The 2020 OTF Weight Loss Intention & Mutual Support Thread

[Sporting]

I jumped on the scales today, first time in many months.

Oops.

At least you can still jump.

[DCI Harry Batt]

Haha. Metaphorically speaking, anyway.

[Moonlight Shadow]

84.7 this morning...Updated my objective in MFP. I've got a good few weeks to knock it down as close as possible to 80.

The lack of any rigorous excercise does help with keeping the calories intake low...

[DCI Harry Batt]

I just tried to imagine myself at 80. Not possible. No judgement of any kind on me or anyone else implied or intended. Just struck me.

[Moonlight Shadow]

I just tried to imagine myself at 80. Not possible. No judgement of any kind on me or anyone else implied or intended. Just struck me.

Ideally I should aim for 75 but that would be quite a feat, 80 is a compromise I can live with

[Nocturnal Submission]

I thought that I'd resurrect this thread before the end of the year, given how many people struggle towards the end of the month, which in turn might adversely affect some personal statistics!

So, for those who have been trying to shed some timber, how's it gone?

I'm not going to lie, I'm quite pleased with my efforts. Started the year at 13-7 3/4 lbs aiming very high, or low, for 12st. I got into my BMI healthy range when I hit 12-8 in May, hit my year low-point of 12-3 in September (I won't count my weight after last week's laxative treatment!) and have kept my numbers pretty stable since mid-summer. I was 12-3 3/4 this morning.

Right, so that's the self-back patting out of the way. The main point of the thread is advice and encouragement, with motivation hopefully a spin-off benefit.

So, it can be done. Some OTFers have been pursuing quite sophisticated strategies, and good luck to them, but I just focussed on eating a bit less rather than upping my exercise levels, having a warm drink if I felt hungry in the evenings rather than heading for the fridge, reminding myself that I can go to bed hungry and still sleep, that if I get chilled my appetite increases so try to prevent that whenever possible, replacing bread with rice cakes, slightly smaller breakfasts and making sure that I read the calorie contents on food packaging rather than just assuming that I knew roughly what they were, (I was usually way out). And that's it, really.

Have to say that this thread did help me, if no-one else. Stating my plans and reporting back on progress or the lack thereof kept me honest. I hope it helped a few others.

[Moonlight Shadow]

A useful thread indeed. Interesting to read the various strategies but when you look at them, it simply boils down to 'eat less'...I like the anal nature of my calories counting but realise it can't work for everybody.

Down to 84, I have a break coming end of next week, for 4 days, when away in Cumbria but excercise should compensate enough to reduce impact of extra eating.

[Sporting]

it simply boils down to 'eat less'..

...and exercise more.

[Moonlight Shadow]

...and exercise more.

Nope, excercise is excellent per se but it does not automatically lead to weight loss. Eating less does.

[treibeis]

Nope, excercise is excellent per se but it does not automatically lead to weight loss. Eating less does.

Surely it depends on what you eat anyway, where the weight is lost and how you exercise? You're a scientist, aren't you?

[Moonlight Shadow]

Surely it depends on what you eat anyway, where the weight is lost and how you exercise? You're a scientist, aren't you?

God no, I work in a shared services centre...

I have had my fastest weight loss the last month and a half and all I do is walks in the park at the moment, I can go 2/3 days without leaving the house, yet I shifted over 5kgs. Excercise, unless you track your calories burn very carefully can be counterproductive in fact, you feel hungrier and end up overestimating how much you burn and your calories balance is fucked. I have heard enough people at work going on about their 30 minutes light gym session where they burned 800 calories(as if...a 3 hours mountain hike will do that) yet they can't lose weight.

[San Bernardhinault]

MS is largely correct. Exercise will make you look and feel better and "improve" your shape. But unless you're exercising a huge amount you probably wouldn't lose weight without concentrating on your diet.

[Moonlight Shadow]

MS is largely correct. Exercise will make you look and feel better and "improve" your shape. But unless you're exercising a huge amount you probably wouldn't lose weight without concentrating on your diet.

The guy who drilled this notion into me was my wife nutrition coach, himself an Ultra runner. He is a maniac about his calories counting even on race days.

[San Bernardhinault]

There are people I know who lose weight through exercise without controlling food intake. Friends of mine who go on 2 week bike trekking trips riding mountain bikes for 6 to 10 hours a day up on the continental divide. Friends who spent 40 days rowing across the Atlantic. If you're actually basically doing nothing but exercise for many successive days there is a point where calorie intake can't match what you burn. It's possible. But for normal people, exercise makes us hungry because we have evolved to not run out of fuel - and our bodies think that if we're exercising now we might continue burning off our energy and therefore we should stock up as much as possible.

[treibeis]

Does it matter what the scales say? Isn't it more important what your clothes say?

[Stumpy Pepys]

Seeing as I'd have to do a 25-minute run to burn off the calories in one beer, my solution would be to forget the run and forget the beer.

[Nocturnal Submission]

(To Treibeis)

Absolutely. I've lost a few inches off of my waistline, which has enabled me to get slightly more flatteringly-sized jeans but, more importantly, is good news from a health perspective for a man of my age.

