Have any of you lost significant amounts of weight?
I’ve been eating like an absolute monster since thanksgiving and have gained 35 pounds in 3 months. Former athlete and amateur bodybuilder so I know what needs to be done and how to get back in shape. Still “in shape” for general population, but for myself I’m fat. 6’3” (I grew another half inch and am rounding up), 225lbs.
I’ve spoken at length about how being in shape is as close to a cheat code that an individual themselves can use in the game of life. Interested to hear other’s experiences with personal health and fitness.
I was a college athlete, got injured and medically retired. Got into bodybuilding (600+ deadlift at 190lbs, 37 pull-ups). Gained weight senior year as I extended myself too much academically. Got in best shape of my life that next year and a half as I was lifting 3 hours a day and doing another hour of cardio 7 days a week. Sat around 200lbs after that for the next 3 years or so. Started 2022 probably around 205 and got down to 195 until thanksgiving, where I started packing on the pounds.
Was going through my old lifting spreadsheets this evening and am so far away from those weights and volume it’s laughable.
Made a new spreadsheet and gonna track my lifts / weight / cardio again. I’m not a big body weight in pounds guy, but it’s a simple metric to track. Also gonna start measuring my food again and stop eating out. Ran the numbers and I’ve spent $5k on food since Thanksgiving.
Quick math here - I'm coming out to almost $25/meal, 3 meals a day, 7 days a week to run up $5k since thanksgiving lmao.
I started munching on everything early November. I used credit card spend starting from my first November payment which was early November so thanksgiving is a bit misleading. But yeah I’ve been spending a ton, especially on dessert
Or you could just bring your wife and kids to dinner at Masa
Lost 35 pounds since Jan 2022. Basically put on bad weight during my senior HS football season and then de-prioritized fitness while grinding college applications (really stupid thinking back now). Advice is drink a ton of water, get as many steps in, lift 5x a week, incline treadmill when you can, and prioritize protein whenever possible. I'm also in college though so I have a bit more freedom in my schedule and eating habits.
I've lost a lot of weight (40+ lbs), started at a higher baseline than you, and peaked during COVID. I'm still kind of fat probably even for gen pop (I'm 6' and 210lbs, low to mid-20s PBF). What's worked for me is to eat as much protein as possible and in the cleanest form possible. Basically whenever I'm eating something, will do a quick mental calc on the protein ratio. Pure protein is 4 calories per gram and cooked chicken is probably 6-7x even with a little oil used to cook it (like at Chipotle). Protein bars range from 9-11x (Quest is the lowest, most are 10x, and some are higher). I try not to eat anything that's higher than 15x and for anything higher than 10x try to make sure the calories are smaller nominally. Protein (& fiber) also makes you feel more satiated and has a higher thermogenic index than other calories. When you lose weight, ~30% of your weight loss will be muscle mass. To avoid this, eat your lean muscle mass in protein grams and get in some lifting 3-4x a week.
Getting an Apple Watch is helpful to try to get in fitness & walking every day as it's a reminder of when you didn't do enough exercise or get in enough steps. Try to get 10K steps every day and 30min-1.5hrs of exercise (mix of lifting and cardio) 3-4x/wk. If you work in finance and you get a meal budget, make an effort to pick up your food vs getting delivery regardless of how busy you are. Your blood sugar is more regulated when you go for a walk before or after your meal so you won't experience a spike to the point you get hungry later.
If you are ready to be really hardcore, recommend logging meals in an app like MFP or LoseIt. It's pretty easy to do if you limit your food intake to 1-2 meals per day. It sucks for a week or so to feel hungry but then you get used to it. Same thing with food taste. Once you cut back on real sugar for a few weeks, anything sweet or overly buttery/oily tastes weird. I more or less eat Chipotle or Sweetgreen for every meal and normally only eat dinner. If I go out to restaurants, I just order the chicken entree and avoid eating the carbs or starches that are sides and don't eat desserts. If you sacrifice on food during the week, you can still grab a few beers on weekends while losing weight.
