Forums » Smalltalk » Shedding some pounds

The past year I've lost approximately 20 kilograms / 44 pounds. I'm not happy with the way it happened, as it was mainly due to health issues and other things that went on. Even though it wasn't planned I've noticed a big difference in my body that encouraged me to proactively lose weight. So I've started doing just that.

I'm at a high risk for diabetes as it occurs in both sides of the family, which is actually the biggest reason why I want to knock another 20 kilos off. It will benefit my future health if I shed these pounds now rather than later!

No, I'm not going on a special diet or doing special exercises. I just eat what I'd normally eat and adjust the portion sizes so I'm not consuming too many calories in one meal. So yes, I can technically eat a pizza as long as the portion is right. I do make an effort to cook better, using vegetable oil and trying to avoid deep-frying my food. It usually tastes just as fine when it comes out of the oven with a dash of vegetable oil!

I've started using a site (also a mobile app for that site) to monitor what I eat and how much I exercise. You can find my profile here:

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/daftthoughts

And for people who friended me on the site, my food diary is here:

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/food/diary/daftthoughts

I was actually hoping if someone else around here is trying to gain or lose weight (either one works!) and wants to buddy up with me on this. Together it's much more fun and encouraging! The site's calculations and recommended settings also ensure that you're not gaining or losing weight unhealthily fast, and will let you know if your food intake is too high or low.

The best part? It will calculate your net calories intake. My maximum 'allowed' calories intake is set at 1840 kilocalories a day (keeping in mind that I'm aiming to lose 1.5 pounds a day!). If I ate breakfast worth at 500 calories, and then exercise worth 300, it will automatically fix my net calories to 200. So exercising cancels out consumed calories in their math.

Who's in?

Wow, Sanne! That's really awesome! While I can't say that I want to really gain/lose weight, (besides growing, of course. ) you do have my full support. I wish you the best of luck in this endeavor!


Cheers,

~Oaky

Aww, thank you Oaky!!

So far I've been doing well, but it'd be awesome if others can join me.

Oooh, if only you'd asked a month or two ago. I had been trying to gain weight for about 7 months out of last year. I managed to gain about a pound and a half, and have finally given up until I can get some other health concerns taken care of.

I knew you'd been making progress, but seeing it laid out like that is really amazing! I just want to make sure to stop and congratulate you on your efforts. Adjusting habits can be very very difficult, especially when it comes to the deliciousness of food -- and even though it's often just as good, it can take awhile to convince yourself of that, especially if you are spending a lot of time with people who don't want to change.

Wow... congratulations! I need to lose a bucket of weight, but the odds are stacked up against me. I take a medication and have a particular condition that both make it more difficult to shed fat, and I happen to have exercise-induced asthma. (I didn't even know that was a think. Dammit!) It's been an uphill battle and all I've managed to do is keep my weight mostly steady. I think I could afford to lose 30 kilos, but with weight lifting as well I honestly have no idea what my target weight is. So yeah... I've been trying, but not too hard, since I am trying to piece together a new, reasonable plan for the new year.

How is that website working out for you? I think it'd help me a lot to use something like that to track my intake and stuff.

Congratulations, by the way! And good luck in future months!

I'll probably be doing this for a while to come. When your health is back on track, we can work on this together!

Thank you. I have to admit with how the past year's been for me, my habit has been losing weight in unhealthy ways. I don't really feel like I shouldn't eat delicious things, just that I should eat less and control any urges to pig out rather than enjoy a normal portion. Admittedly, it's taken the better part of my life to finally come to terms with the fact I'm genetically inclined to put on weight faster than lose it, as opposed to my underweight sister. (Funnily enough, she's fighting really hard to put on weight and just can't seem to get it done.)

Medicinal induced weight gain is the absolute worst. I'm sorry! My neighbor's kid has the same problem and the only way he lost weight was not through dieting or activities, but to stop the medication. (It was for allergies, he's fine without them now for most part)

As for exercise, have you tried doing more simple things like taking (long) walks or going swimming? Not all exercise has to push you to the limit, you don't need to be sweating buckets or anything. You can burn a lot of calories doing just chores.

Another good exercise is yoga. It combines breathing techniques with muscle stretching, which helps burn calories too. If asthma is an issue this might be an excellent solution to exercise problems!

The site is working wonderfully for me! I read that my 1840 calories is not something I should stay below, but actually have to eat up. If I lose 300 through exercise, I need to eat those 300 again too. It has something to do with keeping your metabolism active and preventing it from going into 'starvation mode', which means it'll preserve your energy and store fat immediately when you have any.

This post explains some things on the matter. As for your struggle with losing weight, this might help too. Since a lot of it seems to be your medication I'm not sure how much it can help, but a read-over can't hurt.

And thank you for the encouragement.

