Starving, doing without, constantly pre-cooking. If you want to lose weight at work, you have to invest time and suffer – so the prejudice. The healthy decrease for working persons goes also differently. How to master both: healthy eating and everyday working life.
By Max Frehner
What should I get at the bakery in the morning? What alternatives are there to water? And which diets really work? Answers around the topic "Lose weight for working persons. – © Pixelbliss – stock.adobe.com
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What do 24 carrots, six eggs and a bar of milk chocolate have in common?? They all bring it to just under 500 kilocalories. However, the satiety effect could hardly be more different. Although there are healthier alternatives, most people reach for the candy bar rather than the carrot. It tastes better.
The workday in particular is a real challenge for anyone who wants to eat more healthily. Nearly half of all working people in Germany feel their own Job as stressful – this was the result of a stress study conducted by the Techniker Krankenkasse (TK). To compensate, they often stock up on nerve food in their desk drawer. Or reward yourself after a hard day’s work with some chocolate on the sofa. By the way, the same plight applies to Jobs that demand little from employees. People who are bored or engaged in a monotonous activity succumb more quickly to the temptation for sweets.
These are not the only problems that working people have to deal with. Those who don’t bring their food from home can find a place to eat near the workplace not always enough choice, To eat healthy. Thus, in the TK nutrition study 2017, more than a third of the people surveyed criticized the offer of healthy food on site. At the same time Time pressure many professionals to eat more healthily. Only six out of ten employees get to eat in peace during work breaks.
The fact is, however, that if losing weight is the declared goal for professionals, the diet must be adapted. For this the cravings must be suppressed from time to time though, But you don’t have to give up sweets completely. In the same way, working people don’t have to eat healthy starve or pre-cook daily.
Healthy weight loss for working people: 7 questions, 7 answers
But how can losing weight for working people succeed in practice? Together with TK nutrition expert Michaela Hombrecher answers the German Crafts Newspaper, What really matters when it comes to healthy eating.
1. How do you actually lose weight??
Everyone has to eat a certain amount of calories every day. Energy is needed to maintain basic functions such as breathing, heartbeat and the immune system. How many kilocalories are consumed depends on weight, height, age and gender.
Average burns a adult person between 1.700 and 2.500 kilocalories, without having to move even a little bit. Everyone can calculate the so-called basal metabolic rate. However, since hardly anyone lies motionless for 24 hours a day, the daily energy requirement is even higher. After all, activity burns even more calories.
The daily Total metabolic rate forms the limit. Those who eat more calories load up on extra pounds. Those who eat less lose weight. The body helps itself in this case to the reserves, which among other things at the belly or at the hips were accumulated.
In summary: For working people to succeed in losing weight, they must not take in more calories than they burn off. You can do this either by eating a low-calorie diet or by exercising more.
But you don’t have to starve yourself, explains Hombrecher. Theoretically, the daily requirement could also be distributed among vegetables. "And nobody is hungry after a bag of carrots", she jokes. However, she also points out that such a diet would be too one-sided. "Finally a reasonable mixture must be found, which supplies the body with all important nutrients", says the nutrition expert.
2. What does the body really need?
Balanced nutrition – what does that actually mean? To maintain the immune system, a person must be Vitamine, mineral materials, proteins and ballast materials in sufficient form to itself take. If it does not, it harms thereby its health. For example, people are more susceptible to stress and colds as soon as they take too few vitamins. If the deficiency persists over a long period of time, the risk of cancer can also increase dramatically. A balanced diet prevents diseases such as allergies, arteriosclerosis and cardiovascular disease.
Which foods contain the important nutrients??
- Vitamins Stuck mainly in fresh fruits and vegetables. But be careful: if the food is stored or cooked for too long, the nutrients evaporate. Better: light cooking or steaming.
- Minerals such as calcium, magnesium and iron are found, for example, in whole grain products, milk, legumes, fish and green vegetables.
- Protein in vegetable form is found mainly in soy products, potatoes and legumes again. Animal proteins provide milk, cheese, meat and fish.
