I have been posting, commenting, and especially lurking on this sub for probably about 3 months. I have found so much strength in the great community here. No one judges you for your looks, your weight, your political affiliation (see username...). I haven't posted any pics, and likely won't, but even if I did, it would be using a throwaway and heavily blurred, but that's not important. What is important is our overall health, and how we can take control of it. Feel free to PM or comment if you have any questions or concerns about the speed with which I've lost this weight.
My (Abbreviated) Story [stole from a comment I wrote the other day]
I grew up with fairly overweight parents, but I had a great physique as a child/teenager/young adult. I swore to myself I'd never "get as big as Dad." I remember thinking as a kid that my dad would die young because he was overweight (he's still alive, and he's never been THAT overweight, honestly - just the way kids see the world). I remember seeing his pants as a teen, when I was wearing maybe 28" waist or so, and saw his pants were 38" waist. I said to myself, man, I'll never get that big. That is ridiculous!
Fast forward to age 22. Get a job out of college sitting on my ass all day. Drink a lot. Have some money, so no worries about going out to breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Never had a care in the world about my diet.
Fast foward to age 30. I am well past a size 38 (biggest pants I bought were size 42). Friends and family I haven't seen in years comment on how big I am (ever notice how its "OK" to say that to a male friend/relative, but not a female??). I am basically at the point where I say "fuck it, I'm gonna be a fatty for the rest of my days"
Fast forward to age 32. My first child is born and she changes my world. I quit smoking cigarettes (after nearly 20 years of 1.5+ pack a day smoking). A few months later, I decide to try and lose some of this weight because I realize I can't keep up with my infant daughter. My back hurts more than it ever has before. I am losing my breath carrying the baby upstairs. This and many other things made me realize it was time for a change. And I made it!
How I Lost The Weight
It has been, and still is, a long process. You may say, "/u/_TrumpTrainConductor, 4 months isn't very long at all!" And to that, I'd agree. But I have been as meticulous as humanly possible with my diet. Sticking under my calorie goal as frequently as I can.
First thing's first... You need to decide it's time to lose weight. Not your wife/husband/SO... YOU. Just like with any bad habit you're trying to kick, or any major life change, it all starts, and ends, with YOU. Once I made the conscious decision to start losing weight, I looked around at various diets/exercise plans, etc. The standard stuff you do when you make a choice like this in 2019. Looked at beach body, P90X, whatever. You name it, I researched it. And then I stumbled upon "CICO" which everyone here knows and loves. That sounded like something I could handle. So, I decided to start counting my calories.
Day 1 - 255 lbs. download MyFitnessPal and enter my information. Realize that trying their "-2 lbs per week" plan seems un-doable. So, I chose the 1 pound per week plan. Quick napkin math tells me that if I were to lose 1 pound per week, and my target loss was 55 lbs, it would take just over a year (or likely more with cheat days, slip ups, etc). That seemed very daunting to me, but I said screw it, you have to start somewhere. I will say, the first few weeks of cutting cals to get into my CICO sweet spot was quite hard. Even now, and my target has dropped by almost 500 cals with the pounds I've lost, I still have some days where I'd just love to stuff my face with something unhealthy.
So I started by logging my foods and then making small adjustments to what I eat and drank, based on what I was seeing in MFP. I cut out the caramel drizzle on my homemade lattes. Then I swapped out my Vanilla sweetning syrup for a sugar free (and 0 cal) sweetner instead. Rather than whole milk, I started using skim. These things all add up, especially over the course of a week. I also went straight from cold cuts on white bread every day for lunch to salads every day for lunch. I then swapped my dressing for fat free (half the cals), stopped using croutons, and cut even more cals off of my lunch. Then one day within the past few weeks, I had the epiphany that hey, CICO is working for me, and if I can just find other lunches that have the same caloric value as my salad - I'd be in a pretty good spot. Since that day a couple weeks ago, I haven't had another salad, yet I continue to lose weight (See the Low-Cal meal options below for more details there). CICO truly provides a restriction-free diet game. Well, other than restricting your calories. For dinner, I did much the same (though dinner changes every day, and some meals are still heavier than others - I just tried to plan in advance, and if there was no other options, just have a smaller plate [or go over my cals for the day]. About two weeks into my journey, I bought a smart scale from Amazon (Renpho Smart Scale). It was about $25 and provides a TON of data about your body weight. Check the "My Stats from a Smart Scale" section below for more details.
