27.2 pounds gone in 6 weeks, how I did it!
lpm3925
Posts: 39
I started my weight lose journey about 5 ½ weeks ago. So far I have lost 27.2 pounds. I’ve seen a lot of questions in the forums about what diet, and what exercises, and how long does it take to lose x amount of weight. I thought I’d share how I’ve done it so far.
I started out at 318 pounds 6 ½ weeks ago, my wife was 292. I was not serious about losing weight. I thought and talked with my wife. We decided to start just eating better. The big thing I did that week was my switch to water. I gave up everything else, and have only drunk water since then. I am probably most proud of that one achievement so far. In fact I am drinking water as I type this. I drink about 100-150 ounces of water per day. The week of us just eating better lead to us deciding to workout a little. We hit Wal-Mart and picked a DVD for walking at home. I kind of laughed being a guy, “This is silly walking at home, to easy”. Uh, no! I was wore out after the first day. I plowed through the rest of the week with eagerness because I finally realized I was in horrible shape. I thought, “I can’t even walk without my heart jumping through me chest!” Scary! I walked for 6 days. During that week I ordered the Power 90 Program. Somewhere around the end of that week my wife found Myfitnesspal.com, the iPhone app, and we’ve been on it ever since.
We stay under our calorie goal every single day. We follow the Power 90 workouts exactly. We work out 6 days per week. 3 days of strength, 3 days of cardio, alternating days as we go. We take a Vitapak supplement program from GNC every morning. I’m on the Men’s Mega Man Sport, and my wife is on the Women’s Ultra Mega Energy and Metabolism. We drink the GNC Wheybolic extreme 60 recovery drink, one scoop for our AM snack, one scoop for our PM snack.
Now on to our “diet”. I have tried every fad diet, Atkins, South Beach, Soup, blah, blah, blah. They don’t work. I’m sorry to say it but the only thing yo-yo dieting got me was my gallbladder removed when I was 30. Yo-yo dieting is a main cause of gallstones. I put the word diet in quotes because what we are doing is eating right. I eat sugar, I eat carbs, I eat fat. I eat these things in healthy percentages and amounts that Myfitnesspal.com helps me track. I think I pay more attention to the nutrition portion of my iPhone app then I do the calorie count. My food diary should be open to everyone to look at. We decided to really help our weight lose by drinking a meal replacement shake from Shakeology at night. This really is as much a convenience factor as it is a diet issue. You see we don’t work out until about 6:00PM every night. We want to have our last calorie intake of the day by 7:00PM. So cooking was a hassle, then clean up, then our whole night became about the eating and diet. We did it for three weeks, but the shakes are quick and filling.
So the other factor that helps us is getting our metabolism going and staying burning through the day. We eat! We wake up, we have a cup of water each, take our Vitapak, and eat breakfast within the first hour of waking up. You must eat breakfast! Your system doesn’t “wake-up” and burn calories until you eat. We then have our AM snack (our recovery shake and maybe a Nutrigrain bar or nuts) in about 2-3 hours after breakfast. We then eat lunch, then our afternoon snack (Recovery shake and fruit or trail mix, maybe even something a bit larger depending on calories at lunch). We go home workout on a mostly empty stomach so we are burning stored energy (a.k.a Fat) as we workout. We do our dinner Shakeology, and that is it. We try to time our dinner shake about 3 hours before bed. Our goal is to go to bed just a little hungry feeling. This means our body is burning stored energy (a.k.a. Fat) all night.
We weigh daily, track it versus calories consumed. We measure weekly stomach, chest, thighs, arms, hips, and neck. I’ve lost 4 inches off my hips, 3 from my waste, and my pants are getting ready to fall off of me now! We track daily because for about a week I wasn’t really seeing much lose. I actual had to bump up my calories to see the weight start to come back off. Weight lose slowed again at the end of last week, I’m now easing up on the calorie intake again. The differences are only about 400-500 calories a day, not a lot, and I think the variation keeps my body guessing and it seems to not be able to settle into a lower metabolism that way. That is what works for me.
I’m not saying I have the keys to weight lose for everyone. But I will say the fact of take in less, but better foods, exercise more, and eat several small meals throughout the day, and don’t go to bed on a full stomach. The psychological part is the hardest. I still crave cheese burgers, but my motivation to really change is real this time. I currently weigh 290.8, and my wife is at 270.
