Weight loss support thread

[Iron Jaguar]

You could also think of it like unsaturated fat = good, saturated fat = depends, trans fat = bad

You could....but you'd be wrong.

It's hard, fellow fatties. I'm in the gym, doing the work. My relationship with food is still fucked though. That's the one barrier I can't break and makes this an almost futile effort. Any tips on overcoming food addiction?

The gym work plays a very small role, as you obviously realise. Which foods do you like to eat? What are you struggling with?

 

[Overly Serious]

My BMI says I'm overweight, and while I have some fat, there isn't much excess. So I am not sure.

Lot of good advice already but I didn't see anyone specifically address this. BMI is a very rough tool. My BMI when I was in my twenties suggested I was a podgy bastard but it was because I did weight training and had a passable amount of muscle. Not Hercules by any stretch but enough that BMI could be misleading. A better tool would be measuring things like your waist to hip ratio and seeing what it is. Less than 1? Good start. More than 1? Room for improvement.

If you're not very muscular then yes, your BMI of 28 means you're fat. But don't take BMI as gospel. This guy (just searched up his stats) at this point in his life, had a BMI slightly higher than yours:


Maybe you look like this for all we know! How healthy do you feel is the most important question, like @cactus said. If you're eating as little as you say I'd be surprised you're plateauing. That's not much.

 

[argopilled]

I weigh 355lbs. I plan on doing weekly weigh-ins and really focusing on water intake and hitting the gym whenever possible.

349.8lbs. Obviously mostly water weight but no alcohol and i've been trying to watch my calories. I need to working on actually tracking calories and getting to the gym.

 

[Señora Airi]

349.8lbs. Obviously mostly water weight but no alcohol and i've been trying to watch my calories. I need to working on actually tracking calories and getting to the gym.

314.4 from 315 at Sunday of last week. What has helped me going to the gym consistently the past week or so, was forcing myself to drive there and just do some form of workout. Even if it's a small shitty workout, it's far better than just sitting on the couch.

 

[HTTP Error 404]

Going to have to find a new gym. Planet Fitness, which I hadn't gotten around to actually going to yet but had a black card membership for a few months (long story), apparently couldn't figure out how to take money out of my bank account. A week early.

So having tried to take money out early, which was absolutely fine to do, and failing, they sent me a text, which I ignored because they're stupid and it's like the 7th similar text I've gotten from them. Looking back, every month they failed to take directly out of my savings and had to use my "backup payment" -- credit card.

Supremely fucking weird thing all around. I knew something was fucked when their application to join was like 5 pages of hyper-small IRS-form like paperwork. I had always heard they were faggots but jesus christ. I now know they wanted the savings account direct debit instead of a card becuase there are many many ways to cut their asses off if you're paying through a card, but if they're taking it from bank transfer they get their money and you can get fucked.

Anyway, long story short, they tried to take money out a week early, failed, then sent me to collections within like 48 hours of them not being able to figure out payment processors. Apparently they own their own collection's agency, cause I got a nice polite email from Planet Fitness warning me that I was delinquent, I needed to sign up for a special naughty boy website (owed and operated by Planet Fitness), and pay what I owe them. And then they had a big long blurb in 4 px font at the bottom saying "Yes, this is a collection's agency. This serves as your notice that within 30 days we'll fuck you over as hard was we can. yadda yadda."

So I paid up. They charged me like $20 to cancel -- apparently I got away easy, usually they charge you like $75 to get away -- and $10 for a late fee and $25 for the month. But I'm out clean and as far as I can tell they didn't actually ding my credit. And now I need to find a new gym.

 

[Overly Serious]

To the people who like to post weights taken from a weigh-in one morning, I just want to suggest that people instead focus on an average weight over the course of a week as their minimum. It's easy enough to do if you're using an app to record your weight each morning and still pretty trivial if you're just writing your morning weigh-in on a bit of paper.

Especially for small changes, it's of far greater worth to say "my average weight for this past seven days is lower than my average weight for the previous seven days", than it is to say "I'm 2lbs lighter from yesterday". To the point I'd say the latter can actually do more harm than good.

