Ask the guy who lost 200 pounds in 9 months

In My Humble Opinion
81

I would suggest to you SenorBeef that you very much underestimate the importance (in particular from the long term health perspective) of what fat and what carbohydrate. A calorie is not a calorie; a gram of fat is not a gram of fat; a carb is not a carb.

The highly significant health effects difference achieved by replacing dietary saturated fat with PUFAs is overwhelmingly well established. That link is a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials that addressed the issue, not just looking at the usual proxies of long term outcomes, but actual rates of myocardial infarction and/or cardiac death: “10% reduced CHD risk … for each 5% energy of increased PUFA” The MUFA data is more indirect, demonstrating improvements of proxies of long term health in population studies. And I won’t even bring up the whole bit about omega 3s!

Similarly the packaging of the carb is critical. That refined, highly processed, and/or simple carb package is pretty well accepted by now to be as bad as you make it out to be. Carbs packaged in real foods that include the fiber and a variety of phytochemicals OTOH help increaseinsulin sensitivity and lower insulin levels, as well as provide protection from a variety of cancers and inflammatory conditions. (Note the second link demonstrates better insulin sensitivity on a high cereal fiber diet than on a high protein diet.) The improved insulin sensitivity may also underlie the well identified lowered cancer risks associated with a higher fiber diet. If what you care about is insulin then decreasing simple carbs is indeed important, but keeping carbs with fiber is more so.

As to the nature of ancestral diets, we are probably best off looking at worldwide hunter gatherer diets as a proxy. Yup, overall more protein than typical Western diets, ranging 19 to 35% of energy, and less carbs, ranging from 22 to 40% of energy. (And obviously not from refined processed sources!) Still even that lowest end carb percent is 110 grams for a 2000 kCal diet, much more than most “low carb” diets advise. Note that there is no overlap between your cited 10 to 20% figure and the 22 to 40% figure of hunter gatherer diets. Agreed that the typical American diet, and even the USDA guideline is higher than that ancestral (or at least hunter gatherer) range and that someone who wants to replicate the macronutrient profile of that diet should eat less than the USDA’s advised 45 to 65% of energy from carbohydrates, but “low carb” diets miss that goal equally as much in the other direction.

High sodium is more well established as a very significant health risk than you make it out to be btw.

No debate that losing fat mass, at least 5% from an obese baseline, is good for ones health, whether that is done low carb or low fat or a variety of other approaches. Your goal of doing so by a method that works for you is laudable and only you can determine what method works best for you.

My “Ask the” question remains - are you currently concerned about medical concerns that address your short term function or are you currently considering longer term health issues? I will add in: would your longer term plan be different depending on the answer to that question?

82

I love how people want to come in and lecture people about certain dieting methods and cautioning people about cutting out certain carbs and fats in their diet. Sure that makes sense when your talking about a maintenance diet, i.e. what you need to be eating for the rest of your life.

But when someone is morbidly obese, doing whatever they can to shed the pounds will prolong their life in so many other ways I would argue that doing it in the way that the easiest for them to do it is better than staying morbidly obese…all day long.

Once you’ve lost the weight, then become more focused on your maintenance diet.

83

I started a low-carb diet a while back, probably about the same age you were, and I found it was incredibly expensive to buy all that meat. Did you have the problem with your food costing you more, or did you figure out a way to handle that? I only stuck with it for a couple weeks, but it sounds like you never wind up eating less, seeing as 10 bacon and 10 sausage is way more than I would ever eat now for breakfast, but would have been nothing then.

84

When I’ve eaten low-carb, I get a lot of my protein from eggs and cheese. Some meat too, yeah, but you can buy chicken on sale for $.99/lb, so it’s not like you have to go out buying sides of bacon and expensive steaks.

85

I am sorry if I come off as lecturing but certain statements were made that to me read as witnessing for low carb high fat without regard for getting adequate fiber, especially by way of vegetables and fruits, without any concern over sodium or nitrate intake, falsely describing such as somehow “natural”, and I do not feel that those statements should be left unchallenged, even in IMHO.

