Ask Lemmy

• Daily long walks.
• Eat less.
• Eat better. I quit stuffing myself with industrially processed food, best decision ever. Even better than quitting smoking (which I did some 20 years ago). BTW, eating better helps a lot in eating less.

Edit: some improvements made to my (severely) lacking English.

It's easier to use your will power to not buy snacks at the grocery store than it is to not eat them once they are at your home.

Track your calories. Eventually you get skilled enough at it that you don't necessarily have to journal everything to have a good idea of how many calories you are taking in. If you can eat the same things day after day without getting bored, that helps a lot.

Learn to cook well. Chicken breast doesn't have to be dry and bad. Veggies can be dressed up and made tasty without adding too many calories.

Sugar snap peas are a tasty, crunchy snack and you can eat a lot of them without blowing out your daily calorie limit.

If you drink alcohol, stop, at least mostly. Even a shot of vodka with no mix is ~60 calories. In fact, try not to drink calories in general.

I know Lemmy thinks everyone that avoids carbs must be carnivore, but you can use your head and avoid sugar/starches and lose a lot of weight. Fruit is tough to drop but apart from a few blueberries or something, fruit is pure sugar, and juice is as bad as pop. Don't think because something is "healthy" that it's not loaded with sugar.

By the time you get full eating things like pasta, you've eaten way, way too much. Fats will make you feel full. I used to eat a 16 oz steak with potatoes and vege and still want dessert, and now 6 oz of something fatty like brisket with some broccoli or brussel sprouts will fill me up.

And you can't outrun a bad diet. Exercise will tone you, but you can't exercise enough to work off a cup of mashed potatoes without giving up the rest of your free time.

Start by cleaning the house out of that shit, don't bring it back in, and use something like Carb Manager to figure out the sleepers that are putting weight on you.

In the past, I have found crippling levels of poverty to be quite helpful.

I once lost some weight not by focusing on what not to eat, but by making myself eat a large salad for lunch. I forget what order things went in, but at one point I was eating a lot of home made fermented vegetables (cabbage mostly with others things in the mix, so basically kraut) mixed with romaine to dilute the sourness. At another point I would buy the sort of thing I previously ate for lunch (like a sandwich) and eat only half of it, chopping it up and mixing it with my salad. I ate whatever for dinner.

I wasn't trying to lose as much weight as you, I realize. But I think for some people, not focusing of deprivation / but focusing on something I like "I will eat this quantity of these vegetables" and letting the fullness from that reduce the amount of more caloric stuff you eat, can work better.

I've lost more than 70lbs of fat and have not kept it off for about 4 years. I've previously lost more than 50lbs, but then regained the weight later. What is different this time is I have a much better understanding of the forces at work and have made fundamental, sustainable lifestyle changes that will help keep me fit over the long term.

The saying is that "you'll never out exercise a bad diet," which is completely true, but even if the calorie burn isn't sufficient to put you in a calorie deficit, there is tremendous value in exercising. Muscle is an endocrine organ, and exercise helps produce things like brain-derived neurotrophic factor a protein that is vital for the functioning of your brain. Muscle is also a huge chunk of your metabolic overhead, so maintaining or increasing muscle mass makes it easier to manage your caloric intake and not be in surplus, adding fat. Something like 90% of people who lose weight gain it all back and then some, and among those able to keep it off, nearly all of them have adapted their lifestyle to increase their baseline level of physical activity. I've done it by using a bicycle for nearly all of my local transportation. I live in a warm climate and my city is fairly bikable (though there is definitely room for improvement!) This one change adds ~ 6-7 hours of additional cardio to my week.

When it comes to eating, whatever you do has to be sustainable. You can "go on a diet", but if you revert to your former norms once you've lost the weight, you're just going to gain it all back. Worse, if you didn't take care to boost your protein and do resistance training to maintain muscle mass while in a calorie deficit, you'll have lost substantial muscle mass as well, and you'll likely end up fatter and in a worse position when all is said and done. With strict caloric restriction without boosting protein or doing resistance training, about 40% of your weight loss will be muscle mass. Minimize the loss of muscle by boosting protein intake to around 1g of protein per lb of lean body mass, and doing some form of resistance training. Weight training in a gym is preferable, but you can do a lot with simply bodyweight fitness at home. Joe Delaney's beginner gym workout program is a useful starting point, and is what I'm doing now. However, I started with a basic bodyweight fitness program I put together from the info at reddit's r/bodyweightfitness, and it helped me a lot. Point is, something is better than nothing in this regard, and you need to do it as a matter of habit, like brushing your teeth.