 

[Eternal Struggler]

I just want to suggest that people instead focus on an average weight over the course of a week as their minimum.

I personally weigh-in every weekend, but I tend to forget or be distracted. Honestly, doing it daily and averaging is a good idea, helps keep the habit going.

In my case I'm always above 80 KG recently (~175lbs), I managed to shave off some weight by going back to jogging at least once a week, and cutting hard on carbs in meals (instead eating more meat and some vegetables). It's not too hard, I love meat. Might go under 80 this summer, hopefully.

Maybe this was discussed previously, but how do you fellow kiwis eat your vegetables? Do you boil them, stir fry them? Any nice recipes?

 

[WardTrangler]

I cook my primary meat dish, whatever it may be, chop it up finely, then stir fry frozen mixed vegetables in with it and its juices.

Celery, carrots, onions, tomato and lettuce are my go to salad veggies and those are eaten raw. Generally with a can of tuna and salt/pepper mixed in, no mayo/dressing.

Broccoli, celery, carrots, onions in homemade stews/soups.

Boiled corn on the cob. It tastes better with butter and salt, but I tend to skip that as it’s messier and the butter’s main value is just binding the salt onto the corn imo.

Raw carrots by themselves I eat purely to satisfy the mental food cravings, I don’t find them pleasant as a solo food (same for things like snap peas).

 

[lIllllIiiiiLLLLiiiiIIIIll]

Has Null ever visited this thread?

 

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I've been doing salads lately. 50%/50% spring mix/spinach I think? I'd have to look. Basically grab a handful, toss it in a bowl, toss a few cherry tomatoes / baby carrots, and if I'm feeling hungry, a can of tuna. Been using various salad dressings but I might be working those out of my system, the tuna water works pretty good on it's own for that. Half-Salt / and some form of Pepper sound good to add to the mix.

I have a veggie mix from the local store I like, several actually -- Costco has "Stir Fry Veggies" in giant 10-15 pound bags which are nice. Krogers has "Fajita Mix" which is basically bell peppers + onions. Recipe machine suggested broccoli with some italian mix + red pepper after being sprayed down a bit with avocado oil, and adding, well, Fajita seasoning to the Fajita mix, cooking both in the oven, and partitioning them out. Might give that another try, it was a lot of work for not much gain.

 

[Overly Serious]

Maybe this was discussed previously, but how do you fellow kiwis eat your vegetables? Do you boil them, stir fry them? Any nice recipes?

Depends what it is. I tend to like raw vegetables or if cooked, just briefly and rapidly boiled - like 2mins in boiling water with some broccoli. And if I'm being fancy and have guests, blanch it in ice water immediately after boiling.

Or things like using crisp lettuce as a wrap around a burger instead of bread. It's delicious with some condiments. You want tasty protein with low carbs? Lettuce wraps are a good casual way to do it.

Veg is important. The fibre makes a lot more difference than people realise and there are gut bacteria which help weight loss that depend on you eating veg. But I get most of it from cold salads or blanched. The only cooking of veg I do is in the very occasional stir fry or roast vegetables like parsnips, potatoes, etc. Properly roasted veg is delicious. Boiled and fried just cannot compete.

 

[Iron Jaguar]

Or things like using crisp lettuce as a wrap around a burger instead of bread

Hell yes. Some time ago I tried a lettuce-wrapped ("bare", they call it) burger from a somewhat upscale burger chain - it was a revelation. You truly taste the meat, and the cheese, and the sauce, and the onions, with no sugar-laden bun diluting those flavours. It was so much better that I've never gone back to eating normal burgers again.

 

[Overly Serious]

Hell yes. Some time ago I tried a lettuce-wrapped ("bare", they call it) burger from a somewhat upscale burger chain - it was a revelation. You truly taste the meat, and the cheese, and the sauce, and the onions, with no sugar-laden bun diluting those flavours. It was so much better that I've never gone back to eating normal burgers again.

Yep - it's genuinely really nice. Especially with really crisp fresh lettuce.

And especially as so many places (in Bongland) now seem to only do burgers with fucking Brioche buns which are mind-bogglingly awful as burger buns.

