Thursday 10 April 2014

How Eating Clean Made Me Fat & Flexible Dieting Got Me Shredded

Dieting is the hardest part of getting into shape... and confusing, or is it? With so much misinterpretation within society, on the news, in many fitness magazines and gyms, its hard to define what we should and shouldn't be eating. Don't eat carbohydrates for breakfast, don't eat apples or bananas as they have sugar in them, don't put sugar in your coffee and my personal favourite, don't eat carbohydrates after 6:00pm as they will be stored as fat.

Clean foods only diet, Paleo diet, low carbohydrate diet. Yes, I've tried the majority and failed miserably. I hate the word diet! I can't think of many people who do like the word diet! I prefer to use the word Nutrition. Diet to me sounds like a strict eating regime that someone has to follow to get the body of their dreams. Now don't get me wrong one has to be strict (to an extent) whilst trying to get into shape. There's no if's or buts about it. You can NOT out train bad nutrition (yes, I've tried that too) especially if your goal is set out to get into shape, which entails losing unwanted body-fat.

I'm sure a lot of you have also been in the same boat as me, wanting to lose body-fat and get the body of your dreams. A body that turns heads on the beach. You've tried everything, copious amount of cardiovascular endurance, fat loss pills and EVERY diet under the sun. If this sounds like you, then maybe you should keep reading.

'Clean' Eating
I love my food. I love chicken. I love chocolate. Chicken throughout the world in considered a good food, a clean food, a un-processed food. Chocolate on the other hand, well need I say more? A complete opposite compared to chicken on the nutritional food scale. Chicken = Good, Chocolate = Bad. But does this mean that we have to cut chocolate and other processed 'un-clean' foods out of our diets? Many of you will think yes, but let me tell you a story, a story which will hopefully change your perception on food, a story which will hopefully help you start enjoying your food again whilst trying to lose weight, a story which will hopefully make you stop labelling foods as good as bad; 'clean' and 'un-clean'.


The picture on the left is me during a festival called Tomorrow-land during the summer of 2013,  less than a year ago. The one on the right is now. The exact date of the photo on the left is July the 28th. The holiday was booked roughly 9 months before. I set out a goal to be in the best shape of my life in the lead up to the festival. During the lead up, I was eating 'clean' foods only. 'Clean' foods are usually labelled as chicken, broccoli, oats, eggs, spinach, mackerel, steak and nuts. This is what my diet consisted of. I was eating any amounts of these foods day in, day out for 6 days a week. Sunday arrived and it was time to reward myself, my diet had been good all week so time for a treat right? At the beginning a treat was a large Domino's pizza. As the weeks progressed so did the treat meals. By the 6th week I was consuming a large Domino's, Ben & Jerry's ice cream, a tub of Nutella and a bag of cookies. I couldn't wait for Sundays to arrive, it was the highlight of my week. This cycle continued for 9 months and one thing was clear, I was making very, very little progress, if any at all. What's worse, is that along the way, looking back I definitely developed an eating disorder. How do you know this you may ask. Well... Orthorexia Nervosa is a condition where a person has an obsession with eating foods that one considers healthy. Now, you may be thinking 'but you were binging on the weekends?', well, that in itself is an eating disorder, but I'll leave that for another time. Although I wasn't diagnosed by a doctor, I self-diagnosed myself a few weeks back by answering a questionnaire which my friends at Shredded By Science put up. Questions included:

1. Do you care more about the virtue of what you eat than the pleasure you receive from eating it?
2. Has the quality of your life decreased since the quality of your diet has increased?
3. Do you keep getting stricter with yourself?
4. Do you look down on others whose diets are not, in your eyes, healthy?
5. Do you skip foods you enjoy just to eat the "right" foods?
6. Does your diet make it difficult for you to eat away from home?
7. Do you feel guilty or hate yourself when you stray from your diet?

I answered yes to all of these questions. What's scary is that at the time I was completely oblivious to the fact my mentally towards food had ended up like this! Anyway, with the holiday over and the photos up on Facebook I was not happy with what I saw. It was time for a change. For a few weeks I cut carbohydrates from my diet, that didn't work. The only thing that did was turn me into a miserable, lethargic, tired, weak pathetic excuse of a human being. Scrap that!

