Aibu to ask what normal healthy slim people eat?

[Toofrigginfat]

Have name changed.

Things have reached an all time low, found myself sobbing in the bathroom about to stick my fingers down my throat, luckily - I suppose - interrupted by the cries of 'mummyyyyyy' from two bickering children.

I am SO fat and SO depressed about it. I have tried WW, SW. Watched programme last week about dieting industry and it has put me off doing anything commercial/faddy. After failing to be able to stick to anything for the past 20 years my weight is now at an all time high of 11st 10 (I'm 5ft 2) and I have lost all concept of what a healthy balanced diet consists of.

What do normal, slim people eat? And if I eat that way, will I lose weight too? Just bought a juicer, husband and I keen to get into that.

Help. Please.

[Sallystyle]

Sorry for typos

[secretscwirrels]

Can I just say something about the replies OP?
You asked what normal healthy slim people eat.
Lots of people have posted who have never been over weight and therefore must presumably eat healthily.
But there are also so many posts about diets. It seems to me you have been there done all the diets and failed. You don't want to be on a diet for the rest of your life. You need permanent changes to the way you eat. I have never been more than 10 stone at 5'8" and I have never dieted, but I do have some rules.

The juicer seems to me to be a way of pouring calories down you. Just because it's fruit doesn't mean it's good in large quantities.
I love orange juice but would never have more than the equivalent of a small wine glass as it's loaded with sugar. Breakfast for me is a very big bowl of all bran or bran flakes with skimmed milk and no sugar. It doesn't have to be crunchy nut corn flakes.

[YoniBottsBumgina]

Oh I think the other thing that stops me eating too much is money. I would never (for example) go to McDonalds and buy a meal and then an extra burger on the side, even if I was still hungry afterwards. It just feels like a waste of money. Similarly to serve huge portions at home feels like a waste of money when that extra portion could be saved to form another meal another day.

This is probably from generally being skint and worrying about where the next meal is coming from, but also because I never really realised that you could have more than one burger at McDonald's or whatever. It was only when I got older and realised that other people sometimes did this that I even thought about it and I found it really shocking and rebellious at first!

[OneLittleToddleTerror]

I see you've started a food diary. I really recommend it.

I've never been fat my whole life. Have always been around BMI 20. The first time I gained weight that I need to lose consiously is when I had a MC at 12 weeks in April. I gained 3-4kg in the first trimester, and without bf to help shift the weight. That's when I discovered myfitnesspal. And my way of losing weight is just to cut the cake out completely and go to the gym more.

And sorry, I'm also against the juicer. What is the purpose of the juice in helping you to lose weight? I don't think it's a good idea to replace a meal with a juice And if you feel thirsty, just have water! It has 0 calories!

I think I'm similar to a lot of the slimmer people's responses here. We eat our main meals. We seldom eat crap. (I only eat cakes and biscuits when it's brought into the office. And then it's only one piece). I only have pudding when I cook one in the weekends. I don't have soft drinks. I eat quite a lot of carbs because I feel fuller with them. But the carbs are complex carbs like rice, pasta, etc. (I would like more wholemeal, but I don't always).

I know quite a few fatter people. And I do notice how they take comfort in overeating. For example, a friend would talk about how having a great sunday going to an all you can eat breakfast. And another who consider a all you can eat pizza night a great meal. I like food but tend to prefer pricier places with nice food, not about stuffing my face, iyswim.

[OneLittleToddleTerror]

Oh and yes the breakfast cereal as someone already pointed out. A lot of them are just sugar. (Same with juice really). Just because it says it is a cereal doesn't mean it's good for you. Look at the sugar level on a lot of them. I think the NHS refers to any over around 13-14% as too high in sugar. Read the packet and you'll find many aren't good for you at all. Try the old favourites like porridge or weetabix. (I love rude health ones if you don't mind spending a bit more on cereal).

[IneedAsockamnesty]

I'm 5f 9 and a size 8

Breakfast is usually a bowl of porridge

Lunch either sushi 6/8 bits, soup any as long as its not got cheese in as i dont like that in soup) with brown bread or a anchovy based salad.

Dinner anything I fancy just a normal portion size.

