I'm a fat sh1t and I cant shed weight!

[PoleDriver]

Having struggled for years I finally listened to the OH.

Don't go on a 'diet'!

Change your whole style of life/eating. The first couple of weeks aren't easy, but if you are serious you will get past them.

Cut out beer, 'bad' carbs and high fat food.

Eat plenty of veggies and salad.

Concentrate your eating to earlier in the day.

Portion control was the main solution to my 'problem'.

Take carb/fat blockers if you need to but wean yourself off them gradually to allow your body to adjust.

You should be able to lose 3/4 kilo per week at the start, falling to 1/2 kilo as the weight comes off (don't forget that the body has less work to do as your weight reduces). As you get closer to your target weight (if a realistic one) you may have to make a few adjustments to keep weight loss above 1/4 kilo per week.

Don't go crazy when you reach your target weight!


Yes, there are many varied ways to lose weight but I've found this the best for long-term high-level weight loss. Hopefully the transition when reaching target weight should not form a mental barrier and enable you to carry on eating sensibly without it being a chore. The occasional 'treat' should do no harm!

[King Herald]

A Potato said:

King Herald said:

A Potato said:

Have two protein and oat shakes a day, a multi vit and two slices of brown bread with honey. Drink PLENTY of water too!!

And that is it, the simple effective guaranteed answer to weight loss?

What happens when your stomach is growling with hunger though?

Or is it back to the old 'self control' lark that most of us suffer at?

In a word, yes, that's how to lose weight quickly and effectively! After literally a few days any hunger pangs are easily controlled. Once the weight is off you'll also have much less of an appetite and only able to eat smaller portions as your stomach would've shrunk. It's then SO much easier to make the little effort to keep the weight off. Been there, done it, still slim three years on!

Not saying it won't work for some people, but it goes against just about everything I've heard on 'crash dieting'.

Two shakes and two slices of bread a day is pretty much starving your body, and it goes into famine mode, and you consume muscle, not fat, etc etc.

The sad fact is most fat people don't eat because they are hungry, or even just peckish, but for other reasons. That is the hardest part to control, not hunger pangs.

[uk_vette]

Do you mean normal porrige oats?
The type that made with 100% milk or some times 100%, or 50% / 50%

??

Vette

[Tiggsy]

I just use normal "instant" oats in my shakes - like drinking nasty porridge but does the job of protein hit and slow energy.

[uk_vette]

Good replies about the porrige oats.

So a good bowl of hot porrige oats, made with half water adn half skimmed milk every morning is going to help me lose a littel weight?
I was reading that the flour and pastry is bad, but isn't that derived from oats any way?

vette

[Ordinary_Chap]

A Potato said:

Myprotein sells ultra fine oats that you can use in a shaker with your protein supplement, I find it easier and convenient! You could just use ordinary porridge oats with water or skimmed milk.

As it happens I use myprotein Hurricane XS which contains oats. It doesn't mix as well as the normal protein but I don't really care, I just neck it!

[PoleDriver]

uk_vette said:

Good replies about the porrige oats.

So a good bowl of hot porrige oats, made with half water adn half skimmed milk every morning is going to help me lose a littel weight?
I was reading that the flour and pastry is bad, but isn't that derived from oats any way?

vette

Flour and pastry are processed, oats are natural. The added benefit (as stated above) is that they are 'slow release' so will give you that 'full' feeling for longer and help stop cravings for food!

DON'T put sugar on them and DON'T put a mountain of them in your bowl!

[Pvapour]

Fatman2 said:

Cheers I'm not suggesting that exercise does not help but just that, relative to a tip top diet, it's effect isn't as significant as ensuring that the intake of food is good.

I guess the exact balance of protein/carbs/fats will vary slightly for everyone but it surprises me just how much this is neglected by a lot of diet advice given in mags etc. As you say, the right amount of protein will stop the spikes that lead to the dreaded snack attacks that are the killer of any weight loss plan.

I think burning a typical 3-400 kcals during an hour of exercise (excluding BMR) is pretty low relative to the amount of kcals that can be consumed by eating too many biscuits/chocolate/crisps if a snack fest presents itself I can easily munch my way through an entire 100g pack of Walkers Thai Sweet Chilli Sensations (500kcals oh dear!). Do this regularly and that pretty much negates the hours of exercise put in at the gym.

Put like that it starts to sound depressing but just hits home to me the importance of a decent diet.

absolutely

the point I was trying to make (poorly) was that whilst you will be burning 400 odd calories in your 1 hour workout, the bodybuilder will be burning nearer to 900 calories in his 1 hour workout.

I think Arnold was quoted as once saying he used to burn near on 2500 calories in his 2 hour workouts

I think larger/stronger muscles play a very important part in being a tool to control weight more effectively, bit of a tough investment for a beginer though as its advantages wont be seen for a while.