Ways to kill hunger: Nicotine (Vaping, Zyn), drink at least 0.5oz/lb of water throughout the day, and drink black coffee (and if you don't like the taste you can get sugar-free vanilla at Starbucks that's 0 calories) in the morning. I know someone who will drink pre-workout every morning (1 scoop so the caffeine is similar to coffee and not going to make your heart explode). Would avoid caffeine after 2-3 pm at the latest. Poor sleep makes it hard to eat well and you'll want to revert to old habits.
The good news is you are in a better position than I am starting off so should take a lot less time for you to get to your goals.
This just isn't true. There are ways to keep muscle when losing weight. They include engaging the muscles and having enough protein to maintain the muscles. If you're doing a straight up fast, this might be true, but it largely depends on body composition.
Here's unsolicited advice from someone who has lost 75 pounds- just calorie in-calorie out it. Attempting to burn off 35 pounds via exercise is an admirable goal, but it's easier to restrict calories and then gain back muscle later on. For example, keeping calories under 1500 for a day saves you 500 calories by not eating (hello, unnecessary snacking), while running 3 miles might hit 340-350 calories at a 10 min/mile pace.
For most non athletes, the choice between diet and exercise is obviously to go with diet, tacking on exercise as an extra. Maybe that's not you, but for most people, that is the best way forward.
This. My father lost a bit more than you after a near fatal cardiac event over a 2 year span, never touched a weight, just calories in calories out and lots of walking around the neighborhood. Obviously if you exercise on top of keeping calories and quality dialed that's good but my experience is that it's 80%+ diet
A little intense but look into PSMF - protein sparing modified fast. You eat 800 calories a day - all protein. You'll retain your muscle and lose 3-4 pounds of pure FAT per week.
Not for the faint of heart though and will probably need additional supplementation like the EC stack to wear off the hunger pangs.
What others here have said is right - it is just calories in, calories out. PSMF just gets you there as fast as possible (assuming you can sustain it).
Lifting has its ebbs and flows. We aren't in HS/College anymore, much harder to stay on track when you have socials and a real job. I lost like 25-30ish lbs as I shifted my focus on getting a job and finishing out school.
Once I move into the city, I'm hoping to get back to some structure. 3-4x a week training then 3-4 miles a week running, I've managed to stay quite lean through diet alone but lost a bit of muscle and numbers have dropped significantly (315 bench to 205, 180lbs bw to 150lbs, etc.). Most of this stuff I just dont care about anymore though, I just wanna be lean, be good at pullups, run 5-6min miles and enjoy life. Being "strong" and jacked is far too much maintenance for what I'm willing to put up with nowadays
Right there with ya bud. Schedule is way too packed to dedicate enough time for an intense routine. I'm aiming the same as you, about 4 days of training and 1 day of cardio. I was super skinny back in college and was able to put on some serious muscle over the last 7 to 8 years about 30 pounds, plus covid gave me some more time to workout. But the holidays this time around really had me put on some weight, not 35 pounds about 10 pounds so still eager to drop that weight.
You sound like someone that was housing food and calories to keep up with your athletic endeavors (that much gym time and cardio at your height would require significant calories to build muscle), but after that activity stopped you didnt taper your diet as much as you should.
IMO this sounds like a diet thing more than activity piece. What does your weekly meal set look like? If you are truly eating clean then you will find it is very difficult to gain that much weight without just absolutely gorging
I'm 100% sure that this isn't what you should do, but commenting in case anyone was like me: I was morbidly obese and I got Weight Loss Surgery. Best health decision of my entire life, hard stop. I've lost 110 lbs so far and would do it again in a heartbeat. Gave me the tool I needed to lose weight and not feel that clawing hunger that plauged me all the time.
Calories in and calories out is the only way it works, and diet accounts for 90+% of weight loss. You can exercise an hour more, or you can eat one less cookie--one off those is much better than the other for professionals like us, who's free time is crazy valuable.
