Long Time Losers -How did you do it?

Azdak

I was curious to see if there are any people here who have lost a goodly amount of weight and have kept it off at least one year. There are different ways to reach the same goal and some people might find something that speaks to them.

I started my program in March 2009. Between March and August 2009, I lost around 56 lbs. At that point I switched to more of a "maintenance" phase just to see what happened. I also injured a hip which limited my exercise for a year. My weight has stayed between 200 and 206 during the past year. I was out of work when I started and then got a new job in Feb 2010, so since then I have had to deal with the "real world".

Here are just some bullet points of my program:

I basically did it with portion control. MFP helped me keep track of my foods and my numbers. I changed my food prep, but it was more going back to how I used to cook for myself when I was single.

I did not eat any special foods or follow any "diet" plan--I knew the changes had to be permanent, so I didn't want to do anything too unusual.

I increased my protein intake somewhat, but only because it was on the low side previously. At a wt range of 90 to 115kg, my intake probably averaged about 70-80g per day, or around 20% of total calories. My ratio averaged 50% carbs, 20% protein and 30% fat. I found that if I went below 50% carbs, I lacked the energy to work out.

I dont' use protein shakes, supplements or vitamins. I occasionally carry around some protein bars (low sugar) because I often have to go directly from my workout to start my shift so I don't have time for a recovery meal. I also don't use PAM or sugar substitutes.

I don't monitor water intake and never drink 8 glasses of water per day.

I drink an average of two cans of diet soda per day.

For carbs I focus on whole grains, protein, fiber and sugar content. Actually, I try to avoid any processed flour and sugar in any food.

I prepared most of my food from scratch and avoided prepared meals, limited restaurants to maybe once every couple of months. Salad is your friend.

For the first 6 mos, I weighed myself every day. I like data. Since then, I weigh myself once or twice a week on average.

I did a LOT of aerobic exercise. I averaged 6 days a week and would often go 2-3 weeks w/out a day off. I was and am in pretty good shape so I could exercise at a fairly high level. I averaged about 4000 to 4500 calories per week in exercise, at one point upping it to 5500-6000. I trained more for fitness than weight loss--so I mixed endurance workouts, tempo workouts and interval workouts--no HIIT..

I did a modest amount of resistance exercise at first--maybe 3 workouts every 2 weeks. After I adapted, I lifted mainly in the 4-8 RM range.

When I switched to "maintenance" in Aug 2009, I increased the strength work and started including more high-intensity interval workouts. Unfortunately, I also injured a hip in a fall and had to give much of it up until just recently.

Since I started working again full-time:

The increase in physical work activity didn't help one ounce--actually it was worse because I had to cut back on my workout routine. It took a good six weeks to adapt and get back up to my previous workout levels.

I am still working out 5-7 days a week.

I have packed my work meals every day. I have not yet gone out to a restaurant or ordering any outside food. I have not gone to a fast-food restaurant yet. That is one thing I am most proud of. I still am doing most of the cooking at home for myself and the family. I have had to struggle at times with my late-night snacking habit, but with exercise, I have been able to rein myself back in before I backslide too far.

I still think about food every day. That's the one thing that has surprised me the most. I thought once I lost weight, it would be no big deal, but it is.

And I am still wearing most of my fat clothes, because I spend my clothing budget on workout stuff.

Anybody else?

HealthyChanges2010

tagging this for later..

Thanks for sharing Azdak...:)

chrisdavey

Interesting topic.

Between Jan 07 and Sep 07 I went from 95kg down to 68kg (I am 173cm or 5'8"). Did this calorie counting but not really focussing on macronutrients and I believe protein intake was a bit low. Well not low but not up near 1g/lb.

The main exercises for me were jogging and boxing (no resistance). Because of this, I lost a lot of muscle mass as well.

2008 I was mainly focussed on long distance running and as such stayed quite skinny. I was around 70kg +-2kg all year. Average for year was 2200cals, 51% carbs (281g), 20% fat (49g) and 29% protein (160g).

Start of 2009 I started some resistance training. Initially body weight type stuff. Then did a few months of P90x. Then at the end of the year I started working on "the big 3" Deadlifts, squats and bench press. Started with Stronglifts 5x5 program. Average for year was 2200cals, 48% carbs (264g), 26% fat (64g) and 26% protein (143g).

Start of 2010, I tried a few different resistance training programs but all focussed on the big 3. I also took up mma training which is basically kickboxing, wrestling and jui-jitsu. I do this twice a week. I stopped running all together as I found it did not help my "round fitness" as all. I also do a fair bit of HIIT. I currently average about 3000 cals of exercise per week.

On the food side of things, initial weight loss was simply eating when hungry only, taking packed lunches most days but I was a bit of a Subwayaholic back in the day. (no the excess sodium didn't really matter and I didn't even know about that at the time :P)

My diet now is 30% protein, 35% carbs and 25% fats. I have previously tried low carb (less than 100g) as I was trying to lose last bit of stubborn belly fat. Didn't really work and I don't think I had as much energy either.

I am now 74kg and for the last 4 weeks have actually been trying to put on weight (which is a first for me in my life) and I am realising just now that I didn't have to stick to around 2100-2300cals for maintenance as I have been averaging 2700-2800cals and only put on 1kg. Loving it at the moment, get to eat an absolute ****load of good food

Keys to success long term:

Find some exercise that you enjoy and want to do long term (30 day shred's etc. may work well but do you want to keep doing them over and over? If yes, then go for it, otherwise find something that you love doing and do that instead)

I always aim for 1g/lb BW of protein. Generally lean meats but I also eat a lot of dairy. Some say this is counter productive but others say it's not. Who do you believe? :P

Try to focus on low gi carbs.

Avoid empty calories where possible (soft drink, alcohol etc)

Eat breakfast! (no, a coffee isn't breakfast)

Re takeaways: try and find one item on the menu that is relatively healthy so that if you are stuck with limited food choices you can still have something half decent. (do your research!)

Drink lots of water

That's about all I can think of

panjabi

bump :glasses:

Iron_Biker

Very interesting topic!

I went in 4 months from 90 to 70 Kg, and pretty much stayed there since.

My philosophy is all about habit changing. In order to keep your target weight in the long run, you have to make it a habit.

A habit to eat right, a habit to exercise.

Mostly I do what you have already mentioned:

- Food portion tracking
- Avoid useless liquid calories (like Coke, Starbucks, etc.)
- Run at least 5 km every day
- Avoid food suplements, milkshakes, vitamins and all that stuff
- 5-6 glasses of water a day seems fine for me
- Limit alcohol consumption
- Obviously non-smoker
- When in doubt, eat vegetables instead
- Enjoy life! One or two days a week over calorie limit is OK, but 90% of the time must be within that limit

The key is to make it part of your life, and never look back.

This might seem an intuitive process to some people, but I am really surprised how many still believe in fad diets and one-month-fat-burn programs and after losing some water they revert to their old, fat habits.

That's what I do, in a nutshell, and it works. Please feel free to constructively criticize my habits. I want to further improve them.