Successful dieting or how to be miserable for months without actually doing longterm lifestyle adjustments

[wired]

Dieting for the obsessive compulsive

Every year or two I do a new years diet. Not because its a resolution its just that I have a birthday , anniversary, wifes birthday , Christmas , new years etc all in the month of December and we celebrate plus the weather goes to hell and my current job is work from home. Not a lot of moving around. So, I ended up picking up 40 lbs in the last year. Time to take control. I allot January and February as diet months although it looks like this year I'll have to throw March in there as well. Ive been tracking this stuff for the last 10 years. When I started this I weighed 261.7 lbs . My target is 220 lbs. I weigh first thing in the morning. I weigh everything I eat during these sessions to the gram and stick to it religiously. I'm a math guy so I do the math balance diet assuming the following :

3500 calories in a lb of fat.

At my age , weight and height and level of activity it takes 2800 calories to maintain weight. Ive backed these numbers up in my spreadsheet. Science.

I reduce my caloric consumption to 1600 calories per day and 100 or less net grams of carbs

That is a deficit of 1200 calories per day.

First week I ALWAYS lose 10 lbs in 7 days. Always. Why? My carb intake drops and my insulin levels do as well because I'm not processing anywhere near the same level of carbs. As insulin drops so does the water my body retains to process the insulin and carbs.Its all water weight.

3500 calories in a lb of fat/ 1200 deficit calories = 2.92 days to lose 1 lb.

Its been a week. Ive lost 10.2 lbs as expected. Now I have 31.4 more lbs to go . 31.4*2.9=92 days. 2nd week of April I should be done. Back to swilling beer and eating hot wings. . It may go a little faster as Ive taken up 3-5 miles a day of cycling.


Ive been doing this in one form or other for 25+ years. First time I overdid it and drooped 45 lbs in 2 months at 1000 calories a day. Thats too much work . 1600 is easy to do. No sugar, minimal carbs, knock off the drinking . 250-300 calories for breakfast, no snacks, lunch of 250-300 and 800 or so for dinner. Thats a LOT of steak, pork or chicken and a can of green beans or a good salad. Easy to do. Then 35 grams of air popped popcorn and 15 graims of butter as a snack.

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[Certaindeaf]

Target 220 means you need to be 6'6" at the very least.







:hide

 

[gryghin]

That's good that you know your body and can control your diet in the South.

Every time I come back home to the Carolinas, I am reminded why some of my cousins didn't live past thier 60s. The food is too good and our family gatherings doesn't encourage controlled dieting.

 

[wired]

That's good that you know your body and can control your diet in the South.

Every time I come back home to the Carolinas, I am reminded why some of my cousins didn't live past thier 60s. The food is too good and our family gatherings doesn't encourage controlled dieting.

Its math and willpower. Im obsessive about some things , not everything so its not too bad.

Then its back to pork ribs and mustard based BBQ sauce.

 

[L84Cabo]

You need to rethink your definition of "diet."

A diet is not a temporary fix/solution. It should mean a way of eating healthy for a lifetime. If it can't be sustained for the rest of your life and is only intended to be a temporary thing, you have already failed. The real reason you put on 40 lbs is because your actual real diet...what you eat/do day in and day out...doesn't support you.

 

[bolus]

Always thought it was funny when hearing a diet fad can make you lose "20 lbs in a week." That would be needing to burn 70,000 calories. That's like running nonstop for 18 hours a day for a week. A diet that makes you lose 10,000 calories a day when the energy you need to just lay in bed is like 2000 cal?

 

[Alexx1401]

Always thought it was funny when hearing a diet fad can make you lose "20 lbs in a week." That would be needing to burn 70,000 calories. That's like running nonstop for 18 hours a day for a week. A diet that makes you lose 10,000 calories a day when the energy you need to just lay in bed is like 2000 cal?

That's why I have often wondered when we see people come in who are literally so overweight they can not stand up? Why are family members not charged with abuse. Someone has to be bringing that person a lot of calories to keep them that damn heavy. I long said if it was someone I was caring for I would hand them a few bottles of that ensure stuff every day. Tell them when you can get out of bed and walk to the fridge you can have more.