 

[Imp]

I've been making my own vinaigrette dressing for salads that I have 6x/week. Sundays are pizza night and I can eat only one slice down from 2-3. Tirzepatide is making it semi difficult to eat at all some times so I am thinking of reducing my weekly dose.

Recipe (not my original)
3/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
2 T honey (I use raw or local raw)
1 T whole grain mustard
1 clove garlic minced (I cheat and use jarred - don't @ me)
1 tsp salt
1 tsp black pepper

whisk together
I use the whisk attachment on my hand mixer and over-whisk so it stays mixed. I don't like pouring most of the oil onto my salad before I get any vinegar or other ingredients. I also double the mix most times because my mom uses so much that a single sized batch seems to be used up in a day and a half.

Salads are romaine, green or red bell pepper, red onion, celery, sliced green olives and tomatoes. Sometimes raw broccoli. I dislike carrots, spinach (for the texture), and cucumbers. On days when I'm low on calories I add feta cheese.

I have a couple bags of different kinds of mustard seeds to make my own whole grain mustard but I haven't tried to yet. Yeah I'm a lazy bastard.

 

[Señora Airi]

Going to have to find a new gym. Planet Fitness, which I hadn't gotten around to actually going to yet but had a black card membership for a few months (long story), apparently couldn't figure out how to take money out of my bank account. A week early.

So having tried to take money out early, which was absolutely fine to do, and failing, they sent me a text, which I ignored because they're stupid and it's like the 7th similar text I've gotten from them. Looking back, every month they failed to take directly out of my savings and had to use my "backup payment" -- credit card.

Supremely fucking weird thing all around. I knew something was fucked when their application to join was like 5 pages of hyper-small IRS-form like paperwork. I had always heard they were faggots but jesus christ. I now know they wanted the savings account direct debit instead of a card becuase there are many many ways to cut their asses off if you're paying through a card, but if they're taking it from bank transfer they get their money and you can get fucked.

Anyway, long story short, they tried to take money out a week early, failed, then sent me to collections within like 48 hours of them not being able to figure out payment processors. Apparently they own their own collection's agency, cause I got a nice polite email from Planet Fitness warning me that I was delinquent, I needed to sign up for a special naughty boy website (owed and operated by Planet Fitness), and pay what I owe them. And then they had a big long blurb in 4 px font at the bottom saying "Yes, this is a collection's agency. This serves as your notice that within 30 days we'll fuck you over as hard was we can. yadda yadda."

So I paid up. They charged me like $20 to cancel -- apparently I got away easy, usually they charge you like $75 to get away -- and $10 for a late fee and $25 for the month. But I'm out clean and as far as I can tell they didn't actually ding my credit. And now I need to find a new gym.

It's better to find a more local gym anyways since they'll more often than not have a better selection of freeweights.

Maybe this was discussed previously, but how do you fellow kiwis eat your vegetables? Do you boil them, stir fry them? Any nice recipes?

Either spinach or spring mix with balsamic vinegar, grabbing bags of frozen veggies and mixing that in with whatever meat I'm using for meal prep, use veggies in a soup, and I'll occasionally pan fry some cabbage if the Piggly Wiggly has a decent looking cabbage selection.

 

[8reallybigbirds]

