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You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

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201–210 of 501 posts

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#201
post #73

I weigh 350 pounds. I'm very obese. I know this. When I was a teenager, I looked at people who weighed 300+ pounds and though, how do you get that way. Don't you realize that you are gaining weight? Don't you know that you just have to eat less to lose weight? Anyway, now I realize that I am hungry. It never goes away unless I eat a significant amount of food. My body told me to eat, so I ate. It doesn't even take th…

Hey, I agree with you that it's different for everyone. Personally, if I've been eating too much and I try to eat a healthy amount I will always be a bit hungry for at least a few days - maybe longer -until my body adjusts to the new amounts. After a while it gets easier, especially if I'm smart in my food shopping.

Eating certain types of foods (the article calls them hyper-palatable) can also kick off feeling much more hungry. It's sometimes hard for me to get back into a healthy cadence, especially if I have stress in other areas of my life.

When this is going on I think a lot about Ego Depletion - the idea that willpower is a limited resource. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ego_depletion

I think it's definitely OK to be a little hungry, or even a lot hungry. In fact, when I'm feeling like I have some willpower to spare I go on a fast. I think it really helps me calibrate my internal tolerance for hunger. After a fast, the mild hunger I feel after eating an appropriately sized meal barely even registers as hunger.

Keep up the good work!

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#202
post #8

Someone finally wrote this article. So refreshing. It's obvious when you live with a fat person why they have trouble losing weight, even when they're on a diet: they're usually not actually following it. Whether they don't understand portion sizes for calorie math, or look at calories at all, or eat things that they say "do not count", there is almost always a failure to understand what and how much they are eating.

"I'm big boned" - show them an MRI or cat scan of a morbidly obese person and you see a tiny little skeleton surrounded by what looks like a giant, puffed up cartoon balloon body. "I have a low metabolism" - obese people actually have a high 'metabolism', because moving all that extra weight takes a lot of energy "Being overweight is not unhealthy" - weird then that they are having trouble getting pregnant and/or mis…

>You know what's really infuriating? Maintaining a healthy weight, getting exercise, making an effort to eat a balanced diet that hits lots of nutrients....and seeing these people cost my insurance company several orders of magnitude more money to keep alive than I do.

Not to veer too far off topic but this is something that always bugs my mind when people talk about how they don't want "socialized" healthcare because they don't wanna pay for other people to live unhealthy lives. Like dude, healthcare is already socialized, where exactly do you think the money the insurance companies uses to pay for all of your health costs comes from? From....other members paying into it. Which means that they already adjust prices to account for all their unhealthy members. You're already paying for it, might as well cut out the part where the company's incentivized to put turning a profit over providing quality care.

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#203

And if you are going to work out, lift weights. Don't just do cardio. In fact, many people won't have to do cardio at all. Cardio doesn't help you look and feel better. Build muscle, and that muscle will burn calories, even when you're asleep.

Are you kidding me? I love strength training, but cardio will absolutely make you feel better in nearly every active activity you do. [0]

[0] https://health.clevelandclinic.org/the-many-benefits-of-a-ca...

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#204
post #176
post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Black, one sucralose packet per 10 to 20 oz and that's fine for me. I know that's a wide range, but you can't really do "half-packets" easily and the cup sizes I use vary.

My favorite sweetener is a sucralose/stevia mix in highly concentrated liquid form. You can’t find it in the US, I get it from an importer: https://chinchileproducts.com/products/iansa-cero-k?_pos=2&_... About 6 drops is a teaspoon, so 125ml lasts forever. It is much more concentrated than other versions in the US. The pure stevia versions and pure sucralose versions are okay, but for whatever reason the mix is reall…

Thanks! I'll try this when I run out of my current bottle of sucralose (from Capella, which also makes interesting flavor additives). Shortages have made it occasionally hard to restock and I've yet to really try stevia as a sweetener that I personally add (as opposed to something already added) so I'm gonna enjoy trying something new.

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#205

This article is quite accurate I think. I use MyFitnessPal on and off. It is easy - you just scan the barcode and it tots up the calories. MFP is excellent at making you face up to what you are actually eating. At first it was a huge eye-opener for how many calories were in everyday things - like a slice of bread is 80-120 calories etc. The article mentions fruit juice too - that was a big one for me as well. I figur…

Burgers get a bad rap, it was actually using MyFitnessPal that showed this to me.

There's no law says you have to get a fries and corn syrup drink with the burger, a burger and mineral water is a great meal, macros line up and I feel full for hours.

