I cannot control my eating of junk food (veggies, Weight Watcher, overweight)

[DennyCrane]

Originally Posted by pitt_transplant

Ok I see you haven't learned the magic of calorie shifting. I HAD to do this because I had to lose weight without regular exercise.

When I dropped inch wise again I would maintain every day for a month or two depending on what my body liked. It was easier to hold a steady weight when my body fat was lower and my weight was lower.
I got all the way down to the 130's this way with the proper amt of body fat %. (20-22%)

I exercised here and there but it was in no means a religion. Basically just a few weeks with stints here and there when I was in the 140s doing HITT.

After that you cant lose much weight without exercise unless you eat perfectly. I cant do the large cuts anymore. Anything under 1000-1200 for a female would of stalled me out.

Another thing I personally notice...Its nice to save the muscle rebuild for post loss. When you increase your calories from a calorie cut place you metabolism will be slower and you can turn those bumped up calories into muscle with lifting and resistance your body will respond to FAST because it hasn't been doing it all through the diet. Besides the more muscle than fat burning thing is about 15%...
If you lost 15% more its not really much if you wont stick to what you are doing.

Cardio takes out muscle too if you dont have the nutritional support or overextend yourself . So if you are really looking to maintain on a diet you should just lift and not look to lose more than 1 lb per week. Keep your cardio to 30-60 minutes 5-6 days a week.

I just wanted the weight off because of pain. its a lot easier/more desirable to exercise now than when I was bigger. If someone told me I had to exercise to lose weight when I started I would of probably just quit right then and there. But I did it my own tweaked way and got exactly what I wanted without making myself miserable all the way.

I think it's great that you were able to lose weight without having to do a lot of exercise. But we all respond to exercise differently. Some people can get away with only doing it 3 times a week. Others need to do it daily. Each person has to figure out how much is enough for them. Same with calories. You can't just apply a general number to everyone. One person can eat 2000 calories per day and lose weight while another person would just maintain their weight. And too many people are wanting to avoid hard work. They'd rather cut calories than actually exercise. But instead of cutting calories a lot and not working out, the better plan would be to cut calories a little and exercise more. That way, you don't starve yourself and your metabolism doesn't slow down. Plus, exercise becomes even more effective with a proper diet. I tried dieting but it wasn't until I started working out that I got my body fat down to 10%.

[pitt_transplant]

Originally Posted by DennyCrane

I think it's great that you were able to lose weight without having to do a lot of exercise. But we all respond to exercise differently. Some people can get away with only doing it 3 times a week. Others need to do it daily. Each person has to figure out how much is enough for them. Same with calories. You can't just apply a general number to everyone. One person can eat 2000 calories per day and lose weight while another person would just maintain their weight. And too many people are wanting to avoid hard work. They'd rather cut calories than actually exercise. But instead of cutting calories a lot and not working out, the better plan would be to cut calories a little and exercise more. That way, you don't starve yourself and your metabolism doesn't slow down. Plus, exercise becomes even more effective with a proper diet. I tried dieting but it wasn't until I started working out that I got my body fat down to 10%.

Men respond better to exercise for weight loss than women. I thought that was interesting when I read that because I had been observing it in myself and others. So I had to share with you. You can apply a general number to everyone with calories. Metabolic difference between healthy bodies is max 30% and is based on calories per pound factors. A normal dietary cut of 500-1000 calories covers that. Those with slow metabs have to mess with the plate. High fiber foods make your body absorb 6% less of the calories knocking it down to a metab diff. of 24% which is more than covered by the dietary cut. Now that doesn't mean you can eat 6% more calories or anything. Eat as directed by thats one of the reasons wholesome high fiber/water foods will be more conducive to weight loss. (people with special health probs like diabetes, PCOS, thryroid etc this does not apply)

