Longest plateau?

Colt1835

DebSozo wrote: »

OODone wrote: »

DebSozo wrote: »

OODone wrote: »

singingflutelady wrote: »

tayreneebrown16 wrote: »

singingflutelady wrote: »

2. Why only green vegetables?
3. Legumes and beans are a great source of protein
4. Sugar doesn't cause weight gain either. Eating at a calorie surplus does
5. What's wrong with fruits other than berries?
6. You say absolutely nothing processed so that means you only eat raw green vegetables and berries since cooking is a form of processing.
7. Not being able to pronounce something doesn't mean it is bad.
8. Nothing wrong with red meat in moderation.
9. Drink whatever you want as long as it is in your calorie budget
10. You need sodium to live
11. Your little workout won't do much. It's better than nothing but it isn't a big calorie burner.
12. Grapefruit, lemon juice and cinnamon do not raise your metabolism.

Look, I'm just trying to help people who are struggling in the same way I struggle. These are all thing's I've tried before and they've really helped me. No one has to do ALL of this. They're just various tips and tricks to jumpstart weight loss after a long plateau.

2. Green vegetables are usually the healthiest. The least amount of sugars and the highest nutritional values. I know that all vegetables are nutritional, but maybe it's just the thing someone needs to get their body back in gear.
4. Added sugar is really horrible for you. It's addictive and your body doesn't really know what to do with it. Not 1 thing causes weight gain, but it's a factor to it. Natural sugar isn't bad, but too much of it isn't good either. Again, it may be the difference in someone's diet that helps.
5. Nothing is WRONG with them, but berries have the least amount of sugars. All fruit is good for you, but if you have to do something a little more extreme, knowing that berries is the best helps.
6. Processed as in: there's preservatives in it, it's individually wrapped, etc.. I'm not saying go all GMO free and organic. But no granola bars, protein bars, pudding cups etc.. And those things aren't all bad in general, but when you're trying to lose weight they're good to stay away from for a little while.
7. It's just a general and generic rule for people who are new at dieting and may be intimidated by having to read labels. It's not a life rule or anything.
8. No, there isn't anything wrong with it. But like I've said, all these things I've tried to say are just for a short period of time to try and get your body to lose the weight you want it to. And red meat is one of the "worst" when compared to others like tilapia, chicken breast, etc..
9. That's also a good rule for general weight maintenance or for starting out. But when you're on a plateau, sodas and juices aren't helping you. Cut it out for a week or so and see if it helps.
10. Yes you do. But many many things have hidden sodium as preservatives, and you can get natural salts from protein and such. So you don't need to add table salt to things. Once again, just cut it out for a short period of time to help you not retain water weight.
11. That's not supposed to be your only workout for the day. It's just an extra thing you can do to help. It's not too difficult but it'll get the job done of waking you help and helping your metabolism kickstart in the mornings. Plus, if you don't want to/can't workout every day, it's a nice thing to do on the "off" days for yourself.
12. They don't raise it. I'm sorry if I said that. What I meant, was that they make it work a little harder, thus burning some more calories. Plus they're good for you and they add flavor to your diet.

I never meant for any of this to be a "bootcamp" thing. It's just supposed to be helpful to someone who needs to go that extra mile to end their plateau. I've had to put a lot of work into getting my body out of it's plateau's during my weight loss journey, and these things have helped. They're not meant to be a life long or long term thing, just a week or 2 to help.

I'm sorry for all the upset I've caused. just trying to help.

Of course you lost weight on this because your calories are probably much lower than your usual intake.

CICO doesn't work for everyone. I'm not saying the science of CICO doesn't work for everyone, just that some people don't know how to track CICO. People have different strengths and weaknesses, so it makes sense that we would have different methods.

OODone , you are coming across as if you are saying calorie tracking is a strength and weakness issue. Before Google, MFP, product labels, kitchen scales, and other calorie counting methods people had to rely on their bodies to tell them when they were hungry. Now obesity levels are close to something like 36% even with all of the extra helpful, convenient, and relatively easy calorie tracking tools.

CICO is math. Math is a strength for some and a weakness for others. Obesity has increased because of easier access to cheap high calorie food, and non calorie burning entertainment like you tube and forums. CICO is at work wether you track or not. There is no way around that.

CICO is at work whether I track or not, and I am able to maintain quite nicely without tracking. I do use a calculator or input numbers into MFP which tallies for me qhen i am in active weight loss mode. Math isn't a big strength of mine. I did pretty good in geometry, algebra and calculus but was not as great as others.

I'd call it a strength if you did good in your classes. Don't sell yourself short, you're awesome.

dykask

Just broke a 2 year plateau about a month ago. I started using a 24/7 fitness tracker and make some changes with the new visibility I had.

Main changes:
1) First thing in the morning a light workout, stairs and some waking, maybe 100 kc.
2) I cut snacks and was pleasantly surprised to find I didn't really get hungrier. Mild hunger is fine but a couple years ago when I was losing I really suffered.
3) Been using the Fenix 3 HR to spike up my workouts and push my daily activity.

In my case. I'm a pretty technology driven person.

