Do I look too thin now?
Replies
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you don't look too thin, but you do need toning and muscles.0
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Agree that it looks more like extra skin. Focus less on losing weight, and more on gaining muscle. You'll be surprised at the difference you see.0
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Being overweight for too long damages the elastic properties of the skin. See a trainer/doctor about toning your stomach if you can. You may have to get a tummy tuck.0
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You don't look anorexic or anything, but you do look thin. I wouldn't think you have any more weight to drop at this point, looks like you might just benefit from hitting the weights a little bit in the gym. Other people are usually far too willing to tell us what to do, when to do it, and even, apparently, when to stop.0
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I'm currently 167 pounds as a 6'0"(183cm) 30 y/o male.
The problem is I had my body fat measured by a DEXA machine at the beggining of October at 175 lbs and it registered 15%. So I made a goal for myself to get to 155 pounds and 10% body fat by the end of the year. My stomach still does not look flat (it looks kind of like a floppy/droopy pancake) and I feel like there are still significant fat deposits around my midsection. In fact, the dexa scan said I had 14 lbs of fat on my "trunk" alone, which I take to mean midsection. There was also 10 lbs of fat on my legs and 2 lbs on my arms.
I have been lifting weights during most of my weight loss, an 8-12 rep routine with barbells going as heavy as possible. I'm also trying to keep my protein intake over 100 grams per day to minimize muscle loss.
I wouldn't say you've necessarily gone too far. Even at 155, you're within the healthy BMI range (which is an ok rough guideline at least). On the other hand, 15% body fat is perfectly fine and actually well within the "fitness" range for men. Ignore the estimates of how much fat is on your legs, arms, trunk, etc. Part of that is still essential body fat (insulation, protection, etc) and some of where it sits is genetic, but the important thing is that your body NEEDS some fat.
If you want to decrease your bf%, I would say the best way at this point would be to increase lean muscle mass. You can do this through lifting heavier things (as heavy as you can safely complete 8-10 reps for hypertrophy is what I've heard) and eating at a slight surplus. You may want to look into bulking/cutting cycles, as well. You may even be able to get the changes you want while eating at maintenance, but it will be slower. And if you increase your weight through LBM, you'll still be healthier, plus it is easier to sustain than skinny is.
It will also take some time for the extra skin to tighten up. I think that lifting may also help there - not that it will shrink skin faster, but it may fill it out a bit with attractive muscle (as opposed to fat like before).
ETA: I just saw the pictures you posted of your idea. Yes, it's time to start hitting the weights and eating at least at maintenance. You aren't going to get muscles like that with a major deficit, and 10% bf won't make you look like that without putting the time and effort in to building those muscles. Now is the perfect time to start building that muscle
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Great work on the weight loss! Now you get to work on the fun part of carving out the body you desire. People will always be saying you're either too light or too heavy. 167 lbs. at your height is a perfectly healthy BMI. I am 6'1" with a small frame and feel my best at 165 lbs. That is also the weight at which people start saying "don't lose any more weight". My family says I look 'gaunt' at 165, but I start getting a stomach in the 170's even after busting my ar$$ in the gym for years. Most people say I look best in clothes around 180-185 so it's kind of a trade off. I agree with the other advice given above. Focus on lifting weights and gaining some mass to reduce BF% without losing any more scale weight. Good luck!0
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"ugly4" and "ugly5"?
First suggestion I have is stop calling yourself "ugly"!
yes, please!
tears came to my eyes when I saw you had named your files "ugly."
You are not ugly. I am not sure there are actually that many truly "ugly" people in the world anyway, but
YOU are lookin' JUST FINE!
You deserve better than to call yourself that, o.k.? :flowerforyou:0 -
Great job on the weight loss, your cut is done, eat a little more than maintenance and lift heavy, fill out the loose skin with muscle.0
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Both of those actors were on steroids when shooting those films. If you're not planning on doing steroids, then forget having those bodies.To me, ideal would be something along the lines of this (minus the offensive tatoo in the second one of course):
As for your issue at hand:
First, to directly answer your question, 165 lbs at 6'0" is not unhealthy. Whether you continue to lose weight or choose to bulk up is entirely up to your personal fitness goals. There is no right answer except the one that will make you happy with the way you look or feel.
Second, critique time: Congrats on the weight loss, but your body from the sternum up looks like a hungry skeleton. I don't know what your routine was while losing this weight, but it didn't work very well for building or retaining lean body mass (LBM). That is why your family is expressing concern.