[San Bernardhinault]

Seeing as I'd have to do a 25-minute run to burn off the calories in one beer, my solution would be to forget the run and forget the beer.

That seems like you're forgoing two things that will put you in a better mood. If my focus on the number on the scales did that to me, my priorities would be out of balance.

[Janik]

Nope, excercise is excellent per se but it does not automatically lead to weight loss. Eating less does.

Running a calorie deficit does. That could be eating less (which could be reducing portion size or reducing calorie content of said portions). Or exercising more. But some combination of the two is very effective.

Seeing as I'd have to do a 25-minute run to burn off the calories in one beer, my solution would be to forget the run and forget the beer.

The other important additional benefit that exercising more brings is increases your metabolic rate. The calorie burn calculators you get online are not that useful because they don't account for that. Yes, running for 30 minutes = burning 300 calories, or whatever. True to an extent, but exercise five days our of seven and the body will metabolise food faster in preparation for what it 'expects' to happen. So you will need more calories daily just to maintain the same weight. This is much more useful as it means you don't gain weight particularly on the rest days when you still eat approximately the same stuff but don't actually do a 30 minute run or whatever. Fitting in some intensive exercise when you can, but then going for days without doing anything similar, is much less effective as you lose the cumulative effect on top of the one-off hit.


The summary position for me is I weigh pretty well the same now as I have done for the last 4 months. My 8am weight dropped below 71kg for the first time in decades on 29th July. Since then the highest it has been is 72.4kg, the lowest 69.3kg, mean 70.5kg. And as of this morning - 70.4kg.

[Moonlight Shadow]

There are people I know who lose weight through exercise without controlling food intake. Friends of mine who go on 2 week bike trekking trips riding mountain bikes for 6 to 10 hours a day up on the continental divide. Friends who spent 40 days rowing across the Atlantic. If you're actually basically doing nothing but exercise for many successive days there is a point where calorie intake can't match what you burn. It's possible. But for normal people, exercise makes us hungry because we have evolved to not run out of fuel - and our bodies think that if we're exercising now we might continue burning off our energy and therefore we should stock up as much as possible.

Correct, I remember a hiking holiday in the Alps when I ate ridiculous amounts of food yet lost 3kgs but I was out every day on big Alpine hikes. At some point, it becomes pointless controlling your intake due to the burn when active.

[Moonlight Shadow]

Running a calorie deficit does. That could be eating less (which could be reducing portion size or reducing calorie content of said portions). Or exercising more. But some combination of the two is very effective.



The other important additional benefit that exercising more brings is increases your metabolic rate. The calorie burn calculators you get online are not that useful because they don't account for that. Yes, running for 30 minutes = burning 300 calories, or whatever. True to an extent, but exercise five days our of seven and the body will metabolise food faster in preparation for what it 'expects' to happen. So you will need more calories daily just to maintain the same weight. This is much more useful as it means you don't gain weight particularly on the rest days when you still eat approximately the same stuff but don't actually do a 30 minute run or whatever. Fitting in some intensive exercise when you can, but then going for days without doing anything similar, is much less effective as you lose the cumulative effect on top of the one-off hit.


The summary position for me is I weigh pretty well the same now as I have done for the last 4 months. My 8am weight dropped below 71kg for the first time in decades on 29th July. Since then the highest it has been is 72.4kg, the lowest 69.3kg, mean 70.5kg. And as of this morning - 70.4kg.

I don't dispute that a combination of excercise and calories control is ideal to not just lose weight but also increase your well-being but it needs careful tracking. It also needs a certain discipline. Real life tends to throw many spanners that can disturb your plans.

Ultimately, as can be seen on here, people can work out their own ways, some just intuitive like the 'fit in my trousers' , for others much more based on numbers controls. What matters is that it works and you feel better as a result.

[colchestersid]

Last post of the year but my first post on this thread

Started year at 97.9kg, finished at 89.5kg - not quite the 10kg loss I was aiming for but close enough, probably derailed by a broken toe in November

2021 I am aiming for getting under 80kg for the first time in maybe 30 years. I'll continue the good eating/sleeping and non drinking habits of 2020 and add in more intensive exercise than the regular walking of the last 12 months

New thread needed or just continue this one?

[Nocturnal Submission]

Sorted.

[slackster]

Start of year 13st9lb. June...same (a combination of back niggles and lockdown grazing). October 13st 4lb. End of year 14st1lb. That’s a good 10lb of blubber more than I’d like. FFS

Oh well, New Year, new thread, new effort

[Wouter D]

2020 - a tale of two halves:



Everything went well until late April. A series of consecutive stressors destroyed my will to maintain my weight, so we see a linear trajectory into disaster. The Christmas and New Year's Eve period of gluttony and immobility added another kilo, so I end the year just below 85kg where I started it just below 79kg, hitting just below 76kg as minimum for the year.

But hey, I'm still here, and I've survived 2020. I see no reason why the first few months of 2021 cannot replicate that downward trajectory of the first few months of 2020.