*** Big Fat Weight Loss Thread ***

[ic1male]

Third fast today. I have to say I'm shocked because I'm actually enjoying NOT eating! I'll hang on til 6pm and have a Huel - yes I am hungry throughout the afternoon but I don't feel compelled to rush off to the cupboard and scoff a bag of crisps. I just have a drink of water and ride it out.

And then on the two normal eating days, I've just managed to get to about 2000kcals and feel well satisfied. I even had some of my easter egg yesterday.

 

[neoboy]

Orthodox Easter today so not having a dinner is non negotiable despite it being a fasting day.

I'll have some nom noms and then just eat a lot of veg on top and that will be it for the day. All in all, even without seeing the weight on scale I can tell I've lost some this week which isn't a surprise.

Going forward, 36/12 is a bit too extreme in terms of appetite control when staying home this much. I'll just shift a small portion of calories from the eating window as one meal on the "fasting" day.

Basically same calories and just get 2 smaller fasts than a big 36 hour one but with hopefully better appetite suppression and just keep trying to improve my running before life starts returning to relative normal.

 

[Uther]

Got a Wahoo hrm a few days ago, it's been a game changer for me phsycologically.

 

[AndyCr15]

I have a bit of a quandary. I've commented how I'm snacking a lot at night and even waking up, having a biscuit bar or protein bar and going back to sleep. This has gone on most nights over the last week or two. Sunday night is kebab night and I tend to just have a cheat evening, lots of biscuits too. I did this last night, as usual, and then slept solid for all 7+ hours of the night. Looking at my sleep score, it was 86, highest of the month, aside... guess when... last Sunday, when I had a cheat evening and scored an 87 for 8+ hours with 1 (quite late on) interruption.

Given that I don't really believe in the whole 'don't eat before bed, it doesn't get burnt' malarkey (it's always just cals in and cals out, doesn't really matter when they come in or go out) maybe it's not a bad thing to load up a little at night, to ensure I get a decent (interruption and snack free) nights sleep?

 

[neoboy]

Well depends how late we're talking, if you eat too much hard to digest stuff, then that alone can give you bad sleep.

I actually have a similar problem, my issue is that I tended to eat a lot before bed and will struggle to fall asleep when hungry, then lack of sleep can make me more hungry the next day, etc, so here I am at 115 kg (lost little weight last week).

In bid to stop that, I've been loading up on a big platter of low calorie veg and smoothie as my last meal to bulk the stomach out. Bunch of tomatoes, half a cucumber, one big carrot and then I'll stuff as much spinach as I can into my big blender with some broccoli and dump a stick of celery in there for good measure.

Normally works out at least half a KG of veg so does a good job suppressing appetite for rest of the night so basically if it works and calories are the same then it's all good?

 

[AndyCr15]

Are you saying that does work? I could give it a try. I'm actually doing a little similar with Huel at different times at the moment. Maybe make a huel up of 300 cals and fill it will 5-600ml of water, so volume-wise it's pretty big, cal wise, not so much. Normally this would be breakfast or evening meal, but I'm trying it sometimes as a snack.

 

[neoboy]

Well this whole, "have a glass of water, you won't feel hungry" thing doesn't work on me hence why I save all the vegetables towards the evening. I go to bed around midnight at the moment so just had my last meal at 10, as an example I finished 3 salad tomatoes, third of a cucumber, 2 small-ish carrots and had a smoothie with 100g of spinach, 100g broccoli and a celery stalk (some Vitafiber for sweetness). Probably 600+ grams of vegetables right there so feeling pretty full and won't be getting any hunger pangs before I hit the bed.

 

[AndyCr15]

Yeah, even though the extra water in the Huel is the same, I guess, I can't decide if the glass of water thing works for me either. Mind you, as I think about it, I've not drunk as much water recently. Maybe it was working?! I'll try upping that again for a few days. Also thinking about it, one of the last things I eat before bed is often an apple and a kiwi fruit, sometimes some grapes or strawberries too. They usually add up to around 300g and less than 200 cals. Maybe I just eat more of that, double it up perhaps.

 

[neoboy]

Yeah water makes no difference on my appetite and things like "eat more protein to feel full" doesn't work on me either so I got for simple physics and bulk out with as much low calorie veg as I can. Upside is that I eat more vegetables and get a lot of fibre in and helps control my appetite towards the evening and night so win win for me.

 

[AndyCr15]

"eat more protein to feel full" doesn't work on me either

One thing I think works on me is how long it takes me to eat the calories. What I mean is, after a meal, if I have a biscuit or bar that I eat in about 30 seconds I feel like I should eat something else. I've got some Oppo Salted Caramel Ice Cream which is only about 160 calories for half a tub and I eat ice cream really slowly, kind of just letting it melt in my mouth. I think psychologically that works for me. I spend 10 minutes eating half a tub, only 160 cals but I feel like that's desert all done Fruit is similar. I make a plate of things that take me 10 mins to eat, feels like more just because it took so long to eat.

 

[Martynt74]

Yeah, i think there's a lot written about being "mindful" of eating, rather than just gulfing stuff down.

Next milestone for me of weighing in just under 95kg at 94.7kg. It's been pretty static for the last few weeks as i've been doing less running and eating a decent amount due to lockdown so seeing a drop of around 2kg this week has been nice.