 

[chukar]

Why worry?

insert Alfred now…

Youse consume less than you burn, youse lose weight…

 

[chukar]

Calories are like celeries. They all make the same donation.

Some might be "healthier"….

But in end, calories are calories….

 

[arakboss]

Dieting for the obsessive compulsive

Every year or two I do a new years diet. Not because its a resolution its just that I have a birthday , anniversary, wifes birthday , Christmas , new years etc all in the month of December and we celebrate plus the weather goes to hell and my current job is work from home. Not a lot of moving around. So, I ended up picking up 40 lbs in the last year. Time to take control. I allot January and February as diet months although it looks like this year I'll have to throw March in there as well. Ive been tracking this stuff for the last 10 years. When I started this I weighed 261.7 lbs . My target is 220 lbs. I weigh first thing in the morning. I weigh everything I eat during these sessions to the gram and stick to it religiously. I'm a math guy so I do the math balance diet assuming the following :

3500 calories in a lb of fat.

At my age , weight and height and level of activity it takes 2800 calories to maintain weight. Ive backed these numbers up in my spreadsheet. Science.

I reduce my caloric consumption to 1600 calories per day and 100 or less net grams of carbs

That is a deficit of 1200 calories per day.

First week I ALWAYS lose 10 lbs in 7 days. Always. Why? My carb intake drops and my insulin levels do as well because I'm not processing anywhere near the same level of carbs. As insulin drops so does the water my body retains to process the insulin and carbs.Its all water weight.

3500 calories in a lb of fat/ 1200 deficit calories = 2.92 days to lose 1 lb.

Its been a week. Ive lost 10.2 lbs as expected. Now I have 31.4 more lbs to go . 31.4*2.9=92 days. 2nd week of April I should be done. Back to swilling beer and eating hot wings. . It may go a little faster as Ive taken up 3-5 miles a day of cycling.


Ive been doing this in one form or other for 25+ years. First time I overdid it and drooped 45 lbs in 2 months at 1000 calories a day. Thats too much work . 1600 is easy to do. No sugar, minimal carbs, knock off the drinking . 250-300 calories for breakfast, no snacks, lunch of 250-300 and 800 or so for dinner. Thats a LOT of steak, pork or chicken and a can of green beans or a good salad. Easy to do. Then 35 grams of air popped popcorn and 15 graims of butter as a snack.

Your strategy is like many animals that fatten up during certain seasons then burn off the excess energy in other seasons. Good for you, sticking with a strategy for so many years.

 

[wired]

My wife and I were having this discussion yesterday. That first time I tried this plan when I dropped 45 lbs in two months on 1000 calories a day I went from 230 lbs to 185 . Towards the end it was a pound a day like clockwork. My then girlfriend dumped me because I told her she needed to lose some weight( didn't like her much anyway so no loss ) . Anyway I began to look at food completely differentl than I had before . It was as though I was looking at food the way an anorexic does because I was one.

1600 a day is much more reasonable. Its more difficult now because I travel for work frequently so there is more planning involved.

 

[wired]

Always thought it was funny when hearing a diet fad can make you lose "20 lbs in a week." That would be needing to burn 70,000 calories. That's like running nonstop for 18 hours a day for a week. A diet that makes you lose 10,000 calories a day when the energy you need to just lay in bed is like 2000 cal?

