Every article, every website, every book, every expert says... "If you eat healthy and exercise often you will lose weight", which makes sense.

But what is eating healthy? ... especially compared to how I eat now?

I pig out. Literally. I don't just eat bad, I eat real bad and real big. I drink at least 6 liters of Dr. Pepper a week (actually more considering how many fountain drinks I get). I can eat two pizzas a day. I ate a bag of powdered donuts for breakfast this morning.

The thing is... eating like this, I only gained 4lbs in the past three months (It took me seven years to get to my weight now... 154lbs at 4'11"). I've been told that for how much I eat, I should be way bigger and that my metabolism must not be that bad. Hypothetically, if I eat better than I usually do, then I should lose weight right? (And by better, I mean way better...)

I don't know if I want to go on any set plans, though, because I always find them so restrictive and know I won't be able to make them into a 'lifestyle' that I can stick with forever. I just want to eat healthier... but I don't know how.

What should I be eating or not eating? What recipes should I be looking for? How much? How often? ... I'm just so confused by all the different things they have out there: no carb, lo carb, only good carbs, low fat, no sugar, calorie counting, points... oy.

What do you think of when I say to you .... I want you to eat more real, whole foods?

I think... "What does that include?"

I think it means stuff like meat, veggies, fruits, whole grains... but what kinds of meat can I eat? And how much grains? And how big of portions? And are there any good recipes? Lol, too many questions...

There are never enough questions if you still need answers.
You're right. If you can look at a food and see that that is how is grows ... yer good. If you have to wonder "How did they do that?" It's not real food.

Don't worry about recipes just yet. Learn as much as you can about proteins, vegetables, fruits, carbs and fats first and then try combining them.

Wanna do proteins first? chicken, fish, fat free cottage cheese, canned tuna, protein powder, lean beef ....

I do calorie counting, but I'm not restrictive about it. Mostly if I try to eat healthy, it is hard to overdo the calories.

Dr. Pepper is a diet killer on so many levels. Being a soda addict, I can sympathize. Start buying tons of other variety of drinks. Allow yourself a soda when you have drank 20 oz of water (I use bottled water to help) and one other healthy drink. You'll cut it down to 2 cans of soda a day that way. Ideally you cut it out all together unless you like the diet kind. Other healthy drinks include milk, OJ (regular orange is better), V8, any fruit juice (but not cocktail), and so on. You can add flavor packets to your water to spruce it up if you don't like water. You can also switch to caffiene free to see if you are more addicted to caffiene than the soda itself.

Your next culprit is portion control. It takes time to learn what that is. Over time it is easy and becomes a lifestyle. Try using www.fitday.com as a journal and food calculator. It helps train you. It's free. Many here use it.

Let's move on to healthy. There are many diets here. You have to choose. All diets end up controling calories. Calories in and Calories out. I personally also pay attention to saturated fats (fitday helps with this) as well. I don't watch carbs (although I don't eat white bread mostly cuz I don't care for bread) or proteins strictly, but I try to make sure they are all balanced. It's not called a balanced diet for nothing.

Food choices. I think we all know what healthy food is. REAL food. You can eat some processed food if you watch the nutrition label, but the majority of your foods should be real foods and not hidden in unhealthy sauces. Look at a book or on a website for a listing of nutrient dense foods. Pick some each week. Fruits and Veggies should follow the color code for variety: Red, Dark Green, Light Green, Purple, and Orange. Think nutrients. Your body needs vitamins. Vitamin pills help, but your body doesn't do as well as it does with real food. Find alternatives for your craving. Fudgecicles instead of icecream (or chocolate). Also eat little bits through the day. Your body does better. I wish I had good metabolism like you!

Always buy some muchie foods (on the healthy list or alternative list) and foods that take no cooking (because there will be nights where you won't want to and you don't want to splurge on unhealthy stuff because you werne't prepared). Make a master list of all the foods that fit the healthy model (including meals) and keep it handy. Add to it when you need to. It'll keep you from feeling like there is nothing new or nothing to eat you like. The Nutrient Dense Foods list will help.

P.S. I went from 4 pk of soda per week (I drink diet but I needed to get off caffiene and drink more water) with me drinking the majority of them myself to 2 pk and my husband drinking half. Whoo Hoo!

P.S. I find getting a range with calorie counting works best. My range is 1200 to 1800. Pretty big range. If I go over, I look at why, and move on. I lost 7lbs in a month. Not bad.

I can't tell if you are trying to lose a lot of weight or wanting to just be healthy. There is a difference in calories there. Weight vs. Maintence.

Well, first off-consider yourself lucky to have an obviously quick metabolism.

But-here is something that I want to mention. Even THIN people have strokes, heart attacks, cancer, and other ailments that a proper lifestyle can reduce the risk of significantly.

Even if you have someone who is naturally thin and can eat massive amounts of food and stay thin-if they are eating junk, then they still have risks for health problems. If someone is eating a lot of bad fats-like fatty meats (bacon, sausage, regular hamburger, etc.) and a lot of packaged pastry type sweets that contain trans fats-they are very much at risk for having heart problems, because they are gunking up all of their arteries with it.

Someone who never eats any fruits and vegetables, and lives on meats and starches instead is missing out on all of the nutritional properties that they provide-the compounds in fruits and veggies cut the risk of many cancers, reduce signs of aging, prevent deterioration of eyesight and other things-too many benefits to count.

Loading up on that much soda pop-essentially you may not be gaining much weight, but you are throwing your body into a tailspin by consuming so much of the sugar water and caffiene cocktail-both which affect your bloog sugar levels.

Thin or average weight does not always mean healthy. If you ever wonder how someone who looked so great just up and had a heart attack, or ended up with diabetes...these are a lot of the causes.

The thing is, foods like donuts, soda, and fast food are meant to be "treats". They are not meant to be used as a daily and constant part of the diet.

Cut down on the junk-plain and simple. Eat more things that occur naturally in nature-and in their most natural form. If you have a bowl of oatmeal-you pretty much know that the oats come from the field, and they are cooked in water-not too hard to figure out-a Toaster Struedel, on the other hand...is a little different.

Food in it's most natural state is better. Fresh chicken breast is much better than processed, filler added, batter dipped chicken nuggets. The more processing is done to a food-the less healthy it becomes.

Also, check labels and ingredients. If you recognize most of the ingredients as food and not from a chemistry lab and items that have fewer ingredients tend to be more healthy for you. That's a generalization, but it applies to most things. If it has a long shelf life unrefrigerated, chances are it's not too healthy. Do twinkies or Pop-tarts really ever expire?

You don't mention your age or sex. Men tend to be able to eat more and not as carefully as women, the younger you are the better your body handles food- excess calories. It might be good to get a body density test somewhere just to see how much of your body is fat. Gives you an idea.

Volume of food: well that's kind of tricky, you can eat healthy and still gain weight because you are eating too much of it.

Best wishes
Sarah

Sarah-I call Little Debbie snack cakes, and Hostess snack cakes and the like "embalmed" foods. Because really, if you bake a pie or cookies at home-how long do they last before they go bad? Usually about a week.
You can buy a packaged pastry item like that, and the "best by" date is 8 months away!!!!!!!

They are "embalmed".