Another thing with exercise is the cross training thing...You have to do it.
Your body gets used to whatever exercise you do all the time and burns less calories doing it. Thats another reason I don't like to make any cardio that has a weight loss goal just one thing all the time and consistent. I think thats why HITT was so helpful for me in spurts. Try that OP! A mistake that exercise people make big time is eating back too many calories thinking the workout did more than it actually did. I know it naturally makes me want to eat like a 15 year old boy...lol

I didn't starve myself and my metabolism didn't slow down Thats the zig zag magic! I usually went : 1000/1200 - 1400/1600 - 1800/2000 - repeat
My maintain calorie guide at that time I think was 1800-2000? (I forget as I just went up from the bare minimum 1000-1200 day by 200 a day.)
My end of week avg was higher than my BMR which my body liked and I only felt like I was on a diet two days out of the week. The one day odd day of the week I ate what I wanted between 1200-2200 cals. Resistance training will preserve your metabolism more than cardio. SO if you do anything.Do that.

[nascarnancy]

Replace soft drinks with water, add lemon, orange or lime for taste.

I highly recommend Weight Watchers and you can even do it on-line since you can't escape your office, no excuse there. It's a great program!

Do you work in an office building? Take the stairs.

Take care of yourself, there is only one of you.

[Mathguy]

Originally Posted by BramleyDinnes

Hello everyone,

I am a working executive, working long hours and addicted to fast food, usually eating while I'm in the office. I seem to eat whether I'm hungry or not and have got to a stage where I am unable to control my eating habit. Unfortunately, my weight is increasing and I'm being forced to buy clothes a size larger than normal. I can devote a little time to exercise, but is there a recommended safe way to lose weight? I've heard of all these diets, such as Atkins, that don't sound very healthy at all.

Keep your office stocked with healthier options. Bring in some fruit (bannana's, oranges etc.) and also keep granola bars, cheerios etc. around. This has helped me a lot....people bring in donuts and I have a handful of cheerios instead.

You sound like my bro-in law....I doubt he will live to see his kids both graduate highschool. I was on the same path...my cholesterol is down 60pts and I lost 25% of my body weight.

P.S. Exercise is REALLY important for stress redux and other benefits. Especially with your type of job this is important.

[nascarnancy]

Originally Posted by Mathguy

Keep your office stocked with healthier options. Bring in some fruit (bannana's, oranges etc.) and also keep granola bars, cheerios etc. around. This has helped me a lot....people bring in donuts and I have a handful of cheerios instead.

You sound like my bro-in law....I doubt he will live to see his kids both graduate highschool. I was on the same path...my cholesterol is down 60pts and I lost 25% of my body weight.

P.S. Exercise is REALLY important for stress redux and other benefits. Especially with your type of job this is important.

Congrat's on your success!

Donuts are pure evil! WW makes some great little 1 point cakes, like a zinger and twinkie, just enough to satisfy.

[Mathguy]

Originally Posted by nascarnancy

Congrat's on your success!

Donuts are pure evil! WW makes some great little 1 point cakes, like a zinger and twinkie, just enough to satisfy.

Thanks. I really should post before and after pics here....at my peak I was 242 a few years ago...more recently 223....now 183ish and pretty dang fit. I'm really hoping people listen to what I'm saying, no BS, no "I'm ok, you are ok" Bullcrap...weight loss is one of the few things in life entirely within your control.

Food addiction is so widespread, and as health damaging as many other addictions. Seriously, if life sucks so bad that you cannot break free...seek professional help and I mean that to people in kindness. It took the death of my wife and anger...well rage perhaps... over the years of cancer to make me break free. Don't kill yourself slowly...find WHATEVER works for you and do it. Make lifestyle changes and never look back.

Peace and best wishes to you all.

[AbbeysMom]

If you are going through the drive thru due to the time it will save you ... remember that there are also some healthier options ... go for the salad ... don't get the greasy burgers and the deep fried foods.

