Of refeeds and diet breaks
Replies
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Nony_Mouse wrote: »If I really want to do pull ups (one day!), I can walk along to the park and use the conveniently located pull up bars
. There's actually a heap of stuff I could use there. If I wanted to workout in public, which i don't...
C'mon girl you know you can!
I am around 76kg now, I can do 5 full chin ups now. 3 full pull ups. I could only do a couple of each not long ago and one of each when I was a lot heavier. And none of each when I was really heavy lol!
You can buy those pull up things for your door jamb as well, so no one needs to see the back in action ; )Nony_Mouse wrote: »NB, for anyone thinking of embarking on the high carb refeed, you really need to plan getting food in consistently throughout the day so you don't end up with a mega dinner like that. I did actually learn this lesson my first refeed weekend, but when I made the filling for dinner earlier I didn't factor in how much the potato was going to bulk up once I added cottage cheese. Because keeping fats lower plus all the carbs inevitably leads to higher volume, you just about need to plan on having 4-5 meals. Or lots of snacks.
Yep, I found the seemingly vast amounts of carbs pretty daunting, rather than ooh yeah I get to eat all the sweets/sweet things, etc...I usually have 3 main meals, plus lots of snacks. 3 day refeed was main meal, snack, main meal, snack, main meal, snack and then the lots of snacks as usual as well...as I said previously my carb go tos were cereal, crumpets and sweets (marshmallows, fruit pastilles and jelly snakes). The thought if a kg of cooked rice or I have no idea how much potato just did not enthrall me to be honest...
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nexangelus wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »NB, for anyone thinking of embarking on the high carb refeed, you really need to plan getting food in consistently throughout the day so you don't end up with a mega dinner like that. I did actually learn this lesson my first refeed weekend, but when I made the filling for dinner earlier I didn't factor in how much the potato was going to bulk up once I added cottage cheese. Because keeping fats lower plus all the carbs inevitably leads to higher volume, you just about need to plan on having 4-5 meals. Or lots of snacks.
Yep, I found the seemingly vast amounts of carbs pretty daunting, rather than ooh yeah I get to eat all the sweets/sweet things, etc...I usually have 3 main meals, plus lots of snacks. 3 day refeed was main meal, snack, main meal, snack, main meal, snack and then the lots of snacks as usual as well...as I said previously my carb go tos were cereal, crumpets and sweets (marshmallows and fruit pastille and jelly snakes). The thought if a kg of cooked rice or I have no idea how much potato just did not enthrall me to be honest...
I tend to go down the sweet route too. Had iced buns last weekend, cereal, lebkuchen, oh and burger buns for my burgers. I could probably go to town pretty well on some soft fresh bread too. I'm not sure yet what this weekend will involve. Probably more cereal for sure.1 -
Nony_Mouse wrote: »As for exercise, you don't have to exercise for weight loss, but I am in the camp of everyone such do some sort of resistance training. Bodyweight would be a good place for you to start. Have you ever tried yoga? I love yoga, and you can do it at home. Check out Yoga with Adriene on Youtube. She has a beginners series, and also foundations videos for individual poses to help learn those.
Thank you!
Of all the types of working out that I've tried, strength training was the one that I had the most interest in - I hate aerobics classes, can't walk on a treadmill (something about my walking gait messes with the moving belt and unbalances me unless I hold on tightly to the handrails - and this happens no matter the model or brand of treadmill), and haven't had much interest in bikes or elliptical. I do enjoy hiking, but that's not exactly something I can do several days a week lol. I've tried exercise videos but found them boring very quickly!
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Nony_Mouse wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »People seem to be stuck in pending limbo for a while in Lyle's group. I'm under the impression that some of the vetting comes from a general glance at your list of "friends of friends" or groups you're a part of. Even some of the people I invite get stuck. I have no explanation other than it's so flooded with requests that vetting each person is just a complete ball ache. I don't even pay attention to anyone's request in the group I admin lol. I just assume someone else will let them in (ಥ﹏ಥ)
Oh god, I've probably got all kinds of crap in terms of pages I follow. And probably groups that people have added me to that I've never gotten around to unfollowing.
Yeah the occasional time I do look at group join requests and if I happen to see "X is a member of 423 groups" I'm kind of like "sweet hell, why should I let you in here?" .. but I'll approve them anyway (because of vetting laziness) and if they spam/don't read the pinned post = instant ban
Nah, I checked and I'm in, like, seven groups - a few fitness, a few archaeology, a couple cat related. Nothing too derpy.
