Day 1? Starting your weight loss journey on Thursday, 16 January 2020? Start here!

Today is your Day 1?

Welcome to r/Loseit!

So you aren’t sure of how to start? Don’t worry! “How do I get started?” is our most asked question. r/Loseit has helped our users lose over 1,000,000 recorded pounds and these are the steps that we’ve found most useful for getting started.

Why you’re overweight

Our bodies are amazing (yes, yours too!). In order to survive before supermarkets, we had to be able to store energy to get us through lean times, we store this energy as adipose fat tissue. If you put more energy into your body than it needs, it stores it, for (potential) later use. When you put in less than it needs, it uses the stored energy. The more energy you have stored, the more overweight you are. The trick is to get your body to use the stored energy, which can only be done if you give it less energy than it needs, consistently.

Before You Start

The very first step is calculating your calorie needs. You can do that HERE. This will give you an approximation of your calorie needs for the day. The next step is to figure how quickly you want to lose the fat. One pound of fat is equal to 3500 calories. So to lose 1 pound of fat per week you will need to consume 500 calories less than your TDEE (daily calorie needs from the link above). 750 calories less will result in 1.5 pounds and 1000 calories is an aggressive 2 pounds per week.

Tracking

Here is where it begins to resemble work. The most efficient way to lose the weight you desire is to track your calorie intake. This has gotten much simpler over the years and today it can be done right from your smartphone or computer. r/loseit recommends an app like MyFitnessPal, Loseit! (unaffiliated), or Cronometer. Create an account and be honest with it about your current stats, activities, and goals. This is your tracker and no one else needs to see it so don’t cheat the numbers. You’ll find large user created databases that make logging and tracking your food and drinks easy with just the tap of the screen or the push of a button. We also highly recommend the use of a digital kitchen scale for accuracy. Knowing how much of what you're eating is more important than what you're eating. Why? This may explain it.

Creating Your Deficit

How do you create a deficit? This is up to you. r/loseit has a few recommendations but ultimately that decision is yours. There is no perfect diet for everyone. There is a perfect diet for you and you can create it. You can eat less of exactly what you eat now. If you like pizza you can have pizza. Have 2 slices instead of 4. You can try lower calorie replacements for calorie dense foods. Some of the communities favorites are cauliflower rice, zucchini noodles, spaghetti squash in place of their more calorie rich cousins. If it appeals to you an entire dietary change like Keto, Paleo, Vegetarian.

The most important thing to remember is that this selection of foods works for you. Sustainability is the key to long term weight management success. If you hate what you’re eating you won’t stick to it.

Exercise

Is NOT mandatory. You can lose fat and create a deficit through diet alone. There is no requirement of exercise to lose weight.

It has it’s own benefits though. You will burn extra calories. Exercise is shown to be beneficial to mental health and creates an endorphin rush as well. It makes people feel awesome and has been linked to higher rates of long term success when physical activity is included in lifestyle changes.

Crawl, Walk, Run

It can seem like one needs to make a 180 degree course correction to find success. That isn’t necessarily true. Many of our users find that creating small initial changes that build a foundation allows them to progress forward in even, sustained, increments.

Acceptance

You will struggle. We have all struggled. This is natural. There is no tip or trick to get through this though. We encourage you to recognize why you are struggling and forgive yourself for whatever reason that may be. If you overindulged at your last meal that is ok. You can resolve to make the next meal better.

Do not let the pursuit of perfect get in the way of progress. We don’t need perfect. We just want better.

Additional resources

Now you’re ready to do this. Here are more details, that may help you refine your plan.

• Quick Start Guide - Build your foundation!
• Loseit Compendium - Frame it out!
• FAQ - Answers to our most Frequently Asked Questions!

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Weight loss help for a petite woman (4'11)

Hi all, I am a 22 year old female college student who would like to lose a few pounds. I am very small (4"11) and weigh 118 pounds with a TDEE of 1442 calories. I have weighed 118 since high school with my lowest ever weight being 113. I am just getting back to being serious with my diet of 1200 calories for weight loss (I do love r/1200isplenty). My goal weight is around 105. My question is: should I do weight training or cardio? I see a lot of conflicting advice on what petite women should do to lose weight. I would really like to try weight lifting. At home I have dumbells, a kettlebell, and a treadmill.

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At the beginning of my weight-loss journey, but I've beaten my binge eating 🙌🎉😊

Hi Reddit, I’m Laura, 24F from the UK who started lurking here at the start of the year 😊

HW: 288lb, CW: 268lb

So, here I am, two weeks in.

I’ve been here before, as many of us have been.

