Ask Lemmy

Stress helped me lose 20 pounds in three months last year ^.^

I wouldn't recommend it.

One thing the diet industry hates:

Fasting. Hard to make money off not eating food.

It's also highly effective and safe so long as you educate yourself properly before beginning.

I did 14 day fasts with an electrolyte slurry, psyllium husk, and multi vitamins. Take a month off, eat well balanced meals, repeat until goal weight. I lost ~15-20lbs each fast doing it a total of three times to hit my goal weight. Each time is less, because the daily caloric requirement to maintain your body decreases with your weight.

After that, I started gym/weight training.

edit: and never eating junk food or drinking sugar ever again. That includes fruit juice and dairy milk. Unsweetened Coconut "milk" for me now. Processed grains massively reduced too. Basically, flour. Honestly flour probably inflated the waist line for me more than sugar.

I’m very, very susceptible to addiction, but the thing that makes it easiest for me to curb a habit is to pretend I’ve already moved past it. If I think about junk food, I intentionally think of overly sweet, salty and artificial foods and (internally) express my distaste. With smoking, I think of the smell of an ashtray in the rain; with drinking, I think of cleaning up day old beer with a hangover.

Saying “I don't really have a sweet tooth” is what made me lose my sweet tooth.

I was also gonna say fasting, intermittent fasting to be specific, and cooking at home more. But it seems that’s not answering your question because it’s a “food habit”. So instead, I would recommend:

• Sugar substitutes. Yes they can make you gassy/poopy. It’s trial and error to find the right substitute and right amount to use, but once you get it, you’ll be able to avoid a ton of sugar. For example, a teaspoon of stevia on my coffee is fine. Monkfruit instead of sugar but only half as much for savory dishes works for me. Allulose for home made ice cream is fine as well. And so on.

• Eat water-rich food to make you feel full but not consume a lot of calories. Celery and cucumbers are good snacks and can be paired with other food.

• A bit more pricey, but shiratake is basically zero calories and comes in noodle, rice, or cube form.

1. Plain oats with chia seeds for breakfast (no more than a teaspoon of honey[real honey from bees or don't bother] because you still need to enjoy food). Table spoon on Saturday

2. this is dependent on your budget: Bananas are cheap AF. Eat one whenever you have a craving. Drink a glass of water, eat a banana, then take your supplements (fish oil and multi v) in the morning after oats

2a) Apples/pears/berries. An apple can kill a craving for sweets so quickly. Plus the fiber will clean you out. Other fruit is more expensive and goes bad quickly. But seriously apples can help to be one of those fillers in your diet

3. Tea. If you don't drink black coffee, switch to tea. No need for sugar and milk, tea is pretty good on its own. More importantly, it tastes just as good cold

4. Drink water. When I get up in the morning, I try to drink 1 1/2 pints of water. Then start breakfast. Just walked the dog? Chug a pint. Out of the shower? Slug a half pint. Cooking lunch? Drink a pint before you eat. Yes, you will pee a lot. But you skin will look better and you won't have those moments of "shit, I need coffee" A pg* a

5. Rice and Beans. Make one pot a week. Use oil instead of butter. Lots of beans. Chop up one large onion. Put equal parts quinoa to rice. Last a while and you can spice it or add hot sauce. Use it as a filler for eggs or chicken or whatever

6. high volume food with low calorie density. Need a snack? Rice cakes, to raw carrots and celery, pickles, cucumber, . Chips and salsa is a good one

Eat less. It sounds obvious, I know. But prepare your meal as normal, divide it in half and put half in a container in the fridge. Eat the other half, then distract yourself for half an hour. If you’re still ravenous, heat up the other half and have it. But you probably won’t be. And you’ve got your next meal ready to go!

Removing the second "t" off the word "diett" will reduce its weight by 20%.

Drinking much more water instead of diet soda all the time. I’ve never felt so hydrated and sated in all my life.

One extra tea.