I'm in a couple of Doctor Who things and a bunch of fitness stuff. They might think I'm a weirdo.1 -
livingleanlivingclean wrote: »Love seeing all the awesome progress in this thread
I wonder how bulk cycles play into the whole deficit break. Just when I get pretty lean (after a bit of a painful deficit)... I don't stay there very long, I reverse diet into a bulk and stay in a surplus for quite a few months, which is a huge breath of fresh air.
Bulk cycles had no impact on me, but I'm going to say I have other stuff going on that makes me not respond in a normal way...
My latest test results are awesome.
Low thyroid, low oestrogen and testosterone, practically no progesterone. I now have to get acth and igf/gh tests....
The Dr was more concerned about my haematology results, which show I'm slightly anaemic (but not due to iron, which was tested and ok), and have slightly low neutrophils and platelets...she's referred me to a haematologist to make sure that's ok first
No real answers, but at least heading in the right direction! (or a direction?)
Also guessing my body isn't doing anything it's supposed to properly... Yay!
Crud. Well, it's a start for sorting things out eventually, so there *is* that.0 -
nexangelus wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »If I really want to do pull ups (one day!), I can walk along to the park and use the conveniently located pull up bars. There's actually a heap of stuff I could use there. If I wanted to workout in public, which i don't...
C'mon girl you know you can!
I am around 76kg now, I can do 5 full chin ups now. 3 full pull ups. I could only do a couple of each not long ago and one of each when I was a lot heavier. And none of each when I was really heavy lol!
You can buy those pull up things for your door jamb as well, so no one needs to see the back in action ; )
Chin up/pull up bar acquired yesterday and put to use
The 'one day' was as in one day I will be able to do them
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bmeadows380 wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »As for exercise, you don't have to exercise for weight loss, but I am in the camp of everyone such do some sort of resistance training. Bodyweight would be a good place for you to start. Have you ever tried yoga? I love yoga, and you can do it at home. Check out Yoga with Adriene on Youtube. She has a beginners series, and also foundations videos for individual poses to help learn those.
Thank you!
Of all the types of working out that I've tried, strength training was the one that I had the most interest in - I hate aerobics classes, can't walk on a treadmill (something about my walking gait messes with the moving belt and unbalances me unless I hold on tightly to the handrails - and this happens no matter the model or brand of treadmill), and haven't had much interest in bikes or elliptical. I do enjoy hiking, but that's not exactly something I can do several days a week lol. I've tried exercise videos but found them boring very quickly!
Srsly, if you're choosing between strength and cardio, pick strength. My cardio currently consists of walking only, with weekend day hikes as weather allows (coming into summer here, so they're on the increase).
My maths broke, and my body owes me a hell of a whoosh. But, new training programme, and I've had wicked hay fever the last couple of days (for me, hay fever is a full systemic meltdown, I feel like I have the flu until antihistamines kick in).
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GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »People seem to be stuck in pending limbo for a while in Lyle's group. I'm under the impression that some of the vetting comes from a general glance at your list of "friends of friends" or groups you're a part of. Even some of the people I invite get stuck. I have no explanation other than it's so flooded with requests that vetting each person is just a complete ball ache. I don't even pay attention to anyone's request in the group I admin lol. I just assume someone else will let them in (ಥ﹏ಥ)
Oh god, I've probably got all kinds of crap in terms of pages I follow. And probably groups that people have added me to that I've never gotten around to unfollowing.
Yeah the occasional time I do look at group join requests and if I happen to see "X is a member of 423 groups" I'm kind of like "sweet hell, why should I let you in here?" .. but I'll approve them anyway (because of vetting laziness) and if they spam/don't read the pinned post = instant ban
Nah, I checked and I'm in, like, seven groups - a few fitness, a few archaeology, a couple cat related. Nothing too derpy.
I'm in a couple of Doctor Who things and a bunch of fitness stuff. They might think I'm a weirdo.
*cough*4 -
Nony_Mouse wrote: »
These guys do breads too, but I haven't tried them. One has 'paleo' in the name, so I refuse to try that one on principle
Same. I might be missing out on some pretty good products, but there's an irritable part of me that just says oh please. I thought paleo was all about natural and unprocessed, just like our ancestors did? If you want bread, have bread. Bah. Humbug. You flintstones get off my lawn. (wanders off grumbling)
I'm an archaeologist, so the whole paleo fad is like a red flag to a bull for me. Tis not how our ancestors ate (and they totally processed stuff, including grains. Oldest evidence for flour manufacture is at c. 30,000 years ago).9 -
Nony_Mouse wrote: »bmeadows380 wrote: »Nony_Mouse wrote: »As for exercise, you don't have to exercise for weight loss, but I am in the camp of everyone such do some sort of resistance training. Bodyweight would be a good place for you to start. Have you ever tried yoga? I love yoga, and you can do it at home. Check out Yoga with Adriene on Youtube. She has a beginners series, and also foundations videos for individual poses to help learn those.
