Y’all wanna know what most people get wrong when it comes to dieting in general?
We weren’t meant to live in a constant state of restriction. Feeling like sh*t, no energy no matter how many coffee or Bangs I shoved down my pie hole, chronic constipation, no body comp changes, cold all the freakin time – THAT was my normal back in the day.
I committed every sin I’ve talked about here on the interwebs. I used to CrossFit my a$$ off hours a day 7 d/wk on 1500 calories, eating all the carbs & plants, wrecking me mentally & physically. I wondered why I could never recover & I never looked “jacked” like other female athletes that weren’t working “half as hard” & eating twice as much as me.
Fast forward today, my 39 year old self finally fit the puzzle pieces together & learned not to fear food, not to see it as something I had to earn or burn off. I’m 5’1, 105lbs. I workout 5 d/wk, I lift & CrossFit, I walk a lot, and I eat ALOT. I avg 1850-2000 calories a day most days, primarily ground beef, eggs, lamb, & Perdue ground chicken.
Reminder, maintenance calories are how many calories we can eat in a day & maintain optimal body function without seeing any changes to muscle & fat composition. In other words, chillin like a villain.
If you’re eating below where you need to be calorically & basically feeling the exact opposite of the signs we’re talkin about in the slides of this post, you most likely need to do what’s called a reverse diet. Don’t know how? I have a whole 354 page EGuide with a section dedicated to this very subject.
Included are some things you may not want to hear:
A healthy body loses body fat & any weight you gain in the process of gaining health is weight you needed to gain.
It may take years to get the body you want going through numerous periodization cycles.
There is a cost to being a certain level of lean.
That athletic body you covet just may weigh more than you think.
Unless you’re a newbie & never worked out before or dieted, fat loss takes a calorie deficit, muscle gain takes at least maintenance & more likely surplus. Pick one. You cannot do both at the same time.
Also, our bodies are all different. What weight & body fat % one person is might work great for them as far as hormonal & metabolic health, others it may not be optimal & you may need to eat more to remedy any issues.
And if you refuse to eat more when you need to restore your health, you have far pressing more important issues than looking good in a bikini.
Keepin it real,
Coach K
