I'm 5'11, 223 lbs male trying to get back into a 36 waist pants what foods do I have to eat to do that?

Question

I'm overweight with no muscle and I'm wearing 40" to 42" waist pants

Answer 1

Don't target more than about 2 lbs per week. If you try to lose faster, your body will go into "starvation mode" and get very stingy about burning calories while at the same time very efficient about storing any calories that you do provide. And it will make you feel awful.

There is no site specific way of losing fat... the old myth about working your abs to burn belly fat isn't true. To get rid of love handles, you need to lose overall fat. That happens with exercise and watching your diet. More on that below.

The most effective way to lose fat is aerobic exercise in the "moderate" fat-burning range, ideally first thing in the morning before you eat. When you wake your body is ready to burn fat and your levels of growth hormone are highest at that time. Later in the day it can take up to 30 minutes just to put your body into a fat-burning mode.

Another overlooked way to burn fat is by lifting weights. Skeletal muscle has very high caloric needs... almost twice that of adipose (fat) tissue. Put on a little muscle and you will burn calories all day even at rest. Be aware that skeletal muscle weighs more, so with this approach you may see your weight increasing while your body fat is melting away. Not realizing this often stresses folks who think they should be losing weight as a measure of fitness. Forget the scale, look in the mirror and you will be happy.

To lose a pound of fat, you need to eliminate about 3500 calories. You can do this by burning more with exercise or by modifying your diet to reduce intake. If you do a Google search on say, "swimming calories" you will quickly find a website with tables of calories burned for a given exercise. You can use such lists to estimate how many calories you are burning up with your routine.

For diet, keep a diary for a couple of weeks counting calories, grams of protein, and grams of fat intake. It is easy with online sources of nutritional information (type the name of the food and calories into the Google search engine) and packaging labels. That will let you quickly figure out where the fat is coming from in your diet.

Fat gives you 9 calories per gram. So take the number of grams of fat, multiply by 9, then calculate what percentage the fat calories are of your total daily calories. Restricting the calories from fat to about 20% of your total intake is ideal for a maintenance diet... that isn't overly restrictive. Of note, you need some fat in your diet. For instance, the body uses fat to produce hormones. Once you have a picture of how to modify your diet, you can drop the diary and just go back to it occasionally if you are wanting to tweek things further.

There is a subset of questions that goes further and asks about "How to get a six-pack?" The answer is the same. Six-packs are 20% abdominal exercise and 80% diet. There is one caveat... abdominal muscles will form in the position that you exercise them, so be certain to pull them tightly toward your spine while doing crunches, etc. Also, during most lifting, the "core is active" which means that you should be stabilizing with contracted abs then too. Fail to do this and the abs will form, but bulging outward and the result is not attractive.

If you are trying to build muscle as a way to lose fat, then you may need to increase total calories and specifically your protein intake. I target about 0.8 g of protein per pound of body weight each day when actively building. That is far more protein than most people need in their diets.


Aloha

Answer 2

You didn't specify you current eating habits, so it's hard for us to suggest foods right for you. But, as someone has already said, walk. The human body is made to walk, and walking an hour a day- without changing anything else- will greatly improve your health.

Eating healthy is also important. ( I can sit here and say eat fruits and vegetables- but you've already head this, no?) You must take it into your own hands to learn about foods that you should and should not eat.
This site is a great place to star:
http://whfoods.org/foodstoc.php

Also, be sure to drink lots of water. Aim to drink 8, 8-oz glasses of water each day. Even if you dont eat this much, you'll still be drinking more than you have been.

Most important, start slowly, and gradually build onto your healthy lifestyle.

You may want to start by just walking for 10 minutes- twice a week. But you'll soon be walking those 60 minutes! Soon after that, you'll be jogging!

As for changing your diet. Try drinking a glass of water, or low-fat/fat-free milk with your lunch/dinner instead of soda.

It's not difficult to lad a healthy lifestyle. You just need to equip yourself with the knowledge of health, and be serious abut this life-long commitment.

Answer 3

I was 5'11, 205lbs male wearing a tight 36 going to a 38. I am now 180lbs wearing a 34. Bill Phillip's "Body for Life" helped me lose the 25 lbs in 3 months and keep it off. Eating 6 meals a day. Portion sizes (as big as your fist) of a lean protien, complex carb and vegetable. Also exercising 20-40 minutes per day, six days a week. Exercise and proper diet is the key.