I started out at 318 pounds 6 ½ weeks ago, my wife was 292. I was not serious about losing weight. I thought and talked with my wife. We decided to start just eating better. The big thing I did that week was my switch to water. I gave up everything else, and have only drunk water since then. I am probably most proud of that one achievement so far. In fact I am drinking water as I type this. I drink about 100-150 ounces of water per day. The week of us just eating better lead to us deciding to workout a little. We hit Wal-Mart and picked a DVD for walking at home. I kind of laughed being a guy, “This is silly walking at home, to easy”. Uh, no! I was wore out after the first day. I plowed through the rest of the week with eagerness because I finally realized I was in horrible shape. I thought, “I can’t even walk without my heart jumping through me chest!” Scary! I walked for 6 days. During that week I ordered the Power 90 Program. Somewhere around the end of that week my wife found Myfitnesspal.com, the iPhone app, and we’ve been on it ever since.
We stay under our calorie goal every single day. We follow the Power 90 workouts exactly. We work out 6 days per week. 3 days of strength, 3 days of cardio, alternating days as we go. We take a Vitapak supplement program from GNC every morning. I’m on the Men’s Mega Man Sport, and my wife is on the Women’s Ultra Mega Energy and Metabolism. We drink the GNC Wheybolic extreme 60 recovery drink, one scoop for our AM snack, one scoop for our PM snack.
Now on to our “diet”. I have tried every fad diet, Atkins, South Beach, Soup, blah, blah, blah. They don’t work. I’m sorry to say it but the only thing yo-yo dieting got me was my gallbladder removed when I was 30. Yo-yo dieting is a main cause of gallstones. I put the word diet in quotes because what we are doing is eating right. I eat sugar, I eat carbs, I eat fat. I eat these things in healthy percentages and amounts that Myfitnesspal.com helps me track. I think I pay more attention to the nutrition portion of my iPhone app then I do the calorie count. My food diary should be open to everyone to look at. We decided to really help our weight lose by drinking a meal replacement shake from Shakeology at night. This really is as much a convenience factor as it is a diet issue. You see we don’t work out until about 6:00PM every night. We want to have our last calorie intake of the day by 7:00PM. So cooking was a hassle, then clean up, then our whole night became about the eating and diet. We did it for three weeks, but the shakes are quick and filling.
So the other factor that helps us is getting our metabolism going and staying burning through the day. We eat! We wake up, we have a cup of water each, take our Vitapak, and eat breakfast within the first hour of waking up. You must eat breakfast! Your system doesn’t “wake-up” and burn calories until you eat. We then have our AM snack (our recovery shake and maybe a Nutrigrain bar or nuts) in about 2-3 hours after breakfast. We then eat lunch, then our afternoon snack (Recovery shake and fruit or trail mix, maybe even something a bit larger depending on calories at lunch). We go home workout on a mostly empty stomach so we are burning stored energy (a.k.a Fat) as we workout. We do our dinner Shakeology, and that is it. We try to time our dinner shake about 3 hours before bed. Our goal is to go to bed just a little hungry feeling. This means our body is burning stored energy (a.k.a. Fat) all night.
We weigh daily, track it versus calories consumed. We measure weekly stomach, chest, thighs, arms, hips, and neck. I’ve lost 4 inches off my hips, 3 from my waste, and my pants are getting ready to fall off of me now! We track daily because for about a week I wasn’t really seeing much lose. I actual had to bump up my calories to see the weight start to come back off. Weight lose slowed again at the end of last week, I’m now easing up on the calorie intake again. The differences are only about 400-500 calories a day, not a lot, and I think the variation keeps my body guessing and it seems to not be able to settle into a lower metabolism that way. That is what works for me.
I’m not saying I have the keys to weight lose for everyone. But I will say the fact of take in less, but better foods, exercise more, and eat several small meals throughout the day, and don’t go to bed on a full stomach. The psychological part is the hardest. I still crave cheese burgers, but my motivation to really change is real this time. I currently weigh 290.8, and my wife is at 270.
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Replies
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Great job, thanks for the post!0
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Great ideas! Thanks!0
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Great job! Great advice! That's a real accomplishment! Keep up the great work :flowerforyou:0
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Congrats on your achievement thus far as well as your wife.
I agree with you 100%, I also eat everything but in moderation and I have had great success. Guess what, I don't have to go carb free to lose weight; yay for me!0 -
Congrats! thanks for the details.. it's interesting to see how people are incorporating changes into their daily lives.
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WOW!! You guys should be so proud of all your hard work! Keep it up. Commitment pays off in the end. If you're not motivation, i don't know what is 0
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congrats ,greatly appreciate the info and everything,0
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Good job to both you and your wife! You must feel so great!!!0
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wow, i commend you and your wife on the strides you two are making. The beauty of it all, is you two have each other to do this with. The shake sounds like something I need to incorporate into my daily routine... Keep up the great work 0
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That is great!!! Thank you for your story. It helps to know how healthy choices and moderation can make such a difference!:happy:0
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That is awesome!!! Thanks for sharing!!! It is very frusterating....what works for one, may or may not work for another. I think to myself all the time...I am not losing weight...I should just quit,.....however.......I am building muscle by walking and strength training, I feel better everyday, I am not sluggish and dragging to get out of bed, so I AM doing something right.