Paleo
A few weeks after I gave the Paleo diet a go. What a joke that was. The Paleo diet is very popular among cross fitters and very similar to the clean eating one I had previously done. It involves and is emphasised around foods a caveman would eat. Things such as mackerel, steak, brocolli and a chunk of Mammoth every now and again if supermarkets stocked it!! 
I found this on Instagram. I must say I did have a little chuckle to myself.
Paleo was worse than clean eating! It was horrible. I was having mackerel and broccoli for breakfast. Yes, that's right, mackerel and broccoli for breakfast! At least I could have oats for breakfast whilst eating clean. I just don't understand the whole concept behind it. But I was desperate to  lose body fat that I'd try anything. I gave it a go, failed miserably and turned to the chocolate again.

September 2013 - New Job, New Me, New Diet?
I was fed up. All this hard work in the gym was for nothing. My body composition hadn't changed for years. I'd started a new job in Cardiff, moved into a new flat. This was it, it was happening this time, I was getting those abs I'd always craved.

I was searching the web one night, when I came across this fantastic article which gave me a much better insight into what it took to lose unwanted body-fat. I'll explain. The number one rule to lose weight is to burn more calories than you eat. It doesn't matte how 'clean' your diet is, if you're not in a caloric deficit you will NOT lose weight. I came across a word which made no sense at the time, but after further research it made complete sense. The famous word was 'Macro Nutrients', macros for short. For those of you that don't know, macros are the amount of protein, carbohydrates, fats and fibre one has to consume daily to either lose fat or gain muscle, depending on the individuals goals.When calculated, these macros add up to the total calorie intake an individual needs to achieve their goals, whether it's fat loss or muscle/weight gain. It made so much sense! I worked out my macros using an on-line calculator. I was hitting 2,300 calories a day, mostly made up of protein and fats. I wasn't consuming a lot of carbohydrates (around 75 grams only from fibrous green veg), as carbohydrates make you fat right? I was still in the mindset that processed, un-clean foods would harm me in my goal of losing fat. So I set out a 'diet plan' which involved mainly whole, 'clean' foods, eating specific meals at specific times of the day.

3 weeks in and things were shaping up. My body composition was definitely improving. BINGO, I'd hit the jackpot. But again I'd slipped into the habit of having cheat meals on a Sunday or Saturday night. I was ALWAYS craving chocolates, crisps and chips and I would full fill these satisfactions on weekends, which meant I would binge on a cheat meal one night a week, which meant I would go over my weekly caloric intake. Although fat loss was happening, it was very stressful and not a pleasant experience. Not only was I spending 2 hours in the kitchen every Sunday and Wednesday preparing meals for the week ahead, I would also freak out at the supermarket if a food which was in my 'diet plan' wasn't in stock. Was this a sign that I was going back to my eating disorder which I still din't know I may have had?

Christmas 2013 had arrived. There was food everywhere, but I stuck to my diet plan. I even felt guilty eating Christmas dinner. But I was losing fat, the 'diet' was working and I was hitting my macros on a daily basis (apart from weekends). But again I was unhappy. Surely there was another way?

January 2014-Flexible Dieting Changed My Life and a RANT!!
January arrived, but I had no New Years resolutions. I'd given up already. Fed up of eating the same old food, over and over again and again! The first few weeks of January were filled with guilt. I went back to eating anything I wanted, but I kept hitting the gym. Funnily enough my body composition didn't change at all, even though the majority of my diet was made up of 'bad/junk' foods. The main reason for this was because I had a better knowledge of how portion sizes should look like. Every night I lay in bed thinking the same old thing, 'surely dieting doesn't have to be this strict. Surely I can enjoy the foods I love whilst still getting into shape?' Then suddenly BINGO!!! It was as if a light bulb had gone off in my head. A fitness model who I follow on Instagram always used the #FlexibleDieting. Now this meant nothing to me at the time, but after thinking it made sense. He always uploaded pictures of home made pancakes, topped with Nutella, berries and honey; home-made sausage casserole etc., foods I'd always dream to eat whilst on a 'diet'. Flexible dieting is what it says, it's about being flexible with your foods, fitting everything in moderation using a simle app on your Iphone or laptop called MYFitnessPal. Here is a perfect example of how flexible dieting should be implemented into ones daily food intake.