Let me share some things that have helped me! For some context I was not hugely overweight, 190lbs was my max. I am a little tall for a lady too, so my bmi was just barely in the obese range. But I lost 40lbs in the last year and hit my goal weight and most importantly I got rid of my stubborn double chin. I fucking hated having that.
Diet matters more than anything!!! You can pump iron at the gym all day long but if you go home and eat it all back it was for nothing. You will be hungry sometimes, get used to it.
Anyways I got really caught up in the calorie counting thing, and yes calories in calories out is true, but you don't always have to be so precise with it. What helped me the most was first of all reading this very interesting book "Catching Fire" by Richard Wrangham. In addition to the very neat history of how our diets have changed how we've evolved, the book also goes over some studies about raw food diets. I don't remember all the nitty gritty but the basic takeaway is that the more raw food you eat, the more weight you lose. This is because cooking the food causes some chemical processes that almost pre-digest it for you, making the starches and sugars and especially the proteins more easily accessible for your gut. If you eat the food raw, the digestion process in your stomach actually burns away most of the calories, leaving not much left behind to get stored as fat.
Your daily nutrition also plays a huge role. Listen, you have to be pooping minimum once a day. You also want to be paying attention to the texture and size of your bowel movements and how long you're sitting on the toilet. I'm not kidding, I know it's gross, but it's important. Basically you want to be hydrated enough that your bowels are properly lubricated and you should be eating enough fiber that it's all pretty much one long smooth log. It shouldn't take you more than 5 minutes on the toilet to be done. Any longer, and your body is not functioning at peak. I LOATHE keto for this reason, eating mostly protein is terrible for your system in the long run. Colon cancer is on the rise for young people. It's time to get serious about this... well shit. For all kinds of health reasons I tell people all the time, fiber, fiber, and more fiber. Not to sound like the vegan teacher here but eat your fucking vegetables. Which leads me to portion sizes. When you're making your dinner plate you should strive for at least 75% of what you see on that plate to be vegetables. The rest meat and IF YOU MUST some grains. Quinoa is a favorite of mine.
Also, skip breakfast. Allow yourself a coffee and water, the caffeine will also help suppress appetite. For lunch keep it light. Some raw veggies or fruits to snack on, maybe some lunch meats. Stay farrrrrr away from carbs until you're at your goal. It'll set you back very fast.
I didn't even work out that much over my weight loss journey, just a couple yoga classes and a few miles walk every week.
You can do it!!

 

[Iron Jaguar]

Diet matters more than anything!!! You can pump iron at the gym all day long but if you go home and eat it all back it was for nothing. You will be hungry sometimes, get used to it.

Correct.

Colon cancer is on the rise for young people

That's because of the garbage they eat, which is full of seed oils, HFCS and glyphosate. Plus, they engage in sexual activities that cause cancer.

Stay farrrrrr away from carbs until you're at your goal.

Correct, and the most important thing overweight people need to understand.

Listen, you have to be pooping minimum once a day.

People on a very low carb/carnivore diet probably won't go that often. Meat is largely digested before it even reaches the colon, so there really isn't that much to come out.

 

[8reallybigbirds]

Plus, they engage in sexual activities that cause cancer.

What kind of sexual activities cause.... actually nevermind I don't want to know.

People on a very low carb/carnivore diet probably won't go that often. Meat is largely digested before it even reaches the colon, so there really isn't that much to come out.

Right, which is why I said I really dislike keto/carnivore whatever you want to call it. I just personally feel like it's very unhealthy.

 

[Ultrapenguin]

Diet matters more than anything!!! You can pump iron at the gym all day long but if you go home and eat it all back it was for nothing. You will be hungry sometimes, get used to it.

Indeed, the fats will attempt to lose weight by going to the gym and spending some time on the elliptical or w/e, and that's going to do almost nothing vs. diet modification. Burning off calories is a lot harder than not consuming them to begin with.
Not being fat really isn't that difficult, I think a lot of people struggle simply by having absorbed bad eating habits and having no frame of reference for what a sane diet looks like. Just because they put this shit on the shelf at the grocery store doesn't mean humans should actually be eating it.

People probably eat too often as well, I especially don't really believe people need to eat breakfast. Maybe that was necessary in a time when people had fewer calories available and lived much more active lifestyles, but that's not today.

I think if people tried limiting the period in which they eat they might find they feel a lot better; one's energy levels will be a lot higher if they get used to putting off eating until later in the day. If someone can limit the period they eat to between 3-9, or 5-12, it will most likely benefit them in a lot more ways than just cutting weight.

Basically you don't eat as much and you eat less calorically dense things, avoid carbs or sugars, and it will cause you to lose weight. Groundbreaking.

 

[Iron Jaguar]

I just personally feel like

Ok. But your feelings are just that.

I think a lot of people struggle simply by having absorbed bad eating habits and having no frame of reference for what a sane diet looks like. Just because they put this shit on the shelf at the grocery store doesn't mean humans should actually be eating it.

People probably eat too often as well

Absolutely correct. People too much, of the wrong things, too often.