How does one lose inches?
Options
Replies
-
@sarahwinston2 Read this thread. It's got everything a beginner needs.
http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1080242/a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants/p1
And maybe this one...
http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1161603/so-you-want-a-nice-stomach/p13 -
janejellyroll wrote: »
If someone is exercising without paying attention to how many calories one needs or using extra activity as an "excuse" for eating, that has the potential to create major stress for the body. If it's true that this impacts fat stores, wouldn't we want to minimize that?michaelwrightkindle wrote: »Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating.
I feel like you could just as easily argue that dieting leads to anorexia or other eating disorders.
I mean, any glance at any public forum dedicated to weight loss or dieting or exercise shows you that there are a tremendous number of people trying to use a Fitbit as an oracle. It's counterproductive and "rule of thumb" generalizations like "eat back half" are pretty arbitrary and meaningless without context. You're not going to fall out if you go from sedentary to doing a daily aerobics class or walk without compensating with a protein shake or an energy bar. But it would be trivially easy to undermine your weight-loss efforts if you equate working out more to eating more, especially when diet is the major factor. Maybe I'm wrong for assuming someone adhering to the kind of training regimen an elite athlete might use would present differently, though, and the average person on a dieting forum is genuinely at risk of doing themselves harm by overexertion? Nah.2 -
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »
If someone is exercising without paying attention to how many calories one needs or using extra activity as an "excuse" for eating, that has the potential to create major stress for the body. If it's true that this impacts fat stores, wouldn't we want to minimize that?michaelwrightkindle wrote: »Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating.
I feel like you could just as easily argue that dieting leads to anorexia or other eating disorders.
I mean, any glance at any public forum dedicated to weight loss or dieting or exercise shows you that there are a tremendous number of people trying to use a Fitbit as an oracle. It's counterproductive and "rule of thumb" generalizations like "eat back half" are pretty arbitrary and meaningless without context. You're not going to fall out if you go from sedentary to doing a daily aerobics class or walk without compensating with a protein shake or an energy bar. But it would be trivially easy to undermine your weight-loss efforts if you equate working out more to eating more, especially when diet is the major factor. Maybe I'm wrong for assuming someone adhering to the kind of training regimen an elite athlete might use would present differently, though, and the average person on a dieting forum is genuinely at risk of doing themselves harm by overexertion? Nah.
I'm not telling anyone to "eat back half" and I'm not recommending that people consume protein shakes or bars unless they like them.
What I'm arguing is that people should understand how their activity contributes to their overall calorie needs and take that into consideration when determining how much to eat. I realize that's not as fun to argue against as what you imagine I'm recommending, but why on earth wouldn't you want to consider your overall activity level when deciding how much to eat, especially if the goal is to reduce unnecessary stress on the body?14 -
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »
If someone is exercising without paying attention to how many calories one needs or using extra activity as an "excuse" for eating, that has the potential to create major stress for the body. If it's true that this impacts fat stores, wouldn't we want to minimize that?michaelwrightkindle wrote: »Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating.
I feel like you could just as easily argue that dieting leads to anorexia or other eating disorders.
I mean, any glance at any public forum dedicated to weight loss or dieting or exercise shows you that there are a tremendous number of people trying to use a Fitbit as an oracle. It's counterproductive and "rule of thumb" generalizations like "eat back half" are pretty arbitrary and meaningless without context. You're not going to fall out if you go from sedentary to doing a daily aerobics class or walk without compensating with a protein shake or an energy bar. But it would be trivially easy to undermine your weight-loss efforts if you equate working out more to eating more, especially when diet is the major factor. Maybe I'm wrong for assuming someone adhering to the kind of training regimen an elite athlete might use would present differently, though, and the average person on a dieting forum is genuinely at risk of doing themselves harm by overexertion? Nah.
Except equating working out to eating more is literally how MFP works.
The argument often comes up that one can use not logging exercise as a buffer for logging errors. But if you're assuming your food logging is so off that you need a 150-250 calorie buffer, and you are completely ignoring your exercise calories, you're just accepting that your diary is a work of fiction. How can you expect to learn from it a month from now if you aren't at least attempting some sort of accurate representation of your calorie needs?