I was in high school when I hit 250lb and – after an upsetting doctor’s appointment – started to make changes for the better. I installed MFP, started eating at a calorie deficit and saw the lbs starting to drop. At least, I saw the number dropping when I was stood on the scales. The mirror told a different, more brutal story; I saw that same 250lb girl staring back at me every time, and eventually became demoralised by what I couldn’t see.

For a few years, my weight yo-yoed back and forth. I gained weight, panicked when I plucked up the nerve to stand on the scales and then lost it by avoiding food completely for a number of days, treating it like the enemy.

Over the last five years, I ballooned up to my all-time high of 288lb, a culmination of years of secret binge eating when my depression and anxiety peaked and work became a source of stress for me. No one could ever understand how I got to that weight when I didn’t eat that much, or that bad – not as far as they could see. Behind closed doors, I was ordering takeaways almost daily, hiding masses of food in my room and gorging on it, not for the pleasure of how it tasted, but for the sheer amount.

Binge eating is a behaviour that started for me in high school. It was a secret comfort, something that distracted me from negative thoughts and anxiety. It wasn’t just junk food and sweet treats, it was anything I could find in large quantities – I would binge on entire boxes of cornflakes, on foods that I didn’t even like, and when I did, I would almost feel disconnected from myself, as if acting in a trance.

Towards the end of last year, I decided my mental health was something I needed to focus on improving. I finally stopped the cycle of binge-eating. I deleted the food delivery apps from my phone and made a promise to myself to at least be upfront and mindful about what I was eating, to be aware of the reasons for it, even if I continued to overeat.

By the start of this year, my weight had fallen to 277lb just from having gained control of my destructive habit. I was able to be open about it, to confide in people, and now I feel able to confront my weight loss and make those changes permanently.

Two weeks into the year, I’ve dropped 9lb so far and I feel happy and confident that I’ll be able to shift the rest over the next year or so.

More importantly, I’m learning how to be kinder to myself, how to look after my body and my mind.

The purpose of this post:

a) Hi, hello, I’m here and I’m hoping to keep checking in with this community as I progress

b) To highlight the difference between overeating and binge-eating. I feel like these are two behaviours that – for me, at least – needed to be addressed separately.

Right-o, long post is long but – in the immortal words of Arnold Schwarzenegger – I’ll be back

Laura 😉

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Recently switched to a vegan lifestyle. Feeling better than I ever have. I’ve had a lot of ups and down, but right now I’m getting better than ever and feeling great. Here’s my story:

My story:

https://imgur.com/gallery/ivP8V8d

I’ve talked about my weight loss story, but most people just see the before and the after. I would never want anyone to be discouraged. It is very rare that someone loses a lot if weight then keeps every bit of it all forever. That kind of consistency is tough, but it is possible. Some of us let life get in the way and fall off. The important thing is you can bounce back from anything.

16 years old. I was fat. I weighed 315 pounds. I hated myself. I was out of shape. I just wanted to level up in CoD and halo, eat Doritos, and drink a case of Dr. Peppers. I really wanted to to get better and healthier, but I had asthma so my parents never let me participate in anything that involved exercise. Partially their fault, but also partially mine. So one day my brother says hey lets just go get a gym membership I had $33 in my wallet from my birthday. It was 6 days after I turned 16. The membership would be exactly $33 to start up and then my brother said it could come out of his account monthly. Little did I know that decision would be the biggest one I ever made. My brother was a little familiar with weightlifting and nutrition, but not much. I went to every machine in that gym and did a set. When I tell you I hurt for 3 days....I literally couldn’t move. I said what the hell did I get myself into. So once the soreness went away we continued. I quit sodas cold turkey. Not as hard as I thought, but the taste of water was different. Yes, I never really drank water before. Sad, I know. So along with that I started tracking my food intake. I didn’t eat any chips, or candy, or anything calorie dense with no nutritional value. A lot of lean meats, veggies, the occasionally rice serving, maybe some potatoes. I had no idea what I was doing, but something was better than nothing. So, I kept strong.

I had some muscle but mostly just lost the fat. Got tiny. So a year goes by and I start gaining strength. Started to notice that I was getting pretty strong. Well it’s a lot easier to build muscle and gain strength if you’re eating more calories, so I did. I’m about 230 pounds at the time. I got into powerlifting. Started eating a lot more. Wanted to gain more muscle. Wanted to get bigger.

So I wasn’t impressive but I just wanted to workout and get strong. Over time I gained a little by little. Well I got really into powerlifting. I got really good at it. I wasn’t to be the strongest guy I knew. I wanted to be the best in the world. I wanted to compete and I needed to be stronger than I already was. So I said I would eat everything until I got to the next weight class and I would compete in 6 months. Extremely stupid I know but ego gets in the way sometimes.