As far as diet goes, there are lots of opinions out there and you have to find what works for you. If you have a lot of fat to lose, the ketogenic diet is helpful but restrictive. I did this for a while, and transitioned into what is more or less a Mediterranean diet. I eat whole foods, minimize highly processed foods, exclude highly processed foods with added sugars, and emphasize lean meats for protein and also fiber intake. I shoot for 160g of protein per day and 50-100g of fiber. If I consume carbohydrates, they have to come with fiber. Whatever dietary regime you choose, calorie tracking with a tool like myfitnesspal is vital. It is so easy to overlook consumption that if you don't strictly measure and log everything that goes into your mouth, you really have no idea where you're at with respect to being in a calorie deficit. After you've done it long enough you end up with a good grasp on your calorie intake and can relax the burden. No matter what dietary regime you select, it has to be a sustainable part of your life or the results will only be temporary.

Don't just stop: swap.

Cutting things out leads to cravings and causes the entire process to be a constant fight. Instead, make small swaps over time that build habits.

I have a burrito every day. I swapped the tortilla for a high fiber one (get more fiber). It saved 50 calories a day and is still delicious. I swapped my side of chips for protein chips (when I can get them on sale). Lower cal, high protein, still crunchy and taste like cool ranch.

Think about what you can ADD to your meal. Having stew? Add beans and extra peppers. A sandwich? Add spinach. You'll end up eating less of the calorie sense stuff. You'll also get more fiber.

Estimate your total daily energy expenditure:

https://tdeecalculator.net/

Eat in a caloric deficit. You will need to weigh your food and track calories, at least for a while.

Weigh yourself and see if the weight is going in the right direction and not losing too fast either. Adjust calories as needed.

It's way harder than just these steps but this is the foundation. Personally I found the food weighing and calorie counting massively stressful but I got a good sense of how much to eat from doing it from a few weeks. Now I check the scale and log weight and make sure it's going the way I want it.

Also talk to a therapist. I needed one to get over certain mental barriers and to re-evaluate my relationship to food and my body image.

In my experience, there's an impulse to eat that can be curbed if you aim for foods you can chew on without outpacing your calorie count.

The classic is celery. Carrots, apples, and other crunchy foods all work pretty well, too. I can nosh and sate the raw impulse to eat without feeling like I need to starve myself at actual meal times. Just having vegetables you enjoy on hand to indulge in is a good for you generally speaking, even when you're not aiming to lose pounds.

For bigger meals, soup is a favorite dish. Lots of fluids leave you full. You can have the flavors you enjoy without housing an entire slab of meat or a bunch of carbs. I also try to avoid sauces (which often means avoiding eating out generally speaking). All that stuff is packed with sugar, which makes everything more expensive to consume. Dry fried meat and veggies, spices and rubs for flavor, and grilled food rather than fried or stewed keeps me away from excess junk.

For my sweet tooth, Japanese candy tends to have less sugar than the American stuff. Mochi is better than a candy bar. Pocky is better than a box of popcorn.

I straight up cut soda and beer out of my diet when I'm focused on losing weight. (Really, just ditch soda entirely, or go to the flavored seltzer water - it's awful for you).

After that, it really does help to count the calories. When you know what you're eating, your logical "is this worth it" brain can temper the base impulses of the "I just want it in my mouth" animal brain. I hate counting calories, because it's annoying. But making the things that are hard to count annoying to keep track of also helps to focus my diet back onto foods I've got memorized and are low calorie.

Last time I got serious about weight loss, I just counted calories really aggressively. It worked.

But my diet was boring and eventually I got tired of depriving myself, so I stopped. I gained back some of the weight, but not all of it, so that's nice.

It also helps to not be constantly depressed and stress-eating through the fall of democracy.

Count your calories and see what isn't worth it. Usually the best thing to cut first is liquid calories, when I realized I could basically have another meal a day if I quit soda, it made things a lot easier.

I guess the most important thing would be to focus on lifestyle changes. You can have a super strict diet for months and lose tons of weight, but if you don't incorporate that as a permanent change, it can be easy to gain it back while not in "diet mode." Smaller changes that you stick with perpetually are better in the long run, even a 100 calorie daily deficit will eventually see results.

Also perhaps get a kitchen scale for portion control, this kinda ties in with counting your calories, but after I started measuring meals it was also easier to not overeat.

Eat until you're not hungry, not when you're full. That may require eating more slowly. It will be an adjustment for sure.

Intermittent fasting worked for me. By setting a limit on the number of hours I can only eat, it effectively put me into a calorie deficit. There’s only so much you can eat within several hours.

The great part is I didn’t have to be selective with what I eat. I just needed to quit eating before my daily eating window closed. No need for overly complicated diets.