Not eating works pretty well, though I understand it's probably harder for someone with a desire to eat.

Step One. Count all of the calories you eat in a day. Check that nutritional info, do the math, add it up, see what you're eating without leaving anything out.

Step Two. Try to minimize sugar, carbs, and bad fat, while maximizing protein and fiber. My go-to daily meal plan is steel cut oatmeal in the morning, sweetened with baking splenda, pinch of salt, and cinnamon. Intermittent fast through lunch with coffee. Dinner is open face (so only 1 slice of bread) turkey sandwiches, Black bean soup spiked with tobasco and extra black beans. For dessert, make a big ol bowl of banana cream or vanilla pudding with skim milk. Find a meal plan that works for you, you don't have to eat the same thing everyday, but have that back-up meal plan ready to go in case you don't feel like making something different.

Step Three. Don't inhale your food. It takes your body 20 minutes between attaining a "full" stomach, and your stomach alerting your brain to that fact. Thus, pacing your food is important. How to do that? PUT THE FOOD DOWN. If you pick up your sandwich, eat half, then put it back down, take a drink of water, then you can finish it. Have a big ass glass of water with every meal. I also buy baby carrots, you can get a nice 1 lb bag, and in between dinner items, eat a handful of baby carrots. They're crunchy, full of water, and help you pace yourself through dinner.

Step Four. Go for a walk after you eat. A little bit of exercise, even a walk around the neighborhood for a few minutes, is enough to to tell your body that you want it to take all that energy you just took in, and use it immediately. You're telling your body "Hey, don't put all that energy into long term (fatty) storage, make it available, and of use right now."

Step Five. Add in Exercise at your own pace. Start with something manageable, achievable, and then make it routine. Whether that means walking your dog instead of just letting them out into the yard, start small, build at your own pace. Make it a daily habit. (Pro-tip, whenever you feel like skipping a day, tell yourself all you have to do is get dressed for the exercise and do it for five minutes. if you do that much and still feel off, you're allowed to take a rest day. The majority of the time, once you get started, you start to feel better and end up doing it. the key is getting dressed and putting yourself into the position to do it, even if you allow yourself to stop. just keep putting yourself into position to succeed with your new habit.) This also works as an effective daily anti-depressant.

Step Six. Reward yourself for achievements. When you start these things, your body will respond, and you will feel better, more confident, sexier in your own skin. Celebrate with some new clothes that let you show it off. Feel good about it, it's something you earned!

Step Seven. Allow for cheat days. This you can do every week, every two weeks, whenever you decide. If you find yourself going hard-core on the diet and then crashing into a food frenzy, it's because your going too hard, and need to allow for a cheat day. Be kind to yourself if you break your diet on a miserable day, and use that as information to consult when scheduling your next cheat day. The long term goal is to reorganize your thoughts around food, and having specific times when you let yourself go whole hog on a bag of Oreos or whatever, lets you recognize that behavior as a reward, or special circumstance, and not a daily activity.

Congrats, you're now feeling better, looking better, and those two facts will reverberate through the rest of your life like ripples through a pond, making you happier and healthier.

Diet Hacks!

Want to lower your LDL? (you shouldn't want to do this)

• Seed oils! (corn oil, canola oil, any veggie oil)

Want to lower your uric acid? (you shouldn't want to do this)

• Allulose 20g a day reduces uric acid levels by 50% in some people in 6 weeks

Want to dramatically improve your HBA1C before a blood draw?

• Donate blood 2 weeks ahead of time (new blood cells created to replace the donated blood wont be glycated, lowering your HbA1C)

Want to reduce your blood glucose levels dramatically? (do this)

• Don't eat any sugar or carbohydrates

Food Dietary Advice:

If your not in a rush, any whole food diet (no factory food), will work for most people

If you want to reverse a problem, a ketogenic diet (no sugar, no carbohydrates) will help you claw your way back to normal in steady consistent steps

If you have no time to waste and need to drop fat now... Go full carnivore

Diet Tips:

• Eat fat to lose fat
• Eat two eggs before you allow yourself any snack
• Eat butter as a snack - Not hungry enough to eat butter? Then your not actually hungry
• Sometimes hunger is actually electrolyte cravings, take salt/potassium to reduce urges
• A CGM (continuous glucose monitor) is an AMAZING tool, immediate food feedback, can have a accountability friend watch you and coach you. This is the best tool to stay on a good eating pattern.