You either ate way too little for your body to maintain LBM, or you have an ineffective workout routine. I don't see any deltoid, traps, or pectoral definition that would normally come with someone who is athletic with low body fat (I'm not talking about your juiced out actors, either). Then again, you're not flexing in the pictures so maybe that's it.
Your lean body mass at 139 lbs is below average for your height -- you should be in the 150-160 lb range on LBM alone and can get to 160-170 without having to go crazy with weight training. In order to fix that, you'd have to eat slightly above maintenance and figure out how to make your weight training routine more effective.
From the sternum down, that's just loose skin which will go away with time or surgery. The DEXA scan might be over-estimating your body fat because of this, I'm no expert in how DEXA scans work but if it's counting everything other than muscle as 'fat' then that explains your upper torso -- you could be really down to 10%-ish bodyfat but don't know it.
If I were you I would do a lean bulking routine @ 250-500 cal/day surplus to put back on 10-20 lbs of body mass and monitor bodyfat very closely. I would caution against doing more than that as you might just revert to your pre- weight loss self.0 -
Firstly, congrats on your weight loss!
I do not think that you've lost too much weigh or that you look too thin.
I am also 6'0 and my BMI says that I should roughly weigh between 140-180. I am aiming to weigh around 160 depending on the results I get.
I would try what others have said to tighting up, agree that it might be excess skin.0 -
I would go lighter on the weights as losing weight and doing HEAVY lifting is an oxymoron. I would also increase my protein intake (200grams).
Ultimately you have to decide what you want to do. Congrats on the weight loss, however you can't complain because that was your goal! If you want to gain muscle you have to eat more if you are going to lift heavy.0 -
Thanks for all the continued responses. I have read them all and do appreciate your time and thoughts on the matter.One question - how did you come up with 155 as a target weight? (My approach was to look up tennis players and 400 metre runners that were my height, and use their weight as a benchmark)
I really targeted 10% more as my goal rather than a lower weight; I estimated that going from 175 from 155 at least 50% of my weight loss would be from fat (hopefully more like 70-80%). I had 26 lbs of fat at 175. So if I had 16 lbs of fat at 155, that would be right at 10%.When was the last time you had a break from eating at a deficit? You say your strength hasnt really increased a great deal, so why not eat at maintenance for a while and concentrate on your lifting/fitness?
For more than a few weeks? Probably back in August. I had pulled my hamstring plus I had a bout of some sort of flu, so I stopped exercising and ate 2000-3000 calories per day for about 2-3 weeks. For most of this year though, I have been cutting save for a few binge/cheat days. Usually I aim for 10,500 on weekly caloric intake and 6000 for weekly cardio exercise burn, and I'm able to attain that on a weekly basis, even if certain days get out of hand.0 -
I wouldn't aim to lose any more weight. 155 lbs. seems really light for a 6ft man. Instead of cardio I would switch to strength training and maybe hire a personal trainer to help you focus on the spots you want to improve.0
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Just as a reference for muscle mass, here is what I looked like at 240 and 190. I honestly don't think I had much muscle mass at either of those weights either. 290 was too gross so I never took a picture.
240:
190:
165:
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I know it will never happen because of my age and the damage I've done to my body, but I'd like to get a lot closer to that than what I am now.
You're 30 years old! You can definitely get into that kind of shape. It won't even take long-- there's not much actual mass in either of those guys, and you've already got yourself down to a pretty lean state.
Unless you've got some joint damage that makes lifting impossible, I don't see why you can't reach those goals within a year (well, the Ed Norton picture anyway) just lifting heavy and eating right.0 -
Look at what you've achieved! Amazing work, so be more pleased with yourself!
You need to eat more. Seriously. Eat more and lift. The loose skin will tighten up in time. Even if it didn't it really doesn't look as bad as you think.
Right now, try not to focus so much on how you look, and just ensure you are eating adequately.0 -
I think you look great. Excellent job on the weightloss! I wouldn't suggest losing anymore, but toning up.0
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Your achievements are amazing...Great job. However....at 6' tall I'm not sure 155lbs is a good weight. Everyone is different but my suggestion would be 185 at 10% body fat.0
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"ugly4" and "ugly5"?
First suggestion I have is stop calling yourself "ugly"!
Totally agree with this!0 -
Your extra skin doesn't look bad at all but if it bothers you that much, see how much the surgery is. Make sure you do your homework when searching for a surgeon.
In the mean time, hit the weights! This guy I know only lifts one day a week but he lifts til his muscles are fatigued. He looks great!0 -
I won't repeat the good advice you've been given, but will add my, "you like fine!" to the chorus.