I'm going to answer this as a physiologist: First, eliminate processed foods as they do make you over eat Next, start exercising. Any amount is fine as long as you do something at least 6 days a week. Don't get obsessive; just do something To maintain the proper deficit, you need to measure and plan your meals. Keeping to a mostly consistent calorie total is important. It doesn't have to be exact every day, but you need to stick to a weekly total. This should be about 200-400 calories less than your total caloric needs by day. Too much and your body will fight back and your metabolism will drop to match this new level and you'll stop losing weight. To find the right amount, you're going to need to see a nutritionist and a weight loss expert with a real degree. They'll be able to fill in the details. Any specialty diet only works short term. An active lifestyle with healthy foods will make the biggest impact. And you need to be think long term: losing more than 1 pound per week will cause your body to fight back. You need to very slowly nudge it to where you want it to be, but also realize where your genetics put you. There are so many things to consider, so you need to connect with a specialist.

Preperation. If my house is full of healthy food, I'm much less likely to impulsively order delivery food or head to 7/11. You have to learn how to cook without using highly processed foods too.

Edit: This includes flour btw, it's as bad as refined sugar, basically! There's nuance sure, but tell it to the ghosts of my flab rolls!

I never buy snacks or treats in my usual weekly shop - once in while I treat myself such as buying a box of stollen for Christmas... and even then I share with my family. Switching to unsalted/flavoured nuts and fruit after meals helped a lot.

Another thing is getting into the habit of intermittent fasting. At least three days a week, I only eat dinner in a 24hr period. This definitely isn't for everyone - I only happened to get back into it noticing I was putting on weight working from home through COVID however there are other versions like 16/8

I just finished maintaining a calorie deficit for about 8 months and losing a little over 50 lbs, so here's a few things I can think of:

• when you make food, you'll probably eat it all, so keep that in mind when you're making it. Or, box some of it up for later and put it in the fridge before you start eating.
• don't keep much or any snack food around the house.
• or, keeping a few small sweet snacks around can be good for handling it when your sweet tooth is bugging you. I kept fudgsicles in the freezer (40 calories) and sparkling flavored water (5 calories) for when I wanted something sweet.
• working out 6 days a week was what I needed to make a habit out of it. I'd done 4 or 5 days a week in the past, but when I started doing 6 per week it only took like a month before I started feeling uncomfortable about not working out on my break day.
• For keeping it off, I'm gonna try to keep on counting calories for a year but just setting my app to maintaining my weight. Meeting that calorie goal is super easy compared to what I was doing.

I personally use a calorie counting app, like Waistline, and when I start getting into that routine of eating less naturally without actively counting, I stop using the app.

When I fall off, I go back to it for a bit until I'm back in the rhythm.

I also exercise a few times a week and try to do at least one walk a day. 

Wearables like Garmin also do great calculations of calories burned. If you don't like the idea of your data being sold, which you shouldn't, Garmins are often compatible with this FOSS app: https://f-droid.org/packages/nodomain.freeyourgadget.gadgetbridge

I like to binge snacks (doesn't matter if healthy or not) out from my house, so it sometimes feels hard to stay in specific calorie amount. What helps me with that is to either make snacking a process where I need to prepare it each time I want them or not to buy any from stores.

Also just generally preparing food yourself instead of just ordering/buying food helps with getting less calories. Not always possible due to time/energy/money, but it has helped me a lot.

Good luck with your plans!

You're obviously getting a lot of specific nutritional advice regarding what to eat, avoid, and how to behave.

My biggest recommendation is to find support in creating a healthy relationship with food. No individual or category of food is "bad" but our behaviors and views can support or sabotage our progress.

I highly recommend the podcasts In Moderation and Showing Up Anyway with Coach Adam. Also social media - I know they have accounts across platforms but on YouTube look for The Plant Slant, ScottyKFitness, Adam Wright Fitness, and Hybrid Calisthenics.

Most people can force themselves into a box and create a habit for a period of time, but making long term changes stick needs healthy support and education.

Cut out soda entirely. Skip breakfast and lunch. Maybe eat a light snack at some point during the day if you need to (real food, not sugary crap). Train yourself to just deal with being hungry. When you do eat, focus on things that are nutritionally dense, filling, and slow to digest.

• Eat better food.
• Proteins get about 15% calorie discount due to processing.
• Track everything.
• Get a good kitchen scale, because mass is the ONLY good way to track.
• Find a few things you love that you can eat on repeat, so it is easy to eat and easy to track.

The way out comes but once; be steadfast.

There are a few different strategies I have used at different phases in life.

Where I am at right now.

Don’t eat processed foods. They make it easy to over way by design.

Eat the recommended amount of sodium or less a day. Sodium makes food more palatable. You will find yourself eating less calories simply because the food isn’t as good.

