Fall 2025 Exercise and Nutrition Plan
It's 1:56 PM on Friday afternoon as I begin to write. I'm having a little bit of a hard time letting go of the feeling that I should be working on a Family Support project right now because Friday is my Family Support productivity day, but I need to move on. I spent a good bit of time visiting with family earlier this week. It's okay if I stay focused for the next few hours on an important lifestyle upgrade. This morning after Daily TV Mass and a telehealth session with my therapist, I set to work on my weekly shopping list. Would I buy another box of Clif Builder bars for breakfast? Nope. Time to switch to miso soup. Then I drove my mom to the chiropractor and finished my list while waiting for her in the car. After that, I took her to Hannaford for her grocery shopping and did some grocery shopping of my own. Once we got back to the house, I helped my mom move furniture and change out some rugs for a new season. At this point, I had a choice to make - drive in the car by myself for the rest of my grocery shopping, or grab a backpack, take the bus to the Asian market on Colvin Avenue, and make it a rucking adventure to get home?
I went with the rucking adventure, and I am very glad I did. It took me about an hour to walk back home with a 15# backpack full of groceries. I listened to three YouTube videos about rucking along the way:
This was my first time using this backpack in 5 years and it felt great but a little heavy and hard on my shoulders at the end, too. It's important to understand that this trip is my exercise peak of the year so far. I've been struggling to make it from the sedentary to lightly active exercise level in 2025.
My mood was very good for this walk. I was wearing my favorite shorts after a major wardrobe reorganization. I had a pack full of healthy whole foods that "sparked joy" when I thought about cooking them. I was helping the planet and my local public transportation authority by taking the bus. And I had found an excellent old/new way to merge green transportation, plant-based nutrition, and more vigorous exercise: take the bus to Central Avenue and ruck my groceries home!
After a quick baseline lunch (1 packet of Trader Joe's wheat noodles, 1 Tofurky sausage, and some Trader Joe's zhoug), I settled in at my desktop to plot out a fat-loss goal for the end of the year. I'd like to get more of the "skinny fat" donut off my belly by reducing from 166 pounds at the start of September to 155 pounds by the end of December. This means I need to drop about 0.66 pounds per week by aiming for a daily caloric intake of about 1900 calories IF I maintain a light activity level and don't fall back into a totally sedentary lifestyle (according to Understanding Your Activity Levels: A Comprehensive Guide and the calculator at What Are the Recommended Daily Calories for Men?) I think my key task here is to walk for an hour a day, taking rest days when my body tells me I need it, and to add in 1 day of rucking per week through the end of September. Google Gemini confirms that rest PRN is better than a pre-scheduled rest day (like when I tried to rest from walking every Saturday and it didn't work very well). Gemini further suggests that 1 day of rucking per week with 15 pounds is a good starting point. If all goes well, maybe I can bump that up to 2x per week before the end of October.
That covers the activity side of things. Would it be awesome if I layered in some dumbbell strength training 2 times a week and some gentle yoga or qigong before bed? No doubt. But I am not ready to make a plan out of it. I don't have that much success at lifestyle change. Wait a minute. Is that really true? And is that the right way to look at my fall 2025 healthcare program? Nope. Let's add "at least 5 minutes of yoga and/or qigong before bed" as a recurring daily commitment on my Microsoft To Do next action list, and let's add "at least 15 minutes of dumbbell training" as a recurring Monday and Thursday commitment on the same list. Okay, done. It's an achievable start and it feels a lot healthier than putting it off for another season.
How about the nutrition side of things? Well, I think I need to let the 290-calorie high-protein Clif bars go as my staple breakfast and switch to 600 calories or less of lentil miso vegetable soup. This decision, which I made early this morning, is what led me on my rucking adventure to the Asian market. Broadly speaking, this is my fall 2025 nutrition plan:
- 600-Calorie or less super nutritious whole-foods plant-based breakfast.
- 700-Calorie or less super nutritious processed-food plant-based lunch.
- 600-Calorie or less super nutritious whole-foods plant-based supper.