I avoid fried things can't really be bothered with potatoes unless they are mashed, don't snack or if I do its fruit or raw veg. Never have processed food apart from one thing I love and have occasionally ( cheap and nasty processed veg grills).if I have a takeaway its usually hot and sour soup and mixed veg

My down fall is diet coke but I don't have any caffeine so get the gold label one. But mostly drink water often with lemon in. I rarely drink alcohol.

[KateSMumsnet]

Excellent tips here! We're just going to move it to weight loss chat.

[stopgap]

I'm 5'7.5 and weigh between 8.5 and 9 stone. I think much is dictated by genetics, as I come from a long line of skinny folk (who develop a thick waistline at 50+, mind).

Today I've had:

One bowl of porridge with sliced banana and flaked almonds
Two apples

Scrambled eggs (three eggs), two pork sausages and spelt toast with butter.

An orange

For dinner, I plan on having a broccoli, kale and chicken stir-fry with brown rice.

I don't avoid any particular foods, but I do eat 90% organic and zilch in the way of ready-made meals.

I also do plenty of physical exercise.

[Lweji]

I prefer protein to carbs in general, but like fat (butter, mayo).

The quantity is important.

But the problem is that you want to lose it, not just maintain it.
For that you effectively need to starve (eat less than your body needs).
So, you should increase your physical activity as well as eating less than you do.
And keep it up.

However, don't go on weight alone. Mind your body fat index, and your waist size. For health reasons your waist size needs to be

Avoid lots of fruit (lots of sugar) and diet stuff (it tricks your brain and you get addicted to the sugary taste anyway).
Drink lots of water rather than any other drink.

[tedmundo]

I am 5'2, 8st and have never been over weight. I have never been on a controlled diet. I eat anything and everything, just not very much of it.

The thing that I think makes a difference to people's weight is their attitude to cooking / baking. All the foodie types I am friends with can cook the most amazing food. They love recipe books, baking, trying new ingredients etc. they are ALL overweight.

They think about food all the time. Planning meals, trying new recipes, new restaurants, describing great meals they have made. And then talk endlessly about how they need to diet.

I cook ok food. A meat, a carb and veg of some variety. Nothing exciting but nice and easy. Quick prep, easy cooking, job done. Thankfully, the DCs and DH also do not live for food so we get along nicely!

[OneLittleToddleTerror]

^The thing that I think makes a difference to people's weight is their attitude to cooking / baking. All the foodie types I am friends with can cook the most amazing food. They love recipe books, baking, trying new ingredients etc. they are ALL overweight.

They think about food all the time. Planning meals, trying new recipes, new restaurants, describing great meals they have made. And then talk endlessly about how they need to diet.^

I am a foodie, love recipe books, trying new ingredients, think about food all the time, plan all my meals, try new recipes, love new resturants. I'm very slim (as said above BMI 20). Maybe the only saving grace I have is I don't really bake! I just love making new food for my packed lunches and dinners. I plan them all on pepperplate and try out a new recipe or two every week.

[tedmundo]

fair enough onelittletoddler .. I am only describing the foodie friends I know, not all foodies! I think you might be right, the baking is possibly the link!

[OneLittleToddleTerror]

Definitely the baking I think. Baking is now all the vogue isn't it? Everyone is talking about getting KitchenAid or Kenwood. I don't get into baking precisely because DH and I struggle to finish a cake whenever I bake. Unless it's the ones that freeze well. It takes us about a week to finish a cake between us, having a slice every night.

[theoriginalandbestrookie]

I don't get the baking thing. I have a friend, we are both in our 40s, she is very thin, yet always has great cakes on the go and certainly enjoys a slice or too herself. Having said that though I suspect she is the type that would forget to eat at work if she was really busy ( never happens to me, the forgetting bit, not the busy bit).

[EmmaBemma]

I love baking but will tend to only bake for friends: if I'm going round to someone's house for coffee, or we've got visitors here, or for pudding after a Sunday roast, which is pretty much the only time I do a pudding if we don't have guests. If I do have a wodge of Victoria sponge or similar during the morning, most likely I won't have anything else till dinner, apart from maybe a banana or something. We do eat dinner early though- about 5.30ish.

