With my food allergies its hard to get in all the vitamins & nutrients I need into my daily diet. I find it hard to keep weight on (yes, I know, if only everyone could have this "problem") and keep my weight stable. I tend to stick with proteins, sweet potatoes, the odd serving of rice/rice pasta & loads of veggies for my meals everyday. As you can probably see I'm missing a couple major food groups in my everyday meals. So I made an appointment with a nutritionist/dietician through my husbands EAP at work & we had our first phone session the other night.
After telling her what I eat, what I can eat, & what I'm willing to try again, she gave me her suggestions and is sending me a pkg. in the mail with additional suggestions, etc...
After our conversation & her guidelines, I came up with the following daily food group meal plan for myself:
- 4 Carb servings
- 8 Veggie servings
- 2 Fruit servings
- 6 Protein servings
- 2 Dairy servings
- 2 fats/oils servings
- 8 glasses of water
- 2 "extra" calorie servings *this will be the sugar in my coffee.
- And then some exercise... *But I'm usually on the go all day, so this is not a problem! I have some crazy high metabolism! lol!
Eating anything above & beyond this is a bonus! ;) Seeing as I have to eat almost all my fruits & veggies cooked due to my OAS, getting in the fruit is especially hard unless I'm baking with it & I don't bake all the time. So baking myself something 2x a week is also on my list now.
I used to eat purely Paleo/Primal but my weight drops too low without carbs, so keeping a few servings of healthy carbs in my diet helps to keep a few extra lbs. on my tiny frame!
I'm also trying to add in a bit of dairy again to see how my body reacts in regards to my being very lactose intolerant & my eczema issues. Hubby brought me home a block of x-old cheddar yesterday which is very low in lactose due to the aging process. I started my day with one very thin slice... my stomach had been rumbling & making all sorts of noises, but I felt 'ok' overall. I'm really hoping that I may be able to add some cheese back into my diet.
Next on my list will be lactose free or Greek yogurt, but I'll see how I do with the cheese first. Taking "Lacteeze" or the like is a no, as I've had reactions to certain meds so I usually avoid them.
I feel like I'm back to square one like a few years ago when I started trying to lose weight & was calorie counting & all that annoying stuff! (Calorie counting didn't last by the way & I lost 50lbs!) Yesterday I fell way below the guidelines as I'm a stress 'non-eater'. If I'm stressed or worried about something I have no appetite, therefore just pick at my food.
So today I have my food group counting APP on standby ready to hopefully fill! ;)
Have you ever had an appointment with a dietician or nutritionist? Do you follow a certain diet? Are you trying to lose or gain weight? Or are you happy exactly where your weight is?