Very happy for you man. I really hope one day we get to a point where we can hack our metabolisms to run faster. Some people are absurdly blessed (i.e. they burn 2500 calories a day with 0 exercise) while others are the exact opposite (burning 1700 calories with no exercise). I've seen guys who could put away a lot of crap and still have a six pack while others brutally suffer off protein bars and egg whites and still can't achieve the same
Whatever works for you that is safe and you can sustain LT is what matters
yeah you're workout plan is just not sustainable IRL. i was skinny fat, started cooking/eating only at restaurants with macro breakdowns and pulled together a plan that helped me be in a deficit while building muscle with 4 lifts a week plus I was walking about 6 miles a day. i also limited myself to 3 drinks a week. took about 3 months to make significant changes, now I'm in maintenance mode and lift 2x a week wahoo
Absolutely - 1 year ago got fucked up in an accident, prior injury stats are 6'5", 230, around 15%(visible abs though not shredded by any means).
Over next 6 months got pretty fat, stopped lifting apart from physio, mainly just a decline in body composition, got up to around 255. Last 6 months I've gotten my ass back in gear, 236 as of today, strength on main lifts at or above baseline.
Main things I did to lose weight were firstly working out again - especially since you're not some lifetime fatass, muscle memory, it comes back like 5x as fast as gaining the first time.
Practical tips: Eat all your protein first - I do ~2.5 lbs of meat (steak/chicken/pork/tuna) and I make sure to eat all of that first. Most lean meats are around 5cals/gram of protons, so if you're eating around 2lbs of meat, that's going to be about 200grams of protein, and about 1000 cals (rough estimate). After that shit, basically eat whatever you want - there's almost no way you can gluttonize to such a degree that you'll gain weight after being so satiated from all that protein.
Secondly, doing some form of intermittent fasting definitely helps purely from reducing cravings - I've done the 6x per day meal bs and I'm sure if you have too you know that despite eating all the time you're way more hungry in general - if you shorten that to like 3 meals in 6 hours daily, after a few days you get used to it and cravings go way down.
Finally, probably best tip is, especially if you don't want to fuck with any of this other shit, just fast 1 day a week. I do every Thursday to like reward myself on the weekend. Just by doing that, if you're eating like 3500 cals/day, that's already equivalent to like a 600 cal daily deficit, which isn't insignificant at all.
In summary: Eat all your protein first (obvi some sauces or whatever are fine), IF helps, not with weight loss directly but definitely does with reducing cravings, and finally, I fast 1 day per week because I like to gluttonize on the other days. (Don't eat from Wednesday dinner till Friday breakfast).
Were you in banking? How'd you find the time for 3 hours a day lol
I lost ~80lbs (~230 -> ~150) over ~1.5 years by literally outrunning a bad diet. I worked up to running 25-35 miles per week by mostly run commuting (to, from, or both, 4.5mi away). It was never “hard” to lose weight when burning 600-1200+ calories per day.
F$&@ing badass. Congratulations!
I lost 40lb though this was over the course of 5yrs and probably 30-40% was muscle. Regardless you can safely lose 2lb a week max if you're not obese (realistically for most that will be 1lb a week). If you're planning to lose 40lb, you could likely do it 6 months with strong effort
I get you though because I gained 40lb my senior year (60% fat / 40% muscle would be my guess). Never doing that again, I never want to go through bulk & cut cycles that way at this point in my life. Just want to get to a healthy 160-165lb with 11-12% body fat (5 ft / 10in). I'm actually around 168lb right now, so it's mostly recomp at this point. I'm hoping to get to this goal by end of year -- won't be easy but it is doable
two things:
1. calories-in / calories-out
2. quality of food when on calories-in / calories-out
maybe you eat a small chocolate of ~ 100 calories and you may say, oh well, that's it. but it goes way deeper than that. eating sugar/carbohydrates raises your insulin and once it drops your body looks for more of it thus temptations may appear. if you try to resist those temptations you just end up emptying your energy reserves during the day and at night or when some stress/anxiety kicks in you'll surrender to fatty foods/sugars/extra calories. Repeat that often and you could easily add 10 lbs every 2 months.
some foods such as coffee also accelerate the metabolism = increasing adrenaline, and you'll inhale/exhalate more often or in larger quantities (losing weight is done strictly through exhalation, btw). also, if you do intellectual things during the day you could also lose a lot of weight (I've read that chess professionals could burn 1k-2k calories in only 1 professional chess match which could go for 4 - 12 hours because the brain needs as much as energy as the rest of the body)
I pursued a turtle path in terms of losing weight, and I've gone from 30% body fat to 18% without really putting effort and just adding/subtracting small lifestyle changes during past years
important, plan for the long-term, and don't overwhelm yourself or try to do too much at once.