I see that you are relatively new to these forums (welcome
). We get a lot of posters here who eat just their MFP calorie goal, while ramping up their exercise because that's what the diet industry tells them to do, and they can't understand why they are fatigued and hangry and starting to struggle with bingeing. A couple of hundred calories can certainly make that difference, especially for shorter females.
I ate my MFP calories, synced my Fitbit, ate my exercise calories, logged all my food all the time using a food scale whenever possible. When I'd hit a stall, I could look back at my diary as an accurate picture of my calorie intake and expenditure and learn from it. That is the entirety of how and why I succeeded. I know others succeed with much looser logging, but I think striving for accuracy at least in the beginning so you can understand your numbers and how your body reacts is an incredibly useful and advantageous strategy.13 -
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »There is quite a lot of evidence that suggests visceral fat is tied to cortisol and stress. Just like insulin impacts your ability to store fat, meaning that *what* and when you eat matters, your body has mechanisms that determine where and how it stores or burns fat. I believe that, along with genetics, some weight-loss and lifestyle plans are more effective at targeting visceral fat than others. The stress on your body from intermittently fasting on top of maintaining a calorie defecit might help target belly fat. Especially if you choose to exercise in a fasted state, I believe you have a better chance of losing belly fat faster. Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating.
keywords for research: visceral fat, cortisol, fasting, exercise
Visceral fat is exactly the kind of fat that won't cause a loss of inches. Belly fat =\= visceral fat. Belly fat is subcutaneous fat located at the belly.7 -
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »
If someone is exercising without paying attention to how many calories one needs or using extra activity as an "excuse" for eating, that has the potential to create major stress for the body. If it's true that this impacts fat stores, wouldn't we want to minimize that?michaelwrightkindle wrote: »Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating.
I feel like you could just as easily argue that dieting leads to anorexia or other eating disorders.
I mean, any glance at any public forum dedicated to weight loss or dieting or exercise shows you that there are a tremendous number of people trying to use a Fitbit as an oracle. It's counterproductive and "rule of thumb" generalizations like "eat back half" are pretty arbitrary and meaningless without context. You're not going to fall out if you go from sedentary to doing a daily aerobics class or walk without compensating with a protein shake or an energy bar. But it would be trivially easy to undermine your weight-loss efforts if you equate working out more to eating more, especially when diet is the major factor. Maybe I'm wrong for assuming someone adhering to the kind of training regimen an elite athlete might use would present differently, though, and the average person on a dieting forum is genuinely at risk of doing themselves harm by overexertion? Nah.
Except equating working out to eating more is literally how MFP works.
The argument often comes up that one can use not logging exercise as a buffer for logging errors. But if you're assuming your food logging is so off that you need a 150-250 calorie buffer, and you are completely ignoring your exercise calories, you're just accepting that your diary is a work of fiction. How can you expect to learn from it a month from now if you aren't at least attempting some sort of accurate representation of your calorie needs?
I see that you are relatively new to these forums (welcome ). We get a lot of posters here who eat just their MFP calorie goal, while ramping up their exercise because that's what the diet industry tells them to do, and they can't understand why they are fatigued and hangry and starting to struggle with bingeing. A couple of hundred calories can certainly make that difference, especially for shorter females.
I ate my MFP calories, synced my Fitbit, ate my exercise calories, logged all my food all the time using a food scale whenever possible. When I'd hit a stall, I could look back at my diary as an accurate picture of my calorie intake and expenditure and learn from it. That is the entirety of how and why I succeeded. I know others succeed with much looser logging, but I think striving for accuracy at least in the beginning so you can understand your numbers and how your body reacts is an incredibly useful and advantageous strategy.
Well said.
I would say that the average dieting person is less at risk at doing herself harm by undereating for an extended period of time (although that certainly is a risk for some), the risk for most is that they will set an aggressive calorie goal, exercise on top of that, and then get tired and hungry and quit because dieting is "too hard." These are the people who conclude that counting calories doesn't work or that they just can't lose weight. So when we tell people to make sure they account for exercise, it's not really because we're afraid that they're going to exercise themselves down to nothing. The average person is going to quit well before that -- that's exactly what we're trying to help people avoid, quitting.9 -
What I said (after what I felt was a thoughtful summary of my research on the correlation between fasting,stress,cortisol, and belly fat) was "Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating." You literally quoted that before disregarding it and going on a spiel equating it to "do not consider your overall activity level when deciding how much to eat." I won't publicly speculate on why you might've been triggered. Regardless, this conversation is over.1
-
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »OK, pal. What I said was "Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating." You literally quoted that before disregarding it and going on a spiel equating it to "do not consider your overall activity level when deciding how much to eat." I won't publicly speculate on why you might've been triggered. Regardless, this conversation is over.
