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Weight Loss Thread.

Critter

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I was sad and fustrated that I was only loosing 1 or 2 lbs a month. My doc told me to go to a butcher shop. Get one lb of fat and stick it in the fridge . When I get fustrated, open the fridge and look at what 1 lb of fat is, how big it is, and that I no longer have that in me. Is a great inspiration .
 

RUCRAYZE

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Spawned from the "Who are our members" discussion when we got off topic, here's a dedicated thread about weight loss. I hope this can become a helpful tool to learn how to do it, share your success stories, your struggles, and your knowledge with others. I hope this doesn't just become a thread to post motivational photo's and messages.

Please follow all forum rules, discussions of health, eating and exercise can get heated as everyone has very different opinions and everyone thinks they are an expert on the matter. If you don't agree with someone, do NOT attack them, make your argument rationally and respectfully.

Weight loss is a very tricky thing to accomplish if you have any significant amount of weight to lose. Even if you get off on a good footing and lose a lot of weight it is a fact that most people gain back anything that they lose, hopefully this thread will help out with keeping that from happening to you.

My name is Stuart, I'm an engineer/engineering student and I spend most of my day sitting at a desk typing away. On July 15th, 2013 I had a wake up call. I had driven from Detroit to Chicago that weekend to hang out with my car club at our annual meeting. 5 hours driving west in the afternoon without AC meant that my windows were down the whole time, and by Friday night my left eye was burning. By the time I got home Sunday my vision was going blurry, I was worried that binge eating Deep Fried Pickles at Quaker Steak and Lube all weekend had shot my blood sugar to dangerous levels. Testing myself I found my sugar was a bit high, 180 IIRC, but when I stepped on my scale I saw something that didn't expect. 470 pounds. That day I decided to change my life, lose the weight, and keep it off for good. To date, Sept 27th, 2013 I have lost 133.2 pounds.

In the long run, the eye thing was just a corneal sunburn caused by nearly staring into the sun for five hours without sunglasses on, but the whole event was a kick in the ass to me. It could have just as easily been a symptom of something much worse.

So I started counting my calories for a few weeks. I use an easy to use app/webpage called LoseIT! (http://www.loseit.com) which makes counting calories simple and fast. Don't know how many calories are in a product on a store shelf? Just use your camera to scan the barcode and fetch the information.

The first thing I want you to do is create a goal. A realistic goal. I'd encourage you to talk with your doctor to establish such a goal, but if you don't want to, look at a BMI chart and figure out where you want to be, 19-24 is the ideal statistical range. Now that you have a goal, write it down, seal it in an envelope, and don't tell anyone what that goal is.

Counting Calories isn't for everyone, some people just can't stand to sit for five minutes at the end of a meal and enter it into the phone, for them just eating smaller portions and moving more can get the job done. But if you're the type of person who can sit there and every meal of every day enter your food into your phone, and not lie to yourself while you do it, I guarantee you can lose weight consistently.

In an effort to not make this post too long, I'd like to direct you to the following FAQ from Reddit's Lose The Fat board, it answers just about every question you might have, offering differing opinions and letting you decide.
http://www.reddit.com/r/loseit/wiki/faq

In closing, I want to say that there will probably be a lot of people who preach an "Eating Healthy/Natural/Organic/Paleo" as the only way to lose weight and get healthy. They're wrong. It works for them, but not everyone has time or money or skill to eat from such a diet. It is possible to lose weight eating a McDonald only diet, trust me, at times I go through phases where I eat at McDonald a lot, I tend to not get the menu items which I know are packed with carbs like French Fries, Big Mac, etc, but that's my choice because I find I perform best with a high protein, medium fat, low carb diet. Find out what works for you, and keep at it, day in and day out till you have reached your goal.

Simply put, "diets "don't work. only 3% of people who have been on "diets" keep the weight off after 2 years. It's not weakness nor lack of will power - they are all external controls- words like cravings, will power cheating etc. help define this. The ONLY way to stay healthy is a personal commitment to yourself. Usually, a good heart attack, stroke, loss of a body part due to diabetes, blowing out your knees, is enough of a wake-up call, but even then many heed not. We all know smoking is not healthy, we all know being fat isn't healthy, and the favorite- "so I'll live a few years less "without thinking of the few years of sickness leading up to an early death. We each have to find our own path, and I wish us all good health in that quest. And besides, the lighter we are driving our Elios, the better gas milage!!!
 

zelio

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Simply put, "diets "don't work. only 3% of people who have been on "diets" keep the weight off after 2 years. It's not weakness nor lack of will power - they are all external controls- words like cravings, will power cheating etc. help define this. The ONLY way to stay healthy is a personal commitment to yourself. Usually, a good heart attack, stroke, loss of a body part due to diabetes, blowing out your knees, is enough of a wake-up call, but even then many heed not. We all know smoking is not healthy, we all know being fat isn't healthy, and the favorite- "so I'll live a few years less "without thinking of the few years of sickness leading up to an early death. We each have to find our own path, and I wish us all good health in that quest. And besides, the lighter we are driving our Elios, the better gas milage!!!
LOL I love that last line! :p :) Z
 

goofyone

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Today I received the latest addition to my fitness program. :cool:

As a birthday present to myself I had been looking for a replacement for my tired old bicycle and this week found a great deal on a dual sport hybrid 29er. I will take it to my friend/bike mechanic tomorrow and we will get the bike fully assembled and tuned up nicely. I could easily assemble it myself however my friend would just take it apart anyhow as there are a lot of tricks to getting these bikes tuned and fitted just right. I will post some more photos and details this weekend after I get a chance to see how it handles both on and off road.