Thank you!
Of all the types of working out that I've tried, strength training was the one that I had the most interest in - I hate aerobics classes, can't walk on a treadmill (something about my walking gait messes with the moving belt and unbalances me unless I hold on tightly to the handrails - and this happens no matter the model or brand of treadmill), and haven't had much interest in bikes or elliptical. I do enjoy hiking, but that's not exactly something I can do several days a week lol. I've tried exercise videos but found them boring very quickly!
Srsly, if you're choosing between strength and cardio, pick strength. My cardio currently consists of walking only, with weekend day hikes as weather allows (coming into summer here, so they're on the increase)
Me too! Except heading into winter so hiking on the decrease
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livingleanlivingclean wrote: »Love seeing all the awesome progress in this thread
I wonder how bulk cycles play into the whole deficit break. Just when I get pretty lean (after a bit of a painful deficit)... I don't stay there very long, I reverse diet into a bulk and stay in a surplus for quite a few months, which is a huge breath of fresh air.
Bulk cycles had no impact on me, but I'm going to say I have other stuff going on that makes me not respond in a normal way...
My latest test results are awesome.
Low thyroid, low oestrogen and testosterone, practically no progesterone. I now have to get acth and igf/gh tests....
The Dr was more concerned about my haematology results, which show I'm slightly anaemic (but not due to iron, which was tested and ok), and have slightly low neutrophils and platelets...she's referred me to a haematologist to make sure that's ok first
No real answers, but at least heading in the right direction! (or a direction?)
Also guessing my body isn't doing anything it's supposed to properly... Yay!
Welp, it's probably not much just short of leaning to HRT, but this may be where I might half-heartedly suggest soy isoflavone derivatives of food and supplementation to possibly help, more along the lines of fermented soy; i.e. natto, miso, etc., or edamame. But that's all I can think of at the moment since even delving into google scholar and holistic hormone therapy is going to destroy me lol.
I've had tests indicating slight anemia, not due to iron deficiency either, but because my body doesn't methylate B12, like at all. I have abnormally high B12 levels >2000 (the highest measurable range my lab tests will provide me), and my own research leads me to believe that I'm either at great risk for cancer, liver/kidney failure, or I have leukemia... or I'm just a normally functioning being with a rare case of severely elevated serum B12 levels that don't go anywhere ヾ(⌐■_■)ノ♪
The point was also to possible request a vitamin panel to see if any deficiencies may be present haha, sorry.1 -
More education. I didn't realise anemia sans iron deficiency was a thing.2
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I'm sure it's a dysfunction of MTHFR that I have, but it hasn't been officially diagnosed and I'm basically playing doctor with myself (yes, in that way also) since my primary physician just lets me do whatever I want with my lab requests haha.2
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VintageFeline wrote: »More education. I didn't realise anemia sans iron deficiency was a thing.
Yeah, pernicious anaemia. My mum's got it. It took her three doctors before she was diagnosed. She was extremely low on B12 by then. She was having all sorts of problems: fatigue, severe psoriasis on her scalp, and she lost her sense of taste. She has to have regular B12 injections, as does her sister. It was only because of her that I thought to ask for B12 testing when I went to the doctor and I found out that I was low as well. I just take tablets and that seems to be fine.
ETA: I should add that my mum's psoriasis cleared up once she started on the injections and her sense of taste returned. I remember her phoning me up one day to tell me she'd gone to a cafe for lunch and the wrap she ate was delicious. It was a wonderful thing to hear because she hadn't been enjoying food for such a long time.3 -
Anyway, I've decided to do a two week diet break. The more I thought about it, the more I realised I probably need it at this point. I'll pop back in here when I finish to let you know how it went. I was able to have second breakfast today. Bonus! 9
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JoLightensUp wrote: »VintageFeline wrote: »More education. I didn't realise anemia sans iron deficiency was a thing.
Yeah, pernicious anaemia. My mum's got it. It took her three doctors before she was diagnosed. She was extremely low on B12 by then. She was having all sorts of problems: fatigue, severe psoriasis on her scalp, and she lost her sense of taste. She has to have regular B12 injections, as does her sister. It was only because of her that I thought to ask for B12 testing when I went to the doctor and I found out that I was low as well. I just take tablets and that seems to be fine.
ETA: I should add that my mum's psoriasis cleared up once she started on the injections and her sense of taste returned. I remember her phoning me up one day to tell me she'd gone to a cafe for lunch and the wrap she ate was delicious. It was a wonderful thing to hear because she hadn't been enjoying food for such a long time.