If you're not tracking your exercise calories, how are you going to account for them when understanding how much to eat? What's the point of the comment about them being an "excuse" for "guilty eating" (whatever that is)?
You haven't "triggered" anyone. I disagree with your approach and I don't think it will be helpful for OP. This isn't an emotional thing.17 -
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »What I said (after what I felt was a thoughtful summary of my research on the correlation between fasting,stress,cortisol, and belly fat) was "Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating." You literally quoted that before disregarding it and going on a spiel equating it to "do not consider your overall activity level when deciding how much to eat." I won't publicly speculate on why you might've been triggered. Regardless, this conversation is over.
Seriously doubt a single jimmy was even nudged, let alone anything rustled, or "triggered". Perhaps you should speculate with yourself why you read the conversation that way.21 -
I'm also prone to the "not losing inches" thoughts.
I found some articles on Livestrong.com that helped me feel a little more at ease about weight loss/fat loss/lost inches (and loving words from my fiancé about the progress I have made). Visceral vs subcutaneous fat, etc.
I weigh and measure all my food to ensure I'm in a calorie deficit. I follow a lifting routine with progressive overload 4x / week. I have lost 18 lbs in 4 months.
While I want the inches lost to occur most in my core (bust/waist/belly), it seems that is the last place my body wants to let it go from. I just have to be patient and eventually inches will drop from those areas like they have from my arms, thighs, etc.8 -
magnusthenerd wrote: »Visceral fat is exactly the kind of fat that won't cause a loss of inches. Belly fat =\= visceral fat. Belly fat is subcutaneous fat located at the belly.
Belly fat is a combination of visceral fat and subcutaneous fat and you'd need specialized diagnostic tools to get an accurate picture of the exact composition, which is why medical literature increasingly and overwhelmingly suggest belly fat or waist size as a benchmark for guesstimating risk of complications due to visceral fat (possibly including dementia, insulin resistance, risk of heart attack and stroke, etc).
Not sure exactly what you were trying to say or on what basis, but I am sure I can support my claims with as many scholarly sources as you'd like.2 -
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »magnusthenerd wrote: »Visceral fat is exactly the kind of fat that won't cause a loss of inches. Belly fat =\= visceral fat. Belly fat is subcutaneous fat located at the belly.
Belly fat is a combination of visceral fat and subcutaneous fat and you'd need specialized diagnostic tools to get an accurate picture of the exact composition, which is why medical literature increasingly and overwhelmingly suggest belly fat or waist size as a benchmark for guesstimating risk of complications due to visceral fat (possibly including dementia, insulin resistance, risk of heart attack and stroke, etc).
Not sure exactly what you were trying to say or on what basis, but I am sure I can support my claims with as many scholarly sources as you'd like.
I've seen studies discuss waist size or waist ratio to another body metric. I can't recall ever seeing a study discussing belly fat. That they discuss waist size as correlative to visceral fat levels or predictive of pathologies doesn't mean the it presumes the waist size is composed of a visceral fat component. Correlation is not causation.
Fat around your heart is going to be visceral, it won't change your waist size one wit.
There is scant evidence of any protocols to actually spot reduce fat. I've yet to see any study suggest a method for manipulating cortisol in a non-pharmocological way to produce a spot reduction outcome.10 -
michaelwrightkindle wrote: »janejellyroll wrote: »
If someone is exercising without paying attention to how many calories one needs or using extra activity as an "excuse" for eating, that has the potential to create major stress for the body. If it's true that this impacts fat stores, wouldn't we want to minimize that?michaelwrightkindle wrote: »Just don't get too caught up on tracking exercise calories or using them as an excuse for guilty eating.
I feel like you could just as easily argue that dieting leads to anorexia or other eating disorders.
