The 13 - 14 - 15 Diet Plan

In the 70's I found a diet in a cookbook that said to eat the number of calories based on what you want to weigh and how active you are. I called it the "13-14-15" diet. Supposedly it takes 14 calories per pound to maintain a normally active person; 13 for a moderately active and 15 for a more active person. So you decide the weight you want to be, multiply that by the correct calorie number and it will give you your calorie total per day. Your body will adjust itself over time.

This is fine if you are 50 lbs or less overweight. However if you are more than that you should base it on no more than 50 lbs below your current weight. Too much change would be a shock to your system and cause your metabolism to fear you are starving and slow down. In those instances you would be like the idiots on Biggest Loser (stupidest losers IMO). They are 400 lbs and put their bodies on 1100 calories per day and then spend the entire day exercising and working out. Do you have time to take 3 to 6 months off from work so you can spend 8-12 hours a day on a treadmill and bike? Me neither and no one has to be that miserable while losing weight but, hey, misery makes good TV - in their opinion.

I may have gone too far with mine. I decided I am such a slug because I am bedridden 80% of the time and do very little activity. I based my calories on 10 calories per pound because I read a couple of places it takes 10 calories per pound to maintain someone in the hospital. At 380 I decided to make my first goal 300 so that meant I could have up to 3000 calories per day for right now. In actuality I am eating between 1900 and 2300 a day, mostly the lower amount. Mostly because I tried to buy a bunch of Healthy Choice, Smart Ones, Michelina and Banquet dinners. They are mostly disgusting and I also bought too many sweet snacks instead of salty snacks.

Today's Lesson - Forget loading up the fridge with a bunch of things you don't like:

Don't make a bunch of dramatic changes all at once. You will be making a lot of changes - cutting back on fats and sweets and changing the type of snacks you eat. If you do too much at once you will load the house up with things you hate. You can only FORCE yourself to eat things you hate for a limited time and then you will rebel. This is when we fail. You are better off making just a few changes every week or two.

I tried to buy a bunch of fruit and veggies a few months ago. I don't care for most fruit and most of them ended up going in the trash. Try introducing one item every few weeks and reduce one bad item every few weeks.

Happy Dieting,
Linda B in TN:)