Weight loss quick question

[oxygene]

Hey guys. Now this isnt a "how can I lose weight" kind of thread, its more a sounding board for a couple of things I've researched.
First lets lay some groundwork.
I started dieting around January to see if that could help me much. I started out at 22st, so had quite a way to go to get anywhere decent. I looked up a few of those silly "join us for £xx per xx and sit around with others talking about your weight" and decided in the end to go it solo. Well I say solo, my mother also wanted to lose some weight so we both started dieting together.
The basic premise was "lets eat healthy and see how we go". So we looked up weight watchers stuff and some other websites and basically picked assortments of healthy low calorie meals. I entirely cut out snacking as I could easily eat a large bag of maltesers and a large bar of choc in an evening and still be peckish.
So from that we basically went down to healthy food only, and around 1300-1500 calories a day.

Now because I'm a chap who likes numbers and records I kept an excel sheet of it. This is linked here.
As you can see it worked out ok for a while, but has been steadily decreasing in effectiveness. People told me when I started that dieting would get less and less effective but I didnt think it would drop off this soon (I'm still 18.5 st).

So anyhow I got myself a treadmill thinking I should add exercise to the mix. Only done a few 15min sessions so far to break myself in. I will try this weekend to see what my limit is before collapse.
On top of this I did some research. I looked around a bunch of diet sites and played around with wiki, and according to those my diet counts as an extreme starvation diet, which doesnt sound pleasent. And because of this my body retains more then it should now and gains are significant when food beyond the current rate is added to the mix (the red gains on the graph / excel sheet are due to diet breaking).
Then I got recommended food focus which does some calculations and according to that I could eat up to 3,300kcals to maintain my weight and should be aiming at around 2800 to have steady weight loss.
So my question is this, seeing as I am on around 1300-1500kcals a day which is half what they recommend, should I be eating more? Would I need to get my body out of starvation mode to start losing weight properly again. Or have I really plateaued so early on what dieting alone can do and will have to start relying on exercise?

 

[uniQ]

That doesn't sound like a lot of calories for an 18-19stone male.

What do you eat in a typical day? And how exactly are you calculating your calories intake?

 

[Nexus]

If you are just eating 1300-1500 calories a day and have for sometime, then I'd imagine you may be feeling quite tired and lethargic? At your current weight, your daily calorific need is obviously far higher than your intake.

Factoring in exercise, if you had been previously doing none will certainly help, but again unless you up your intake its likely you will get tired again, or maybe end up binging on food depending on how strong your will power is.

Best thing really is just to eat simple food dishes which are balanced, factor that in with exercise and the weight will come off, without needing expensive diets which are only temporary anyway.

 

[icecold]

Yes, you started off eating a LOT less you should have been. You should have worked out your BMR (3300 is too high to be correct, there is a good thread on here that will help) and then taken off a couple of hundred kcals to put you in a slight deficit. You can then reduce this again if you stall, but you end up with a lot more room to cut.

Be careful with adding in cardio to further increase your caloric deficit, you could just end up trashing your metabolic capacity even more.

In general, exercise does very little to aid fat loss. It really does mostly come down to diet.

Post up a typical days worth of food so that people can critique it.

 

[Somnambulist]

Starvation mode is over-played. It might just be that at a big deficit like that you're unconsciously moving a hell of a lot less than when you started and your energy requirements are even lower. You might not be tracking your intake that accurately. Calorie targets on their own are rubbish without paying attention to the macros that make up that target. Weight loss comes in spits and spurts too - you can do everything the same and some weeks you'll hardly see any movement, then others you get a 'whoosh'. Sounds like something is off somewhere but it's just a process of elimination.

 

[oxygene]

If you are just eating 1300-1500 calories a day and have for sometime, then I'd imagine you may be feeling quite tired and lethargic?

To be honest I've always felt like that heh, so if I am then I havent noticed a difference. I dont think I've slept too well for a long while and always wake up tired.