Ordinary Chap said:

Pvapour, here's an interesting scientific study that backs up what you said about metabolism and weight training.

Weight training can boost your metabolism for 38 hours!! which is over 20 hours longer than any other exercise has found to be able to do so and then of course the extra muscle takes more calories to sustain too!

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11882927

interesting read, I'd forgotten the elongated raised MBR as well


on the oats thing, if you like gooey food

I make up 5 days worth of:

20 lge egg whites
3 cups of oats, (quaker seem to work better than scotts)
5 cups skimmed milk (soya milk works to)
5 pinches of sunflower seeds
5 pinches of pumpkin seeds
5 pinches sesame seeds
5 tablespoons of splenda sugar

mix everything together in a saucepan on low heat for 10 - 15 mins until you can stand spoon in it

serve cold in the morning with a little added brown sugar

combination of oats & protein is incredibly filling for a long time, lots of energy, convenient, nutritious, not to many calories and very tasty, what more can you ask for quite tasty hot as well!

Edited by Pvapour on Sunday 6th November 13:30

[King Herald]

We have oats (porridge) served at breakfast every morning on my ship. I rarely try them but you can definitly feel a warm glow within by the time you finish a bowl off.

Maybe I should try eating them instead of my Kelloggs Bran and Raisin?

[RemainAllHoof]

Fatman2 said:

I can easily munch my way through an entire 100g pack of Walkers Thai Sweet Chilli Sensations (500kcals oh dear!).

At the risk of being shouted off the thread. 100g isn't that bad in one sitting, is it? I usually eat just over half a 150g bag in one sitting and the rest is finished before the day is up. Any 150g bag of crisps really. Like an alcoholic, I tend not to have crisps in the house as I fking love crisps. Am ok with cakes (he says about to eat a Turkish Delight cake bar).

[Pvapour]

snack a jacks are good, 25g packets = 100kcal, 92% fat free, wide selection of flavours all of which taste ok.

[sparks_E39]

It's all very well saying eat 5 small meals a day... I don't have time for that. I've found eating 3 meals per day and if I have to snack it's fruit, works better. Intake of roughly 1500-1800 a day, usually 1800 when it's a gym day. I cannot make myself eat more than 2500 calories without feeling bloated and don't see the need of exceeding 2000 calories daily as I'm not intending on putting on loads of muscle.

[theshrew]

A Potato said:

The shakes are protein and oats! The protein keeps muscle degradation to a minimum whilst the oats are slow release good carbs for energy! That was the core of my 'eating plan', and is still what I have for breakfast now. Maybe I should've elaborated more but I had a treat day once a week with a takeaway and few beers. Sometimes I had peanut butter or low fat cheese instead of honey, sometimes I had a sub of the day!!

But the shakes were the core of my 'eating plan' and my one meal was varied occasionally. It took three months to lose three stone and I think that speaks for itself. I've never been happier since the weight came off going from a 38" waist to 32"..... I admit I'm nearer 34" now but that's down to beer consumption, but I'm knocking the beer on the head for a month and also gonna have a couple of 'lean' weeks to get in trim for Xmas!!

Well I have to agree you would loose weight doing this but it's a terrible way of doing it. I found out the hard way.

Probably about 10 years ago I was 19 stone +. Had a bad split with a girl which made me want to loose weight.

So what I did was practically stopped eating. I'm talking most days I would have nothing to eat and if I did it would be a cup a soup nothing else. This went on for about 6 months and ended up just over 10 stone. At the I thought I felt great etc but the reality was I was terrible. Was always tired I lived on red bull and coffee. So yes loosing weight if you really want to is easy.

But now I obv put on weight because I eat but also realise the effects it had on my health. I was always ill at the time and my teeth are fecked now. Didn't have one filling before this started but in the years since had nothing but trouble. I suppose it was the lack of victim ins etc

So the last few years ive put a bit of weight on mainly due to now working in a office and not watching what i eat Now Im loosing weight in the correct way eating healthy and doing plenty of exercise and I can honestly say I've never felf better.

[clonmult]

PoleDriver said:

Having struggled for years I finally listened to the OH.

Don't go on a 'diet'!

Change your whole style of life/eating. The first couple of weeks aren't easy, but if you are serious you will get past them.

Thats what I've been telling the ex for quite a while, and she's finally started to listen. She's been through all sorts of stupid fad 'diets', but now she's started to get her diet under control, and started 3 zumba sessions per week, the weight is really dropping off, and she's starting to regain her confidence.

[King Herald]

clonmult said:

PoleDriver said:

Having struggled for years I finally listened to the OH.

Don't go on a 'diet'!

Change your whole style of life/eating. The first couple of weeks aren't easy, but if you are serious you will get past them.