When I was younger I was somewhere around 205+, maybe 5 feet tall at best. The consummate fat kid growing up, even with playing a bunch of different sports - activity, oddly, wasn't really the issue for the most part.
Starting in high school I got more serious about turning thing around, started to workout a bit. That's when I discovered that while it sounds alluring, if weight loss is your goal a "smoothie" from the gym post workout often does more harm than good, although peanut butter, banana, and strawberry is still delicious.
College the weight loss continued, but a lot of peaks and valleys once alcohol started to enter the mix. By my senior year I'd largely shed the weight, and by the end of college was in really good shape - although at the time, I always considered myself 'fat' no matter what. What's interesting is that I largely lost weight through sheer force of will - 2 hour workouts, lots of running, biking, constant movement. Probably the last time in my life where I had enough time to outwork a diet that consisted of alcohol, more alcohol, and then alcohol for dessert with a few carbs and protein mixed in. Fortunately, I built a base that I could at least come back to when necessary.
After I graduated, it was stop and start for maybe five years - I never got 'fat' again - but had periods where my weight would fluctuate up 10 pounds or so until I started to reel it back in. This is mostly diet, lack of exercise prioritization, and overall caring more about 'going out' than my own fitness. It's just easier to eat Chinese food at your desk for lunch, hit a happy hour, and then go out on the weekends. I'd go a few months where fitness was priority, get it back, then go lax again. Basically my weight was in the 20 pound range for a decade or so. For much of this, I made lots of excuses - oh I don't have time, oh I'll do it tomorrow, oh I can just 'out work' the ice cream. Realistically, my relationship with food and my body was not healthy which creates all sorts of issues. I also committed the sin of not being honest about the calories I'm eating vs. expending - I'd eat, eat, eat as if I'm working out a lot (sometimes to fuel my workouts!) then they wouldn't happen. What a surprise that Pizza looks better in the box than on my body.
Oddly, I somewhat thank COVID for helping me get over the edge on this - the last few years have been fantastic for my health and fitness. Not having the crutch of a gym forced me to re-think how I worked out - creating some home gym options, forcing myself to be disciplined and more consistent. Knowing that it's OK to only do a 30 minute workout. Dialing back how I ate and what I ate - not restricting myself, limiting the damage when I do go wild. Really it became what I always wanted it to, my anchor that helps to deal with stress, anxiety, and anything else that comes my way.
I have struggled with weight loss. I control diet and can do OMAD and intermittent fasting. Weightlifting helps a bit. Running does little to help honestly.
Losing weight is very difficult to do for a lot of people. I am a much older monkey and it seems like losing weight has become even more difficult. It is so much easier to gain weight than to lose weight. I would like to lose about 10 pounds but I do not have the discipline to get there quickly. Over the past few years I have put on 25 pounds but part of this is due to muscle gain but not all. Over this period, I have basically doubled my protein consumption and I think this may have contributed to the weight gain. My issue is mainly eating after dinner, which I know is the worst time to eat. I am trying by reducing mostly worthless foods like pretzels and popcorn and replacing it with protein bars or vegetable snacks. With that said, sitting down with a bag of pop corn is much more enjoyable than lounging with a bag of pea pods, haha. I know these type of substitutions can work but it is not easy.
I've found the easiest way to cut is to get cycling or indoor cycling. It's easy just to put on a show and zone out for 3 or 4 hours to cut. Most I've ever ridden indoors is 8.5hrs for a distance of 170mi at 20mph. That ride was insane. I had like 10 smoothies (pictured below).
Temp an icy 65
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