I also due to saving time have to go the fast food route occassionally ... but what I do is to order the salads with whatever fat free dressings that they have.

Even fast food joints offer healthier options ... and rather than that cola get a bottle of water ... I have noticed that you can get a bottle of water now at McDonalds and Burger King ... so you see they do offer a healthier choice.

It is something that you have to do in order to feel better ... sure you might want the Big Mac ... but when you think about how your going to feel when the weight is no longer an issue ... the choice becomes very easy. For me anyway ...

Good luck to you and I hope that you can start making the right choices for your health.

[tabbycat6]

I bet reading all these posts is making you hungry... I just made a sandwich myself. Look you can't let naysayers stand in the way of your dreams... and if those dreams just happen to be about cheeseburgers then **** it man, have a couple cheeseburgers and some ice cream while you're at it(such a heavenly combination). Don't let people try to push you around and then call you fat when they figgure out they can't.

[Niceguy89]

Why do everyone try to find the most wierd way to lose weight? like the atkins, low carb diets, herballife with 50 different damn pills + shakes or whatever.

Let's straighten this out, TS wants to know what to do and has a little time for working out. So why the hell are people in the thread trying to cut out the workout? DON'T!

It's about mealcomposition. I'm gonna do this with the metric system since i'm not used to count in LBs and I don't wanna spend half my time converting.

This is how it would look like for me (100 kg man(ok...boy but still)) to maintain my weight; whenever I aim to lose weight I cut down on the amounts of step 1 and 2 to 80% which will leave me at a healthy shortage of calories.

Step 1: 350-400 kcal calories such as 100g pasta or rice or 450 grams (1lb) of potatoes.
What you want is slow carbs, you will find these in hard bread, wholegrain bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, and in some amounts in vegetables.

Step 2; Protein/fat source here you need to check how much you need of each kind of source to get up to 500 kcal. for example 450 grams of chicken or 250 grams of grinded meat.

Step 3; eat as much vegetables as you need to get full. vary your vegetables, and buy them fresh. tomatoes, peppers(different colors have a bit different vitamins and minerals), carrots, salad, broccoli etc are great.

Step 4; exercise minimum 40 minutes, maximum 3 hours every second day. whatever makes you sweat and is preferably fun is good. the more time you spend at an activity, th more you burn. eat a banana or two after workout, or maybie a boiled egg and a piece of bread.

You can easily takes the 3 first steps into a sandwich at home which you bring to work. Or a box of spaghettimadness and another with vegetables, you empty the first box on a plate and then just use the microwave in the companies cofeeroom.

This is a completely safe, and natural way of maintaining/losing weight. And you don't have to be a rocketscientist to do it, it looks more complicated the first time you are at it than it really is.

What you have to do to customize this after your needs and purpose is te following:

Find a calculator with google; search for "calculate kcal need" or similar. make sure you get your daily activities in the calculation either if it's asking for how many hours you do this and that or if it asks you to multiply a BMR value according to different lifestyles. then you get a number of KCAL you need to maintain your weight. lets say 2500 kcal. then subract 500 from it;
2500 - 500 = 2000.
make sure your breakfast+lunch+dinner= less than 2000 kcal.

whenever you've lost like 10-20 pounds you calculate again since the values will differ.

Dont waste your time with the lazy ways of trying to lose weight without working out, eating some kind of pills etc, this is the safest way of of both losing weight and doing it in a safe way. If you have any questions reply or send a PM.
Good luck!

BTW If you are wondering where the rest of my 3000 kcal that I need to maintain weight comes from thats a gainer and milk to the meals. but I suggest you drink water to meals as much as possible when trying to lose weight.

[Jesse69]

Actually, the fat will melt off from obese people from a change to healthy eating. When I was 205 lbs, I stopped pigging out on junk food like hoho's and Ding Dong's etc and my weight melted down to 193 lbs. Then I biked off the rest to 139 lbs! 5 years laters I'm still 145 lbs!