Enjoy experimenting with cooking and food prepping a lot more to find new healthy Staples you like with more vegetables, protein.and healthy fats (edited). Eat more fermented foods. Don't buy junkfood/sweets, cook or bake healthy versions of junkfood instead. But avoid artificial sweeteners, they mess with your gut biome. Add less sugar to things. Just look for zero added sugars on packages. Bam, easy. 🙃

Weigh your portions. Especially on things like pasta.

What the pack says is a portion is unlikely to be what your eyes think is a portion.

• Daily walks. I started barely being able to walk more than a few steps, I was in a really terrible shape. Nowadays, I will walk at least 8km daily. More as often as I can. It feels too good. Exercising regularly and in the long-run is key.
• Eating healthier food, aka fresh fruits, veggies, real fresh bread and NOT eating industrial pre-processed food anymore. Like none at all. No 'just this one time' or 'just one byte'. No more feeding myself with ready-made dishes, no more fast-food (I still ate delicious burgers and fries mind you... just all hand-made with fresh food), no industrial sweets or whatever either. And no industrial beverage either, aka no soda not even light.
• Not being an asshole with myself. I failed many times at keeping my motivation. No blaming and no hating (I was already punished enough by all that wasted time it meant for me to fall back into my bad habits) but I kept on going while trying to understand how/why I failed (so I would not do the same mistake again).

I halved my weight and I still eat plenty (even chocolate, pastries or things like that, just... a lot less and never industrially made), I replaced me eating shit (literally, industrial are feeding us shit) by me eating actual food (and enjoying preparing it), and I also retook control my body, muscles and joints, by starting to move it... like it is was designed to. We're not designed to sit on a couch or in front of computer all day long (be it to work or to play).

Weigh yourself consistently (i.e. same time, same outfit) - I find it easiest to do straight after jumping out of the shower in the morning, post-poop and pre-breakfast, but ymmv. And the important part, record it. I have smart scales, which makes life easier, but absolutely not essential. There's something very motivating about watching the line go down - and will quickly highlight if you're on the right track, or if you need to cut back a little more.

The timing of the day in which I eat certain things. I lost 15kg over a year just by cutting sweets and carbs after 4pm. I still ate them, especially in the morning.

And talking about morning - "breakfast like a king, supper like a beggar" also contributed to that weight loss.

Nowadays I am not strict but whenever I see myself going over my weight I first take those two measures up before making any calorie cuts

Edit: although these are food habits, so I don't know if it really answers your question. Exercise is the other thing that helps, you don't even need a lot of it

Reading the labels on junk I'm tempted by helps me. That much sugar, really? How many calories?!? Palm oil, ugh. And wtf is pentasodium triphosphate?

Also, when I buy a bag of carrots, I peel them and put them in the fridge, so when I feel snacky I can munch a crispy carrot.

Weighting every day at the same time. Using a smart weight that logs the measurements. Using software that smoothens out the readings, so you don't stress about day to day changes. Don't want to advertise, but combination of Withings scale and trendweight website works great for me. And ultimately, combination of fasting and exercise is ideal for me. Every calorie spent and every calorie not eaten helps.

You have to figure out a diet you can comfortably maintain forever, eat for your target weight. It's no use just losing weight, you have to stay at a healthy weight.

So it's going to be individual. For me, increased activity is the only factor, apparently I eat the same all the time. So walking everywhere or adding extra exercise works better.