Well some more years go by and I’m ready to compete. 276 pounds on the day of my competition. Bloated. Can’t run a mile. At least I’m strong right? No. Wasn’t worth it. I competed and did pretty well. Deadlifted 600 pounds. Benched 400. Squat was around 500. Not what I wanted but it was enough. So at this point I asked myself what are you doing? You got into this for health and now this? So I decided to follow a ketogenic diet and cut it off as quickly as possible.

3-4 months. I cut almost 60 pounds. I was roughly 213 at this point. Not healthy to do so but I felt better. I was very strict. No carbs. No alcohol. Nothing but what was strict on the diet plan. So, then I’m still lifting one day and decide to do a heavy deadlift then drop down.

Well, I herniate two discs in my back.

Yep

This was definitely the worst part. Juggling working 50 hours a week and school and trying to lift all the time and this happens. This took away the best thing I had. I was depressed. I worked out some but I couldn’t do what I wanted. I got off of my diet. We went out drinking too much. I worked out maybe twice a week. I gained a lot back.

So a while back and forth and here we were. December 1st 2019. My back was better. I had been working out and lifting on and off and running here and there. Drinking too much. Diet was trash. Decided to get back on track. I needed something sustainable once and for all.

Here we are January 10th. Recently adapted a vegan lifestyle. It’s not for everyone but I feel amazing. It’s not like keto where I’m extremely strict then binge for a week and fall off. It’s not a diet where I restrict a bunch of different foods. It’s just me enjoying my life, feeling better and working out every day like I enjoy.

I’m short, don’t ever give up. I tried to give up and few times, but I bounced back. No matter how far gone you are you can always get better. No matter what happens you can always improve. Most importantly, be the healthiest and happiest that you can be.

I hope you all have a wonderful day. If I can motivate one person that will be enough.

https://imgur.com/gallery/ivP8V8d

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A seven year journey...

This is what seven years on My Fitness Pal looks like...

I’ve never posted on here before but I wanted to share this with a like-minded community. I started my fitness journey on My Fitness Pal over seven years ago and this is what that journey looked like. I have been overweight my entire life and never learned healthy eating habits as a child. At my highest recorded weight, I was 252 lbs at 5’7”.

When I first started tracking here, I was in my senior year at college. My only responsibilities were my classes and my internship—and some of those classes were senior fitness electives like Zumba, Weight-Training, and Yoga. I was eating 1100 calories a day and had mostly replaced eating with napping. I still ate whatever I wanted (mostly), and I still went out with my friends, but I rarely ever went above 1100 calories. In hindsight, this was probably not very healthy, but it was effective. I lost over 90 lbs in a year. My lowest weight was 157.6 lbs. I maintained that weight loss for about a year and I’ve spent the last five years or so gaining and losing the same 30 lbs.

Today I’m at the highest weight I’ve been in seven years. What you see here is the weight I’ve gained and lost, but what you don’t see here are the career changes, the apartment moves, the heartbreaks, the joys, the stresses, the traveling, the parties, the holidays, and all that goes into a life fully lived. I want to recommit to focusing on my health because I know that I’m worth the effort, and to be honest, I’m tired of my pants not fitting. But mostly, I wanted to remind you (and myself) that this is a journey. It’s easy to be kind to ourselves at the high points, but not so easy when we’re feeling low. My journey with my body has been one of self-acceptance and ultimately, self-love. I've struggled with low self-esteem, binge-eating, and depression--all of those feelings and behaviors were rooted in shame about food and my body. I've had to learn how to have a positive relationship with my body. I know the value of eating well and exercising because I know it’s good for my physical and mental wellbeing. But so is loving myself, because my worth and my life are not defined by a number on a scale. My life has been defined by the lows and the highs, and all the wonderful people I’ve met and the memories I’ve made along the way.

Be kind to yourself as you work (or don’t work) on your fitness goals today. This is your journey and I hope you show yourself love at every stage along the way.

My username is knowyouronion6 if you want a new MFP friend!

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HELP! - Body Lift/Skin Removal Surgery - Post OP having anxiety

Hi everyone,

First time posting on reddit,

I am a 26 year old male, 5 foot 8, 145 pounds. I was obese most of my teenage years and my highest weight was 225lbs at age 17. Lost 50 pounds by diet and exercise at age 18, another 30-35 pounds over the next year or two through going to the gym and eating even less. So about 80 to 85 pounds total weight loss.