 

[ic1male]

I've been having a try-on of all my old clobber. Can now get into my 42" waist jeans with room to spare. The pair of 34" waist Levi's I bought from Macy's in New York City twenty years ago (and I have never been able to get into) are still in a pristine state in the drawer. I reckon by the end of the year, I'll be able to wear them out for my Boxing Day dinner. That's my pledge to this thread.

 

[Psymonkee]

I've had a massive setback with a cellulitis infection (massive water retention) in addition to dropping my low carb lifestyle so whilst not back to square 1 it's not been a great couple of weeks.

On the plus side? Got the weights set up in the garage properly. Once I'm better it's time to SMASH!

 

[Martynt74]

I've been having a try-on of all my old clobber. Can now get into my 42" waist jeans with room to spare. The pair of 34" waist Levi's I bought from Macy's in New York City twenty years ago (and I have never been able to get into) are still in a pristine state in the drawer. I reckon by the end of the year, I'll be able to wear them out for my Boxing Day dinner. That's my pledge to this thread.

Haha, i had similar. Went on holiday one year and bought some Superdry shorts in the airport, i saw Large and bought them. Got to the hotel and there was no-way i was getting in them.

That was probably 2012. I was working away for ~16 months in 2016 and wasn't eating and drinking much as it was all in a big compound so not easy to eat out of mealtimes and i was exercising a lot as i had little else to do.

Got back home and finally managed to fit into them, then threw them away as they were unbelievably uncomfortable as velcro stuck out and was really scratchy!

 

[neoboy]

Funnily enough I did the same recently and got a pair of 34" Levi jeans as motivation, but weight loss has stalled so been hovering around that 115kg mark for a few weeks and my trusty 36" jeans from Next.

Despite the lockdown things have been surprisingly stressful lately which isn't helping the diet at all so lot of slip ups.

 

[ic1male]

Funnily enough I did the same recently and got a pair of 34" Levi jeans as motivation, but weight loss has stalled so been hovering around that 115kg mark for a few weeks and my trusty 36" jeans from Next.

You are confusing me no end. 115kg and you can get in a 36" pair of jeans? Are you like Andy in being muscley/tall or something? What's your BMI?

 

[neoboy]

Yeah I'm somewhere between 6"1 and 6"2 depending on the posture and probably wouldn't look far off him if I was at his weight.

If it makes you feel any better, the jeans have stretch material in them and my thighs make it look like a slim fit when I'm wearing a straight cut

 

[AndyCr15]

I've been thinking recently about timing of things I eat. I know some people say not to eat before bed, the calories just sit there etc, but I don't buy that. It's still calories in, calories out. If I eat them all before bed, that means I didn't eat many during the day. I'll have been in deficit during the day and an overage overnight, it just balances out. What I have noticed, if I eat a lot after 7pm, I sleep a lot better. Using my sleep stats and MyFitnessPal logs, looking back over the past couple of weeks I can clearly see when I eat more than 2,100 cals in the evening, I generally only have 1 or 2 disturbances to my sleep. If I eat 1,500 or below, then I can wake 5 or 6 times in the night (in both instances I'm eating about 2,700 to 3,200 cals in most cases)

The last couple of days I've had an actually ready meal (well, MuscleFood prepped pot) at around 9pm, followed by a protein cookie/brownie and a bowl of cereal (so about 700-800 cals in total) and it's really filled me up. I'm trying this to try and stop my late night cravings that can lead to me eating 1,100 to 1,500 cals late at night. Yes, 700-800 is quite a lot to lock in to a late night meal, but if it's consistent and removes the binges I sometimes have the urge for, maybe that's better? It also has me feeling quite satiated in the morning, so I can get away with just a bowl of porridge around 9am perhaps. Lunch can be fairly light too. I think yesterday at 3pm I had eaten less than 1,000 cals (and been on a 1,200 cal burning bike ride in the morning) so 800 cals at the end of the day should be fine.

Anyway, kind of thinking aloud here, but wondered if anyone had any thoughts on it?

 

[Avenged7Fold]

Eating times and macros do not make a huge difference to most people trying to achieve a normal body composition/weight.

That said, all calories are not equal and you see this more when you push it to extremes. Your body will get its energy from up to three sources when doing an activity. From glycogen (carbs), amnio acids ( broken down proteins from muscle) and your fat.

Your body is a clever thing and will choose the fuel depending on both what is available and how quick it requires the energy.

Without going into tons of detail, when you are trying to do stuff like push a very low/high body fat or you do an exercise which is intense for a long time, your put body energy requirements/stores to the extreme. Very fat people have tons of fat stored and will favour burning fat in larger proportions to other people. On the hand very lean but heavily muscled people will favour breaking down muscle for energy over fat during an intense exercise sesh if they have no glycogen available, as the energy is not only easier available but in greater abundance to fat.

Do stuff like removing glycogen stores, not eat enough fat, not enough protein, get super lean or push energy use to extremes such as run marathons etc, and it's clear that not all calories are equal as well as calorie timing. Body builders on a cut often bell curve their carbs around the time they exercise for fuel, protein is eaten constantly and in intervals of 2 to 3 hours to encourage protein synthesis as much as possible.

Basically food for fuel/function.

 

[ic1male]

I'm sitting here this morning wondering whether I've got gallstones (from fasting and rapid weight loss) or whether I've pulled a muscle from exercising. Although looking at my chart, it's only 3.3kg in 3 weeks so not that rapid. So close now to going from obese to overweight on the BMI scale that I hope nothing scuppers it.