Hey everyone,
I've been a loser for almost a year now, and went from 95 kg (209 lbs) to 78 kg (171 lbs), with my GW being 75 kg (165 lbs). I hope to reach that goal by my birthday (june), after which I will go on a shopping spree for new clothes.
I've learned a lot about how our bodies work since I've started, and I wanted to share a bit of my struggles and realizations with the hopes that it might help people in the same situation. Also it's my way to give back to this amazing sub ! English isn't my first language, so apologies in advance if there are some mistakes.
- Eating foods with good nutritional value is not enough to lose weight, quantities are the key. This is honestly the one I had the most trouble accepting. What I mean by that is that even when I was at 95 kgs, I was eating (seemingly) healthy. I've always cooked my own food, never been into junk food, almost never binged, and always took care of my macros while being on a semi-vegetarian diet (I only ate meat while going out). But that wasn't enough because I was still eating way too much. Sure that homemade meal with black rice, tofu and vegetables seems healthy, but not when you consume 200g of black rice and 400g of tofu. Honestly when I looked back at my old recipes I can't believe I ate this much. This only portions I haven't reduced are vegetables.
- Data is incredibly important. I'm an economist in real life, meaning I'm a bit of a data freak, but funnily enough I never applied this reasoning to my personal life. I was sort of winging it at first, said to myself stuff like "ok I'll eat only a salad this lunch so I can have a bigger meal this evening" but without actually measuring anything. Trust me, a kitchen scale will be your best friend during this journey. Also, a body scale that automatically records your weight via bluetooth is a great way to stay motivated.
- Cooking oils, even healthy ones, are incredibly treacherous. A lot of people do not realize that a spoon of olive oil is 120 kcal, that's a huge amount for such a small quantity. Obviously cooking without oil is hard, but it's pretty easy to reduce the amount. If you have a non-stick pan you can make two-three portions of stir fry with only one spoon of oil fairly easily. You can add lemon juice to olive oil and make a nice roasting mix for your veggies instead of going full olive oil, etc.
- Take progress pics. That's one of my biggest regrets. I didn't take any pic when I started (I have my profile pictures on various social media but they're not great, because I was actually pretty good at hiding my weight). Now at 78 kg instead of 95 I still feel like I haven't changed even though everyone around me tells me that I look much better and my clothes are clearly too big. I just don't see it in the mirror and it's depressing. So take a progress pic, one that really shows your weight and that you can reproduce in the same setting a few months from now, it will help a lot.
- Sport isn't essential, but it helps a lot. I mostly didn't exercise during my weight loss, but I started plateauing in March and decided to start running to see if it helped (started a couch to 5k program, I am still doing it). And boy did I see the difference. Not only did I start losing weight again, but I was much more motivated and really started getting more energy. Before January the weight loss didn't really make me feel different, now I can honestly say it does.
- "It gets easier. Everyday it gets a little easier, but you gotta do it everyday, that's the hard part" - Bojack Horseman. To me if there is a quote that embodies weight loss it's this one. Starting out is by far the hardest part, but once you get into it, start planning, etc. it gets easier, the initial rush of discipline is really the big mountain, from there it's just downhill.
- Lastly, a more controversial one: being on a vegetarian diet makes losing weight more difficult (not impossible though). Because white meat and fish offer so much nutritional value (especially protein) for relatively low calories, and plant-based foods just can't compete in my opinion. Tofu is probably the closest one in that regard, but it requires quite a lot of effort to make it taste good, whereas with chicken/salmon you can just put it in the oven with some roasted veggies and light seasoning and it'll taste amazing. It's honestly a lot easier to find 500-600 kcal recipes with meat in them than without. Now I went from never eating meat at home to eating fish and chicken once a week each, and it really helped.
Hope this helped, and keep being an awesome community :)
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