Why hadn't I thought of this before? Think of it like this, imagine if you had a burger from McDonald's and a home-made burger. They both contain the same amount of calories, lets say 330 for arguments sake. They both contain 26 grams of protein, 45 grams of carbohydrates and 36 grams of fat. Now, a McDonald's burger is considered a 'bad' 'un-clean' food am I correct? And a home-made burger made with a beef burger from the butchers, a wholemeal roll from your local supermarket, and some cheddar cheese with salad is considered 'clean'. What difference is it going to make to your body composition baring in mind that both of these burgers contain the EXACT same calories and the EXACT same macros? The answer...NOTHING! As your body in digesting the McDonald's burger the brain isn't going to say 'oh this is a McDonald's burger, this will be stored as fat'. Your body will digest it in the EXACT same way! Okay, so there may be a difference in quality within the burger but I only used this as an example. This is the mindset I was stuck in for almost 4 years and sadly the majority of the public always have this mindset and always will until they are educated.

Now flexible dieting doesn't give you the freedom to eat whatever you want in any amounts. You will need to meet your macro nutrient goals, but it gives you the freedom to eat whatever you want in moderation. And you will have to weigh and track everything you eat, but it's so easy. You simply scan the barcode and type in how much of that food you are having. If you fancy a chocolate bar then eat it, just fit it into your macros. If you fancy a glass of wine then drink it, just fit it into your macros.

There is no such thing as a bad food, but there is such a thing as a bad diet. Foods shouldn't be categorized as god nor bad. Everyone in one way loves 'bad' foods such as chocolate, crisps, cookies, doughnuts, beer, wine so why cut the foods you love out of your diet? Food is there to be enjoyed. Nothing infuriates me more than seeing people eating salad and chicken for lunch, claiming they are eating healthily to lose weight. I then ask them what their macro nutrient intake is for the day and they ask 'what the hell is that'? You see people think that if you eat healthy food in any amounts you will lose weight. This is not the case. I even saw one teacher claiming to eat healthy where she had 2 mackerel fillets, 50 grams of almonds with a side of cheddar cheese. She claimed they were healthy, so there was no way they could make her fat! Now don't get me wrong, there is nothing wrong with eating this, but she was probably getting 3/4 of her daily caloric intake from her lunch, as we all know the fats in the foods she was eating are extremely calorie dense. It doesn't matter how healthy your diet is guys, if your not in a caloric deficit and hitting your daily macros you will NOT lose weight/body fat. It's scientific and you can't beat science. Below is a perfect of why people believe this 'eat as much healthy food as you want, but don't eat un-clean foods (excuse my French) BULLSHIT':
What a load of Bloocks!!!


Where I am now.
Well, in a nutshell, I couldn't be happier and I mean that. I am eating whatever I want (in moderation) and I have signed up to an on-line personal training company called 'Shredded By Science' who use a flexible dieting approach. They have turned me from a bingeaholic to a flexible dieter who is in the best shape of his life. I have recently completed a personal training course, which means I can share my knowledge with others and change their perception on food whilst getting them into the shape of their life, whilst improving their way of life. I have also decided to compete this year in the men's physique UKBFF category, with the goal to break into the fitness industry. Here is an example of my weekly shop, baring in mind the only meat which is in this picture is bacon and gammon. The chicken and mince was hidden in the freezer.

This post isn't aimed to have a go at clean eaters, paelio dieters or any other types I may have offended. Just don't claim to eat clean and then cheat on weekends because it gets you nowhere. Don't look down on people who don't eat foods which are labelled 'un-clean'. Everyone has different ways of doing things and to me flexible dieting works. if you can get away with eating these so called 'clean' foods all the time whilst hitting your macro nutrient targets for the day then great, do it. So guys, I hope this has helped. Don't get stuck in the 'clean foods only' rut. There's more to life. Enjoy your foods and be flexible.

For online coaching packages email: dan@flexiblefitnessonline.co.uk

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/flexiblefitnessonline

Twitter: https://twitter.com/DanFlexibleFit