I am tempted EVERY day with "bad" foods, I live in a house with 3 boys and a husband, who could really care less about healthy eating, calories and whole grains, but, I am choosing to make my own choices and eat what's good for me, and I slowly incorporate "healthy foods" in with their lunches and dinnners, and there isn't much complaining!!!
I am proud of you and your wife. It takes a lot of will power to start something and stick with it, Good for you guys!!
Good luck in your journey and keep us posted!!0 -
SO proud of you guys!
How do you like Power 90? How hard is it for you guys to do? I keep hemming and hawing on whether I should order it or not. I just don't want to spend money on something that I can't do, or when I do do (heh) it, I can't move for 3 days after.0 -
I actually feel great! I sleep better, pretty sure any sleep apnia issues are gone now, I feel rested. I'm getting some muscle tone back that I haven't seen since high school. i can do push-ups from my toes again!
One of our real motivations si to surprise our familys at Thanksgiving when we go home to visit. This motivation is great becasue it makes it fun. we may not drop 100 pounds by then, but the looks on everyone's faces will be great when they see the way slimer, fit us. It's exciting!0 -
You the man! That's totally awesome. I look forward to your next instalment in six or so weeks when you've gone even further. Good luck.0
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well done and thanks for sharing, you have both done amazing x0
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Awesome Job! I'm so happy that you and your wife can share this wonderful journey together!0
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Congrats on the achievement so far - and thanks for the ideas!0
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Great post, very encouraging, give me more motivation. Thanks and keep it up!!0
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That's Great!!! you and your wife are doing an amazing job! Keep up the good work and much luck on continued loss to you both0
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good job, keep up the great work. that advice helps thanks.0
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Congratulations! That was a great post and I am sure many will benefit from it. It is hard to comprehend that eating more will actually help the weight come off, but it's true! Keep up the great work!0
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The Power 90 is great. just to be clear it is not the P90X two diffrent things! Anyone can do the Power 90, they show you how to modify teh exercises if you need to. I had to start on my knees for the push-up, and my legs under me for dips. Doing both fully extended after just 3 weeks! I will say I picked up a set of adjustable dumbells from Wal-Mart for $120 each set for my wife and I to just make it easier to change the level of weight between various strength training exercises. You don't have to do taht but it is nice and takes your mind off of equipment while working out. teh Level I and II workouts are no more tahn 38 minutes each including warm up and cool down. I recommend it to anyone, and its cheaper than just two months at most gyms.0
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Fantastic job!!
It is a fact that sticking to a plan, a regimen and discipline is going to net you the kind of results you've achieved. My only recommendation would be to consider (down the road, not now while you're dong so well) relying less on some of the expensive supplements and maintaining your weight using more day-to-day foods, etc.
BTW - your risk of diabetes and heart related illness is going to drop like a rock as your energy goes up. Keep everyone posted. It's very motivating!0 -
Awsome!!! Thank you for the tips. Good luck on your journey.0
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Thanks so much for posting!! I really needed the encouragement today. Can you tell me a little more about how you track your weight and calories daily, and then what decisions you are making based on what you found?0
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You guys should definitely be proud of yourselves and what you have accomplished in such a short period of time! Not just the weight loss, but the lifestyle change of eating right and getting physical!! Thanks for posting!0
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I agree about the supplements vs diet. Down the road we will switch. The thing about supplements is when most of us have had such a poor diet for soooooo long we are very vitamin deficient! It takes months to get our bodies nutrition levels in balance, add to that a reduced calorie diet to lose weight (We are not maintaining), and strenuous workouts, and the need for more vitamins then we can take in through food is real. On a maintenance program for a healthy life style a simple multi-vitamin is fine.0
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Great Job. I hope you're taking pictures-- you will go far and a picture says a 1000 words.0
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We track simply on Myfitnesspal.com. The changes are not daily as your weight will fluctuate daily. But you see trends I go a week and only loose net 1 pound I need to examine where I am. For example that happened one week where my net calories were about 1300-1400. I also noticed I had no energy for my workouts. No energy + no weight lose means I need more fuel, a.k.a Food! There is no secret ratio, listen to your body, how do you feel? Plus don’t forget when you add strength training you build muscle which is awesomely good weight gain. Muscle burns more calories just sitting still! So your weight gain could be from muscle gain. I mean I’m fine with 17 inch arms, they just need to be muscle not flab!0
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We are taking pics. But as i said this whole thing is a secret from our family so we vowed no new pics of us anywhere on teh net until then. We are actually writing a blog to which will be revealed at Thanksgiving!0
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