Once again, I like you, support our op’s attempt to find the method of weight loss that works for him, and to also begin to consider what his long term diet and exercise lifestyle is going to be and to prepare for it. And I am curious where his thought process is in terms of longer term health concerns versus short term outcomes.

86

I am not arguing against healthy weight loss. I totally support it.

What I do worry about with ‘crash dieting’ is that it is not sustainable. It’s a great accomplishment to drop 40-50-90 pounds, but I just want to reinforce the challenge that remains to maintain that weight loss.

Once the excitement of rapid weight loss passes and ‘real life’ intrudes, continuing to watch what you eat and to excercise for the next 40 years is a HUGE challenge. I just hope SenorBeef gives as much consideration to that side of equation as to the rapid weight loss side.

87

I’m pretty confused myself. I eat a low-carb diet (no more than 25 net carbs/day) and I’m actually finding it not too expensive…then again, as MsWhatsit said, steak and center-cut bacon is a rarity…I eat more lean pork and chicken than any other meat. And fresh veggies aren’t terribly expensive.

SenorBeef, you do add leafy greens into your low-carb diet, correct? I merely ask because they’re a vital source of fiber, which is key in a low-carb diet, not just for “fullness” effects, but also just for regular intestinal issues.

88

I understand that this is the conventional wisdom, but I don’t see any actual usefulness to it.

It’s hard enough for me to motivate myself to lose the weight even in a relatively rapid fashion. Rapid doesn’t mean easy - I’ve had to work quite hard at it. So it’s very unlikely I’d be willing to sign up for an effort where I’d have to expend the same effort for a much longer period of time, meanwhile being hungry all the damn time and not seeing as much muscle growth due to the lack of protein that comes with a low calorie/low fat diet.

There’s no disadvantage to losing the weight and then engaging a different maintenance diet at that point. Now it may seem possible or even likely that I’ll hit my target weight/fitness and let it slide again, but the thing is… if I can’t manage to do a maintenance diet when I’m already in much better shape, with a higher basal metabolic rate, and more fitness to make excercise less of a struggle, how in the world could I possibly do an even more extreme form of that as a weight loss diet, starting in much worse shape?

If I’m not capable of committing to maintaining my weight that way, there’s certainly no way I’m going to lose it that way. I just wouldn’t do it.

In any case, I think you’re mischaracterizing the argument. You’re saying I have a choice between starvation and unhealthy diet and rapid progress, and slower but healthier diet with slow loss. It’s actually quite the opposite. There’s no starving on a low carb diet - eat as much as your body wants, and you’ve got plenty of protein for your body to rebuild itself.

Whereas just cutting calories and watching fat requires you to not eat as you want, and go hungry often. Since protein usually comes with fat, it leaves you without the tools to build your lean muscle mass as quickly, which in turn makes fitness and weight loss more difficult.

I realize this is counterintuitive to most people, but you don’t realize how natural a low carb diet feels. It’s like you’ve removed a block from your body functioning properly. Your hunger cycles are no longer dependent on sugar spikes and crashes. Your muscles and minor injuries recover faster. You don’t get sick. Your endurance goes up. It’s like you’ve removed a poison from your system that’s been making you feel crappy your whole life.

If it’s so great, though, why don’t I just do it for life? Well, I just don’t like eating that way. I don’t like most of the foods I eat, I don’t like the prep time required, I don’t like that it makes it really difficult to eat out, I don’t like a large enough diversity of food that I don’t get tired of it. I also miss pretty much all of my favorite foods.

I also don’t generally care about my fitness level until it’s at an extreme. When I was, say, 270 post-diet, I was still strong and able to do all the things I physically wanted to do, so I didn’t really care.

But in any case I can’t find a single advantage of doing things the “right” way and try to lose weight over years with low calorie/low fat diets. Just miserable. Tried that before, unwilling to try it again - I’d rather be fat.

89

IMO any attempt to get closer to the “ancestral diet” misses an important thing. Even the luckiest ancestral people in the greatest period of abundance still had to walk everywhere they went, did not spend 8 hours a day sitting, and now and then had to run for their lives. Most of us will never come close to that, hence our need to count carbs so carefully (not fat and protein because their satiety makes them self-limiting). And it’s my personal theory that inactivity in childhood sticks with you for life… it doesn’t help if you pick up the hobby of marathon running when you’re 30. Carb limitation restriction isn’t a gimmick, it’s a necessary counterbalance to a life of physical inactivity in an age of abundance.

