Wife is Starting out - Have i got this nutrition right?

[meddy76]

Hiya.

My wife is wanting to get into shape after giving birth 7 months ago. She's got the training sorted, but we've had a look at the sticky on here regarding nutrition and it doesn't seem right to me. Can you clarify for me?

She's 34, 5'4 and 150lbs. Her BMR is 1441. Her activity level is 1.2 - 1.3. Thats 1734 Cals. If she ate 300 cals less, thats 1434 Cals.
I've worked that out as:

Protein = 1g per lb of BW = 150g
Fat = 0.45g x lb of lbm = 67.5
Carb calories = Total calorie needs - ([protein grams as above x 4] + [fat grams as above x 9])
carbs in grams = above total/ 4

1434 – (150/4 + 67.5/9) = 226.5/4 = 56.6g carbs

Does this seem right? If so, that seems a drastic lack of carbs for energy throughout the day.

Secondly can anyone point her in the right direction for a meal plan?

Meddy.

[MrB1g]

Caloric intake seems on the low side for her bodyweight. All formulas are just approximations, it's always better to start with a higher caloric intake on a cut to get a better gauge of where her caloric maintenance actually is and just reduce her intake week by week based on results.

A caloric deficit will normally come primarily through a reduction in CHO simply because protein and dietary fat are more important for a number of reasons. Energy shouldn't be a problem provided she's managing her overall caloric intake well.

[Rowyn]

Hiya.

My wife is wanting to get into shape after giving birth 7 months ago. She's got the training sorted, but we've had a look at the sticky on here regarding nutrition and it doesn't seem right to me. Can you clarify for me?

She's 34, 5'4 and 150lbs. Her BMR is 1441. Her activity level is 1.2 - 1.3. Thats 1734 Cals. If she ate 300 cals less, thats 1434 Cals.
I've worked that out as:

Protein = 1g per lb of BW = 150g
Fat = 0.45g x lb of lbm = 67.5
Carb calories = Total calorie needs - ([protein grams as above x 4] + [fat grams as above x 9])
carbs in grams = above total/ 4

1434 – (150/4 + 67.5/9) = 226.5/4 = 56.6g carbs

Does this seem right? If so, that seems a drastic lack of carbs for energy throughout the day.

Secondly can anyone point her in the right direction for a meal plan?

Meddy.

The stickies are approximations. For her size, 1400 is on the low side for deficit. Starting around 1800 would be more realistic for about 1/2-1 lb loss per week. As the sticky points out, adjust after 2 weeks if she is losing too quickly/not enough. 1 g per lb protein is used as a guideline because most people don't know their true lean body mass. Eating 1g per lb of her GOAL weight is adequete. She can also tweak her fat a little too, 0.3 g/lb bodyweight is the minimal level I believe.

As for meal plans, most of us develop a good idea of what a day's worth of the proper amounts of cals and protein are pretty quickly when you start logging on a calorie counter site like Livestrong. It will break her food down into macros for her. If she is eating mostly complex carbs with lots of vegs and some fruit, 30-40 g protein per "meal" (if she is not a snacker) and moderate fats, its pretty easy to adjust to hit goals. There really isn't a meal plan thread per se in this section since we all eat differently and learn to adjust amounts/cals. A kitchen scale would be helpful until she is good at approximating portions.

[gwnorth]

You calculated her activity level at 1.2-1.3, but does this include whatever she's going to be doing for her training?

[meddy76]

Just got her training 3 times a week at the moment, just to ease her into it. She's never trained with weights before and was nervous going to the weights side of the gym, as she used to just do CV. Told her that once she'd got a couple of training sessions under her belt we'd look at upping the calories.

The main worry for her is that she can't have any carbs as she's restricted to 51g a day.

[Amanda76]

Is your wife still breastfeeding? That raises her caloric need by 300 calories per day.

I personally would have her start out eating at (estimated) maintenance and seeing what happens from there, keeping in mind that as she's able to work with more intensity at the gym her body composition is going to improve over the next few months even if the scale doesn't move much at first. It's really a more healthy way to go about things as she's becoming more active, as you can tell from your difficulty getting a wide variety of carbs in her nutrition plan with so few calories to play with.

Your other options would be to start with less of a calorie deficit of course (maybe try 1,600 calories) to make room for more carbs and/or drop the percentage of fat she's getting. If you were to use .3g/pound of bodyweight, that would leave room for more carbs and exceed the minimum .25g of fat/pd of bodyweight needed for health purposes.

[Rowyn]

Just got her training 3 times a week at the moment, just to ease her into it. She's never trained with weights before and was nervous going to the weights side of the gym, as she used to just do CV. Told her that once she'd got a couple of training sessions under her belt we'd look at upping the calories.

The main worry for her is that she can't have any carbs as she's restricted to 51g a day.

Why did you restrict her to that when multiple people said to start her calories higher?

[meddy76]

Why did you restrict her to that when multiple people said to start her calories higher?

I restricted her before posting. I'll heed the advice on here and advise her to start at Maint. I'll also reduce her fat to .30g and see where we go from there.

thanks for your help girls!

Meddy.

[Rowyn]

I restricted her before posting. I'll heed the advice on here and advise her to start at Maint. I'll also reduce her fat to .30g and see where we go from there.

thanks for your help girls!

Meddy.

Good deal:). When she gets over the idea that weightlifting equates to bulkiness, she may be happy in just gaining some lean muscle mass with little need to lose much actual scale weight. Muscle can go a long way in changing the aesthetic of one's body.

[getoveritlady]

Hiya.

My wife is wanting to get into shape after giving birth 7 months ago. She's got the training sorted, but we've had a look at the sticky on here regarding nutrition and it doesn't seem right to me. Can you clarify for me?

She's 34, 5'4 and 150lbs. Her BMR is 1441. Her activity level is 1.2 - 1.3. Thats 1734 Cals. If she ate 300 cals less, thats 1434 Cals.
I've worked that out as:

Protein = 1g per lb of BW = 150g
Fat = 0.45g x lb of lbm = 67.5
Carb calories = Total calorie needs - ([protein grams as above x 4] + [fat grams as above x 9])
carbs in grams = above total/ 4

1434 – (150/4 + 67.5/9) = 226.5/4 = 56.6g carbs

Does this seem right? If so, that seems a drastic lack of carbs for energy throughout the day.

Secondly can anyone point her in the right direction for a meal plan?

Meddy.\\\

your carb calculation is not correct ...i don't think....should be double that...