chadlius88's Journal, 16 April 2014

A shame, isn't it? I get so excited when people notice and compliment me then ask me how I did it and share that I document my food, exercising, eating healthy, veggies, fruit, and then...... POOF, they're gone into the recesses of their minds mumbling that it's taken me 2 1/2 years to lose, you gotta' be crazy; why not do bariatric? Damn... Anywho... proud of us here for the work we put into it. 

I get what you're saying Bill, but if you are losing weight and not weight training..you are losing muscle mass, and lean muscle mass is a major player in your BMR. I understand people not wanting to have a whole lot of muscle mass, but there are ways to avoid gaining any muscle at all if thats your choice...its all in your diet. If you are eating a deficit of calories, your muscle mass gains will be slow and nearly insignificant, but the activity of weight training will still burn more calories than running for the same period of time, as long as you lift properly, and with intensity. 75% of the muscle that I have I came into my weight loss journey with. I weight trained the entire process from 204 to 170 and gained mostly just muscle density (which meant more strength but not really much more volume of muscle) It did prevent lean muscle mass loss while on a pretty heafty deficit. Now my BMR is much higher, and I am able to eat 400 cals per day more than I did the first time around, and I am losing weight just as quickly. If I wanted to lose the muscle mass after I could just diet like I'm trying to lose weight and follow a strict plan of solid state cardio and it would happen. The body doesnt want muscle because of its metabolic load...so it will consume it if you give it the chance. 

I get the exact same response from people when I tell them to buy a polar watch that tracks their calories and track the calories they eat and make the eating less than the working.  

Working out is hard, losing weight is hard, being overweight is hard. Choose your hard. If you arent willing to work, then you deserve to be heavy, hard cold truth. Not working to be healthy is what makes you overweight in the first place...to lose weight you must do the exact opposite of what you were doing when you were heavy. Dieting without exercise is literally just a nice way of saying that you are starving yourself. The amount of calories you would consume while sedentary in order to get a proper deficit would be way too small to be even remotely healthy. 

I try not to call it "dieting" I call it "clean eating". It works. Have a nice day  

I try not to call it "dieting" I call it "clean eating". It works. Have a nice day  

I respect your opinion 100% Bill. But just because you dont agree with those last 2 sentences doesn't mean that they are false. VLCD is a known effective way to lose weight, I didnt say that it doesnt work, I just said that it is unhealthy, and is only recommended to people that are overweight to the point that they will probably die because of it. In these cases the VLCD is recommended because the cons of the diet could never outweigh death. It IS starving yourself in order to lose weight. What happens when your body has nearly zero stimulus while on a diet under 1200 calories per day? First it ditches the metabolic loads that are non-essential for survival, I.E. muscle mass and at the same time the body takes tiny pecks at its fat storage. Only once all non-essential muscle mass is gone will the body focus mostly on fat stores. So not only do you destroy your body's BMR by removing most of its metabolic load, but you eat so little food that you begin to lack all essential nutrients (the nutrients that your body doesnt make) You can take supliments to help with this, but they can never replace food, and even after all these years that they have existed, there is STILL no conclusive research that proves without a doubt that they are even effective at all. So yes, a VLCD (very low calorie diet, which is a diet under 1200 cals for a male and under 800 cals for a female) IS starving yourself. 

I understand what you meant now. I'm sorry, I obviously misread what you were saying. 

Yep, it's definitely not a secret or a magical potion that does it. Time, education, energy, and dedication. Diet is a 4 letter word when used in this context. 

I love all the comments. I am a strange person that loves to exercise. I love cardio (hard now because I let myself get out of shape) but exilirating. I also love weight lifting. Strange, I know but it is what the body is supposed to do. One quote I love is "the human body is the only machine that improves with use". I have "let myself go" for several years for various reasons, now I am in the game. I just wish the weight would come off faster. My Deit dr said avoid weight lifting because cardio is better for you. I don't think he is right! I loved the statement "working out is hard, losing weight is hard, losing weight is hard. Choose your hard"! That is perfect! 

I agree with you 100% Chad. Bill. As to those 'last two sentences' ... he's right about the caloric deficit. BMR and TDEE for people who are sedentary usually gives a 100 to 250 calorie allowable deficit without risking muscle mass. Losing muscle mass means a lower metabolism. That means your TDEE will drop even lower narrowing the safe margin between TDEE and BMR. (For those who don't know... TDEE = total daily energy expenditure; BMR = Basc metabolic rate.) I always recommend a walk three times a week for a half hour to start. It's a simple, non-demanding (for most people) to start feeling better and boost their fat usage. As far as weight bearing exercise, it doesn't take much to retain muscle and it doesn't even require weights. Pushups, situps, and body weight squats can keep everything in check while you're losing. The reason most diets fail isn't because people don't know how to lose - it's because they don't know how to maintain afterward. Without the exercise afterward they move back into that narrow TDEE to BMR window and instead of watching their intake they essentially go back to the way they used to eat. Between having lowered there metabolic requirements from losing weight, lower metabolic requirement from losing muscle mass (if they haven't been exercising a little) and possibly dropping exercise because they hit their goal, what would have been their diet calories suddenly because their maintenance calories. Losing weight is a hard process. It's long and tiring. When you're through it, you want to do everything you can so you don't have to go through it unless it's part of a process such as when it's used for bodybuilding. Most people aren't interested in bodybuilding, but that doesn't mean exercise isn't important.  

Agree -- Time, education, energy, and dedication...The Fat Secret is that there is none. You've got to do the work. 

If I had tried to do everything at the beginning, diet and exercise, I would have failed. Too many lifestyle changes at once for me give me to many reasons to give up. I did the diet only for the first four or five months. Then I started lifting light (I row, but no other cardio because of an ankle... well, backpacking, hunting, hiking but those are generally low impact) and discovered I enjoyed that. When a person sees themselves hit a stable weight while on the diet, they either have to cut calories harder or do more exercise. Both is a great combination, but just because you're skinny doesn't mean you're healthy or strong. I read once that the average male lifestyle jogger is 20% bodyfat. It's not bad, but it's not low. They qualify as 'skinny fat'. They look thin, but what you do see is mostly fat. That kind of cardio tends to strip muscle. On the other hand, if their cardiovascular system is healthy, they're doing pretty well, and each person has their own preferred type of exercise. 

Agrees NM, For me, I want a balance, 12-15% bodyfat, but if something heavy is in my way, I want to be able to move it out of my way. :) 

Hello Dream... another here who loves to exercise. When able. On the injured list for another week or so. Yes, please do strength training. It burns fat and builds muscle.  

ClassicRocker headed to the gym now to lift weights. I know a long time ago I read that if you only have time for one thing at the gym----make it weight lifting. That made sence to me. found a place on line to figure my BMR----Mine is 1441 calories a day to maintain----minus 500 to lose that is pretty low. I need to figure in the exercise calories I guess. because everyone says 1200 is low. That is what I am on. I am not a Spring Chic---67 and that makes a differenc. 900 calories is not much if you want to work out. 

I'm 62, 3 past back surgeries and 1 knee replacement. You can do it. Not sure about the calories. All of us are different. Trial and error. 

I have also gotten to love my workouts. I get the same reaction at work re: eating healthy non processed foods and working out. This week i watched the people on my team devour 5 or 6 big bags of chips, a large cake, several boxes of cookies all the while talking about being on diets!! at least 6 of the 9 have over 100 pounds to lose.