fandomsecrets | [ SECRET POST #2785 ]

[ SECRET POST #2785 ]

⌈ Secret Post #2785 ⌋

Warning: Some secrets are NOT worksafe and may contain SPOILERS.

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[Tenth Kingdom]

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03.

(Orange is the New Black)

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04.

[Dresden Files author Jim Butcher, Shannon Butcher]

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[Panic! at the Disco. Brendon Urie]

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06.

[BBC Robin Hood]

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07.

[Chasing Life]

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08.

[Rooster Teeth]

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09.

[Hawkeye 2012]

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10.

[Legend of Korra]

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11.

[QI]

Notes:

Secrets Left to Post: 02 pages, 045 secrets from Secret Submission Post #398.
Secrets Not Posted: [ 1 - broken links ], [ 0 - not!secrets ], [ 0 - not!fandom ], [ 0 - too big ], [ 0 - repeat ].
Current Secret Submissions Post: here.
Suggestions, comments, and concerns should go here.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

So it's come to attention that I need to shift a ~lot~ of weight and while I like to think I've enough common sense to realise less/healthier food + more exercise is the key, I'm a bit lost where to start. Any particular tips that have worked for you?

Cutting out drinks like soda and fruit juice and replacing them with water can make a huge difference. It's easy to do too. Everytime my weight creeps up it's the first place I start.

http://www.nosdiet.com/

I only have advice for gaining weight. Sorry.

Anyway, if you want more advice than what FS provides and you have the ability/money/all that jazz seeing a nutritionist never hurts.

Don't do any silly diets (like no carbs or whatnot). You won't be able to sustain them. Just portion control and working out more. Don't go back for seconds. Get rid of soda and drink more water. I've lost about 80lbs since the New Year and I have just been doing the above.

edit: Oh! Smaller meals and healthy snacks help a lot. I usually have 3 small meals and 2 snacks.

Edited 2014-08-18 23:14 (UTC)

My trick, since I spend all my time at home, is to limit when I can eat, and that's helped a lot. Once I start eating, I just kind of keep grazing until I've eaten everything. If I wait until my preset time (noonish for me), I don't keep snacking all day. I think that only works for snackers, though.

Also, make your food more satisfying. Buy quality food, and pay attention to how much you're enjoying it. The more satisfied you are, the less you'll feel like getting a second helping.

I've never been able to gain enough weight. (That's NOT a good thing, btw.) But it's actually surprisingly similar to not being able to lose weight -- eating unhealthily, eating things that are full of empty calories so that you feel like you're too full to eat something nutritious. And lazing around and getting no exercise and therefore having no hunger for sustaining food, just junky nibbles for the fun of it. I happen to burn off all that empty garbage leaving me exhausted, depleted, and fuzzy-headed, while some people pack that garbage on in the form of fat, but it's the same deal: eating stuff that's of no use to your body in place of stuff that IS of use to your body.

Soda and sugary drinks are by far the biggest culprits of weight gain in everything I've seen, though.

I started from a very sedentary place and began by biking (on a recumbent stationary bike but walking would probably work too) for 10 minutes 3 times per week. As I felt better about what I was doing, I upped it to 15 minutes, then every other day, and now I'm doing 30 minutes 3 days per week and when it's cool enough, I'll take a 30 minute walk once or twice a week (1.25 miles).

I'm also looking to add some add some Wii fit/Kinect workouts, but havent quite worked it out yet. I anticipate they'll fill the off days from biking/walking.

Also: A common misconception seems to be "I need to eat less and healthier" when - if you're eating healthy, you probably need more food than you'd think. An equivalent amount of carrot sticks has far fewer calories than a french fry counterpart, after all.

Don't try to go all out all at once. Some people will advise an extreme effort with the assumption that quick results will be encouraging, but that almost never works.

Start small. Stop drinking soda entirely, for example. Then cut out chips or other junk. Then stop drinking sugary juices and diet drinks. There are a ton of ways to eliminate excess calories that will all contribute to a lifestyle change that will help you shed weight in an almost effortless manner.

Start walking a little more. Take the stairs. Go for a walk instead of watching youtube or a movie at night.

Baby steps.

Drink only water. No soda, no Starbucks (or whatever your local billion-calorie luxury drink is), no "tea" that's nothing but an HFCS delivery system, no smoothies, no booze, no "fruit juice," no real fruit juice. No "sugar free" drinks as most of that stuff taken in quantity is toxic. No diet shakes either - it's easy to drink one and then eat a meal immediately after, especially if you tend to overeat or stress-eat.

The goal of all of this is eliminating sugar - fat makes you fat but sugar makes you fatter faster. And US people (assuming b/c of timezones) tend to drink a ridiculous portion of their daily calories and most don't realize they do it.

