My current weight loss plan (I have a good feeling about this one)

[Deleted member 15778]

My Current Plan

• I use an App, and track all calories, and have a small caloric deficit to loose weight slowly (More maintainable in the long run)
• I don't use drugs or anything that will mess with my health or make me dependent
• Everything that has calories I weigh so that calories don't sneak up on me.
  • This is a habit you can get faster at, and can become routine

How I manage Hunger

• Getting good Sleep (as good as I can)
• Learning what foods fill me up. For example Cucumbers fill you up with low calories. I call these filler foods, and add them to my meals but don't make them the base of my meal.
• Making sure I meet my recommended daily amount of fat
• Making sure I meet my recommended daily amount of protein
• Staying in a small caloric deficit as oppose to a large one. Research shows that this is more sustainable in the long run. If this takes a year, it's nothing compared to weight fluctuations lasting a life time, ruining health
• Learning what foods I have a tendency to eat too many calories of, and avoiding those foods. Even some healthy foods I will over-eat.

About Calorie tracking

• How to Calorie Track
  • Use a food scale.
  • put a bowl on the scale.
  • Turn on the scale
  • Put your food on the scale.
  • Look at the grams, and enter it into your app
  • Look at the calories. If this meal will put you over your daily budget then remove some food, and re-enter the grams in your app.
  • If you want to add salad dressing or something. Press the button to zero out the scale, and then put it on. (There's other ways to measure salad dressing such as measuring by volume, but you need to accurate.
• If a food can't be measured accurately then I won't eat that food. I'll find some other food that gets me that nutrition.

• Things I've tried in the past:
  • Keto
  • Eating as little as possible
  • Intermittent fasting (1 meal a day)
  • Multiweek long water fasts
  • Eating every other day
  • Eating every third day
  • Excessive Cardio

 

[appeal]

how many cals are you planning to consume a day?

 

[Deleted member 15778]

how many cals are you planning to consume a day?

I let Chronometer calculate my calories based on the information I put in. (Weight, height, activity level)

It's around 2500 a day. I'm still a little hungry after I hit it, but it's not bad. It calculated my maintenance at 2900, but we'll see.

I will adjust my calorie intake after a month if I'm loosing too fast, too slow, or gaining weight.

 

[appeal]

any opinions on short water fast for fat loss? like 3-5 days.

 

[Deleted member 15778]

any opinions on short water fast for fat loss? like 3-5 days.

My recommendations for a fast of that length are:

• You may not have the will power. There's nothing wrong with starting with short fasts that last until mid-day, then extending them by a couple hours at a time, and slowly working your way up to multi-day fasts to get your body adjusted to fasting. That's what I did.
• For a fast that short, you probably don't have to worry about electrolytes.
• Do not consume any food, or any calories. Just drink water.
• For long fasts, maintain your normal lifting schedule so you loose minimal muscle mass. The people that say fasting doesn't burn muscle are not very smart, and haven't looked at the literature. If you don't lift heavy during a fast, your body will burn most of your muscle away.
  • Fat as many vitamins, so it's very precious to the body. White the body can easily burn muscle for fuel. So you need to tell your body that it needs it's muscles (by living heavy), or else it will burn them for fuel.
• Don't expect to loose any weight in the long run with fasting. Your appetite will go crazy the days after and you'll easily regain all the weight back, even after multi-week fasts.

 

[appeal]

points taken on board, thank you

Don't expect to loose any weight in the long run with fasting. Your appetite will go crazy the days after and you'll easily regain all the weight back, even after multi-week fasts.

do you not think it’s worth it to shed a few lbs bf quickly, assuming even you end you fast you don’t binge and stick to like 1500 cals when breaking fast, then working up to maintenance

 

[Deleted member 15778]

points taken on board, thank you


do you not think it’s worth it to shed a few lbs bf quickly, assuming even you end you fast you don’t binge and stick to like 1500 cals when breaking fast, then working up to maintenance

It never worked for me. If you measure every single calorie afterwards, for the months after the fast, and are vey diligent about staying within your calorie maintenance. Weighing all of your food.

But at that point, I think it would be easier to just be in a small deficient for a few months.

The main thing that happens on a short fast is your sleep gets messed up, this lowers your will power and makes you hungrier. It happens to almost every one who does multi-day fasts, and people report not sleeping well until about the third week of fasting.

But my general philosophy is to try everything, and see how you react to it, just be aware that this is a likely outcome, and if this happens (lowered willpower, messed up sleep, unable to stay within calorie limit afterwards, regaining of all of the weight and then some), then you know you have more options to try like a small sustained caloric deficit and measuring all your food.

 

[appeal]

It never worked for me. If you measure every single calorie afterwards, for the months after the fast, and are vey diligent about staying within your calorie maintenance. Weighing all of your food.

But at that point, I think it would be easier to just be in a small deficient for a few months.

The main thing that happens on a short fast is your sleep gets messed up, this lowers your will power and makes you hungrier. It happens to almost every one who does multi-day fasts, and people report not sleeping well until about the third week of fasting.

But my general philosophy is to try everything, and see how you react to it, just be aware that this is a likely outcome, and if this happens (lowered willpower, messed up sleep, unable to stay within calorie limit afterwards, regaining of all of the weight and then some), then you know you have more options to try like a small sustained caloric deficit and measuring all your food.

my other alternative would be maybe eating 1500 cals (not low enough lower hormones, lose potential growth, prevent muscle loss etc) of primarily protein w a bit of carbs maybe and running an hour in the morning with that. idk if this more sustainable, i can stick to the 1500, but the cardio would be the harder part to stick to for me)
i also want to lose a few lbs relatively quick in time for summer, can’t decide what the best course of action is.

 

[Deleted member 15778]

my other alternative would be maybe eating 1500 cals (not low enough lower hormones, lose potential growth, prevent muscle loss etc) of primarily protein w a bit of carbs maybe and running an hour in the morning with that. idk if this more sustainable, i can stick to the 1500, but the cardio would be the harder part to stick to for me)
i also want to lose a few lbs relatively quick in time for summer, can’t decide what the best course of action is.

I would say, forget about this summer. I've been trying to loose a few lbs quickly, for over ten years. It always rebounds and I gain even more in the months, years afterwards, even though I continue to eat healthy and exercise regularly.

Sustainability will give you a better quality life in the long run. I know it sucks measuring calories, and weighing everything. I've been looking for a way to avoid doing that for ten years, even though I've known that the best looking guys I knew had meal plans and track calories, and did bulk cut cycles.

I had a big ego, thinking I'm smart (I am), and I have high willpower, and that I could fast, or do a bunch of exercise, or find the right filling foods, or do keto, or some combination of those things to avoid the drudgery of calorie tracking, and even though I had short term success, in the long run it always backfired on me.

To be honest, I could probably be married or have a long term girlfriend now, instead of going into my 40s alone, with no one. Because I didn't take the long approach and calorie track with a small but sustained caloric deficit.