Ah yes, I did know of it just not putting two and two together with B12 deficiency = pernicious anemia.0 -
JoLightensUp wrote: »Anyway, I've decided to do a two week diet break. The more I thought about it, the more I realised I probably need it at this point. I'll pop back in here when I finish to let you know how it went. I was able to have second breakfast today. Bonus!
Yay! Enjoy and make sure to keep hold of the reins, you're just loosening them a little but still controlling your intake.2 -
JoLightensUp wrote: »Anyway, I've decided to do a two week diet break. The more I thought about it, the more I realised I probably need it at this point. I'll pop back in here when I finish to let you know how it went. I was able to have second breakfast today. Bonus!
And what about elevenses? 8 -
Hell yes this works. It keeps your body from down-regulating your metabolism. I have never been this lean AND this strong in my life. And it's SOOOOOO much easier to stick to, oh man. Eat like a professional athlete Mon-Fri, then like a "normal person" on the weekends. Couldn't be more perfect. If you stay on the same calories too long, your body will respond by lowering your metabolism, giving you the dreaded "stall". The key is to keep a deficit going overall, despite the cheat days. Once you reach maintenance, you can still do the cheat days just eat 100% on point the rest of the week. Try it if you haven't already- weight loss doesn't have to be miserable!0
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A recent study you can look up compared 2 groups of men over a 6 month period- one group stuck to the diet consistently without cheating for the whole 6 months. The second group stayed on the diet for 2 weeks, then went off again for 2 weeks, repeating this pattern. Guess who lost the most weight? The 2 weeks on/2 weeks off group lost 9 POUNDs more than the consistent group. Your body has a natural defense to weight loss/starvation which is triggered by a consistent calorie deficit. Re-feeds keep this from happening and weight loss continues unabated. Plus, you physically and psychologically FEEL so much better.0
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They're not cheat days. That's a horrible, horrible term full of negative connotations that no one should use.13
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Hell yes this works. It keeps your body from down-regulating your metabolism. I have never been this lean AND this strong in my life. And it's SOOOOOO much easier to stick to, oh man. Eat like a professional athlete Mon-Fri, then like a "normal person" on the weekends. Couldn't be more perfect. If you stay on the same calories too long, your body will respond by lowering your metabolism, giving you the dreaded "stall". The key is to keep a deficit going overall, despite the cheat days. Once you reach maintenance, you can still do the cheat days just eat 100% on point the rest of the week. Try it if you haven't already- weight loss doesn't have to be miserable!
What does a professional athlete eat?
If you stay on the same calories too long, you start to lose more slowly as your deficit becomes smaller due to you having less body to maintain. Adaptive thermogenesis is a thing, true, but I don't think it plays as big a role in the "stall" as you think...7 -
livingleanlivingclean wrote: »Hell yes this works. It keeps your body from down-regulating your metabolism. I have never been this lean AND this strong in my life. And it's SOOOOOO much easier to stick to, oh man. Eat like a professional athlete Mon-Fri, then like a "normal person" on the weekends. Couldn't be more perfect. If you stay on the same calories too long, your body will respond by lowering your metabolism, giving you the dreaded "stall". The key is to keep a deficit going overall, despite the cheat days. Once you reach maintenance, you can still do the cheat days just eat 100% on point the rest of the week. Try it if you haven't already- weight loss doesn't have to be miserable!
What does a professional athlete eat?
If you stay on the same calories too long, you start to lose more slowly as your deficit becomes smaller due to you having less body to maintain. Adaptive thermogenesis is a thing, true, but I don't think it plays as big a role in the "stall" as you think...
I eat like a normal person every day, just less.
And yeah, it takes a bleeding long time for adaptive thermogenesis to wipe out a deficit. The 'stall', if it's not just crappy logging, is usually more likely due to water retention from jacked up cortisol. Fat loss hasn't stopped, it's just masked.5 -
A recent study you can look up compared 2 groups of men over a 6 month period- one group stuck to the diet consistently without cheating for the whole 6 months. The second group stayed on the diet for 2 weeks, then went off again for 2 weeks, repeating this pattern. Guess who lost the most weight? The 2 weeks on/2 weeks off group lost 9 POUNDs more than the consistent group. Your body has a natural defense to weight loss/starvation which is triggered by a consistent calorie deficit. Re-feeds keep this from happening and weight loss continues unabated. Plus, you physically and psychologically FEEL so much better.