90

Why does low-carb make it difficult to eat out?

91

QFT. I almost never have a problem. Salad with chicken on it. Steak with veggies instead of a potato. Unless you mean “fast food,” in which case I’d agree–if there’s not a Chipotle around, my options are few.

92

SenorBeef,

You have not answered my question directly but I am gathering that the answer is more short term functional impairments due to your obesity, lower fitness level, and unnamed medical issues, that are your current motivation for change, rather than concerns over longer term health outcomes. Is that a fair deduction?

A few things to comment on -

Your previous intense resistance training coupled with adequate protein allowed you to increase your total daily energy expenditure (TEE) while losing sizable fat mass; be aware that few are able to achieve that. Usually fat loss is coupled with a sizable decrease in total daily energy expenditure, “beyond those predicted solely on the basis of changes in weight and body composition,” that persists long term. This graph from that paper illustrates how that amounts to needing to eat 500 fewer kCal/d (beyond the difference based on decreases in weight, age, and body composition) than pre-weight loss baseline to avoid any regain.

That means long term discipline. That set of long term habits is hard to learn and to ingrain. Even harder when doing it is not associated with any reinforcer, like seeing the scale drop. Seeing the scale not go up by much, or not losing regained function, just doesn’t do the job for most. For many (maybe not you, only you know you best) the time to have any chance to ingrain those habits is when they are simultaneously getting the psychological attaboys of active weight loss. Again, YMMV.

I also again need to point out that high protein does not need to come with high fat. Sure those sausages do. Even a T-bone eye steak, trimmed of all visible fat, has 60% fat to its 40% protein. But there is wild salmon with the opposite ratio, canned or pouched tuna packed in water with 94% protein and 6% fat, a bison ribeye at 71% protein to 29% fat, boneless grilled chicken breast, 80% protein for 20% fat, non fat Greek yogurt with lots of protein and no fat (albeit there are a few carbs in that), and so on. Now you may not enjoy those foods, but then again you are saying you don’t like most of the foods you are eating low carb anyway. My understanding (see here and the table here, with butter having the smallest “fullness factor”) is that fat contributes little to satiety compared to protein and fiber.

I believe you when you say that your version of low carb feels natural to you and so on. I am sure it is true for you. You can rightly be expert about what is true for you. But what you say is not true for everyone. Many can eat low saturated fat, modest overall fat (larger amounts of PUFAs including omega 3’s and MUFAs), and low calorie, with more than adequate protein, adequate fiber, and lots of vegetables, fruits, seeds, nuts, beans, so on, and not feel at all deprived or hungry.

There is no “right way” to lose weight; in no way do I presume to tell you how to meet your goal. I do however need to dispute some things that you state are true not just for you, but true for everyone. And to point out the difficulties that most who “diet” rather than develop long term sets of lifestyle habits run into after achieving their goal unless they have prepared very well for that transition ahead of time.
Cosmic Relief, of course you are correct that modern life does not include as much activity built in. But you are just plain wrong otherwise. As documented above, fat does not have built in satiety that prevents overconsumption, quite the opposite. It is as bad in that sense as are simple carbs. Protein does and fiber rich foods do.

Curious though, why do you believe that beginning to exercise regularly as an adult “doesn’t help”? It may not cause much weight loss by itself (since many will just eat more than they burned) but it clearly increases insulin sensitivity, which is indeed a big deal.

93

Interestingly (and parenthetically) I saw my cholesterol levels go down significantly after changing not my diet, but the source of my meat. I began to get my meat from a farm share, and almost stopped eating ordinary meat from the supermarket. I now eat just as much beef (and lamb and pork and chicken) as before, but it’s grass-fed beef from Central Massachusetts, and not feedlot beef from Kansas City (or Uruguay, or wherever else our beef comes from).

Oh, and speaking of beef… good OP, SenorBeef. Long, but compelling.