I have kept the weight off for EIGHT years, I've been 145-155 lbs since about age 18 and I'm now almost 27. I don't even want to use the word "maintained" because my lifestyle is vastly different than my teenage years. I eat probably 1/3 the calories I used to, actually exercise at the gym and have a very active and strenuous job (server/supervisor at an large, busy restaurant) instead of just sitting on the couch and sleeping all day unemployed in high school, stuffing my face like in my dark, depressed, and unhealthy teenage years.

I've wanted surgery for skin removal since about age 19 but I knew it was horribly expensive, and I was a broke college student from a working class family with no more than a $3,000-$4,000 in my account until about age 23. Now that I'm four years out of college working 50+ hours a week in my restaurant my savings reached over $40,000 at age 26 so I decided to look into it.

I found the best plastic surgeon in the metro area based on reviews and recommendation by my primary care doctor. Unfortunately for a 360 abdominal lift (basically a muffin-top removal lol) and the liposuction on my chest/breasts it came out to over $14,000. Quite a lot but it's literally my dream surgery because my loose skin has given me severe self esteem and depression issues all through my 20s. I figured it would be an investment in my physical and mental health. My family is judging a lot but I'm trying to remind myself this is for me, not them.

I got the surgery 10 days ago and I'm really suffering mentally post recovery. The results look amazing in terms of the skin loss - I cried of happiness when I first saw my body post OP, it's truly incredible. However, I feel like I wasn't prepared for how long this process would take and how long I might have to be off work and I don't have paid time off. I can only just now walk again or drive a car again and I'm hunched over forward quite a bit from the 360 degree incision around my waist. The pain is down immensely and I'm off narcotics, but what bothers me is that I can't stand up totally straight or walk very well. I can drive and go the store but I feel like everyone is staring because I'm this healthy looking young guy shuffling around all hunched over. The doctor told me it would be weeks and months before I felt normal again but I'm just impatient and I keep having catastrophic thoughts like "will I ever wait tables again?", "will I ever go back to work?", "will I deplete all my savings and go bankrupt after spending all this money?", "did the doctor lie to me about the recovery time so he would get my money?", "will I lose my job?". I know I need to be more positive and let myself heal but I can't get these thoughts out of my brain as I've suffered from severe anxiety and depression pretty much my whole life and I've never gotten surgery on anything. My family (who has never been obese btw) is telling me I made a mistake and that plastic surgery is for shallow rich people and I should have just "loved myself" instead of getting this surgery. Not helping and I feel so alone.

Has anyone gone through this experience with a body lift surgery? When did you feel like your posture was ok again and you could walk normally and just felt right again? I just want to go back to work SO BADLY waiting tables and being active but I can't go in there like he Hunchback of Notre Dame. It's only been 10 days so maybe I'm getting ahead of myself, because I was in immense pain on narcotics and could barely walk to the bathroom 4 days ago. Whenever I ask the surgeon a question I get that vibe of "just chill out you're being a little wussy give it time". I really just need support through this hard time and any response would be appreciated from someone who has been through this.

Please not this was NOT a "tummy tuck" it was a full 360 body lift which is a much more intense and invasive procedure which I assume has a longer recovery time.

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Feelings/Changes During Weightloss

So before I go jabbering away, let me post deets.

F/27yr old/5'9

SW: 262

CW: 255

GW: 155

So in about a week I've lost 5 pounds. The scale said 254.6 but then turned into 255.0 in a matter of seconds despite already calibrating it. lol I'll stick to 255 to be sure. So I lost 7 pounds in about a week. I do what's called Early Time Restricted Feeding where I start from 9am and eat until 2pm. So I eat breakfast around 10-11 usually and dinner at 1:45 and finish around 2:15pm. I track my hours using LIFE Fasting on android. I like the interface and groups you can join on there. ;D

So Feelings/Changes during weightloss. So I haven't lost a lot YET, but the small amount that I had has made a difffference. I see it in my tummy and legs <3 I have some knock knees and feel the weight on my knees have massively improved with ONLY 7 pounds gone. It feels like I lost 20lbs from my knee pressure XD!I feel more confident and... i am more flexible? I can bend down easier in a deep wide squat. It feeels sooooo good.

Brain fog has lifted a LOT. <3 And I see that I'm taking care of myself better. Like face regimens have gotten more intricate. Hair regimen is more on fleek. Yaz, this girl is feelin' herself! I'm also into some workouts with my kettlebells. I have 16kg ones (two of them). I do squats, Deadlifts and Bent over Rows.

I've tried so many things to jumpstart my weight loss but ETRF is the only thing that has made a massssive difference. ETRF kinda tricks u into an OMAD lifestyle allllmost.

Do any of you guys do this? And what was it like for you guys when you first started losing/lost some weight?!

ETA: I do like 3x3 kettlebell rep schemes. Nothing too strenuous really. But enough to keep the body workin' <3

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