Yes, you started off eating a LOT less you should have been. You should have worked out your BMR (3300 is too high to be correct, there is a good thread on here that will help) and then taken off a couple of hundred kcals to put you in a slight deficit.
*snip*
Post up a typical days worth of food so that people can critique it.

I checked the Steedie thread to use that formula for BMR and according to that my BMR is around 2400, which def doesnt sound right hehe.
BMR = 66 + [13.7 x weight (kg)] + [5 x height (cm)] - [6.76 x age (years)]
BMR = 66 + [13.7 x 117.4] + [5 x 185] - 30
BMR = 66 + 1608.38 + 925 - 202.8
BMR = 2396.58
That puts me lower then that standard amount all guys should take in. Hmm.
As for food, I will post todays worth below.

Weight loss comes in spits and spurts too - you can do everything the same and some weeks you'll hardly see any movement, then others you get a 'whoosh'. Sounds like something is off somewhere but it's just a process of elimination.

Yeah it is odd. I had a look around at different diet methods and issues and I think I'm doing whats called yo yo dieting. Because of the body not expecting much now, whenever I do something bad like have a couple of takeaways in a week or something I put on a lot of weight, then the following week of strict dieting I lose as much as I gained again. But normal weeks are low loss. Those red segments on my chart show that. I will gain a lot then lose a lot the following week, then go back to steadily losing very little.

 

[oxygene]

Ok this is how I start my day:

According to the box, 2 bricks with 150ml of milk is 200kcals. And I have more milk then that. So around 300kcals?
I also give a light dusting of that calorie free sugar dust stuff. I'll get the name shortly.

 

[LOAM]

Get myfittnesspal installed on your smartphone. This helped me immensely, Feb last year I was like you, 23 stone and sedentary, by December I'd lost 7.5 stone.

 

[mrthingyx]

Regarding your BMR, this is the amount of energy the body expends just existing.

So this means that - just keeping your brain operating, your body maintained and function - you are burning through 2.3/2.4k calories a day.

If you do any walking, running, thinking, heavy breathing or even eating, this increases by a value specific to you and your body's metabolism.

 

[oxygene]

Regarding your BMR, this is the amount of energy the body expends just existing.

So this means that - just keeping your brain operating, your body maintained and function - you are burning through 2.3/2.4k calories a day.

If you do any walking, running, thinking, heavy breathing or even eating, this increases by a value specific to you and your body's metabolism.

Ah i see gotcha. Thats not too bad then. I installed that app as well and added bfast and lunch. Apparently i still have 900kcals spare for the day...
I was wondering actually. How bad is fizzy drink. I usually drink nothing but low sugar orange squash but every nown and again, mainly on weekends, i will need something more robust. And i will end up drinking a litre or more of diet lemonade. It says its only like 10 calories for the entire bottle but im sure it cant be that good for you.

 

[mrthingyx]

Ah i see gotcha. Thats not too bad then. I installed that app as well and added bfast and lunch. Apparently i still have 900kcals spare for the day...
I was wondering actually. How bad is fizzy drink. I usually drink nothing but low sugar orange squash but every nown and again, mainly on weekends, i will need something more robust. And i will end up drinking a litre or more of diet lemonade. It says its only like 10 calories for the entire bottle but im sure it cant be that good for you.

If you're using it for a specific purpose (Lucozade Sport to rehydrate or whatever), then including it in a daily/weekly/whatever isn't going to kill you.

However, in the main, they are just empty calories that play havoc with your insulin and add nothing to your body's structure or function. The real question is: do you really need them?

I'm not suggesting you abstain from all things sugary/whatever, but the ultimate goal is a diet which serves both a purpose and is enjoyable... i.e. steak. For breakfast, lunch, dinner and snacks. And steak in a protein shake for hydration.

 

[oxygene]

I think im one of the few people that prefers burger to steak

 

[LOAM]

The trap that a lot of people fall into is thinking that this is a short term change, its really not!. It has to be a lifestyle change, you need to put something in place that you can stick with for a very very long time. There's no easy saying it but at 22 Stone you were doing something very wrong.