- Dietary fiber are found in most fruits and vegetables. Cereals, whole grains and dried legumes such as nuts and seeds are particularly rich in fiber.
If you design your menu so that these substances regularly make it onto your plate in sufficient form, you are pumping up your body full of energy and protects it from diseases. Those who don’t like certain sources of nutrients, or who avoid certain foods for ethical or health reasons, need to look for alternatives.
"The more I limit my menu, the more I have to make sure I get everything at each meal", explains the nutrition expert. Food supplements are usually not necessary for this, so Hombrecher. But there would also be exceptions. For example, vegans should take vitamin B12, as this is only found in animal foods.
3. How do I stop the little sins?
The occupation everyday life is often hectic. And those who are under stress succumb more quickly to the temptation of curry sausage and chips at lunchtime, even though they had actually planned to eat a salad. In the 2017 TK Nutrition Survey, 56 percent of respondents said that they are Lack of time and rest to implement a balanced diet in everyday work life. 59 percent of all working people therefore do not even try to eat healthily on the road.
The consequence: With the lunch rather the calorie-rich meal is selected and in the everyday life creeps itself many small sins in. Almost every fifth man regularly reaches for burgers, kebabs or chips outside the home. Hombrecher sees the small snacks in between as a further problem. Many working people Don’t take enough time for lunch and instead eat on the side. Or it is eaten from frustration or boredom.
"Often, you don’t even keep track of the small and large meals you’ve eaten throughout the day.", estimates Hombrecher. Their TIpp for removing for working persons: Above all with the Nebengeschssen consciously become whether one eats straight from hunger or only from boredom.
If a grumbling stomach really does prompt you to snack, you should consider replacing the chocolate bar with something else. Hombrecher suggests nuts as an alternative: "Better for energy balance and more effective against hunger", she explains. And those who catch themselves snacking without actual energy needs? "Why not just put the bar back in the drawer and better have a drink?"
4. How do I put together a balanced diet plan for myself?
When choosing the right meals for breakfast, lunch or dinner, she says everyone has to figure out for themselves what works. There are many ways in which people can eat a balanced diet, he says. So that losing weight for working people works out, one would have to deal first of all with the topic. "It’s annoying, but it makes perfect sense."
Here, too, there are various options. According to Hombrecher, a good help can come from so-called "diets E-coaches its. After the electronic assistant has been fed with information about what people like to eat and what they don’t like to eat, it uses this information to develop a plan with recipes and shopping lists. Now you simply have to test what is good for you and sufficiently satisfying.
"Sometimes it is enough to simply to consciously go through the supermarket", Hombrecher suggests another alternative to put together a suitable diet plan for yourself.
5. How to find the right diet?
"Straight in the middle years between 35 and 45 have many for the first time with real weight problems to fight ", Reports Hombrecher. Job, children, building a house – it’s factors like these that cause this age group to neglect a healthy diet and sufficient exercise in their daily lives. But also the metabolism, which changes at this age. "We are seeing more and more men in their mid-40s suffering from cardiovascular problems.", she describes. In the past, she says, these problems tended to occur between the ages of 50 and 60.
Yet it’s mostly women who are more critical of themselves. Half of all women have been on a diet. Among men, it’s only 30 percent. The sexes also differ in their motives for dieting. "Women want to fit back into their favorite jeans, for men it’s more the health or performance idea behind it", she explains.
But how do working people find the right diet? If you want to lose weight, you can draw from a huge variety of diet tips and slimming cures. And it feels like there are more every day. Hombrecher does not consider most of them purposeful. "Time-limited diets around brisk slimming lead in the allermeisten cases to the fact that the Kilos are soon again on the ribs ?, she knows. Experts estimate the relapse rate with appropriate diets at 95 per cent. In her opinion, one-sided or elaborate dietary changes also have lousy chances of being transferred to everyday life. "If I need 20 ingredients per dish, the fun of cooking quickly diminishes."