Carry a water bottle, when you think you're hungry drink from it. Some people tend to confuse thirst with hunger and eat in order to get water, and need to learn what hunger actually feels like. Include water filled fruits and veg into your meals. If you absolutely cannot stand drinking water by itself, drop a fruit wedge in it or make unsweetened tea.

Eat good food. Mostly vegetables. Avoid stuff that comes in boxes, plastic, or other packages. Eat regular meals, AND snacks, at regular times of the day (try to develop/stick to a schedule, but don't get obsessive over it b/c that doesn't work either), every day. Cut out as much added salt and sugar as you can find (but if you cut out pre-processed/packaged stuff, that will happen anyway). Switch out your regular carbomated beverage for iced tea, if you really need the caffeine and sugar kick, but try to cut back, and then make your own, w/o the sugar, eventually. (Though this will take time.) Drink water first, when you're thirsty, then go for the other stuff after a few minutes, if you still need something to drink. Buy expensive, imported, healthy snacks; this will make you less likely to binge, becaus you won't be getting them as often, and will be more of a treat than a bag of Cheetos or a Snickers. Get an air popper and eat loads and loads of popcorn, with minimal butter/margarine, and no salt.

If you don't follow all these rules every day, or you skip some days, that's okay too.

^ Listen to this person. Not just because they're giving good advice but because they mention CHEAT DAYS. These are good and necessary things. Sometimes you're gonna eat three Snickers bars and a bag of popcorn and call it dinner. It happens. Sometimes you know you're going to go batshit insane if you don't have your comfort food. Acknowledge it, eat the food, and move on.

AYRT

Yep, this is it, in a nutshell. Attitude is everything.

For the record, I've never been morbidly obese, although I was unwell as I went through puberty (from what is laughably referred to as "comorbid" conditions), and I gained maybe 15 - 20 pounds more than I should have. This was after being very underweight before puberty, due again to chronic illness. But that's the most I've ever fluctuated, and I have been about the same weight (give or take maybe five to ten pounds at the most, either way) for the better part of three decades. And I have always eaten exactly as I have described above. Although, yeah, there are days when I only eat popcorn, or get busy at work and skip lunch, but, eh. Stuff happens.

We always had at least one family meal together each day, when I was growing up, which is harder to replicate now, with everyone going in every direction. Worst comes to worst, I make an effort to spend at least 15-20 minutes cooking (or preparing, in the summer, when it's too hot to cook) something, and then sitting down with the TV on.

From someone who lost 20+ lbs and has kept it off for the better part of a decade...

The first thing you need to do is recognize that you are making a permanent lifestyle change, not "going on a diet." Diets don't work because they are aimed at short-term weight loss, not correcting the underlying unhealthy habits that led to the weight gain in the first place. You need to totally overhaul your eating habits to smaller portions, more healthy food/less junk food, and overall moderation.

Which is another important point: everything in moderation. Don't cut foods out of your diet entirely; by thinking of certain foods as "bad" or "forbidden," you are just furthering the already-unhealthy relationship you have with food. Eating should not involve feelings of shame or guilt. Healthy eating is being able to go have that chocolate sundae once in a while without feeling bad about it because you know occasional splurges don't matter when your overall eating habits are healthy ones. Healthy eating is not thinking of food as the enemy.

Another thing you need to do is find a type of exercise that you enjoy and look forward to. It needs to be something that you actively want to do rather than something you feel obligated to do. I now actually get antsy when I can't have my daily walk because I love the relaxation I get from it. Make it a part of your daily routine and it'll start feeling weird when you DON'T do it.

Good luck, anon! Losing weight is a slow process, so you need to be patient and not expect it to happen overnight. The payoffs are more than worth it.

The main things that helped me a lot:

- Cut on carbs - you don't have to go full Atkins or have ketosis, but cutting out bread, pasta, pizza, starchy stuff really helps. And obviously sweets. Try to solve sweet cravings bu sweet fruits you like.

- Move, even if it's just walking a mile at your own pace.

- This is a big one: Have your main meal at noon, and eat modestly in the evening.

I prefer to eat mostly in the morning (I'm starving at breakfast, less hungry in the evening). I have no idea if one is better than the other for most people in regards to weight loss, but if one part of the day works better for eating more and the other for eating less, I'd so go for that, but try to make the larger meals vegetable- and fruit-heavy (and choose whole grains when eating starches).

Drink water. Only water. No sodas, no diet sodas, nothing with added sugar or sweetener. No fruit juices, either. Cut back on carbs, but eat as many vegetables as you want, leafy greens in particular. (For dietary purposes, corn, carrots and potatoes doesn't count as a vegetable.) Limit yourself to lean protein and keep in mind that the daily amount your body needs is a LOT smaller than what most people eat.

Don't neglect exercise. Start slowly if you need to, but start. Walking is great exercise, aim for half an hour a day. Avoid doing any weird diets like Atkins. They work great in the short term, but have a high failure rate in the long run because they're difficult to maintain.

