First of all, I'm going to apologise again for my lack of posts - I shouldn't be letting this blog slip so much after having such great feedback. Although I don't have a great amount of time on my hands due to a busy work life and the series of books that I'm currently writing about my weight loss journey. The books will come in four parts:
- My Journey, an overview
- Experiences with nutrition
- Training types
- Motivation
Throughout the four books, I'll be sharing my experiences with regard to dieting. For those of you not in the know, three years ago I was over 21 stone and frankly its a wonder that it didn't really affect my health. After three years of hard training and trial and error, I have managed to reduce my weight significantly, dropping right down to 79kg before gaining more muscle and jumping to 90kg. This was by no means an easy feat and it took a lot of research. I experienced set backs along the way, but through some great sources I got the information and motivation that I needed to get myself back on track.
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| Left (May 2012) - 135/140kg - Right (August 2015) - 87.5kg |
What is Flexible Dieting?
Flexible dieting, or IIFYM as it is widely known, isn't a new concept. It has been present for a long time, but unfortunately in the past was discredited by most of the fitness industry; cast aside in favour of 'Bro-Science'. However, when you strip the concept down to the real definition, it isn't very different from the dieting protocols that various icons in the health and fitness industry have followed.
On a base level, the concept of flexible dieting involves calculating an individual's daily calorie and macronutrient (protein, fat, carbohydrate) requirements through a series of calculations specific to the individual. The individual can then use a calorie counting app (MyFitnessPal seems to be the most preferred, it is definitely my app of choice) to keep track of the foods that they are consuming and the caloric properties of those foods. The individual is then free to consume any foods that they want, provided that they satisfy their calorie and macronutrient goals for the day. There are other targets that the person would be required to fulfil, but like I said - at base level this is the premise. I'll go in to these other requirements in a future post, so watch this space.
How has Flexible Dieting helped me to get closer to my weight loss goal?
I discovered the concept of flexible dieting a while ago through various posts from Nick Cheadle Fitness, however at this point I was still of the mindset that chicken and broccoli was the best meal to 'torch fat'. Due to this, I ignored all of the great information that Nick was throwing out there and continued to eat the same boring, tasteless and frankly depressing food every day. After a while, I hit a plateau with regard to progress and gave up on 'clean eating'. After a few months of not watching my nutrition and causing detriment to my progress, I decided that it was time to seek help from someone who knew what they were doing - enter JV Fitness & Nutrition. Jason was really easy to approach and he took everything into account when designing a nutrition plan for me - the result was a detailed and well calculated approach to my nutrition. Through the plan he showed me that I didn't have to eat the same foods every day, and that there were ways to manipulate my diet such as carb cycling (stay tuned for this in a later post) to allow little treats on a weekly basis whilst still making progress.
The plan that Jason detailed for me was only designed to last for around 4-6 weeks, however I was determined to diet for 12 weeks for the run-up to Christmas 2014 so I stretched that time limit to the maximum. In that 12 weeks I managed to get down to 79kg and retained the majority of my muscle mass. However after being in a calorie deficit for so long, I over-indulged at Christmas and set myself back a little. Once upon a time, this would have killed me - however at that point I was already in the mindset that setbacks don't matter in the big picture, as long as you keep pushing forward. After binging for so long and struggling to get back on to the diet that Jason gave me due to motivation and the chaotic nature of my life thanks to work and training; I decided to give flexible dieting a try, At that point I had nothing to lose and possibly everything to gain. I went about this by throwing myself into the mindset that flexible dieting was all about eating what I wanted and that |I could miss things out here and there on MyFitnessPal and that it was a rough guide. As a result, I put on weight and became demotivated. This made me to go back and try 'clean eating' again - which unsurprisingly made me miserable and made me binge after restricting myself so much. It was around this point that I'd seen a collaboration article between Nick Cheadle and Mike Samuels of Healthy Living, Heavy Lifting. Mike was another advocate of flexible dieting and after being recommended by Nick, I had to check his website out. After delving further into Nick and Mike's sites, I realised that the reason that flexible dieting hadn't worked for me previously was because I'd completely misunderstood the concept. Luckily there were masses of articles and resources available on their websites and social media channels for me to re-educate myself with. I also bought a copy of Mike's e-book series - The Foolproof No-fail Guide to Flexible Fat loss. Its no exaggeration when I say that these books completely changed my outlook and my approach to nutrition and I eagerly applied this new approach to my lifestyle.
To cut an already long story a little shorter - Flexible dieting has allowed me to eat the foods that I love whilst still making progress, I never feel the need to binge as I'm always eating the foods that I want to eat (in moderation), I even manage to fit such things as an entire tub of ice cream, or even a large bar of chocolate into my weekly intake (Stay tuned for my next blog post to learn about how I do that). For these reasons alone, I'd argue that flexible dieting is the most sustainable approach that you can take to your nutrition. It caters for all goals and personally I would be very happy with using the protocols that I have learned from Nick and Mike for the rest of my life, could you say the same about your diet? If not, why not drop a comment at the bottom of this article and we can chat.
That's all for now, I hope you've enjoyed reading this. Watch this space for more new content! If you want to check out any of the sources that I've named in this article then I've put a few links in there for you. Or you can check the guys out on social media -
Nick Cheadle Fitness
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/nickcheadlefitness
Instagram - @NickCheadleFitness
Healthy Living, Heavy Lifting
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/HealthyLivingHeavyLifting
Instagram - @MikeHealthyLiving
JV Fitness & Nutrition
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/JV-Fitness-Nutrition
Instagram - JV_Fitnutrition
Thanks for reading!
Alex
Follow me on social media -
Instagram - @Wrighty__
Twitter - @Wrighty__
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