Thursday, September 3, 2020

45% OF 100 POUND LOSS ACHIEVED

Hi --

Three months (or so) ago I provided a history and some goals, see: https://www.reddit.com/r/loseit/comments/grdlx0/52yo_male_346_pounds_down_15_trying_to_find/.

The original post was May 26, 2020. I can tell from the writing I was depressed when I wrote it. I have a much better mental outlook today. And, about 90 days later, I weigh 320 pounds, down from 347 pounds.

For most of the summer, I lost about two pounds per week. I know that because of trendweight--an app that works very well with fitbit. Trendweight provides a trendline of what you weight is by using weighted averages of your prior data points (the closer the data is to the present, the more weight that data point is given). It also neatly does the math and charts: a) body fat %; b) fat mass pounds; and c) lean mass pounds. It delivers the trend for each.

(The dataset is a bit, odd, however. On the one hand, my weight has steadily dropped from a weighted average of 358.0 on 04.20.2020 to 319.6 on 09.03.2020 (today). So,as a weighted average I've dropped 38.4 pounds. But my peak weight was 361--with a lowest weight of 316--so I claim a 45% completion of my 100 pound goal. But, unlike the weight loss, my fitbit scale says my body fat steadily increased from 38% to 45%--but in August (when I started resistance training) it dropped down to 43-44%. Likewise, Trendweight claims I've lost about 40 pounds of muscle, and my fat pounds have remained virtually unchanged. Incidentally, I do see my body measurements (chest, biceps, stomach, thighs) are decreasing by inches, though.) So, the weight loss is good. The devil is in the details though. I think even if the weight that came off was mostly muscle, I'd still be OK with it. It's clear to me that with a 48 inch waist there's plenty of fat to be burned off in a caloric deficit and I'll simply get there eventually.

NUTRITION

I second what I hear others with large losses say on this forum: You can't outrun your fork. More than anything, I am limiting the calories going into my body. I have done that with several strategies.

I've gained control of my eating (really my over-eating) and worked to make a conscious choice to choose life over death/misery. For 101 days in a row I have tracked my calories in my fitness pal. The data is easy to export and I keep a spreadsheet that gives me average calories and macros per month.

furthermore, I have made the effort to do much more cooking and determine what's going in. Through that challenge I bought a wok, and I regularly make myself vegetable dishes. While I do not see myself becoming a vegetarian or vegan--I'm not much of an absolutist--I'm happy to borrow what I think are there best principles. There's a ton of disagreement in the nutrition field. But, everyone seems to agree go ahead and eat more plants (fruits and vegetables). In my experience the vegetables are hard to consume more of, because it takes greater effort to prepare them. The goal these days is for me to make 10 vegetable dishes a week (virtually all of them in the wok). That has served me well.

EXERCISE

I've also returned to daily 30-45 minutes+ of vigorous exercise. I'm using kettlebells for resistance training which I love. I have a barbell and bumper plates in the garage but I need to rework my garage before I can use it as a gym. Moreover, I still have plans to bring my rowing machine out of storage (I love the concept 2) and also get a bike trainer in there as well. But, I'm forced to choose between cooking vegetable dishes and working on the garage--and with limited time the need to focus on vegetable dishes is winning.

THE NEXT 55% OR 55 POUNDS

I need to sustain my 1,800-1,900 a day caloric intake. I probably need to add some protein--the range has been 93 to 112 grams of protein. I weight 320 pounds with something like 35-40% body fat. So, I have lean mass of about 190 pounds or so. I'm getting about 0.5g/lb of lean mass. I think I'm within the minimum numbers -- but I could see making a conscious effort to increase it to a level approaching1g/pound of lean mass.

I continue to come to this reddit for confirmation and inspiration. more than antyhing, I feel like this is totally achievable. And the truth is while the stated goal (for now) is to "drop 100 pounds" (basically 360 to 260) -- there's more to be done after that. But, for now I simply want to focus on the 100 pound goal.

I've also taken up roller blading. I will continue to incorporate that into my regular trx and kettlebell routines. And, I do expect to clean up the garage so I can use it as a gym. When I add that activity to my cooking routines, I expect I can get the other 55 pounds off. My hope is to drop 100 pounds within a year of the original post. I've lost 45 pounds in four months, so that leaves me as much as eight months( (about 34 weeks) to drop 55 pounds. So, about 1.5 pounds per week would do it.

CONCLUSION

This reddit has been and continues to be an inspiration for me. And the anonymity of it provides an opportunity for me to be 100% transparent in a way that's virtually impossible for me in real life. At some point I'll work up the guts to put some photos up (with my face blurred)- but right now, I got to say my face looks a little different but not my body. . . oh well, with time, I suppose. Onward.

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