As a lot of people have pointed out, "going on a diet" won't work because that's a short-term weightloss system, and very unsustainable. It's great for losing a lot of weight at once, but terrible for keeping it off.

Don't completely excommunicate any foods if you really love them. You'll make yourself miserable, your diet will be harder, and ultimately it will just be the other side of a still-bad relationship with food.

Take a look at your diet, your likes, your dislikes, etc. If there is any food you like that's already on the healthy side? Eat more of that; in particular, try to use it to replace unhealthy foods, and look for new ways to enjoy it so you don't get sick of it. So if you like apples, get more apples, and when you really want that bag of cookies in the afternoon, eat an apple instead, but maybe slice it up and dip it in peanut butter (which has a lot of protein) instead of just biting into it. :)

There is a lot of debate over meal sizes and numbers, so ultimately you'll have to find what works for you. Ultimately, though, your digestion and metabolism will make the same work of the same food, regardless of the increments you eat it in, so mostly it's about how they fit into your life and how they can help your diet. Personally, I advocate multiple small meals/snacks rather than a few big meals, because you're less likely to suddenly become hungry/have a craving that undermines your diet, and less likely to get tired from digestion fatigue and need to slurp down a coffee with as much sugar and caffeine as you can fit into the cup. Your best bet is to figure out the times of day you will be doing the most activity, and have your biggest meal a bit before that. For most people, this means lunch as they get the most of their physical activity in during the late afternoon and early evening, but for me this often means dinner or breakfast depending on what shifts I get at work. However, some people benefit from only a few large meals either because that's all their schedule allows for, or because it helps them to have time restrictions on when they can and can't eat. Do whatever works best for you - but once you figure out what that is, stick with it.

Now, many people here have suggested "drink water only" or "no sugar drinks". If you think you can do that, great! But speaking as someone who likes her drinks sweet, I also know that it's incredibly hard for some people to do, so don't worry if you can't. Sugar drinks are mostly bad for weight because it's so easy to consume a lot of sugar in such a short amount of time. You might think nothing of drinking two sodas because they're "just" drinks, and in the process end up having more sugar than a doughnut. If you keep an eye on them and remember to think of them as "food" or sources of sugar, then they shouldn't be too much of a problem.

Switch from regular sodas to diet ones. (Similar problem in that diet drinks can be bad for diets because they mind-trick you or leave you feeling still hungry, but as long as you're aware of that and react accordingly, you should be fine). If not diet, then try sugar cane sodas (i.e. Hansens). For other sweet drinks, try diluting with water so you still get sweetness and taste, but ultimately less sugar out of that one or two cups of juice you eat with dinner. Or, for coffee and tea, 'dilute' with milk. (And going on that, try replacing the creamer in your tea/coffee with milk).

One of the biggest sources of fat, after pre-packaged junk food, is meat. Try to lean away from red meats and stick to white meat. Fish is very health, but if you find it intolerable, chicken and turkey are still good. (And there's turkey bacon! :D ) If/when you do eat meat, try to stick to low-fat meat as much as possible.

In general, though, the biggest goal of bringing down your sugar and fat intake isn't to generally have as little sugar/fat as possible, but to make sure that you take in less than your burn off. Most people aren't in a position to 'burn off' a lot of calories, so they diet/cut down on how many they consume in the first place. If you love your diet too much as it stands right now, that's fine - that just means you really have to kick up the amount of exercise. As long as you're burning at least as many calories as you consume, if not more, you're good - regardless of how many calories or much you exercise you actually get.

The easiest way to start that is to incorporate more physicality into your daily life, before shifting to outright exercise. Some ideas/examples:

-Try to walk places. And if you still have to drive for one reason or another, then park all the way at the back of the parking lot, the furthest away from the door you can get, so you have to walk that little extra distance. Or hell, park a few blocks away and walk the rest. (Or, if walking isn't possible but driving is overkill, try biking!)

-Make multiple trips with the groceries at home. Carry one bag inside at a time if you have to. The more distance you have to walk from the car to the kitchen, the better. Or, if you still want to try to carry as many of your groceries as possible, hold up your arms while you're carrying them, like they're weight.

-When you're cooking or talking on the phone, stand on one foot. Seems pointless, but actually a pretty good core-builder.

-Smaller chores that you might normally use a machine for, do by hand (i.e. dishes - that's at least 5-10 minutes of consistent arm-muscle activity right there).

