bergussonIt’s week bloody 1, and I have a social event. I haven’t had a social event in a year (OK I did go and get smashed with my mates a couple of months ago, but that undermines my point). So who is this individual unwittingly trying to sabotage the project? Belle’s best friends mum. Sadly there few people we can walk our pooch with as she’s pretty choosy in the company she keeps, but Banner is her bestie and the closest thing she’s ever going to have as a boyfriend.
Banners Mummy and the luscious lady are good pals. They’ve been trying to set up myself and her bloke for a man date for ages. Something I’m quite sure neither of us are remotely keen on. You gotta do what you gotta do for love though people.
The first challenge of the project
OK with that out of the way, Banners mum has invited us to lunch. Saturday afternoon and we we’re both (I’m not) very excited about this. However we agreed to this before my covid life of debuachery had finally forced me to get my life back together!
Hence challenge 1, your weight loss effort and new life are not going to happen if you can’t have a normal life. So how do you fit in a lunch which is supposed to be a boozy lunch, (i.e over eating and drinking) and stay on plan?
Assuming you’ve read through the plan you will know that I am tracking my food and my macronutrients and I have a set daily calorie goal. This will put me in a calorie deficit for the week and over time this is going to help me gradually but constantly lose weight.
Save some calories
An afternoon lunch or a meal out at night can be pretty hazardous to these plans. During the week with my cut, I’m “saving” approximately 3,500 calories (roughly 1lb of body fat coincidentally!). Ideally then I want to put as little of that saving at risk as possible.
In the lead up to an event it’s ok to to increase your calorie deficit a little. This assumes you can handle any additional hunger that may result, something you will need to be able to determine yourself .Clearly You can’t do this every week as you are just going to be eating too little and you will almost certainly fail to stick to plan. In my experience anything between 100 and 300 extra calories cut a day is a good aim. This means that by the event you’ve saved up anywhere between 600 and 1200 calories.
My calculations
Worst case scenario, if I go crazy, at the top end of my calculation I eat 4500 calories at the lunch. Pretty good effort. If so, all I’ve done is lose a week worth of calorie deficit. Now of course, that’s for illustrative purposes and I obviously hope I do not to do that. I don’t recommend it either as losing weight feels like a sloooooow process anyway. You don’t want to make it any slower than you have to. That said, it is also important to acknowledge that we need a social life to maintain sane. Any tools that can help me handle navigate going out without wrecking my goals are more than welcome!
As it happens I’ve saved 1709 calories this week. This is very much on the high end of what I would recommend. Given they way I have eaten and drunk this year I am sure my body has plenty reserves!. Either way I have not had to or even tried to starve myself. I imagine doing the same again a few weeks down the line (another social engagement is in the calendar) will be no doubt be harder. I want to be honest about anything I post so that’s what the numbers are!
Plan ahead
I will look at the menu tonight (Friday 25th July). I’ll plan what I’m going to eat as best I can BEFORE I go in all hungry . I don’t want to make my decision’s based on my my hungry/greedy eyes! If there are calories on the menu even better, I know a generous meal for me would be around 500 to 700 calories. Normally my day to day (ie prepared by me or the Luscious Lady) dinners and lunches are around the 350 to 450 calorie mark. It’s what I’m used to so even a couple of hundred calories more will feel like a treat.
My plan is to avoid a starter and pudding as I wouldn’t normally eat those during lunch anyway. Why change just because I’m going out? I know I can still enjoy myself and I’m not denying myself anything so happy days! But what happens if you haven’t saved enough calories I hear you say? Well tracking calories isn’t an exact science so apart from just guessing most of us should be able to assess roughly whats going to be on the high end and what’s on the lighter end of a menu. I’m not going to ask for a salad because I know I won’t enjoy that. My plan is therefore to avoid anything deep fried, served with a heavy/rich sauce, pasta and other than than I will really just eat what I want.
Booze
As for booze. I’ll try to stay away from my fave’s (wine & beer ). Quite frankly I’ve had my life’s fill of booze this last year. I also like a cheeky gin and have found that personally I tend not to be able to drink to much of it. So I’m mentally planning in three gin and slimline tonics. If they have my fave rhubarb and ginger all the better!
So wish me luck and ill report back tomorrow!