Where do you get your calories?

In any strength sport, you need a considerable amount of calories to continue your gains. I’m a powerlifter, pretty novice and training for my fist meet. Before my dx (LADA), I was easily consuming 3500 - 4500 calories/day and making great gains in my lifts. Since, I cut out a lot. I drank a minimum of 1/2 gallon of milk and did pretty freely consumed carbs (though I limited this to mostly whole grains after prediabetes came up in my blood work). This has resulted in a rather large decrease in weight and a loss in strength. I’ve been struggling to find ways to get my calories back up to the 3500+ level, safely. Right now, I’m successfully managing my levels with exercise and diet only. I want to know, what works for you? What do you eat to get the calories necessary for your training?

I stick with mostly proteins and fats (from REAL FOOD), limit my carbs to veggies and fruits. You may need to have a carb heavy (try to stick with oats, yams, NOT WHEAT or any processed crap) after you workout.



Check out the paleo diet for athletes



Crossfit Football has some decent info



Good blog, here is quick blurp on diet



This site has a lot to look through, but the podcasts are great. On…
One of the speakers in the podcast is a great Oly Lifter


There is a ton of info out there that supports avoiding all proinflamatory foods (like wheat, gluten, legumes, milk etc) at least for a while to see how those foods really react with your body. Cut them out for a month and then add one thing back to your normal diet and see how you feel. Seriously great way to keep diabetes in check.



So the short of it is, just eat a ton of meat, veggies, and healthy fats - dont be scared of the fats especially if you are truly working hard. Like I said above, depending on how your energy levels go, you may need to add some unprocessed carbs to some of your meals (some people get along just fine on a lower carb diet).



Sorry this is so quick, trying to get some work done - dont tell my boss…

Thanks for your reply! I'm somewhat familiar with paleo and a little less familiar with the ketogenic diet. That blog looks like a gem. I'm looking forward to digging into that! I've been loosely following carb-backloading, particularly after noting how sensitive my BGL is in the morning. I've done a lot of experimenting with foods and logging the results. So in that sense, I feel comfortable with a lot of what foods to eat, and not eat. I suppose it's more quantities that I'm looking at suggestions for and what specific proteins/fats do you eat at certain times of the day? It's most convenient for me do something like hard boiled eggs and cheese for breakfast, some cheese and mixed nuts for a morning snack and then deli meats and cheeses for lunch. Dinner is rarely, if ever, a problem. But those other meals and snacks have their drawbacks. The eggs have a tendency to make me feel bloated/full for a long time after and the deli meats, as good as they taste, have a lot of sodium in them. I can definitely get in on more of the fats. Avocados are cheap here at the moment. One of those a day will make a nice snack.

Ya that could be a lot of deli meat if you are trying to pack in the cals. I dont get too fancy with my food choices at all. One thing that really saves me is making a huge meal in the crockpot 1-2x per week so i can eat the leftovers throughout the week. A big hunk of meat with some veggies in the pot is so easy and you know exactly what you are eating. Basically whenever I cook anything at home I usually make sure it is enough for 4 or so meals, and this includes my wife eating as well. Nuts and nut butters (try not to do peanuts if you can) are a great way to get in some cals for sure. Coconut manna is awesome to put in shakes and what not, or eat it with a spoon with a little almond butter and a light touch of honey. I dont have any issues with eggs and they are super easy as well - maybe you feel bloated due to the deli meats? There is a brand of meat out there that is more on the natural side: Applegate Farms - but it is def more pricey than the local deli stuff. I am glad to see your link tot eh EFS article, so that means we talks some of the same language at least, have you ever been over to 70sbig.com? They guys that run the blog are awesome and smart people. HERE is a video of the site creator talking about his diet for the day, he also touches on salt and what not. From what I remember reading about sodium consumption, it tends to effect you more when you shock your system - you can have some but a gradual consistent amount is better than chowing down at the local chinese buffet. Its been a long time since ive read up on that though. I think you are there in regards to how to control carbs by cycling in some fashion, you probably just need to get more calories in! How do you tolerate milk? That is another good source of cals. As far as timing goes, I like to only have carbs (and when i say carbs im not talking about leafy veggies, broccoli, cauliflower, etc., im talking about yams, potatoes, starches and the like) either in my morning meals or the first meal after I workout even if it is at night. I tend to stay pretty low carb the rest of the time - it really does help keep my sugars under control being a T1. I would have to say that 90% of my meals have a fair amount of veggies in them - helps keep me full and keeps things flowing nice.

Are you trying to get bigger or stronger?
If you're trying to get bigger you're going to need more carbs because carbs/insulin are very anabolic. No one's ever really gotten to big on a keto type diet, just ripped.

When i bulk i up all my macronutrients... but i def get a lot from fat. I'm trying to eat more carbs but the more i eat the more my sugars are off... I need to figure out new insulin rations for when i bulk.