[CoolWaterRose]

I'm 5'4" 9st 4lb. I've lost 3 stone in the last year, mostly by reducing processed food and added sugar as follows:

I avoid most processed foods especially of the sweet variety (I will stretch to digestives, granola bars, malt loaf and ready salted crisps but not much else.) I don't eat ready meals.

I also don't eat breakfast cereal (breakfast is either porridge, oat & friut smoothie, or eggs.)

I eat very little bread (don't have it in the house, can't be bothered to make my own).

I only drink water and tea normally. No squash, no fruit juice, no fizzy drinks. Alcohol only very occasionally (once a month or less)

I avoid dairy (but have good reason to due to being lactose intolerant. I use almond or soya milk as substitutes)

Have really cut down on takeaway food, and avoid pizza altogether.

I use sugar very sparingly, if I absolutely need to use sweetener it's usually a bit of honey.

Don't really bake much, only for special occasions.

If I'm craving chocolate I usually make myself a hot chocolate with 1 tsp pure cocoa, hot water, soya milk (half/half milk and water) and honey. Sometimes I might have a small 70% cocoa chocolate bar.

I eat lots of vegetables, brown rice, oats, potato, beans and pulses, nuts, fruit, tofu and eggs (am veggie.) These foods make up 95% of my diet. I dont feel deprived at all honestly! Also I don't pay much attention to reducing fat, it's all about reducing added sugar and eating mostly whole foods.

That's it, the secret to my weight loss. There is one giant caveat to the above though...

If it's Christmas, anything goes.

[CoolWaterRose]

Also just wanted to add I eat a lot of spices! Homemade vegetable curries were my mainstay when I was losing the weight. I add spices and herbs to pretty much everything now when I barely used them before.

[Reastie]

Marking place to catch up on later as this is very interesting to me. I've lost over 6 stone but still not in any means slim and really want to get into the psyche of slim people and how much/what they actually eat and how they approach food.

OP I feel really for your OP though.

[Mominatrix]

temundo, with the greatest respect, what tosh! I am quite slim, always have been, and am very much a foodie (hate that word). I made a weekly plan of what we are going to eat based on interesting things I feel like cooking. I am also an avid baker and bake bread 2-3 times a week and always have a cake around. I know quite a few other foodies who are also slim like me.

Being very into food, I will only eat very good food, and will rather eat nothing than settle for less-than-satisfactory food. Actually - it probably prevents me from eating as it is the quality of what I eat which is important, certainly not the quantity and with the price of some of the ingredients, portions will be small!

Being a baker, I dislike the taste of industrially produced bake goods - this prevents me from ordering a slice of cake or a muffin on a Costa/Starbucks/other chain cafe run. I control the ingredients in my cakes - god only knows the junk the other stuff is pumped up with! Also, in terms of bread, baking your own in so much better for you )nutrient wise and also for your digestion)! I specialize in sourdough which is better for your body than the freaky Chorlywood processed loaves commonly available to purchase.

People who are seriously into food are not the equivalents to being gluttons - those who can be gluttonous with very good food would have to be very, very, very wealthy.

[Mimishimi]

OP, just to give you an example I entered the things you had in your juice as my breakfast entry in MFP (can delete them when I do have my breakfast). I entered 1 medium size apple, 1 whole lebanese cucumber, 1 cup
of green seedless grapes, half a cup of spinach, 1 medium size tomato and 2 juicing carrots. The total came to 307 calories which isn't too bad but my sugar allowance is 26g today and the total for the juice is 35g. So I've already exceeded it just with one drink. The danger is also that you will get hungry later on and think "Hmmm, I only had a juice so eating this xyz shouldn't do too much damage". Crunchy nut cornflakes are probably also high in sugar but you could eat a piece of wholewheat toast with a bit of peanut butter (1/2 teaspoon) and a boiled egg and it would come to less than 307 calories. The protein from the egg and peanut butter would help fill you up.