In here you will hear science, opinion and personal experience and really I've given up trying to decipher which one I think is more robust. I know for a fact though that certain things just do not work for me personally, I know science will say that weight loss is disproportionate between diet and exercise but for me personally I could never shift a pound * from solely adjusting what I ate and it was only when I started to exercise that I saw any real weight loss.

Bottom line is you need to get to know your body and understand it better than you do now, you then need to set in motion a change that you can stick to for potentially the rest of you life, the reason fad diets aren't for the long haul is that they cut out everything that makes living worthwhile and only a very select few are prepared to stick with them.

* I should add that when I was in my early 20's I actually did lose a lot of weight from diet alone but I put my body through total hell doing it, became anorexic to the point that I ended up in hospital and ended up putting it all back on anyway because when I was over that period of my life I was still sedentary.

 

[arknor]

sell the treadmill buy a bike.
cycling is far easier , you won't get out of breath so quick and because it's easier you will obviously have an easier time getting your self to do it.

even if my legs are dead my breathing is still fairly fine just a lot heavier than normal but sustainable over a long period of time and with tired legs I can still go around 10mph fairly easily as long as it's not up hill

for example the power of cycling
http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/217051252/3208730
Distance 19.72 mi
Duration 2h:15m:03s
Avg. Speed 8.8 mph
Max. Speed 23.0 mph
Calories 1329 kcal
Hydration 0.70L

over 1k calories hours in 2 hours of cycling (the more fat you have the more calories you will burn because of the extra weight I was 16stone when I did that ride)
I'd probably be dead in 10-20mins jogging and go back home with barely any calories burned but because cycling feels so easy even though it burns more calories because your also propelling the weight of the bike I will happily carry on for as long as I can.
I sweat like crazy and give my legs a real good workout but never feel totally drained and out of breath.

BTW cycling is also better for your joint's as there is less impact and stress on them so a lot of pro runners even do cycling

AS DUKE says diet is everything if you under eat to much your body will slow it's metabolism and you also want to avoid big meals spread them out through the day so you never feel completely empty you want yout body burning energy at a nice steady level and not entering starvation mode

 

[oxygene]

*snip*

Hah dont worry I know I was eating complete rubbish for many years. I blame a mixture of depression and apathy personally.
I could blame other things, the entire side of my dads family are all very overweight. Uncles cousins etc. I was skinny as a rake until about 20 and then piled it on. But its all obviously my own fault, so no blame game.
As for a lifestyle change I have made a huge one for the last seven months. Completely cutting out snacking was the no.1 change. As for the meals, there's plenty of low calorie ones that I still really enjoy the taste of, so that's not too much of an issue.
the main problem is currently my life is in a bit of a slump and all I look forward to each week is on Friday when the family shares the least unhealthy takeaway we can come up with.
Each Friday we will have a portion of fish and chips. And counting these calories, even is they end up being 1500 for the meal, still doesn't take me up to 2500kcals for the day so it is... excusable in our minds.
So that's a trap I will always have. I love my food and meals I use as a celebration, a pick me up when depressed, and something to look forward to the rest of the time.

To be honest I'm surprised I lasted as long as I have on this diet. I have easily halved my food intake and cut out a lot of junk I used to love. I don't feel hungry, bar for some reason half an hour at 11:30 each day. But that is beaten back by some tictacs or a drink of squash.

My main hurdle is always going to be exercise. There is no sport I enjoy or ever have. Even when I was skinny and played football I was always the goal post (thats about how useful a goalie I was). And I find any for of exercise intolerably boring. This is why I opted for a treadmill instead of actual walking. Plus i dont like the thought of thin muscly people watching me while I am bouncy and flabby (loose skin is a pain).
I did have an exercise bike for a bit, but back then when I was heavier I had pains a lot in ankles and knees.