Generally speaking, even when you're going on a diet, you'll probably still have some junkfood now and then, eat cake at a party, etc. Don't beat yourself up over it - just make sure to park a few blocks further away from work or kick up your work-out routine the next day. :) Your body weight doesn't respond incrementally, though - it'll be a sum of your overall diet and overall exercise. It's for this reason that I actually advocate still sticking to some sweets or junk food of some kind even as you generally work towards a healthy diet - find a healthy diet that still leaves wiggle room for fat and sugar, consistently. Then, when you go to that party and eat that birthday cake, you just don't take your usual "cheat" pastry or candy or whatever, enjoying that instead. Then you won't be taking "extra" sugar or fat, and you'll have a diet you can actually sustain as a lifestyle without making yourself miserable in the process.

*looks back up at post*

...that got away from me a bit.

Make it harder for yourself to have soda, candy, and unhealthy snacks by avoiding buying them in the first place. Do not keep them in your home or place of work, or at least not in more than very limited amounts or as a rare treat.

If there are things you want to cut back on but not give up entirely, convince yourself you must get only the organic, free-trade, gourmet, fancy versions. Since these are more expensive, you will have them less and probably want to relish them more.

If you have to eat out or buy a snack somewhere, stop and consider what the most healthy options are.

Brush your teeth right after a meal so you will be disinclined to eat or drink anything but water too soon afterward.

Get enough sleep. This is actually pretty important for weight loss. I've read that it's a good idea to stop eating and drinking anything but water about 2 hours before bedtime, since having to start digesting something new right before sleep disrupts your sleep cycle. So, no snacking later in the evening will help you sleep better, which in turn helps you lose weight, which will also be aided by limiting when you can eat/snack.

Make it harder for yourself to have soda, candy, and unhealthy snacks by avoiding buying them in the first place. Do not keep them in your home or place of work, or at least not in more than very limited amounts or as a rare treat.

This! I always buy junk food telling myself I'll eat it slowly but I'm bullshitting myself every time. I come up with some excuse about how I'm ~stressed~ or in a hurry and I eat it all too fast.

Baby steps!

Less food is a good place to start with the eating. Smaller portions. You'll be hungry for a while, but your body will adjust. If it gets distracting, munch on carrots - there are basically zero calories in a carrot. After a certain point in the evening, brush your teeth and clean up the kitchen - don't eat any more.

Walk a lot. It's a good place to start exercising. Just walk for 10 minutes a day every day, or more if you have time, because it does help. You can work your way up to longer/more strenuous exercise.

Don't expect to lose a lot at one time. It's a slow and steady process and it's actually not healthy to lose huge amounts of weight at once.

Best of luck, anon! :)

Edited 2014-08-19 01:56 (UTC)

Yep, calorie countring - but not in an obsessive, 'how many calories are in this slice of grape fruit' kind of way, just in a way that makes you aware of what you're eating and how many calories it has. So you could start off working out how many calories you should eat a day to maintain your current weight, and compare it to what you usually eat it a day. If you're eating more than that, don't cut out things entirely, just swap bits of your diet for lower calorie (and healthier) options until you're within your calorie limit. E.g., crackers and cheese/nuts instead of chocolate or chips for a snack, a whole meal wrap instead of bread in a sandwich, swap creamy dressings for lighter dressings, fruit and yoghurt instead of icecream for dessert.

See how you feel after a week or so of this. If it's working for you, start lowering your calorie intake more by swapping more stuff for healthier options, or lowering your portion sizes. Don't do it randomly though - work out what a healthy calorie intake would be for you to lose weight, and don't go under 1,200 calories a day because it screws up your metabolism. If you can increase your incidental exercise while you do this - e.g. walking/biking to work, taking the stairs, getting off a few stops eaely or parking a bit away from where you need to be and walking - at the same time as you lower your calorie intake, I bet you you will see results.

Definitely read up on what's in the food you are eating. I'm not saying it'll be the one magic deterrent for bad food, but it helps to know how different foods and chemical additives have an effect on your body. And I don't just mean avoiding McDonald's because of certain chemicals in their foods. You need to know what extra salt or sugar or not enough protein or even too much protein do to you, for example.

Veggies, fruits, lean meats, maybe the occasional grain are all good... if you're cooking, and you find these things boring, learn different spice combos and different cooking methods to make them more appealing. If eggplant is meh, roast it. If lean chicken does nothing for you, try a rosemary herb recipe. Salt but don't oversalt.

Try to cut out liquid calories as others have suggested. Morning coffee may be okay (minimal cream and sugar), but anything monster sized with a whipped cream and sprinkled top from Starbucks probably is not.

If you go out to eat, make a conscious effort to eat something healthy, like grilled salmon and steamed or roasted veggies.

It's also okay to have some vices too. Just make sure it's not a three-times-a-day vice or something that will likely wreck your progress. Have a once a month Sunday brunch with waffles. Or have that rare glass of Dr. Pepper. Just understand it's rare.

For exercise, find an activity you love. Whether it's weights, or aerobics, or dance, or even just cleaning your house, do something you're likely to stick to.

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[ SECRET POST #2785 ]

Weight Loss Tips?

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Calorie Counting

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