94

It is more expensive for me to eat this way but not dramatically so. The food is more calorie dense and I don’t eat out of cravings/boredom so I tend to eat fewer meals and snacks even if they are bigger meals with more calories.

There are also cheap ways to go about it - in season vegetables are cheap, eggs are cheap, chicken is cheap. I spend more than I need to - I could eat a cheap chicken/egg/veggie type diet, but the cost isn’t too unreasonable.

Not as much as I should. I eat a lot of salad, using salad mixes that include other bits of vegetables, and I’ll eat steamed brocolli, and that’s about it - aside fron the onions and peppers I put in everything, not sure if those really count.

Because about 99% of what restaurants offer isn’t low carb. And you don’t have a nutrition guide, so you don’t know if they add stuff in the prep process that adds a lot of carbs. Even just eating something very meaty could have a sugar-based spice profile.

Sorry about the lack of answer. I’ve been reading what you’ve written which is interesting. But yes, as of now, long term outcomes between different types of fats don’t concern me. Trans fats do concern me, because they’re harmful on a much shorter time scale and by a much bigger degree, but otherwise I have no interest in trying to coordinate my fat intake. I do take Omega 3 supplements though, but that just seems like a good idea for everyone.

This is part of why low fat/low calorie diets are so difficult. You’re fighting to hold onto your lean body mass and you’re often adversely affecting your basal metabolic rate and the total amount of excercise you’re able to do doesn’t scale up as fast.

I would even speculate that it might be more productive to eat quite a lot of food and do extensive strength training to build up your lean body mass, and allow that to eventually cause a calorie deficit through increased metabolic action rather than to try to limit your calories or fat, but that’s just a guess based on the difficulty I’ve had with low fat diets.

If I had to sit through the “psychological reward” of losing 5 pounds every month, I wouldn’t do it. It simply wouldn’t be worthwhile. I am absolutely unwilling to starve myself all the time for years-long weight loss, and struggling to get into better shape because my muscles don’t have what they need to function and rebuild optimally

I know everyone wants to push me towards doing something more sustainable, but I’m just saying flat out that I’d rather just keep the status quo and remain fat and maybe die than have to go through that for life.

Down the road, when I’m in better shape and excercise isn’t so difficult, and my BMR is higher, and I only have to do enough to maintain rather than lose, that may be practical. But the idea of starving myself, constantly being hungry, struggling to excercise, constantly being in pain/sore because of it, and all for what, losing 50 pounds after a year? No way.

I see no reason to try to skimp on the fat. You need some sort of macronutrient to exist on. The idea that fat has no satiety value also runs against my experience - I sometimes eat high fat, low protein foods and it satiates me.

The struggles people have on such diets and the failure rates seem to indicate it isn’t that common.

95

I think you are confusing the nutrition plan I am describing with a low calorie plan that does not keep protein intake adequate (and to me adequate means more than the USDA’s 0.8 gm/kg, more like 1.5 to 2.0 gram/kg) and that does not include adequate and varied fiber rich foods.

Honestly, your eventually doing something sustainable or not is your business not mine. I appreciate your honesty that sustainability and long term outcomes are not your current concern, and your leaving your door open to considering those issues at a later date. Without question any nutrition plan that an individual experiences as starving one’s self won’t hold, no matter what is true statistically across larger populations.

Another question of the “Ask the …” sort - obviously you are not able to do the sort of exercise (at least not the same volume and intensity) you did back then, what are you doing now? All weights or some variety? Are you modifying your approach in light of your intermittent injuries getting in the way?

96

It’s been a few weeks since the first post. How are things going?

97

Once I slipped into ketosis, fats seem to have a very satiating effect. I usually don’t have time for breakfast except on days that I work out, so on days I skip breakfast I have a cup of coffee with a pat of butter in it (grass-fed cow butter…mmm). It tides me over until lunch where I usually eat a substantial amount of protein, a big serving or two of vegetables, and whatever fats are present in the meat. I felt hungry within an hour or two when I was eating whole wheat toast or oatmeal for breakfast.