I mean, any glance at any public forum dedicated to weight loss or dieting or exercise shows you that there are a tremendous number of people trying to use a Fitbit as an oracle. It's counterproductive and "rule of thumb" generalizations like "eat back half" are pretty arbitrary and meaningless without context. You're not going to fall out if you go from sedentary to doing a daily aerobics class or walk without compensating with a protein shake or an energy bar. But it would be trivially easy to undermine your weight-loss efforts if you equate working out more to eating more, especially when diet is the major factor. Maybe I'm wrong for assuming someone adhering to the kind of training regimen an elite athlete might use would present differently, though, and the average person on a dieting forum is genuinely at risk of doing themselves harm by overexertion? Nah.
Here, you are in a semi-public forum where the predominant mode of weight management is calorie counting. It's bog-standard to advocate that people strive to count the little buggers as accurately as practical, avoiding obsessive levels of compulsion, including tracking exercise.
It's also common here to recommend that people start by setting their MFP profile for moderate (not crazy-fast) weight loss, and eat back a fair fraction (like half) of their best estimate of exercise calories (or believe their fitness tracker, because tracker estimates are reasonably close - i.e., errors smaller than the calorie deficit - for a majority of people). Then, we usually suggest that they monitor their actual weight loss for 4-6 weeks, while logging carefully, then adjust their calorie intake based on actual weight loss experience.
That's the context you're commenting in, and the context that most of the (experienced, successful at weight management) people above are commenting about.
They've already made it clear that MFP uses a NEAT (before intentional exercise) calorie goal, rather than an TDEE (every bit of activity) calorie goal. They've also made it clear that we regularly see people who are actual exercise beginners (or near-beginners) undertake what will be, at their current fitness level, truly punitive and exhausting exercise schedules.
For a (near-) beginner, even an objectively quite moderate exercise program, way less than "elite athlete" territory, can create physical stress that, when added to a substantial calorie deficit, will result in cumulative fatigue/exhaustion that can easily (1) bleed activity and the calories it burns out of daily life (rest/sleep more; soft-pedal activity in home chores, job, and non-exercise hobbies) to the point of impairing weight loss on the calories-out side of the equation, or (2) cause compensatory overeating ("binges") that limits weight loss progress, or even results in the person completely giving up.
You've done some research, and it sounds like found some things that work for you (or which you're deploying in the expectation that they will). You may even have lengthy experience with what you're suggesting: I have no way of knowing. But one thing I do know, is that the people you're arguing with have also done research, and do have practical experience (even success), so are worth listening to.9 -
I've said it before, but will say it again for emphasis: discovering the NEAT method was the key to my losing weight and getting fit, after decades of trying and failing.
I didn't have to follow a punishing exercise plan and a cruelly arbitrary diet. I set my calorie level appropriately to lose weight, and then got rewarded with more food if I exercised. I could exercise more or less as my schedule and inclinations allowed. That was a great carrot-and-stick motivation for me. I added more exercise as I got fitter, and as a result I was able to get more of the food that I wanted.
Because I have common sense, I didn't spend all my calories on cupcakes. And because I'm not obsessive, I didn't develop exercise bulimia.
This worked so well for me that I recommend it to everyone and anyone who asks.11 -
Why did my calorie daliy goal go up on my app? Is it because i changed my stztus to very active? I cant even keep up eating 1200 calories let alone 1630 which its saying i need each day.. i do the HIIT on my elliptical 3 days a week and am now doing weight of 20 lbs and do my rebounder routine and incorporate my walk fit routine at least a few other days a week plus i work so how am i going to eat that much? Been on tbis journey before but going to make it a way of life as i feel so much better now,.. i use essential ols to help me lose inches and found that cal/mag utyrate has some beneficial affects on losing fat and so does potassium citrate.. look these 2 things up and read about them-2
Categories
- All Categories
- 1.4M Health, Wellness and Goals
- 392K Introduce Yourself
- 43.6K Getting Started
- 259.8K Health and Weight Loss
- 175.7K Food and Nutrition
- 47.4K Recipes
- 232.3K Fitness and Exercise
- 402 Sleep, Mindfulness and Overall Wellness
- 6.4K Goal: Maintaining Weight
- 8.5K Goal: Gaining Weight and Body Building
- 152.8K Motivation and Support
- 7.9K Challenges
- 1.3K Debate Club
- 96.3K Chit-Chat
- 2.5K Fun and Games
- 3.4K MyFitnessPal Information
- 23 News and Announcements
- 998 Feature Suggestions and Ideas
- 2.4K MyFitnessPal Tech Support Questions