I have to wonder if your family and friends are more queuing in to the negative way you seem to perceive yourself. I'm inferring a lot here, I realize, but I am basing my thoughts on the titling of your photo files "ugly" and stating that you will never measure up to your own ideal because "it's too late" and you've "damaged" your body.
I hope you know those things aren't true. I hope that you've just developed a habit of self-bashing because it's easier to do it to ourselves (especially when we've lived as fat people) then to wait for someone else to cut us down.
Lonestarwings (I wish I knew your first name, as I'd use it here), you look fine (I actually find the 190 lb version of you most physically appealing), you are worthy, there is nothing wrong with you. Your body as it is now is physically attractive and would be desired by many many people. You have not ruined your body, it's not too late for ANYTHING, and you are NOT ugly. At all. I'm just a stranger on the internet, I don't know you, and I don't have any reason to stroke your ego falsely. These are truths.
I think the next thing you need to work on is the way you perceive yourself. If you can start valuing that good looking guy in the mirror, your family and friends will NOTICE and they will stop worrying about you. They may not even be conscious of this , but what they are truly afraid of is that you are trying to destroy yourself and that you won't be happy no matter how much weight you lose. Is this true? Is any part of it true? If so, that is what they are worried about (rightfully so, I might add), not your physical weight or body fat percentage.
Lastly, you may not ever be able to look like the ideals you posted, but you could get pretty darn close. It would take some time and effort, but you can spend your time and effort on anything you choose. You're only 30 years old, for heaven sake!! I see lots of guys in the gym that are cut and look fabulous and make me secretly hyperventilate a little
, and (maybe because I'm 39 and my tastes are aging along with me.. lol) a lot of those hot hot men are well into their 40's. Dude, you can do a lot of physical "perfecting" of your body in a decade.
Anyway, I think it's time for a little perspective and a little deeper self evaluation. There is nothing wrong with you, you have plenty of time, and you are not in any way shape or form ugly. You've made a great transformation to this point and it's time to let your brain and psyche embrace who you really are and who you have always been, the good looking dude in the mirror.0 -
I agree with everyone else. You do not look too thin NOW. But you would at 155 (for a 6' tall man, that's too thin). What you are seeing in your stomach is extra skin. Your arms and your chest look great. I think you should eat at maintenance for a while (like 3 or 4 months), keep lifting. Give your skin some time to rebound. Then consider doing a bulk to gain muscle.0
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Somewhere between 190 and 165 you fell off the tracks. Based on your pictures it looks like you were 18-20% bf at 190 (which estimates your lbm @ 152-155) and you lost a sizeable amount of lbm in those last 25 lbs. In fact almost all of it was lbm. Your current weight would have you at 8% bf if you retained your lbm.
Stop crash dieting and ditch the body dismorphia.0 -
Somewhere between 190 and 165 you fell off the tracks. Based on your pictures it looks like you were 18-20% bf at 190 (which estimates your lbm @ 152-155) and you lost a sizeable amount of lbm in those last 25 lbs. In fact almost all of it was lbm.
Stop crash dieting and ditch the body dismorphia.
And insulting him is really going to help. I'd totally disagree that all was lean body mass. He's has some decent definition in his shoulders, arms and chest at 165, muscles you couldn't even see at 190, meaning he lost the fat covering them.0 -
Hi,
A lot of people in my family are telling me that I've taken things too far and that I need to stop losing weight. My mom is a doctor and even she has been telling me this, she's the one that wanted me to start losing weight in the first place. My sister says the same thing. I'm currently 167 pounds as a 6'0"(183cm) 30 y/o male.
The problem is I had my body fat measured by a DEXA machine at the beggining of October at 175 lbs and it registered 15%. So I made a goal for myself to get to 155 pounds and 10% body fat by the end of the year. My stomach still does not look flat (it looks kind of like a floppy/droopy pancake) and I feel like there are still significant fat deposits around my midsection. In fact, the dexa scan said I had 14 lbs of fat on my "trunk" alone, which I take to mean midsection. There was also 10 lbs of fat on my legs and 2 lbs on my arms.
I have been lifting weights during most of my weight loss, an 8-12 rep routine with barbells going as heavy as possible. I'm also trying to keep my protein intake over 100 grams per day to minimize muscle loss.
Anyway, I just wanted to get some honest opinions. I think I still need to cut down to 155, see what I look like, then probably work on adding 10-15 lbs of muscle mass next year. I truly do feel like that if I've come this far, why not put in the effort to burn off that last little bit and see what happens? But like I said, I'm meeting a lot of resistance from the people around me, and it is resulting in efforts by them to sabotage my diet to a degree (I can do a great job of that on my own, certainly don't need their help!)..