98

I’ve been pretty lax this time around. I usually jump into these things at full blast and try to go as hard as I can from day 1, but that’s how I’ve ended up injuring myself in the past. I’m really out of shape - I’m worse now than I was at 380 - so I’ve been easing into it.

So far I’ve only done swimming and walking, mostly swimming. I know I said earlier that lifting/strength training is the key, and it is, but I’m in such bad shape that I’d worry about tearing a ligament or something if I jumped right into that.

I figure with swimming I can give pretty much every muscle group a low intensity but useful workout and rebuild all of the muscle supporting stuff (ligaments, tendons, etc) along the way. So far I’ve only gone 2-3 times a week, I really mean to go more but I pull my hamstrings at the drop of a hat (despite extensive stretching) and, well, I’ve been lazy. In a way it’s easier to go all out like I did before - force yourself to work every day and you can just take a hard line “YOU MUST DO THIS NOW” stance with yourself. But if you’re going slowly and feeling it out, you can start justifying taking days off more often.

But I don’t think I could just switch it on and go nuts every day like I did before. Not yet.

Slowly. I’ve lost around 30 pounds but some of that is water weight, although you do regain some of the initial water weight losses as your muscles store more water. I haven’t been able to excercise at nearly the pace I’d like.

I also am not feeling the magic so much - the switchover you feel when you do low carb and everything in your body just runs better. I’m not sure if it’s because of my age, lack of shape, lack of dietary strictness (0-15g carbs per day before, 20-40 now), or what.

I am making progress - I can swim for about 3x longer than I could when I started.. about 25 minutes into 1:15. Using lower energy strokes though - no crawl. What’s actually stopping me if I keep going is cramping… my electrolyte levels are screwy this time around. Usually that happens during the transition as your water level changes dramatically but then you reach a new equilibrium, but I’ve had problems with cramping since the start. Not sure why.

Overall, not great. Not feeling good, a chronic shoulder pain issue has really been acting up (preceeded the diet though), excercise feels very taxing. But part of that is just the horrible shape I’m in - as I get in better shape, it’ll come easier. Rough start though.

99

That sounds like great progress to me, especially for trying to ease your way around injuries. That’s what, a little less than a third of the way to your goal? My type A husband likes to tear into things full blast the same way you do, which was great right up until chronic fatigue syndrome hit him like a freight train. Learning to ease into things - and not give up when the results don’t show up right away! - has been very difficult for him, but valuable. Keep going, you’re doing good. :slight_smile:

100

SB, do you think maybe your past experience is a bit too high of a bar to be holding your current experience up to?

I know that the long term health outcomes are not your current concern, but I still need to point out to you that even your accomplishment so far, if maintained, are still enough to have made a significant impact on those measures - 5-10% body weight reduction associated with an ongoing regular exercise program. Yes, yes, that smacks of long term behavior changes rather than a time limited intense diet/exercise program and then seeing where you are at. Sorry. :slight_smile:

Anyway, FWIW, I too think that building a base of fitness at a pace that avoids injury seems like a wise approach, not being lazy. It sounds to me that what you are doing is the classic approach:

Step one: build a base, able to do moderately intense activity for at least half an hour 4 times a week. You are already almost half way there.

Step two: Build up intensity as well, of variable levels, sorts, and durations. More volume is often worked on here as well.

Sure, at 17 you could skip right into step two. But while you aint old, you are not a kid any more either.

When are you stretching? Conventional wisdom has changed a bit over the years. Static stretching before exercise has been shown to be of no help and actually possible harm. You are better off just starting off slower to warm up the muscles before putting in a few laps with more effort. Stretching afterward, gently, may be of some use, but even that not much.

Are you considering adding in some weight training too, but easing into it as well? Even starting out with body weight squats and lunges, lighter load bench presses with focus on slow but perfect form? (As tolerated by your shoulder.) Swimming is great but if you want to eventually add weight training back in as well, well … nothing prepares you for the sort you want to get back to being able to do like prepping for that activity in lower intensity kind. And for that prep phase you really don’t need more than a bench and a few well chosen dumb bells in the corner at home. Which can be done on 3 of those days you are not going to the pool.

Honestly you seem to be unreasonably hard on yourself. That is pretty significant amount of progress in a fairly short time.