I'm pretty sure this study has been linked in this thread already. I've read it and watched a simplification by Layne Norton as well.4 -
livingleanlivingclean wrote: »Hell yes this works. It keeps your body from down-regulating your metabolism. I have never been this lean AND this strong in my life. And it's SOOOOOO much easier to stick to, oh man. Eat like a professional athlete Mon-Fri, then like a "normal person" on the weekends. Couldn't be more perfect. If you stay on the same calories too long, your body will respond by lowering your metabolism, giving you the dreaded "stall". The key is to keep a deficit going overall, despite the cheat days. Once you reach maintenance, you can still do the cheat days just eat 100% on point the rest of the week. Try it if you haven't already- weight loss doesn't have to be miserable!
What does a professional athlete eat?
If you stay on the same calories too long, you start to lose more slowly as your deficit becomes smaller due to you having less body to maintain. Adaptive thermogenesis is a thing, true, but I don't think it plays as big a role in the "stall" as you think...
That's what I was just thinking. I'm pretty sure a professional athlete is packing away more calories than my true maintenance would be.
Although I am amused -- my dietitian works with a number of our professional teams in town (her focus is largely in sports nutrition), and she's said more than once that well, they don't really work *that* hard, at least compared to what everyone assumes. But they do like to eat. 1 -
On topic, I usually take a diet break every time I lose 5% of my weight as per trendweight average (plus for special occasions, plus for the holiday season, plus just because, the whole last year has been a giant diet break.. But I digress). I do it for structured sanity, but I'm glad to see that there is something to it.8
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I've had a funny week so far. After all the energy on Monday, I was both hungry and tired Tuesday and Wednesday. Skipped my evening walks both nights (though that was also partially because of wind and not wanting to deal with even worse hay fever from that), stressy day yesterday because I needed to get one of my cats to the vet (ex-stray with feral tendencies, can't pick him up to put him in a carrier, its a horrible ordeal for both of us, but more so him). Life threatening situation, so he had to go (he will be fine, caught it well in time, but he's in hospital for a few days). So lower deficit Tuesday and virtually none yesterday. However, my body finally decided to shed the water weight I've been lugging around, at a new low (which I hit ever so briefly earlier this year), and pretty soon I'll be at a weight I haven't seen in six years - huzzah!!
I'm going to get through today and tomorrow, then see how hunger levels are next week after refeed. I may flip to diet break a week early.
Upper body DOMS from strength Mon/Tues has really kicked in today. It's not horrendous, but I'm mighty glad I decided to have two rest days mid week to get on the schedule I want to be on, cos I really don't want to lift heavy things (ie me) today!10 -
Been on diet break for one week. Feeling fabby, although hungry as heck this evening. Bit of a head scratcher as have been feeling satiated and comfy rest of the week (although yesterday was a pretty full on leg day). Average intake around 2229 cals. Weight fluctuating a pound up and down, so 167 - 168...so weight has stayed the same as last week. Muscle definition seems to have gone up slightly. Clothes seem to be fitting more loosely. Bra cup size decreased (boo!). Energy levels pretty good. Strength great. Have cut out my hour long walks in the evening, still cycling to and from work and just doing hypertrophy programme 3 times/days a week. Sleeping better at the moment also.
Will check in again next Wednesday, day before maintenance phase.5 -
So glad to hear everyone's refeed/diet break has been working.
Just a personal update to serve as a warning: I inadvertently went into an average surplus on the weekend due to celebratory occasions (caution: don't do this consistently lol), and going back to whatever normal schedule of training/diet I carry has dropped 4/7lbs of fluctuation spike.
Silver lining: the practice of undulating periods of highs and lows is still a way of keeping maintenance and/or having a net deficit/surplus, depending on goals. Of course, it's still very prudent not to make either undulating period too high or too low simply because it's extremely easy to trigger issues if you have them already and are recovering.
The overarching point, I think I'm trying to make is that regardless of the situation, we still have control, but that control shouldn't be so restrictive that you break, and freedom shouldn't be so uninhibited that you end up doing more harm than good. This is where "flexibility" and "moderation" lie: controlled freedom and practiced within reason.
( ಠ ͜ʖರೃ)8 -
I just came off a head cold only to find my symptoms coming back with a horrible sore throat. Turns out I have strep.
I have been working since June on getting one house ready to sell, then working very hard in the last 2 months trying to get the new place remodeled after having to gut the place. For one month, I was driving back and forth; now I'm temporarily living in a camper, hoping we'll have enough done by December to move in at least partially.
I say all that to show that I've been under a ton of stress lately, so cortisol levels are probably pretty high. And now my immune system is weakened. So I'm wondering if a diet break would help my immune system repair itself as well.2
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