What do weight loss shows have over me?

Phaedra2014

On these weight loss shows don't they usually get a bunch of loose skin cut off at the end?? Volia! -15 pounds!

I watched 2 episodes of Extreme Weight Loss. I don't have a TV so I don't watch these shows. I have heard and read about them. I think in those two episodes only a stomach skin reduction was done, nothing else.

littlefoot612

On these weight loss shows don't they usually get a bunch of loose skin cut off at the end?? Volia! -15 pounds!

I watched 2 episodes of Extreme Weight Loss. I don't have a TV so I don't watch these shows. I have heard and read about them. I think in those two episodes only a stomach skin reduction was done, nothing else.

On Extreme Weight Loss, it happens in all the episodes. That is their cliffhanger moment in the third quarter of weightloss. The participant has to reach a certain weight and percentage of weight lost in order to qualify for skin removal surgery. Just as they are about to step on the scale they cut to commercial. If the are almost at the goal the show the consultation with the surgeon and, again, a cliffhanger commercial, then the Doctor says they are a good candidate for the surgery. On The Biggest Loser, they are wearing something under their clothing at the final weigh in to hold all the loose skin in place but I understand they have the skin removal surgery later.

WalkingAlong

On these weight loss shows don't they usually get a bunch of loose skin cut off at the end?? Volia! -15 pounds!

I watched 2 episodes of Extreme Weight Loss. I don't have a TV so I don't watch these shows. I have heard and read about them. I think in those two episodes only a stomach skin reduction was done, nothing else.

The women on EWL are not getting anywhere near 21% BF. I think they wind up in the mid-30s at best, typically. So you're way ahead of them. They too would struggle where you're at. (21% is kind of ideal but you probably know that.)

sullus

This contains your answers:

http://www.cracked.com/article_21137_5-details-they-cut-from-my-season-the-biggest-loser.html

Fit_Housewife

What *should* I be doing?

Stop watching weight loss shows.

Lol this

Iwishyouwell

Eat less food.

What makes you say this? You don't know how much food I eat. At the very least, ask me how many calories I consume and what I eat before making your declaration.

If I hadn't eaten less food I wouldn't have lost 126 pounds. I know I got that part covered.

Do you want to lose an additional 15 lbs?

Eat less food. Or if that doesn't suit you, burn more calories.

Repeat until 15 lbs less.

skyeny

Is 120 lb a magic number?... You look awesome NOW (I assume it's your arm on the pic?), you're doing everything right. So why not just keep up with your routine and live your life, concentrate on other goals. Who knows, maybe in a few months your body will surprise you. If not, you know you're healthy and look great. I have my own weight goals on MFP, but already right now I'm happy with myself. I'm happy that I work out and eat healthier. And if my lb number stays the same for the next few months, so be it. I promised myself that I'm not gonna give up on my health anymore, and the number is just a number. I wish I could explain it to my body that for every 3500 calories I'm short it has to give up 1 lb, but I don't know how, it has it's own schedule. Of course I can stop eating, or cut my calories even more, but that wouldn't be healthy or sustainable for me, and I'm not going that way. Weight loss shows... we can quit our jobs, workout instead, eat like kids in Africa... but look how many of those biggest losers gained the weight back. I don't really watch TV, but when I do I prefer the Food Network

deksgrl

Perhaps 120 is an unreasonable goal weight. Set a body fat % goal instead.

RogueinSF

With so little left to go I would say just start having fun! Go dancing, do some power yoga...play, play, play. The fittest I have ever been was because I was too busy having fun to sit about and eat all the time. Good luck and congratulations, you are already a super star!

StacyPhillipsTSFLcoach

Wow! Great job! You are amazing!

Those weight loss shows don't have anything over you. I'll bet you look fit and healthy, as opposed to "formerly obese" like most of the contestants on those shows end up looking. You have some great stats with your % body fat and your pounds of lean body mass that you preserved in the process of becoming healthy! You can be proud of that!

I_Will_End_You

I agree with the eat less food sentiment. If you aren't losing weight, you're not eating less than you burn, period. Have you lowered your calorie goal since you've last lost weight? The smaller you are, the more efficient your body is, the less calories you use. How many calories per day are you consuming?

likitisplit

With very little weight to lose now, it's going to be slow going...you're not doing anything wrong except for watching these shows and thinking that they're actually reality.