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#206
post #175
post #73

I weigh 350 pounds. I'm very obese. I know this. When I was a teenager, I looked at people who weighed 300+ pounds and though, how do you get that way. Don't you realize that you are gaining weight? Don't you know that you just have to eat less to lose weight? Anyway, now I realize that I am hungry. It never goes away unless I eat a significant amount of food. My body told me to eat, so I ate. It doesn't even take th…

The most important thing anyone who wants to manage their weight has to realize is why they eat. You feel hunter but why? Food is complicated and people eat for many reasons. People can eat because they're bored or they're anxious or even just to feel better, even briefly. A healthy state to get to (which is easier said than done to be sure) is to treat food as fuel not as medicine or even a reward. You put gas in yo…

Also to increase fiber consumption. The modern diet is filled with foods that have their fiber removed and used as animal feed. Insoluble fiber fills you up psychically. Soluble fiber takes a long time to digest and helps regulate ones blood sugar. Have to get away from foods with a bad glycemic index as a start.

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#207
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've hit this before as well, and have come to the conclusion that, at least for me, detailed meal planning is not sustainable in the long run. This is one reason why I think that dieting advice that is simple and straightforward has the most success. Some examples: 1. Cut out all sugar-sweetened beverages. This is a pretty easy rule to follow, and even if you find yourself missing a soda or something, my recommendat…

carbs is actually where im struggling the most. I defaulted to just making sides of white rice with everything for so long. I at least switched to brown rice, quinoa and couscous to make it a little easier but learning new sides to go with proteins is tedious. I struggle with feeling full too.

This is just what worked for me, but if you're struggling with feeling full, don't cut out starchy vegetables: potatoes, sweet potatoes, and legumes (things like lentils, black or pinto beans, butter beans, peas, etc.) satisfied my carb cravings, and I found I was still eating fewer calories because those carbs are much less "snackable", and they have a ton more fiber. That is, it's trivially easy to snack on chips, pretzels, cereal or bread, but I'm not just going to grab a sweet potato and start chomping.

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#208

If you squat, deadlift and walk enough, and are generally healthy, you physically won’t be able to eat yourself fat.

Off season bodybuilders are an obvious counter example.

Exhibit A. https://d3h9ln6psucegz.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/201...

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#209

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"I'm big boned" - show them an MRI or cat scan of a morbidly obese person and you see a tiny little skeleton surrounded by what looks like a giant, puffed up cartoon balloon body. "I have a low metabolism" - obese people actually have a high 'metabolism', because moving all that extra weight takes a lot of energy "Being overweight is not unhealthy" - weird then that they are having trouble getting pregnant and/or mis…

Regardless of health, being overweight doesn't make someone a bad person.

I'm not sure about that. Being overweight is selfish and wasteful in a world where many people don't have enough food to eat.

Re: You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

#210
post #73

I weigh 350 pounds. I'm very obese. I know this. When I was a teenager, I looked at people who weighed 300+ pounds and though, how do you get that way. Don't you realize that you are gaining weight? Don't you know that you just have to eat less to lose weight? Anyway, now I realize that I am hungry. It never goes away unless I eat a significant amount of food. My body told me to eat, so I ate. It doesn't even take th…

It's an individual struggle for many. Although I'm rather close to the weight I want to be(now) I struggle and have struggled with hunger too. My weight has gone up and down, I too have tried many things. The struggle with hunger is similar regardless of weight, until I get really quite lean.

I have gone from being in perfect control of my weight(I had to make weight for a sport), to being completely out of control(because the stuff that used to work didn't anymore), to being in control again(new stuff worked), to loosing some of the control(because it stopped working, but I found new stuff before it got out of hand again).

Everyone is different, different stuff works for different people and you yourself are different people when your weight changes significantly, as you age, and as your environment and knowledge changes.

Things that effect hunger: fewer bigger meals (unless it doesn't and you do better with more small meals). Protein, fiber (generally less hunger for most people), carbs (varies), fats (ditto). Avoiding trigger foods, (there are some foods and different for everyone, that once you eat a little it causes more hunger and triggers into more eating). Psychological tricks: (1. realize that a state of being somewhat hungry all the time is the normal state that humans lived with for thousands of years, 2. realize that you can burry yourself with work as a good distraction from hunger and get a lot more done at the same time. 3. Realize that "Hunger is the best spice" - Epictetus 4. Every time you catch yourself thinking about the costs of dieting(hunger), make sure you spend even more time thinking about the benefits. Exercise: figure out what exercises increase and decrease hunger for you, today. Liquid calories: your body doesn't register them and sometimes registers them negatively, best avoided all together. If you need a treat, prefer the ice cream over the milk shake. Cinnabon's highest calorie item is a drink.

I wish you the best, I hope something I said may help.

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