IMG_20141009_165442.jpg

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I love this forum. I already posted my story. It's somewhere else in this forum. But, reading through I was reminded of this. I am new to this chicken, goat farming stuff and I really don't know what I am doing. A few years back I found this great deal on day old bread. Every Wednesday this outlet store sold buggies jammed full of bread for like $3.00 !!! This equaled about 100 loafs of bread every time I went. I'll stop off at daughter's home and give her some nice 'pickings' and same with a couple of friends. Heck I kept a 'very' few for myself. But most of it went to my chickens. Well, stop reading here if your light on your stomach, lol. When I butchered my old ladies that year I discovered what FAT is. My girls are active. They run, chase, fight, bicker and yes I have a few roosters too. They all looked normal. But, I found chicken fat by the globs around all my chicken's hearts and livers and gizzards. Well, I kept it all for frying stuff in. But, OH MY !!! It's not the fat that hangs off our waists as much as the fat that is clinging to the inside, that is killing us. I was awakened.
 

RUCRAYZE

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I love this forum. I already posted my story. It's somewhere else in this forum. But, reading through I was reminded of this. I am new to this chicken, goat farming stuff and I really don't know what I am doing. A few years back I found this great deal on day old bread. Every Wednesday this outlet store sold buggies jammed full of bread for like $3.00 !!! This equaled about 100 loafs of bread every time I went. I'll stop off at daughter's home and give her some nice 'pickings' and same with a couple of friends. Heck I kept a 'very' few for myself. But most of it went to my chickens. Well, stop reading here if your light on your stomach, lol. When I butchered my old ladies that year I discovered what FAT is. My girls are active. They run, chase, fight, bicker and yes I have a few roosters too. They all looked normal. But, I found chicken fat by the globs around all my chicken's hearts and livers and gizzards. Well, I kept it all for frying stuff in. But, OH MY !!! It's not the fat that hangs off our waists as much as the fat that is clinging to the inside, that is killing us. I was awakened.

If you keep them healthy how many can you put in your three Elios??
 

Norahsbed

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Quick, a bread and water diet is not healthy for any critter on earth! Except maybe roaches! My grandma used to feed the chickens all the vegetable peelings and left overs from meals. The dogs got the meat, gravy and dairy, the chickens got everything else, except the bread! They didn't get the bread because by the end of the day there wasn't much left, usually just enough for toast in the morning.
 

BillZ

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In December of last year I found a startling message online from a guy that was "dieting" that included pictures of such extreme weight loss that I was "mouth open" shocked. After reading the reports of this gentlemen's use of The Primal Blueprint I was hooked. I bought the book and read it from cover to cover learning how to change my life.

In January of this year I weighted 248#s and was feeling pretty miserable about my body image and decided to give the Primal plan a try. (I was all in on that plan too.) The Primal plan promises a loss of 1-2 week and I am currently at 208#s. I have suffered a relapse when we had a family reunion that included all kinds of things that were not Primal and since I was the self appointed cook, I partook of way too many things that killed my Primal plan.

The simplified idea is no sugar and no grain, within the ideals of including the 80/20 rule. That rule says that you must adhere to the plan 80 percent of the time and allow yourself some fumbles 20 percent of the time; 80 percent of the weight control is dictated by what you put into your mouth and 20 percent by exercise. While I haven't been exericsing regularly I have managed to loose over four inches from my waist size and am wearing jeans that are the same as when I was in high school. I can easily "slip" into 36" waist and have a pair of 35" inch waist that feel great.

However, this is not a diet, but a lifestyle change. The Primal Blueprint is best compared to the Paleo diet or the caveman diet. The orginal premise suggested that you eat organic and local farmers market meats and vegetables that will provide the healthiest foods for your body. I can't afford to shop at Whole Foods and a few visits to places like Kroger just stretch our food budget too far almost to the point of breaking. I've been using the Walmart Primal Plan and it works. It may not be the most clean or healthiest food, but the weight loss is still effective.

I have decided to eliminate most of the fruit from my diet/menu because of the level of natural sugar that continues to have an adverse affect on my weight, but that is a personal choice. I fully plan to reintroduce most fruits when I get below 200#s, which is my target weight. I am feeling great and avoiding all the insulin blood sugar spikes that can be associated with the Standard American Diet (SAD) while maintaining energy and mental clarity without any problems. I strongly endorse The Primal Blueprint and recommend this lifestyle change to anyone.
 
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