So what’s needed are strategies that work in the long term in everyday life. "There is no patent remedy that is scientifically proven", describes Hombrecher. You would have to try around a little to find the right thing for yourself. Three things are important here so that healthy weight loss for working people can succeed: The diet must cover all the important nutrients in sufficient form, it must be filling and it must be easy to implement. A good start, however, is to break bad habits.
6 nutrition tips for losing weight for working people
- Don’t eat on the side
- Don’t eat too much meat, but also focus on filling side dishes
- Do without dessert more often
- Avoid hidden calorie bombs (z.B. fried food, croutons in the salad, heavy dressing)
- Drinking too little or the wrong thing
- Take time for meals, because otherwise too much is eaten (satiety occurs only after 20 minutes)
Also good: Determining when and how often to eat during the day. "Often you don’t even notice that you’re eating a few hundred calories more on the side", appreciates Hombrecher. A fixed rhythm without snacks in between helps to keep the overview.
Diet concepts for working people
Who instead at a fixed diet plan would like to orient itself, which can according to Hombrecher also at one of the following concepts hold:
The one sees five small meals a day before. The advantages: Cravings stay away, blood sugar levels are kept constant, and the body has something to burn on a regular basis. Another positive side effect: the body is supplied with a wide range of nutrients, which prevents deficiency symptoms.
However, not everyone has the opportunity to integrate five breaks into their daily work routine and to prepare sufficient meals. In this case, the concept of "Intermittent Fasting" could be an option be the better option. Meals there are three times a day with a respective interval of five hours. Thereby must Protein- and carbohydrate-rich foods properly combined Breakfast is the most important meal and no carbohydrates should be eaten in the evening. As a lot of time passes between meals, the body empties itself completely once. "So the body has to go to the fat reserves and burn", explains Hombrecher.
Who does not want to do without Italian food in the evening, does not have to. "Then I just choose a concept that suits me better", says the nutrition expert. "For others, systems that work better are those where people count points and keep food diaries."
Ultimately, it is not necessary to do without everything, as long as the overall balance is right in the end. Means: If you promise your kids a pizza in the evening, you’ll have to cut back again the next day or squeeze in a sports session. Only in such a way the Abnehmen for working persons can succeed.
6. What may I drink?
A healthy adult should have about two to three liters of liquid take to itself. A good guideline is 35 milliliters per kilogram of body weight. Don’t worry: not everything has to be drunk. The body produces about 300 milliliters of water itself during its metabolic processes, and it gets about one liter of water from solid foods such as apples, vegetables or potatoes. Remains thus approximately one to 1.5 liters, which must be taken up over beverages.
The best choice here is classic mineral water. "With other drinks, the only thing that helps is to look at the list of ingredients", advises Hombrecher. Those who want to lose weight should pay particular attention to the sugar content, which can be identified as sugar, glucose, fructose or sucrose.
In general, Hombrecher sees Spritzers as a healthy alternative to water to. "Especially craftsmen in jobs with high physical stress, should make sure that the body is not hypoglycemic", she says. An apple spritzer can be just the right thing to drink. Also healthy and not completely tasteless: unsweetened tea.
Real calorie bombs are by the way Beer and wine. A good alternative here would be non-alcoholic wheat beer. "This is lower in calories and has an isotonic effect.", reveals Hombrecher. Means: The body digests it faster and the drink donates energy.
7. What should I get at the bakery?
To-go is a no-go for 38 percent – that’s what the 2017 TK nutrition study found. The remaining 62 percent like to get something to eat on the hand. As in the supermarket shelf, there are also healthy and less healthy things at the bakery. To what one should reach thus? Hombrecher advises a Whole grain roll with cheese instead of going for a white flour roll. "Whether spelt or rye is rather a question of taste or compatibility", she says. From additional bells and whistles like tartar sauce or mayonnaise should be refrained from. Those who have the choice should also rather classic bakeries or go to organic stores. "Supermarket chain bakeries usually sell quick-fermenting bread", she says.
Even better than the spontaneous trip to the bakery: taking food to work yourself. As practical meals to take along Hombrecher recommends cold food such as salad, couscous, pasta salad or sandwiches with whole grains.