Do not open these links if you're offended by shirtless pasty people. In some ways I think I looked better shirtless when I was still 230+, and like I said, I know muscle building needs to be the priority next year, but I think the last bit of fat has to go first.
http://i973.photobucket.com/albums/ae219/randomperson8008/ugly4.jpg
http://i973.photobucket.com/albums/ae219/randomperson8008/ugly5.jpg
I've gone through this also and it's the biggest mind ****!!! Go to whatever makes you happy ... don't go by a number on the scale.. your stomach is lose skin and the only way to get rid of that is surgery. They will also do a little bit of lipo when doing your surgery ... at least that is what the surgeon told me during a consultation.
No idea where you live but if you want message me and I will share my experience I had with 2 plastic surgeons 1 was horrible 1 was amazing ... I have not done surgery yet but I will one day.
Anyways what I did was I started a bulk when I heard I was to skinny all the time ... gained 28 lbs in 4 months ... I lost 3% bodyfat also ...however I didn't like the "fluffyness" I got out of the process... currently cutting back down and feel allot better about myself at my current size 192lbs
Congratz on your loss brother !! killing it!! should be proud of yourself!
Kind regards,
Brad0 -
I think everyone has given some great advice. I just wanted to add that YOU LOOK GREAT!! Congratulations!! Now if you want a body like the pics you posted, start lifting HEAVY WEIGHTS!!! You have lost so much body fat, now go get some muscle! You can keep dropping body fat and gain muscle at the same time, but you probably don't want to rely on the scale anymore.0
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Sigh. I am so, so tired of seeing people blither on about "loose skin" when they have no clue what they're talking about.
OP, that "pancake" is FAT. Most "loose skin" is FAT.
You look about 15/16% fat. If you get your bodyfat down to 10%, or less, you'll lose the "pancake".
Yes, you might still have some loose skin. But true, real, damn near fat-free "loose skin" is paper thin, like the back of your hand. It is NOT filled with fat globules, nor does it sit on your body in that way. That is simply not the way skin operates.
You're at a pretty decent body fat level, certainly within the "normal" range. However if your goal is to get super shredded, you still have PLENTY of fat left to loose so have at it.0 -
Also, OP, when you have a goal to get truly lean, beyond "normal" levels, inevitably many people will think you're going overboard. Sure if they knew you already looking like Ryan Gosling or Brad Pitt in Fight Club, they'd be blown away and super impressed with your physique. But since you were formerly fat, they have an idea in their heads how you "should" look, and how far you "should" go. Dipping down into truly lean territory, such as the aforementioned 10% or less category, will put you at a place very atypical place, and leaving you looking very ripped. The people around you largely will not be able to conceptualize you at "model" or "famous actor" bodyfat levels, and yes, might even work to keep you from reaching your goals. And don't even get me started on the jealousy and envy...
Ignore them. This is your body and you get to decide what your dream physique looks like. Do not let the ignorant, even if well meaning, people in your life, or even on this board, dictate what your goals are. If you stop because somebody else has decided what YOUR dream physique should be, that'll be a huge mistake on your part.
Keep going until you see reflected back at you the man that you've always wanted to be.0 -
Just wanted to say thanks for the rest of the replies. I've read them all and am considering everything carefully. I am having a good week and feel like the belly is taking more of a hit. I really don't think it's completely loose skin, there is still some fat there that I think might go away at 155, as Iwishyouwell indiciated. I also have a lot of scar tissue/stretch marks around the belly button, which means the stomach will probably always sag to a degree without surgery. I took a really graphic picture of it but will refrain from posting it. I may never look good without my shirt off but at least I can look decent with clothes on.
Yeah, I will probably look too thin overall at 155, but I feel like it will be a good starting point for a slow "bulk". In the meantime I am continuing to lift and trying to keep my protein high. I weighed in at a solid 165 this morning so only 10 more pounds to go, I'm sure I can get there by the end of the year.
I think part of the reason why I became such a fatty is that I never had the muscle mass in the first place to keep my metabolism high and make good use of the calories I consumed. So everything beyond what my puny frame needed just got turned into lard. I'm hoping to change that over the next 12 months by lifting heavy and transitioning to a high protein diet about 10% above maintenance level.0 -
Usually I aim for 10,500 on weekly caloric intake and 6000 for weekly cardio exercise burn, and I'm able to attain that on a weekly basis, even if certain days get out of hand.
based on those figures you net about 800 calories per day....
you seriously need to get some food down you!!0
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