After about a month or so of using strictly CICO, I bought an adjustable/incline bench off of Amazon and 2 25LB dumbbells to start working out. At the same time, I started making smoothies with protein powder to eat after my morning workouts. Every morning, I get up and spend about 30 minutes in the gym doing high intensity interval training (HIIT) with my dumbbells, and since I only have the 25 lbs, I go for max reps instead of max weight on each set. Side note- The 25 lb dumbbells actually gave me some trouble at the beginning. Now I am tossing them around like nobody's business. The protein smoothie costs me about 280 calories, and gives me a big serving of protein for muscle recovery/bulking as well as fruits every day. I initially made my smoothies with Milk as the agent to liquify, but now i just use water. 1 Banana + ~8 Strawberries + 1 scoop protein powder and water to the max fill line. Obviously, lifting (nearly) every day helps me to keep some of the muscle mass I'd be losing if I were just doing CICO without any strength training, or with high cardio instead of strength training. I've read some studies showing that you can expect to lose anywhere from 15%-30% or more of the weight you lose in muscle mass when you're dropping a large amount of weight. I think I am about at 15%, which makes me happy to at least be on the low end of that. After all, half the reason to lose weight and work out is to have some muscles to speak for :).
I have been fairly religious about counting my calories since I started this journey, and it has really, really made all the difference in the world. I have lost 47 lbs in 4 months (to the day), almost 12 lbs per month, almost 3 lbs per week. So, I've smashed the "1 pound per week" target set forth in MFP, and thats with coming damn close to my calorie target (or going over it) every single day. I don't think there was any day where I was like 500 calories under my target (which of course, is -500 calories of TDEE). The main thing is log, log LOG!!! There will be some additional tips about logging in the "Things I've Learned" section. FWIW - I spend approximately 5 minutes max in MFP per day logging my calories. Another big thing for me is snacks - I tend to get the late night, before bed munchies, and I used to just have whatever type of candy, cookies, or cereal laying around the house and I'd eat and eat and eat. Now, instead of that, my snack cabinet is full of "healthier" choices, only they're not really healthier. They're just portion controlled and calorically affordable for me. I stock snacks with 150 or fewer cals in my pantry. See the Low Cal Meal Options / Replacements below for more info.
My Stats from a Smart Scale
So, I didn't have the smart scale until I had already lost 10 lbs (245 was my first weigh in on the smart scale). Unfortunately, that means I don't have exact numbers for when I was 255 lbs. So, these comparisons will be from 245LB to 207 LB. I am a nearly 6' tall male, 32 years old.
Scale: https://www.amazon.com/RENPHO-Bluetooth-Body-Fat-Scale/dp/B01N1UX8RW
I cannot speak for the accuracy of all the measures on this scale. The amazon reviews do show the Renpho results next to a clinical scale at a doctors office, and they're pretty dang close! For under $30, I couldn't NOT have it. Very helpful for any of those data nerds (like me!!!) out there.
245 Lbs (12/20/18):
Weight: 245.8 (obesity)
BMI: 34.4 (obesity)
Body Fat %: 32.8% (obesity)
Fat Free Body Weight: 165.4 lb
Subcutaneous Fat: 28.1% (high)
Visceral Fat: 16 (Excessive)
Body Water: 48.5% (low)
Skeletal Muscle: 43.4% (low)
Muscle Mass: 156.8 lb (high)
Bone Mass: 8.4 lb (average)
Protein: 15.3% (inadequate)
BMR: 1988 kcal (below average)
Metabolic Age: 39 (older)
207 Lbs (4/4/19):
Weight: 207.6 (overweight)
BMI: 29.1 (overweight)
Body Fat %: 24.6 (Acceptable)
Fat Free Body Weight: 156.6
Subcutaneous Fat: 21.3% (high)
Visceral Fat: 11 (acceptable)
Body Water: 54.4% (normal)
Skeletal Muscle: 48.7% (low)
Muscle Mass: 148.6 lb (high)
Bone Mass: 7.8 lb (average)
Protein: 17.2% (standard)
BMR: 1903 kcal Above Average
Metabolic Age: 36
Change
Weight: -38.2 lb
BMI: -5.3
Body Fat %: -8.2%
Fat Free Body Weight: -8.8 lbs (not sure how this happened)
Subcutaneous Fat: -6.8%
Visceral Fat: -5
Body Water: + 5.9%
Skeletal Muscle: +5.3%
Muscle Mass: -8 LBs
Bone Mass: -0.6 (not sure how this happened)
Protein: +1.9%
BMR: -85 (but also lost 47 lbs, so this makes sense)
Metabolic Age: -3 years (still 'metabolically older' than my real age)
So, there are my numbers.... Again not sure how accurate they are, but it's still kinda cool to see. The app has some basic charting features too so you can watch your trend line go down :D
Things I've Learned Along the Way
Create Recipes/Meals in MFP - For things you eat often, take the time to build a recipe out in MFP. It makes re-adding it every day INFINITELY faster.