 

[mrthingyx]

sell the treadmill buy a bike.
cycling is far easier , you won't get out of breath so quick and because it's easier you will obviously have an easier time getting your self to do it.

even if my legs are dead my breathing is still fairly fine just a lot heavier than normal but sustainable over a long period of time and with tired legs I can still go around 10mph fairly easily as long as it's not up hill

for example the power of cycling
http://www.endomondo.com/workouts/217051252/3208730
Distance 19.72 mi
Duration 2h:15m:03s
Avg. Speed 8.8 mph
Max. Speed 23.0 mph
Calories 1329 kcal
Hydration 0.70L

over 1k calories hours in 2 hours of cycling (the more fat you have the more calories you will burn because of the extra weight I was 16stone when I did that ride)
I'd probably be dead in 10-20mins jogging and go back home with barely any calories burned but because cycling feels so easy even though it burns more calories because your also propelling the weight of the bike I will happily carry on for as long as I can.
I sweat like crazy and give my legs a real good workout but never feel totally drained and out of breath.

BTW cycling is also better for your joint's as there is less impact and stress on them so a lot of pro runners even do cycling

Or...

Lift weights, encourage your body to burn far more calories over a longer period of time, and stay in one place.

All the while, building up muscles that will look nice to one's preferred sex once the fat has been shed.

At the same time, building stronger and more resilient bones, tendons and - as a result - joints. What's not to like?

 

[arknor]

lifting weights takes more discipline that most people have though and it's also hard work and he's trying to lose weight so he needs to cut and then bulk?
he can still build muscle in his legs from cycling so his calorie need will rise over time as his muscles develop.

I have weights but during the summer just a few reps and I will start sweating like crazy which put's me off doing it.

and yes I said I sweat like crazy crom cycling and I do but because your out in the open and moving 10-30mph the air keeps you cool and generally you don't realise how hot and sweaty you are until you stop

 

[mrthingyx]

lifting weights takes more discipline that most people have though and it's also hard work and he's trying to lose weight so he needs to cut and then bulk?

Still get his muscles nice and strong, with some decent blood flow.

he can still build muscle in his legs from cycling so his calorie need will rise over time as his muscles develop.

Ah, yes... because legs are the first thing everybody sees when one hits the beach.

I have weights but during the summer just a few reps and I will start sweating like crazy which put's me off doing it

What, and 2hrs of cycling leaves you smelling like a rose?

I'm not warning him off cycling, but a lot of people assume cardio is the be all and end all of losing weight. It is not. By a long shot.

 

[tom_e]

lifting weights takes more discipline that most people have though and it's also hard work and he's trying to lose weight so he needs to cut and then bulk?
he can still build muscle in his legs from cycling so his calorie need will rise over time as his muscles develop.

I have weights but during the summer just a few reps and I will start sweating like crazy which put's me off doing it.

and yes I said I sweat like crazy crom cycling and I do but because your out in the open and moving 10-30mph the air keeps you cool and generally you don't realise how hot and sweaty you are until you stop

Losing weight and keeping it off is hard work, the earlier into it that people realise that the easier it will be for them.
Lifting weights is a great way to lose fat, I went from 17st flabby mess to 14st in decent shape with pretty much nothing other than weight lifting and a good diet, on that note the diet is the most important thing get that nailed and the weight will come off without a great deal of exercise.
If the OP is a number chaser like me then weight lifting is perfect as there's always a number to chase, be it weight lifted or reps performed.
Also in terms of being able to see the changes you're making to your body again weight lifting is going to give you the most dramatic change in body composition and therefore look.
In short get lifting!

Can you stick up a typical days diet Oxygene.

 

[platypus]

Or...

Lift weights, encourage your body to burn far more calories over a longer period of time, and stay in one place.

All the while, building up muscles that will look nice to one's preferred sex once the fat has been shed.

At the same time, building stronger and more resilient bones, tendons and - as a result - joints. What's not to like?

Or....do both ?