It is absolutely possible to lose 20 lbs in a week and it has nothing to do with calories. If you are a hundred lbs overweight, and LOT of people are that much overweight or more, and have been living on a high carb diet and your pancreas hasn't had a problem supplying enough insulin ( You're not diabetic ) to process the carbs you have been consuming into sugar your body can use then if you stop taking in carbs cold turkey and give it a few days for you're bowels to clear out you'll piss like a 20 dick dinosaur for a few days and lose 10-20 lbs of water . Guaranteed. As of this morning Ive lost over 12 lbs in 8 days not because Ive burned a crapload of calories. its just because I have reduced my carb loading and the extra water my body had been holding to process carbs into sugar went away as the insulin level dropped . My joints dont hurt any more like they did a few weeks ago and the dark circles under my eyes have disappeared. Today is pretty much what I consider the start point. NOW its calorie burning and calorie reduction that will cause further weight loass. The first week is always just water. 20 lbs? Not hard to see that at all in the first week to ten days but thats the weight that comes back in a week if you start eating excess carbs and dont actually lose fat. .

 

[Unicykle]

I do think most diets work best when starting off with an extreme change but The problem with extreme changes is they're too hard to stick to for a long term for most people so you end up doing the up-and-down roller coaster. Lifestyle changes are about the only way to keep it off. We are just animals if given the option we will take the same path that we took yesterday, tomorrow too unless that path is straight uphill. I quit drinking beer (15 years ago) and dropped around 45 pounds in two years. I got really sick for a few months a couple years ago and I had a few months recovery after that and That was a routine change and I gained 35 +pounds back. You can cut out a meal,you can drop your meal size, you can cut out fast food, you can start doing 50 push-ups and 50 sit ups in the morning and the night, You can keep track of your steps and add 2000-5000 steps a day to your average.For most people small steps are easier to stick with for long enough to make it a routine and when you start seeing improvements it makes it easier to add another small step.

 

[wired]

I do think most diets work best when starting off with an extreme change but The problem with extreme changes is they're too hard to stick to for a long term for most people so you end up doing the up-and-down roller coaster. Lifestyle changes are about the only way to keep it off. We are just animals if given the option we will take the same path that we took yesterday, tomorrow too unless that path is straight uphill. I quit drinking beer (15 years ago) and dropped around 45 pounds in two years. I got really sick for a few months a couple years ago and I had a few months recovery after that and That was a routine change and I gained 35 +pounds back. You can cut out a meal,you can drop your meal size, you can cut out fast food, you can start doing 50 push-ups and 50 sit ups in the morning and the night, You can keep track of your steps and add 2000-5000 steps a day to your average.For most people small steps are easier to stick with for long enough to make it a routine and when you start seeing improvements it makes it easier to add another small step.

I'd argue that feast or famine is how a few million years of human evolution has built humans. If you can discipline yourself to that periodic induced famine cycle youre really kind of mimicking the paleolithic human experience. I dont think thats really a bad thing.

 

[ma96782]

Aloha, Mark

 

[Unicykle]

I'd argue that feast or famine is how a few million years of human evolution has built humans. If you can discipline yourself to that periodic induced famine cycle youre really kind of mimicking the paleolithic human experience. I dont think thats really a bad thing.

That is absolutely true they also had a average lifespan of about 35 to 45 years

 

[wired]

That is absolutely true they also had a lifespan of about 35 to 45 years

That was more of a gored by mastodon and plague issue

 

[Unicykle]

That was more of a gored by mastodon and plague issue

I was just trying to point out that maybe it's healthier to maintain a healthy body than it is to do the roller coaster ride up and down of 100 pounds overweight but you have the ability to lose 20 pounds a week now and then.

 

[wired]

I was just trying to point out that maybe it's healthier to maintain a healthy body than it is to do the roller coaster ride up and down of 100 pounds overweight but you have the ability to lose 20 pounds a week now and then.

I understand your point, but I just think that your physiology is more adapted to that sort of weight gain and weight loss situation than you think it is

 

[gtivan]

Told I was a Type 2 diabetic on Sept 27
Entirely changed eating habits and avoid carbs with a passion. Especially the easy bad carbs.
Do not count calories. just eat healthy and walk dog more.
A true lifestyle change for the future.

Went from 231lbs to 205lbs and holding steady last couple of weeks
Cholesterol from 230 to 120
A1C from 7 to 6

Still some room to get better. But defenitley enjoying the health more and buying new pants in sizes i havent worn since highschool/college is kinda neat.