Overestimate unknown meals - At home, its easy(ier) to measure out what you're cooking and eating and know exactly what's going into your body. At chain restaurants, its even pretty easy because either their menu will have the calories listed, and/or the food will already be listed in MFP food database. But what about a mom and pop restaurant? What I do is find something similar from a similar restaurant, and use that as your guide. Of course this is not perfect, but better than a complete guess (maybe?)
Don't Eat Back your Workout Cals - Regardless of how hard you workout, try to stay under your cal goal. Perhaps thats how I've averaged nearly 3lbs lost per week? I'm not sure. But it's working for me. Of course, some days you're going to go over if you workout or not - and that's fine. But most fitness trackers are estimating your calories burnt, and doing it poorly. Don't trust Google Fit, SHealth, or even MFP step tracker calories. If you do, you may well end up at a calorie surplus, or at least surplus in comparison to your target, since calculating calories burned is very hard in any arena, smart watches and fitness trackers not excluded.
You WILL have days of gain, you will have vacations, holidays, business trips, etc. DON'T GET DISCOURAGED!!! Yes, it sucks to jump on the scale Monday and see a +6 from your Friday measurement. It's happened to me, multiple times. Chances are its mostly water weight, and sticking to your diet you'll see some 'accelerated results' in your weight loss over the next week or so. This is because your body is balancing out its water weight and you're continuing to eat at a deficit. So, you're still burning fat (and some muscle), all while your body regulates the water weight. Once the water weight is back to normal, you will start seeing the scale gainz come faster, at least for a short period of time. This actually just happened to me - I was plateaued at 210 lb for about a week, had a rough weekend of eating out, and ended up at 215. Over the next 10 days I went down to 207. I did not lose 8 pounds of fat in 10 days - I lost probably 1-2 lbs of fat, and the other 6-7 lbs was water weight/digested food.
Weigh yourself daily, same time, and do it naked (or in underwear). I do it every morning as soon as I get up and go to the bathroom. This gives you a consistent baseline every day. Of course, late night binges, or crazy eating out, your morning weight the next day will be a little off kilter - more in your bowels, more water weight, etc.
CICO really means CICO. I eat McDonald's from time to time. Real Pizza. Ice Cream. Tacos. (Homemade tacos, btw, are NOT that unhealthy!!). I have sodas occasionally. At the end of the day, it really is all about running a calorie deficit. Working out is great and all, but if you work out and still eat 3k calories a day, you're going to gain weight, period. This is why, bar none, the most important step of your diet is to LOG YOUR FOOD AND DRINKS! If you aren't seeing results (and they may or may not be as 'fast' as mine), then you're not logging correctly.
Low-Cal Meal Options/Replacements
I am still working on these as we speak, and hope to transition them throughout the rest of my life, but here are a few I've come across:
-Smoothies with water instead of milk. If you aren't using protein powder, your smoothie will be even less cals, of course.
-CauliPOWER pizza. Found this recently and it is a godsend. No, its not Dominos or Pizza hut, but for under 800 cals, you can have a whole (small) pie. It tastes like McCain Ellio's personal pizzas to me, but YMMV!
-Obviously Salads. But you've gotta be careful! Remember, CICO is all about the calories! Like Cheese on your salad? hard boiled eggs? Avacado? Crutons? All of those add up, and your salad quickly becomes 'less healthy' (from a CICO perspective) than a sandwich!
-Chicken Salad with Half Apple (diced) and Low Fat Hellmann's Mayo. Half (or less) the cals of normal mayo. Add Sirach (zero cal!) to spice it up! Put it on either a 60 cal Pita ( Joseph's Flax, Oat Bran & Whole Wheat Flour Pita Bread, 6 ct) or a 70 cal tortilla ( https://www.latortillafactory.com/product/non-gmo-low-carb-flour-soft-taco-size/ ) and you'll feel like your cheating, when you're not!
-Sub 150 Cal Snacks - Really anything will suffice, but look at the label before you buy! For me, it's easier to just get portioned snacks (pre-wrapped) rather than hope I won't eat more than 1 serving, or having to measure it out every time. Things in this category are: Fiber One Bars, Granola Bars of all kinds (Yogurt, Chocolate Covered...), Rice Krispie Treats, Drumsticks Lil' Sticks, and the list goes on. But again, you need to exhibit some willpower to ensure you don't go and smash your calories for the day by eating 10 granola bars. Everything in moderation.
OK - This turned out WAYYYYYYY longer than i expected it to be. I am hopeful that you all enjoy reading my story and my journey, and maybe it will help someone start their weightloss journey, get over a plateau, or get back on the horse after falling off! This community rocks - and we are all with you! Every one of you!
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