Maximize Your 3 Day Diet Results

I thought I'd share a few tips that I think are very important regardless of what diet you are doing but especially for your 4 days off.

First figure out how many calories you need to eat to maintain your weight. Meaning how many calories do you burn in a day for your daily functions. To do this you need a BMR calculator (which can be found here). Input your height, weight and age and it will give you your BMR number. You then take that number and use the Harris Benedict Equation (which can be found here) to figure out your daily calorie needs based on how active you are.

There is a good chance you are taking in too many calories, especially if you have a desk job. For me I'm sitting quite often since I go to school online and work on the computer as well. You metabolism will slow and you don't need as much as you initially think.

When I first began trying to lose weight the dietitian at sparkpeople told me I needed to be taking in between 1600 and 1900 calories to lose weight. WRONG! Based on my lack of exercise I only need 1800 to maintain my weight. Even though I was exercising I didn't have an active lifestyle so you can't tell yourself your active and calculate your calories that way if you are only active a few hours out of the day.

So with that in mind if you were to have a medium sonic blast on one of your days off that around 1500 calories. For someone like me that's almost my entire daily intake just to maintain my weight. I'm a firm believer in indulging so I eat what I want but in moderation. In a typical day (without the 3 day diet) I only consume 1200 calories and still eat things like Gelato and wonderful carbs. I don't snack or binge eat and seriously think about what I'm going to eat and then enter it into my calorie counter every single day. After doing this for some time I've lost a lot of my cravings because I'm eating the right foods like oats, whole wheat, quinoa, protein, veggies, fruit, etc.

Something you should be taking away from the 3 Day Diet is that it is balanced. It may not be all the calories you need in a day but your getting protein, dairy, vegetables, and so on. Its something you should strive for on your days off as well. sparkpeople monitors your calories along with your fat intake, carbs, and protein. I work very hard to fulfill each of those requirements because you really shouldn't eliminate an entire food group with hopes of gaining results.

Toddler Lunch

 My 3 year old loves the Chef Boyardee Chicken & Rice w/ Veg and before that it was the flavorless Gerber version. Granteed the Chef Boyardee was cheaper and you got more for your money but you also got all the extras that your child doesn't really need that Gerber left out of theirs. So whats a mommy to do. Since today was left over day I have about 2 cups of brown basmati rice and decided to make my own, and not only is it cheaper, more colorful, but better all the way around.

Recipe

Make sure you have 2 Cups of Cooked Brown Rice (any variety), 12 oz Mixed Vegetables Cooked, 4-6 oz Cooked Chicken Breast (depending on how much you want), 1 1/2 - 2 Cups of Swanson Reduced Sodium Chicken Broth, & Salt Free Seasoning (like Mrs. Dash), 1 Tbsp of Flour, 1 Tbsp of Olive Oil.

Start out in a sauce pan w/ oil and heat. Whisk in flour and then add broth to create a thin gravy. You want it a little thin because the rice will soak it up. Once you have your gravy you can add your rice, veggies, and chicken, and then season. Its pretty simple and super cheap! It will have way less sodium.

Dr. Oz's Slimdown Drink

1 Cup of Grapefruit Juice

2 Tbsp of Apple Cider Vinegar

1 Tsp of Honey (Optional)

I thought I would try adding this to my diet and workout plan to help burn that extra fat. So we'll see if this gives me that added boost. I debated actually juicing grapefruits but I'm a big fan of the Del Monte pre sectioned grapefruit so I picked up a 64 oz container of no sugar added grapefruit.

I added with the water into the blender and let it rip. It will get super foamy and will of course have pulp but when I compared the price of 10 grapefruit it would have cost me more money and time. So I mixed her up and poured it into a pitcher so I can add the vinegar and honey as I go. The taste isn't the problem, it really burns my throat. The acid level in this drink is a bit harsh and may be too much for some people. 

According to my calorie counter on SparkPeople it is more than just 70 calories even if it is just the juice and came to a total of 105 calories with the honey. I'm not a big fan of drinking my calories and if it just comes down to needing more Vitamin C than I think a pill would be more cost effective and not as harsh on my throat. So I'm going to try this for a few days possibly a week. 

Currently I'm at

148 lbs

25% body fat 

So we'll see how my body fat improves. 

3 Day Diet Apps

Someone left a comment about a 3 Day Diet App so I went looking.
I haven't had the chance to install any yet but some have really good ratings.

So if your looking for an app to help you follow the 3 Day Diet plan here are some options:

     App Name                            Creator                     Android/Apple                 Cost            

3 Day Easy Diet app                 APP2SHOP                      Android                        Free              

3 Day Diet                              Realized Mobile                   Android                       $1.99            

3 Day Diet                              Realized Mobile                     Apple                        $2.99              

3 Day Diet and 1200               
& 1500 Calories Diets                  Post799                           Apple                         $0.99            



Just click on the name and it will take you right to the app where you can install it. The one with the best rating would be by Realized Mobile on Android. There is no rating for the one on Apple but it is by the same company.

Tiffany Rothe Workouts

I finally decided to make some dietary and fitness changes.
A lot of people come to my blog because of the 3 Day Workout.
I think its a good kick start but it didn't really work for me long term.
So about a week ago I happened upon a video on YouTube of someone talking about belly fat.
I had ran across a pin that talked about the different types of belly's and mine fell under stress.
I told myself that there was nothing I could do about it because it wasn't a dietary issue.

This guy laid it all out that if you want to loose belly fat really fast you have to cut the carbs, fruit juices, soda, basically the things that turn to sugar in your body because that's where they go. I don't know about everyone else but my food chart consists of bread, potatoes, pasta, and rice. I've always eaten a ton. So I decided I would reduce the carbs drastically. While I was watching his video I saw the Tiffany Rothe Workouts. She is amazing and has free workout videos on YouTube. She has studied with Billy Banks, Jane Fonda, and others. I started working out first thing in the morning, reducing my calorie intake, cutting the carbs, and I lost 7 lbs in the first 5 days. No unusual and unhealthy tricks just being healthy. I have 13 lbs to go but I'm trying to focus on feeling comfortable with myself and not a number or specific size.

This is her YouTube channel: http://www.youtube.com/user/TiffanyRotheWorkouts/videos

One of her first Q & A sessions answered some of my most important questions and she does a really good job explaining how to do her workouts and the problems almost every woman faces when they workout.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEEEel2z1cM

So check her out and let me know what you guys think and the progress your making. I haven't joined her inner circle because when I heap to many changes on myself at once i usually backslide so I'm slowly implementing things. I may decide to join later.

I also wanted to note that I haven't decided about before and after photos. I personally feel that a woman of a healthy size does not want to see a skinny girl get skinnier. I'm not a stick but I like Tiffany's outlook about being happy with yourself and not aspiring to be someone else, which is something I do often. So I just choose to not put up my photos because I'm nothing exceptional, I'm just me and want to have a healthy body fat level, and not be a stick figure.