Also, what makes you say you need to lose 15 Lbs? Just some arbitrary number you told yourself you needed to be at or are you making this determination based on BF% or something else? How are you arriving at this number? If you're at a healthy BF%, your body is going to be reluctant to keep leaning out...the human body really doesn't like being super lean.

I based it on body fat% as tracked by trainer over a period of time. I'm currently at 21% BF with LBM of 106 and Fat Mass of 28. I know these numbers can be off but I've had measurements taken consistently so they've been off from the start :-D

I want to preserve LBM (or increase it later with a bulk) and cut down on BF% to about 17%. 15 pounds may be too ambitious but 10 is also cool. I'm only 5'2" so not tall.

I've only seen your arm, but I think that 21% is a little high for the amount of muscle definition you have. And it would still put you at about the mid-point of the healthy range for your age. 11.6% is essential fat for our bracket.

I would seriously try to recomp at this point.

Phaedra2014

Is 120 lb a magic number?... You look awesome NOW (I assume it's your arm on the pic?), you're doing everything right. So why not just keep up with your routine and live your life, concentrate on other goals. Who knows, maybe in a few months your body will surprise you. If not, you know you're healthy and look great. I have my own weight goals on MFP, but already right now I'm happy with myself. I'm happy that I work out and eat healthier. And if my lb number stays the same for the next few months, so be it. I promised myself that I'm not gonna give up on my health anymore, and the number is just a number. I wish I could explain it to my body that for every 3500 calories I'm short it has to give up 1 lb, but I don't know how, it has it's own schedule. Of course I can stop eating, or cut my calories even more, but that wouldn't be healthy or sustainable for me, and I'm not going that way. Weight loss shows... we can quit our jobs, workout instead, eat like kids in Africa... but look how many of those biggest losers gained the weight back. I don't really watch TV, but when I do I prefer the Food Network

It was the magic number when I first started out and didn't know what I know now thanks to some very helpful people on MFP who are now part of my friend's list. I've had endless support and encouragement and I am truly grateful for what this site has given me.

Yes that is my arm!

I think what I'm gleaning for the responses is to focus more on BF%. That's a good goal to have anyway and something realistic I can work toward.

likitisplit

Is 120 lb a magic number?... You look awesome NOW (I assume it's your arm on the pic?), you're doing everything right. So why not just keep up with your routine and live your life, concentrate on other goals. Who knows, maybe in a few months your body will surprise you. If not, you know you're healthy and look great. I have my own weight goals on MFP, but already right now I'm happy with myself. I'm happy that I work out and eat healthier. And if my lb number stays the same for the next few months, so be it. I promised myself that I'm not gonna give up on my health anymore, and the number is just a number. I wish I could explain it to my body that for every 3500 calories I'm short it has to give up 1 lb, but I don't know how, it has it's own schedule. Of course I can stop eating, or cut my calories even more, but that wouldn't be healthy or sustainable for me, and I'm not going that way. Weight loss shows... we can quit our jobs, workout instead, eat like kids in Africa... but look how many of those biggest losers gained the weight back. I don't really watch TV, but when I do I prefer the Food Network

It was the magic number when I first started out and didn't know what I know now thanks to some very helpful people on MFP who are now part of my friend's list. I've had endless support and encouragement and I am truly grateful for what this site has given me.

Yes that is my arm!

I think what I'm gleaning for the responses is to focus more on BF%. That's a good goal to have anyway and something realistic I can work toward.

Try gaining some muscle.

I don't want to be all negative, but eating more and increasing your lifts is so much more life-giving than reducing weight.

helenarriaza

from the link at cracked:

"They claim the weigh-ins you see are weekly, but that's a straight-up lie. When people exclaimed "I lost 12 pounds in a week!" that wasn't always the case. It's all based on filming schedules. Sometimes the real period between weigh-ins was over three weeks, and you got liked like a rock star for losing so much weight so quickly. Other times it was only five days, and the audience thought you were phoning it in that week"

"The healthy way to do it is to lose weight slowly by eating well and exercising. But turning down the second slice of pizza and going for a walk doesn't exactly make for dramatic TV, does it? "

"At the end of the series, my immune system shut down due to the effects of losing too much weight too fast. My hair fell out. I can't say I was in better health at 260 pounds than I am now, but doctors told me that everything I did to my body on the show was a physician's nightmare. Before the final big weigh in, I lost 19 pounds in two weeks."

