In Phase Three it’s all about keeping the weight off. Here is the how, when, what, where and why when it comes to weight maintenance.
Welcome back to Be Healthy! Be Happy! I’m here to talk with you today about phase 3 of the RABBAP Vector diet protocol. After going through phase 1 and phase 2 you’ve accomplished your goal, losing 12% to 15% of your desired body weight.
It’s now time for phase 3 and phase 3 is all about maintenance.
Patients ask me where I came up with the name RABBAP Vector protocol. Well, it seemed like I had to come up with something, so here it is!
RA stands for raspberries, B stands for blackberries, the other B stands for blueberries. A is for apple and the P for protein. V is for Vector, in other words the power to get where you need to be and reminding us that you should take a quality micronutrient multivitamin and mineral supplement to ensure that during this strict dietary protocol, you’re getting all you need in terms of micronutrients to build protein and carbohydrates and fats and the like. You made great gains in phase 1 and phase 2 – outstanding, extraordinary! But now it’s phase 3 and we want to maintain the gains you made. And to do that it’s all about goal setting.
So, what are those goals? Basically, and fundamentally, it’s about maintaining your weight and, for that matter, even losing a bit more over the next 57 to 84 days. You’re now in phase 3 and the goals that you set are to maintain or in addition to lose some of the weight that you still need to get off. Maybe you are not done yet, and if you are not, you want to at least maintain and try to lose just a little bit more.
Breakfast: how do you do that? Breakfast really changes very little. It’s a lot like phase 2 where you continue to have the raspberries, the blueberries and the blackberries but maybe add to that a little yogurt or perhaps 2% milk. If you want, add of a quarter of cup of granola. But remember, granola’s got a lot of calories. It’s got a lot of carbohydrates and carbs are the real deal when it comes to losing and maintaining weight – avoiding them for that matter – they are healthy and good for us, but you’ve got to watch them really carefully.
Lunch time? For lunch, it’s still the apples and oranges. Two large apples or two large oranges – really no reason to go beyond more than that, just so it gets you through the day.
Dinner: same as phase 2, punch up your protein to 8 ounces. Keep it there with fish, pork, beef, tofu, eggs – whatever you like in terms of protein about 8 ounces and all the vegetables you want – you always get all the vegetables! Remember vegetables are zero calorie foods. They help fill you up – nothing wrong with that. It’s certainly important to be satisfied, so go to vegetables. And for your salads, 2 tablespoons your favorite 50 calorie dressing. Also, peas and green beans and carrots and other sorts of vegetables. You might ask about baked potatoes. That gets into the carbohydrate issue and you’ve really got to watch portions of carbohydrate, so a small baked potato with a little bit of butter, a little bit of cheese, and some salt-and-pepper. What about rice? Rice – about the amount of a deck of cards, and pasta the same thing, an amount the size of a deck of cards to control the intake of calorie dense foods.
Desserts? I love them! I’ve got a sweet tooth too! So, go for them occasionally, but not with every meal and again, we have to talk about portion control.
Favorite meals: finally, when it comes to dinner, it’s time to have some your favorite meals. My gosh we’ve all got favorite meals, so have them sometimes and get some satisfaction from your kind of traditional sorts of things and at the same time an eye on maintenance. Weight yourself daily and if you find that you’re up next day, rollback on the food that you’re taking in the next day which keeps it going in the direction of maintenance.
Danger zones: so now let’s talk about some of the danger zones. Danger zones are foods that you may not really realize contribute to your total daily caloric intake. And first and foremost, among those are beverages. Beverages can contain a lot of calories and often times those calories are just simple sugars that contribute nothing to quality nutrition. I’m talking about sweetened beverages like Coca-Cola and 7-Up and Mountain Dew. A 12 ounce can of regular Coke contains 160 nutritionally empty calories. Who needs that? Same goes for Mountain Dew and all the other commercial beverages that have calories, but no nutrition. I get the criticism around aspartame. I certainly agree, but I’ve got to tell you, obesity is far more harmful to you than utilizing aspartame to control caloric intake. Alcoholic beverages also contain calories, so not only should you watch them because you need to be careful with your use of alcohol, but they do that add calories. Certainly 6 to 8 ounces of wine at mealtime is a good deal – especially if its red wines – because it’s got those flavonoids and flavonoids are actually good for you. Boss’s donuts: when people bring food into work, it’s really easy to plow some of that down. Remember a donut has 400 calories or about 40 minutes of exercise to get rid of it! So, watch the donuts and the other things that people bring into work; work celebration means portion control too. Grazing and snacking: I see so many people at work snacking throughout the day or what I call grazing. You just can’t do it! Most snacks are carbohydrates and they are tasty – you can’t eat just one. Right? So, watch snacking at work really carefully. The best thing to do is just avoid it altogether and not get in the habit of snacking and having something in your mouth all the time. Remember too those Costco teasers. We go up and down the Costco isles, go by all kinds of tasty food to try all the time while shopping, so watch the Costco teasers as well.
Danger meals: let’s talk about danger meals. What are the danger meals? I’ve talk about the danger foods with alcohol and sweetened beverages, which include fruit juices. Going back, to what I was just talking about, juices have a lot of calories too. They are healthy, and they can be nutritious, but they can also be unhealthy for you due to the amount of calories that you can consume.
Danger meals are Mexican food. My goodness do I love Mexican food, but it’s a real danger meal. Hamburgers and fries, cheeseburgers and fries – and if you get it with bacon and all that stuff, you really can’t maintain your weight eating a double beef whopper with cheese no doubt about that. Italian foods? I love Italian food, but it’s got a lot of carbohydrates, it’s got a lot of sauces, so it’s about portion control and being careful not to over eat any food or meal laden with carbohydrates.
Fast foods: and I’ve got to tell you again, stay away from fast food. We don’t know where that stuff actually comes from and it’s about a lot of calories and usually not very good nutrition.
Summary: so you have set your goals for phase 3 – days 57 through 84 – to maintain and even lose a bit more weight. The way to do that is the recipe for what I’ve been talking about above and weighing daily and track it to figure out what you’re doing that maybe makes you go up a little bit or has you going down. Track your weights on a regular basis and make notes about what actually occurred the day before.
Exercise: and finally, you’ve got to exercise. Exercise is important for overall health and well-being and it’s certainly important for weight maintenance and weight loss!
This is Dr. Jim for Be Healthy! Be Happy! Power your path to happiness.