I’ve been eating the recommended amount if fiber on purpose. I eat oatmeal instead of rice/potatoes/bread. It’s filling and less ‘munchable’ if you think you are hungry put a bowl of oatmeal infront of yourself. I do season it with olive oil and spices.

I restrict sugar and high fuctrose corn syrup for the same reason I restrict salt. Sugar makes food taste to good making it easy to eat more then you need to without realizing.

These change help me eat the proper and filling portions of food without overeating. I eat till I’m full.

I also only eat like this most of the time. But even then I’m giving myself leeway on the holidays. I just try to make more good decisions then bad.

I eat a single meal a day at about 1800 cals. About to hit 100lbs down.

I've only crossed the "slight overweight" line now. But in the past 15 years I have monitored my weight while trying gentle changes: eat healthier, no added sugar, more exercise, build a small amount of muscle. Nothing has made a difference. I was gaining weight slowly, year by year.

Now I'm finally doing what I wanted to avoid for 15 years: stop eating while still slightly hungry. It was a psychological exercise: To focus on the feeling of hunger so I stay aware of it, so I don't automatically walk into the kitchen. To convince myself that I'm okay with it, this is how it has feel, no need to panic. There was some resistance, but in the end it was easier than expected. I mostly do this towards the evening, and not every day, and when I'm more than just a bit hungry I still eat.

The effect on my weight was almost a shock after the non-effect of all my previous attempts. I feel like I can keep this up easily. In fact I had to dial it back, losing weight faster than I intended. And I did keep my healthy habits from earlier: especially I try to be active one hour each day, and if I wasn't I usually go for a late walk.

Yeah, because I am poor, AuDHD and depressed, so I very often go an entire day without eating.

Hey, so I dropped weight casually and all I did was:

• Limit snacks. Best to zero, but minimum to one a week.
• Your food portion? Cut it in half. Fat folk tend to eat big portions, I know I did, cut it in half.
• Don't eat constantly, predefine 3 times you are gonna eat, that's it. For me it's breakfast, second breakfast (at work) and dinner.
• Drink water when hunger is too big.

You will be hungry, a lot for some time but shortly it will stabilise and you'd mainly feel hunger around food time.

After time, my body stabilised around 15kg lower than I were when I began, and that's with me breaking it quite often xD

Figure out what diet you can actually maintain in the long run. All of them work if you stick to them. You can't out excercise a bad diet but at some point a stricter diet becomes harder than a bit of exercise.

What works for me is replacing carbs with meat , cheese and vegetables. Tastes good and at a slight deficit I'll still mange to not raid the fridge after dinner.

I really recomend checking out a weight loss clinic, the one i went with was not a chain and didnt accept insurance, its run by an obesity M.D. doctor, and their spouse a professional dietician. There they prescribed me a flexible diet that has me going to the grocery store and cooking in the kitchen and an excersize plan that has me going regularly to the gym (in the beginning with a personal trainer) and weekly tirzeptide injections and some specific supplements after taking blood work.

I've lost over 100 lbs, sustainably at about 2lbs/week, and i feel better than I ever have.

It costs me about 500$/month for the service - cheaper exists - but the support from the professionals along with the guided plan has worked wonders, now that im approaching my goal the conversation has evolved into safely tapering off tirzeptide, how to avoid rebound weight gain (like i have in the past weight loss journeys), technical talk about how ghreline and leptin work and can override will power and how to avoid and deal with that scenario, etc

The pros know how to focus and train you for genuine lifestyle change as well as the turbulence between changes, not just weight loss

Don't focus on what you can take out. Focus on what you can add. So like if you live instant ramen. Make a half pack and add bok choy and a soy egg or something. Kylie Sakaida on YouTube (actual dietician, dunno all her credentials) focuses a lot on this and gives examples. Changed my life and lost maybe 30 lbs just by following that train of thought.

For me meal prepping is big too. Make a bunch of something on Sunday when I have time and divvy it up throughout the week. My wife can't eat the same stuff as much so I freeze some now and pull something out from a previous week. If you plan it out right you start building variety of your favorite stuff in the freezer for easy meals you just throw in oven.

I found cutting carbs to be a big help. I eat massive amounts of protein and little to no carb and I've been losing a lot of weight that way

Avoiding nearly all sugars + mental conditioning to be ok with mild hunger

Ill drink water if I’m hungry or have a hard boiled egg and then just…deal with being hungry 🤷‍♀️ if I really need a snack I try to make it something very small and high fat/protein but ultimately there’s no avoiding having to mentally endure some hunger

I also switched to smaller bowls and plates because psychologically the mind is indeed somewhat fooled by finishing 1 plate of food, even if it’s a smaller plate