The menu you gave is relatively quite carb heavy too and most of the calories seem to be at night. I'd swap those meals around actually and have the soup at night. You need the energy from higher calorie meals to get through the day.Noodles have heaps of calories - particularly if they are the refined flour, prefried ready in 2 minutes variety. The 'breakfast like a king, lunch like a prince, and sup like a pauper" is a good saying - not every meal has to be 300 calories. You could eat 500 for breakfast, 300 for lunch and 200 for dinner with 200 leftover for snacks (that equals about a small yoghurt and carrot sticks with healthy dip).

[lollylaughs]

Just on the juicer - a friend of mine wanted to lose some weight so she went on this juicing diet - she bought one of the pricy juicers and after a week she was in so much pain. She was diagnosed with ibs which was brought on by the juice.

I have a juicer and use it every now and then but imo its not great for drinking all the time. The juice is too concentrated to have all the time.

[chickydoo]

I weigh around 8.5-8-7
I am about 5ft 7
I think the reason I am still slim in my mid 40's is I have never been overweight in the first place. It is not genetic as my mother was overweight, my father is huge and my siblings are big. For years I struggled with the fact I didn't want to be big too. From an early age I watched what I ate & exercised. I was never obsessed, if I wanted a whole packet of biscuits I would have them, but would have them and no dinner.
I would eat better the next day to balance up.
This way of eating has kept my weight pretty much the same ( pregnancies aside) for the last 30 years.
Now I exercise every day, if a few pounds creep on, I watch what I eat for a couple of days.
I think never letting my weight get out of control has been the key for me.
Now my body seems to just stay at this weight without me dieting or doing anything really.

[Octopus37]

I am 5ft5 and about 8st1 at the moment, was 7st12 before my holiday. Gradually lost 9 pounds by keeping a food diary and being a bit more boundaried about what I eat. Trying to get back into this at the moment, find that to maintain (lose a little bit if I am luck), I am able to eat around 2000 cals a day, know this sounds a lot but I walk everywhere and have young DC's. I freely admit (and have been slated for this in the past) that I eat chocolate and processed food (I find ready meals help me to control portion size, I am one of those people who can sit and eat a huge bowl of pasta just cause it is an excuse to sit down), I had got into the habit of eating a small handful of almonds mid morning as my snack which had helped and I have recently started eating meat (after 23 years) due to finding out in June that I had very low ferratin levels. Think a big part of maintaining for me is fighting against comfort eating (unfortunately I will always have a tendency to do this) and also accepting that a bad food day is not the end, sometimes I need to eat what I want and say what the hell - the worst that can happen is that I might put a couple of pounds on one week. Also I no longer beat myself up for enjoying food and enjoying treats, I freely admit to loving takeaways, cakes etc and think that you can fit them into your eating, life to me is too short. Part of my attitude is probably due to me having a history of bulimia 20 years ago and never wanting to go back to that dark place and the feelings of shame surrounding food. I know my way of doing things doesn't work for everyone, but we are all different. Typicall I eat:
Breakfast: Belvita breakfast biscuits, 1 muller light yoghurt
Snack: Something small and sweet or 19 almonds
Lunch: Either a toasted cheese sandwhich (made with multi grain bread) or two slices of said toast with humus
A piece of fruit somewhere along the way
A chocolate bar (eg a normal sized Dairy Milk) or a piece of cake
A ready meal of some sort such as Iceland Piri Piri Chicken, sometimes with some mixed veg or salad.
Possibly another yoghurt

[Octopus37]

O also probably have a drink on average once or twice a week, a drink being a pint of cider.

[HarumScarum]

I am pretty slim (5'6" and about 8 stone, well over 40, never dieted) and I just want to say something about the juice that you had for breakfast. I don't think it's a good idea. It is really healthy and tasty but it won't fill you up. I had a full fat yoghurt and a tangerine and an apple for my breakfast this morning. The yoghurt was about 200 calories and the fruit can't have been tons (sorry no idea what cals fruit has in it - the yoghurts have it on the pack) but because it contained fat and protein it was loads more filling than any kind of juice could have been. Plus it was more solid, especially with the fruit, so it made my stomach feel full. I don't think juice could do that. Maybe if you like the juice you could have half the amount of juice and a yoghurt or slice of toast with cream cheese or peanut butter or something as well.