Answer 4

Sorry to say it but food alone will not do the trick! salads, lean meats for protein- ie. skinless chicken (don't even think of KFC) and fish- cut down on heavy carbs & keep those that you do eat to the morning time (breads, pastas, potatoes, etc.). You't probably wouldn't want to launch yourself into a massive health kick as far as exercise goes as you would more than likely strain your body, but start walking a bit each day to get your heart rate up. When you feel comfortabel walking for about 20 minutes or so, make it 30! Working up to an hour if you want. You don't have to bust a gut to lose weight, jsut be smart about it

Answer 5

build some muscle and the fat will go away.

Try just eating nothing, that will slim you up realy fast...

It's not so much about what you eat, but how many calories you intake and how many calories you use. There is only one way to lose weight: burn more calories than you eat.

Eat your normal diet for a week, keeping careful track of how many calories you take in. Should be listed on labels of stuff, you can look up stuff like fruit online. Then, set a goal number that is lower than what you have been eating and try to stick to it. If you are too hungry, you lowered your number too much. If you are not losing any weight, lower the number some more.

And there is nothing wrong with "carbs". Vegetables are one of the greatest things for a healthy diet and they are almost pure carbs.

Answer 6

I have heard recently that liquid sugar (i.e. most commonly high-fructose corn sugar as found in soda) does not trigger a "satisfied" feeling in the brain. Perhaps it is absorbed too quickly?

So, figure out how many calories of liquid sugar (soda and juice with high-fructose corn syrup added) you consume per day. Stop eating the liquid sugar and instead have half that amount (or less) of calories in chocolate or some other snack that will be more satisfying to your body.

Eat smaller portions of all food, not just dessert, but also eat more slowly. I believe it takes the brain about 20 minutes to detect that the stomach is full. This is why we stuff ourselves to bursting at Thanksgiving, but don't start feeling the discomfort until it is too late.

Start off with walking as previously suggested. Once you are used to regular walking, try to find an activity you enjoy (tennis, swimming, frisbee, bicycling, basketball, volleyball, etc), and do that. It is much easier to exercise regularly if you view your exercise time as "fun" instead of as "exercise".

Answer 7

you must be all flab i'm 5'9" weight 215 and i wear 38 waist. back to your question you can eat anything you want but you have to eat smaller portions. Watch your carbs. Lay off all soft drinks they are the worst thing you can do to your body all that sugar goes straight to the blood and it turns to fat. You should stick to a 60 carb meal and i mead stick to it no cheating. eat no more meat than 3ozs per meal, be very careful of potatoes they turn to sugar ,aldo dried beans and peas are full of sugar. If you do this you should get back down to fighting size but you gonna have to exercise at least 1.5 hours 7 days a week no cheating on this either. walking is the best way to get it off. I have told you the facts now you do the rest and good luck to you.

Answer 8

I used to be like you....then I lost 40 pounds and went to a size 31....don't aim for size 36....aim lower! Also, hit the gym and get some muscle.

There isn't really any food you eat persay....it's all about calories and portion control....You could eat ice cream and lose weight if you do it right and include exercise...

Answer 9

Losing weight is a life style adjustment. I have lots over a hundred pound over a period of one year. I started slowly by cutting out fat in my diet....less butter/margarine till I was using none...no mayo used mustard instead to add flavor to sandwiches and meat. Watch those salads all dressed with toppings, especially Cesar salads. After doing that for a bit I started watch my carb intake and cutting back on portion sizes, filling in with vegetables to fill the void. Eventually I cut down the amount of fast foods and snacks I eat. Sugars are a biggy since sugar turns into carbs then into fat. As I started to lose weight at a slow and healthy pace I started to felt better and became more active. This is when exercise really kicked in. I did do extreme amounts of exercise but began walking allot more.

I am proud to say I have now maintained a healthy weight for over seven years now. Not perfect but varied between 10 to 20 pounds of ideal weight. Good luck to you. Ohhh and yes tuna is a great low fat food if you eat it without mayo. Try spicing allot of your foods for that add punch of flavor.

Answer 10

this is the truth i'm doing it right now i swear it will help you. for about 6 -8 weeks only eat dark green veggies.go to your grocer's freezer purchase kale,turnip greens,mustard greens,collards,cook them in a pot with very litte water on a low fire for about 20 minutes eat the whole bag a day,season with garlic drizzle with olive oil,or canola oil.if you get hungry pop a veggie burger in the oven eat it with spicy mustard.you will get over the initial hunger pains.drink any beverage you want you will lose the weight. don't forget your crunches! try to get an ab machine if you can i recommend "the ab scissor" by jake.

Answer 11

My dad is 6 ft even and waist 175lbs and his waist is 36. I'm not sure how tall you are, so this information may not be helpful.