Might not hurt to add that while I do have a goal weight, I'm focusing mostly on looks. I took this picture in December. My weight loss actively started around May 2012, so I achieved this in about 7 months:

Thanks for the tips! Thankfully I've managed to keep my weight stable for about a year or two. (It shot up 30 pounds when I started weightlifting for bulk--muscle mass.) Currently I'm 5'4" and 215-220 pounds. I really can't stop the medication, alas... and even if I did, I still have the condition. It's a one-two punch. But that stuff about forcing yourself to eat your daily calories is actually really fascinating... I think that might be one of my problems. There are days when I get a ton of calories, and days when I get almost none. I thought starvation mode required eating crazy few calories, like 500. (Though there are certainly days when I get that few.) It seems so counterintuitive! Forcing yourself to eat to lose weight!

I think I'm an exercise skeptic... I feel like walking is better than sitting, but won't really do much in the long run. Unless you're walking for hours. XP But EVERYTHING is better than sitting. I'm skeptical about yoga, too, but the stretching alone is probably crazy good for you. (The more muscle mass you build, the more you SHOULD be stretching. My partner Redbeard has been lifting for years but never stretches, and he can't even crouch he's so inflexible.)

I see you also can't hide your sex on MFP, so I probably won't be making use of it. But I got my daily calorie goal, so I'll try to stick to that and track my intake myself! But I can hide my whole profile! Okay! I mean, it comes down to things I KNOW I need to do... eat more fruits and veggies. Don't sit around all day. Cook food instead of eat out. Write every meal down. It's just an issue of actually doing it.

Yep! Eating your calories (carbs, and fats, and sugars) keeps your metabolism working. There's a story on MFP that explains how a lady consumed only 500-700 calories a day, low-fat, little to no carbs, and she just wasn't losing a single damn pound. She went on 'binges' with eating 3-4 cookies occasionally and gained weight, even though she was barely at 1200 calories for that day.

Turns out that by consuming too little calories, her metabolism had halted and was reserving and storing as much energy as possible. She needed to increase her calorie intake with carbs and other things she avoided in order to kickstart her metabolism again. If you don't eat carbs and fats, your metabolism will slow down, eventually making it more difficult to lose weight. It's why a lot of diets suddenly stall your weight loss.

I understand your skepticism about exercise, especially because I feel/felt the same. But it does help a LOT, even if it feels like it doesn't. Taking a daily 30 minute walk with the dog at a moderate pace allows me to eat more, for one. For second, I can tell after just one week of walking my sister's dog regularly that my overall fitness is better. I can run short distances without my tongue dragging across the floor, whereas previously even a short 50 meter run was pushing it.

Exercise also builds muscles, and muscles burn fat a lot quicker when they're built. This also aides your metabolism big time since it will work harder to process the calories to cater to the muscles' usage.

I'm counting household chores to activities, by the by.

• Washing dishes - 60 minutes - 100 calories
• Vacuuming - 60 minutes - 245 calories
• Mopping floors - 60 minutes - 224 calories

The amount of calories burned varies per person. Weight plays a factor in this, and different sites give different estimates. But it shows that you don't need to hit the gym to get some exercise in. A lot of people forget that you can really work up a sweat doing something as simple as mopping the floors!

Something that is important to note though is to get a calorie intake advice based on your height, weight and activity levels. A lot of diet advice centers around the average, but it may not apply to you. Your physical sex may also play a role in it. (Women on their periods usually add 2-4 pounds of water weight for example, and men have an easier time building muscle and burning fat because their metabolism and hormone levels are different) The average consumption a day is 2,000 calories for women. But hey, most women are about 5'6" on average. I'm 6'1", my regular calorie consumption lies around 2,500 a day!

And yes, getting up and doing it is the most difficult thing. Sticking to it after a while when it feels tedious is also hard. But it helps to have someone to do it with. My fiance wants to convert most of his body fat into muscle, so he's monitoring his intake and exercise somewhat too. It's a motivation to me since I don't feel alone in it.

And that's why I posted this too. I'd love to friend you on MFP and encourage and help you and anyone else who wants to do this.

Wow Sanne, congrats on loosing weight! It's really good that you made the decision to lose it in a healthy way I hope you meet your goal soon!

I am under the impression that this varies by what your average caloric intake is, and what your average has been over years, and what your mother's average was. Lots of sudden changes from what's "normal" just make your body assume something weird is going on out there! So you have to find your healthy normal and stick with it like crazy.

Also genes.

Regardless of your height and average intake (even if you're short), if you consume less than 1200 minimum a day it's really not good for your health and kicks most people's bodies into starvation mode. On the MFP forums, 1200 is what everyone recommends regardless of how short and active you are.

Of course, the taller you are, the more calories you can afford to eat. 1200 would be pushing it to the absolute max for me.


Thank you! Healthy way is the best way.