"Once, during a speaking engagement in Colorado, an overweight teenage girl came up to me after my presentation. She was a fan and desperate to emulate the weight loss results she saw on the show. Obviously her results weren't as drastic as ours had seemed to be. She was so crestfallen that she resorted to anorexia and bulimia. At one point she felt like such a failure that she tried to kill herself and wound up in the hospital. "

So, yeah. Don't watch them, or do it to get the positive, not the obsessive.

Wormulon

I agree that focusing on something else like BF% might be better. Running the numbers of your current BF, target BF, and lean body mass you can't loose 15lbs without loosing lean mass too. 9 lbs of fat loss will get you to your target BF% while maintaining your lean mass.

cwolfman13

With very little weight to lose now, it's going to be slow going...you're not doing anything wrong except for watching these shows and thinking that they're actually reality.

Also, what makes you say you need to lose 15 Lbs? Just some arbitrary number you told yourself you needed to be at or are you making this determination based on BF% or something else? How are you arriving at this number? If you're at a healthy BF%, your body is going to be reluctant to keep leaning out...the human body really doesn't like being super lean.

I based it on body fat% as tracked by trainer over a period of time. I'm currently at 21% BF with LBM of 106 and Fat Mass of 28. I know these numbers can be off but I've had measurements taken consistently so they've been off from the start :-D

I want to preserve LBM (or increase it later with a bulk) and cut down on BF% to about 17%. 15 pounds may be too ambitious but 10 is also cool. I'm only 5'2" so not tall.

You are already very lean then for a female...the leaner you are, the harder it is...like I said, the body simply doesn't like being super lean. As a male pushing 40 I have a great deal of difficult maintaining a BF% much below about 15%...most women have difficulty maintaining a BF% below 20% as women naturally have more fat.

In my experience, when you're already that lean and wanting to get leaner, the quality of your diet really comes into play. I have to be bang on to maintain anything below 15% and I'd imagine that's about where you are then at around 21%. That's the point where I really have to start giving up things like beer (not worth it) and the like. It's going to be tough sledding.

WalkingAlong

...obese people lose 200+ pounds in ONE YEAR. I am positive they hit plateaus but still, to lose steadily in a year is awesome.

Also, I don't watch Biggest Loser but on Extreme Weight Loss they don't lose very steadily over the year. Did you watch this week's episode with Melissa? I think she lost like 70 lbs. the first 90 days, 40 the next 90, 5 the next 90 and like 20 the last 90 (with skin surgery). So in the last 6 months maybe 5-10 lbs. of her own doing. And her job was to lose weight that whole year.

Saramelie

On most of those shows, with the exception of the ones involving bariatric surgery, the participants can spend anywhere form 3 to 6 months on the "ranch" or at "boot camp". For the time they are there, they workout for hours each day, meals are prepared for them and losing weight is their full time job.
We, on the other hand, have lives and families and jobs as well as trying to lose weight.
Although I sometimes find myself rooting for these people and finding some of them inspiring (and others annoying) their weight loss journeys are so far from reality.

There you go!

Phaedra2014

...obese people lose 200+ pounds in ONE YEAR. I am positive they hit plateaus but still, to lose steadily in a year is awesome.

Also, I don't watch Biggest Loser but on Extreme Weight Loss they don't lose very steadily over the year. Did you watch this week's episode with Melissa? I think she lost like 70 lbs. the first 90 days, 40 the next 90, 5 the next 90 and like 20 the last 90 (with skin surgery). So in the last 6 months maybe 5-10 lbs. of her own doing. And her job was to lose weight that whole year.

I watched the one with the young coach guy. Made me cry to be honest. He lost so much weight and looked so incredibly fit.

My question really was about how to get through a stall or a major slow down in terms of loss. How do those people do it regardless of all the assistance they have. I mean, if I put in the work I will get the results. That much I know for sure.