 am. Same thing with sliced raw veggies. If when she buys nuts, she immediately portions them into snack ziplocks, it will prevent too-large portions. It costs a bit more because of all of the packaging waste, but It's totally worth it. 

She can also totally pre-make her lunches and freeze them in proper portions. I do that with my whole-wheat pasta and sauce for when there aren't left-overs for me to scavenge from.

Also, her calorie count seems wayy off. I use the usda super tracker site and that calculates calorie counts from eating, exercizing and body-survival based on activity level. if she's at a desk all day, she can just use a tool like that to help her out.

iamjoesgurl

Thanks again for the great tips. I'll tell her that I think her calorie count is too low. She told me that she did WW before and at first I was thinking that was where she got the calorie  count, but I don't think they go by calorie count. I don't really know much about calories myself because I focus more on small portions of food and trying to limit sweets and high calorie foods. (In other words, I don't count calories but I basically know what to do to ensure that I'm not eating too little or too much.)

I really appreciate all of the feedback!