Thats what I've been telling the ex for quite a while, and she's finally started to listen. She's been through all sorts of stupid fad 'diets', but now she's started to get her diet under control, and started 3 zumba sessions per week, the weight is really dropping off, and she's starting to regain her confidence.

My wife got into a weight loss frenzy a couple of years ago, eating properly, gym four or five days a week, lost a bunch of weight and looked great.

I told her, I warned her, that she was overdoing it all, that she would burn out, and she did, after four months she suddenly got fed up of the gym and in a year had put all the weight back on.

Now, two years later, she is going off on another frenzy....

[F40LOUD]

that's why its important to have a day a week where you can have a beer or a meal you enjoy - don't kick the arse end out of it, but don't go on a binge either. The biggest thing is finding a heathy diet which you prefer to your normal one, then you won't go back.

[RemainAllHoof]

King Herald said:

clonmult said:

PoleDriver said:

Having struggled for years I finally listened to the OH.

Don't go on a 'diet'!

Change your whole style of life/eating. The first couple of weeks aren't easy, but if you are serious you will get past them.

Thats what I've been telling the ex for quite a while, and she's finally started to listen. She's been through all sorts of stupid fad 'diets', but now she's started to get her diet under control, and started 3 zumba sessions per week, the weight is really dropping off, and she's starting to regain her confidence.

My wife got into a weight loss frenzy a couple of years ago, eating properly, gym four or five days a week, lost a bunch of weight and looked great.

I told her, I warned her, that she was overdoing it all, that she would burn out, and she did, after four months she suddenly got fed up of the gym and in a year had put all the weight back on.

Now, two years later, she is going off on another frenzy....

I've got bored of telling people as I was passionate about helping people to sensibly lose weight. They just cannot help themselves, however. They will only be ready to do it the right way when they finally have had enough of being a prat about it. It's like watching a degenerate gambler or an alcoholic. Until they admit they have a problem, the best you can do is enjoy the slow motion car crash unfolding before your eyes.

[RobM77]

I agree with the above. It's more of an attitude and someone's inherent preferences than anything else. The reason I'm a healthy weight is that I happen to love exercise, so I do it for fun; and I much prefer healthy food to the vast majority of unhealthy food - I would genuinely rather eat a veggie stir fry than a chocolate cake. As above, the key for many people is finding healthy food that they like and exercise that they also enjoy. It's possible for most people. The problem then is that many overweight people don't enjoy pushing themselves when they do do exercise - I'm always timing myself and trying to beat my PBs. Even if people enjoy, for example swimming, they may just go down the pool and do a sedate breasttroke for half an hour, which is better than nothing, but won't burn many calories.

As I said before I think, I'd recommend the MyFitnessPal iPhone app. It's free, and allows you to keep a food and exercise diary, then it calculates the calories you've eaten and burnt each day and compares this with your weight goal. I downloaded it purely out of interest and set a goal of maintaining my weight and it's very interesting. It's actually made me feel better about the few exceptions to my usual healthy preferences as described above (beer, pizza and flapjack mainly!). The app makes it very clear that you don't have to starve yourself silly to lose weight, just keep it sensible and exercise.

[Tiggsy]

RobM77 said:

As I said before I think, I'd recommend the MyFitnessPal iPhone app. It's free, and allows you to keep a food and exercise diary, then it calculates the calories you've eaten and burnt each day and compares this with your weight goal. I downloaded it purely out of interest and set a goal of maintaining my weight and it's very interesting. It's actually made me feel better about the few exceptions to my usual healthy preferences as described above (beer, pizza and flapjack mainly!). The app makes it very clear that you don't have to starve yourself silly to lose weight, just keep it sensible and exercise.

I love getting supper and seeing I can get peanut butter sandwhich in within my 2000 cal limit

[RobM77]

Tiggsy said:

RobM77 said:

As I said before I think, I'd recommend the MyFitnessPal iPhone app. It's free, and allows you to keep a food and exercise diary, then it calculates the calories you've eaten and burnt each day and compares this with your weight goal. I downloaded it purely out of interest and set a goal of maintaining my weight and it's very interesting. It's actually made me feel better about the few exceptions to my usual healthy preferences as described above (beer, pizza and flapjack mainly!). The app makes it very clear that you don't have to starve yourself silly to lose weight, just keep it sensible and exercise.

I love getting supper and seeing I can get peanut butter sandwhich in within my 2000 cal limit

Since I got the app I've realised that I actually eat a lot less calories than I thought I did. I have a huge bowl of bran flakes for breakfast, two lots of sandwich, banana and flapjack in the day (at 11 and 3), and then a fairly large dinner (often stir fry with fish or chicken), and then a bowl of cereal mid evening. I frequently have a beer or two as well, usually Belgian Exercise wise I do about an hour a day on average throughout the week. Despite all that food I'm consistently coming out between 0 and 300 calories under what the app says I should eat to maintain my weight.