Alright, I have now added each of those in as recurring daily tasks on my Microsoft To Do next action list. My next step is to plan tonight's 5-6 PM kitchen block. I know that I want to pre-soak my red lentils overnight in water and a dash of white vinegar. But how many cups of red lentils am I looking to make for soup tomorrow morning? Well, according to Google Gemini, 1 cup of dried red lentils contains 687 calories, 46 grams of protein, and 21 grams of fiber. That should be just about right for 2-3 servings of breakfast soup, depending on what else I decide to put in it. I don't know if I can handle cooking breakfast every other day (those Clif bars are so easy to prepare!), but I could probably manage every third day. One step at a time.
As far as supper for tonight is concerned, I was going to make a bowl of wheat flakes with thawed red raspberries, blueberries and soymilk, but when I was at the Asian market, I saw some attractive Gai Lan tips and mushrooms, and I haven't had any greens yet today, so that's what I am going to make. Gai Lan tips, mushrooms, canned chickpeas, and ginger or garlic. I don't have any oil or a dedicated frying pan and cooking utensils of my own, so I am not sure how I am going to cook it up just yet. I did get some iodized Morton Lite salt to try, and I have some Earth Balance soy butter on hand, and I have a heavy-duty pot that I share with my mom. That could just about do it.
Update: I went with about 1/3 pound of Gail Lan tips, trimmed and blanched for 4 minutes; then I sauteed a couple bunches of oyster mushrooms, slivered, and garlic cloves, sliced, in a tablespoon of soy butter and water in the bottom of a heavy pot, added the Gai Lan and 1/2 cup of chickpeas, and sauteed it all a bit more, put it in a bowl, and sprinkled on some Morton Lite and cracked black pepper. Nothing like what I could do in a wok with some oil, but it's a start. I haven't cooked in over a year. Here is a photo.
My plan for the miso soup tomorrow morning: rinse the cup of red lentils I soaked overnight and add them to a pot with 4 cups of water, a tablespoon of chopped fresh ginger root, and about 3/4 cup of sliced button mushrooms. Bring to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes. Add 1 head chopped baby bok choy and simmer for another couple of minutes. Add 2 tablespoons of dried wakame, turn off the heat, and remove from the stove. Ladle half of the mix into my breakfast bowl and save the rest for the following day. Mix 1 tablespoon of miso in separate small bowl of warm water and then add to my breakfast bowl. Garnish with freshly chopped scallion. This should provide me with more calories, more protein, more fiber and less fat than my usual Clif Builder breakfast bar, but with a lot more work and a lot less chocolate. Hmmm. Let's see how this goes.
ReplyDeleteI followed through on my miso soup plan as noted above, but I used 2 cups of sliced baby bella mushrooms and added most of the scallion with the wakame to make the flavor a little more mild. The miso is organic but not reduced sodium. Flavor of the soup is good but it's not a chocolate Clif bar. I think I can get used to it though. Feels very healthy.
ReplyDeleteThis morning I was running short on time and made a quick lentil miso soup with 1 can of brown Trader Joe's lentils, drained and rinsed; 1 can of no salt spinach, drained; 3-4 cloves of sliced garlic; and a handful of sliced baby bella mushrooms. I simmered all of that for a few minutes, turned off the heat, and added 1 rounded tablespoon of wakame. Then I portioned half into my bowl and mixed in a tablespoon of low-sodium miso with a small strainer. Taste and quantity was excellent, but this was less protein than I would get with a Clif Builder bar.
ReplyDeleteFor lunch today I had a Clif Builders bar at the hospital, then a bowl of wheat flakes with thawed red raspberries, blueberries and soymilk after I got my mom home. I like the way the acid and pectin the raspberries makes the soymilk super creamy. Others might not. For dinner, I blanched the rest of my fresh gailan tips, then sauteed them up in some olive oil with garlic and fresh oyster mushrooms. For additional calories, I mixed this saute in a bowl with 1 can of Trader Joe's corn. I added Morton Lite and black pepper for taste, potassium and iodine. Now I have to decide if I am running to Honest Weight for more fresh vegetables tomorrow. And Gemini tells me that olive oil and canned corn are not considered whole foods. Maybe I need to change my plan. Maybe I don't need 100% whole foods at breakfast and dinner, just a big shift in that direction.
ReplyDelete