I had a friend who lost weight by just reduced portions - she literally just took 1/3 less of everything. Like left more space on her plate. And another who ate popcorn for supper. Regular breakfast, regular lunch, then in the evening just popcorn. So again was eating 2/3 of what she had been. But then you have to keep it that way to maintain the weight.

tried all the bullshit in these comments, nothing worked long term. was still miserable and hated myself. progressed into an eating disorder. only thing that ended up working was to seek psychological help. learning intuitive eating helped stop the binges. I let go of the obsession with food, obsession with weight, obsession with image. accepting yourself as you are is the only way to change. fancy that.

Keeping track of calories while also cutting out all snacking during the day, so that at night I know what sweets I can afford to eat.

I've tried a dozen ways.

All diets work, if you stick to them.

Try a few and go with the one you find easiest to stick with.

Long term you'll have to figure out how to change your habits if you don't want to stick on the diet forever. Or you'll regain it again.

Fill up on vegetables instead of carbs. Eat dinner mid afternoon instead of evening, and exercise, even if just a long walk, afterwards.

Worms.

Track your calories, macros, and any micronutrients that you're concerned about (e.g., sodium, fiber). Set a goal and stick to it. I use the LoseIt app and a digital kitchen scale.

Drink a lot of water. Half your body weight (in lbs) in ounces. So if you weigh 130 lbs, drink 130 ÷ 2 = 65 oz of water daily. This is your baseline; add more for exercise. Don't go overboard because too much water is bad for you.

Aim for 45-60 minutes of vigorous exercise 3-4 times a week. I like weightlifting for this. On the other days, be active, but don't push yourself too much. You need rest for recovery.

After your workouts, don't eat back all your calories, but do consider having something protein-heavy.

Sleep. I can't emphasize enough how important sleep is. Try to get 7-8 hours every night. This is the hardest one for me personally; I don't have a ton of advice. But developing a bedtime routine helps.

Weigh yourself every day first thing in the morning, after you've used the bathroom and before you've had anything to eat or drink, with no clothes on. I like my Withings scale because the app tracks my measurements over time.

Have a mindset of lifestyle change - otherwise, if you go back to old habits, you're likely to gain back any weight you lose.

Good luck!

If you're finding it hard to get started, totally strict exclusions can force you to start actually thinking about what you're putting in your mouth. Even if you don't particularly care about veganism from a moral/ethical viewpoint, try following the diet for a while. You'd be surprised how much snack food contains milk powder, or other animal products. Strictly following the rules eliminates mindless consumption, then after a while you find yourself thinking whether or not something is worth consuming, rather than just sticking it in your mouth because it's there.

Hyper-fixating on something keeps me away from the kitchen, for better or worse. Same with sleep ¯_(ツ)_/¯

Coconut cream + coconut water = great sugar killer. Judt get the water with no added sugar and dilute it like 1/2.

Try it, seriously. Its like sucking at the titties of the coconut Goddess. Closest we'll ever come to Nectar of the gods

The best thing I ever did was fast 16 ish hours until after noon then broke with a light healthy snack. You can almost eat whatever you want after that because you eliminating 1/3 of your meals. I lost a ton of weight that way

Ice cubes peppermint gum. To chew when others are having dessert. I've eaten, I don't need empty calories, but my teeth are still hungry. Gum gives them something to do, and the little crunch of Xylitol helps it feel more like eating than other sugarless gums.

I'm working on losing a few kgs for playing sports, so I'm trying to make changes that are sustainable for the rest of my life. E.g. quark and granola instead of bread for breakfast, and no more snacks in between meals (RIP stroopwafels).

That way I only need to change habits once instead of multiple times like when you're dieting, and the effect is slow but noticeable.

I track my macros. I have a jar of Chilli Crisp and a jar of hot honey on hand at all times.

If I make my lean chicken tacos for dinner and Ive got a bunch of carbs left i put the hot honey on, if I have fats left over I use the Chilli Crisp, if Im running light on both just a small pinch of chilli powder.