For motivation ... I bought an Omron body composition monitor and scale. That thing is just nasty. First biological age reading was 13 years higher than physical age. It has both foot and hand electrodes and give very consistent readings. While my weight loss so far is pretty modest, almost one Kg, I've managed to drop my visceral fat by 1% and now my biological age is only 9 years higher than physical age. I wouldn't recommend such nasty motivation for most people, but it is working for me.

A secondary motivation is to loss enough to shame my wife into getting serious about her health.

My goal is to lose about 1 Kg / month. I'm trying to do enough strength workouts to at least maintain and maybe build a little muscle. Pretty difficult to actually build any muscle when running a calorie deficit, maybe not possible but I'm running a pretty low deficit.

DebSozo

dykask wrote: »

Just broke a 2 year plateau about a month ago. I started using a 24/7 fitness tracker and make some changes with the new visibility I had...

For motivation ... I bought an Omron body composition monitor and scale. That thing is just nasty. First biological age reading was 13 years higher than physical age. It has both foot and hand electrodes and give very consistent readings. While my weight loss so far is pretty modest, almost one Kg, I've managed to drop my visceral fat by 1% and now my biological age is only 9 years higher than physical age. I wouldn't recommend such nasty motivation for most people, but it is working for me.

Wow! That is great that you broke your plateau. Congratulations! That Omron body comp monitor and scale sounds scary. I am curious as to if you keep going will you get all of your physical age years back to match your biological age or better? That is motivating!

LivingtheLeanDream

6 weeks..but when I look back on that I know it was because I wasn't logging my calories as accurately.

dykask

DebSozo wrote: »

Wow! That is great that you broke your plateau. Congratulations! That Omron body comp monitor and scale sounds scary. I am curious as to if you keep going will you get all of your physical age years back to match your biological age or better? That is motivating!

It is kind of my goal to get the scale to measure a biological age less than my physical age. At first I was kind of frustrated by it but then now I know it does go down. Right now it seems mostly tied to weight for me.

I also want to get my lean body tissue up to 40%. I typically around 34%. To do that I think I need to get my body fat under 20%. I'm around 25% now, but 3 years ago I was more like 35%. (Now I'm really embarrassed.)

I've been living in Japan for about 4 years and Japan is not a good place to be so fat! You should see my kids. Healthy, thriving but very slender, at least by US standards.

BlueberryJoghurt

Only a few weeks of general "slowness" but it was ok. Slacked a little, didnt count properly and only lost a little slower. Actually started to go straight this week again! Tbf Im only 2 thirds into my goal so there might be one ahead.

b7mapile

For anyone still reading this thread:

Your plateau can break by a simple diet change and increase in activity. You first have to understand that the only way to lose weight is to eat less in calories than your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE). For example my current TDEE is about 2818 calories/day. To lose weight I put myself at a 10%-20% calorie deficit. So 2818*.8=2254.4 calories/day. This puts me at a calorie deficit to lose about a pound-2 pounds a week. Now you have to balance these calories in macros (carbs, protein, fat). When bulking I do 20% fat, 40% carbs, 40% protein. During a cut I do 50% protein, 30% carbs, 20% fat. Maintaining I just make sure my calorie intake is at my TDEE. I don't drink sodas often, maybe once a month, I use a common sense diet. Obviously too much sugars, junk foods, fast foods, alcohol and greasy food is bad for you. So just don't eat it if you're trying to do something with your body.

I've been doing this since last November, prior to this I was on a 6 month plateau. Now I cycle my cutting phase, bulking and maintaining about every 6 weeks-2 months.

I've gone from 180 to 169 in 3 months. Bulked from 169 to 177 in 6 weeks. Currently cutting from 177; I am now at 174.3 working on getting down to 170. My body fat % went from 20% in December to 10% now. No fancy low carb, gluten free mumbo jumbo that's been all the hype lately (it's all over the place here in Portlandia). Only time you need to be gluten free is if you have ciliacs or krohns disease, which only about 5% of our population has. Now if you need to follow one of these diets to stay disciplined go for it.

tl;dr:
Eat below your TDEE by 10%-20%. Use your common sense. Fad diets you don't need, but if it makes you feel better about yourself and motivates you go ahead.

dykask

b7mapile wrote: »

For anyone still reading this thread:

Your plateau can break by a simple diet change and increase in activity. You first have to understand that the only way to lose weight is to eat less in calories than your total daily energy expenditure (TDEE).

Well I'm with you on fad diets. In fact I really don't believe that carbs are well understood yet. In Japan the diet is very carb heavy and Japanese love white rice and things made out of white flour. In fact there are bread trucks that go around selling all kinds of sweet breads, just like ice cream trucks in the US. However it really seems that more carbs they eat the thinner they are. Now the kids that eat at McDonalds actually get fewer carbs in their diet and they get chubby.

However, I think everyone here understands eating less than TDEE to lose weight. That is sort of the theme of this place. Still, it really isn't so simple. That is because we have to live at the same time.

Three years ago I started and took my weight down about 12 Kg. (~ 25 US pounds) I did it by just eating less and working out. Boy did I ever suffer. I felt like I was starving all the time. None of the tricks worked. It was horrible and that is probably why I let myself plateau for 2 years. It was literally not worth the misery. However I slowly built up my workouts during my plateau. I got to the point where I could do over 100 push ups in a day and I started working on pull up and dips. I even got to the point where I was banging out 30 pull ups in a day. (Not all at once.) My weight went up about 1 Kg a year.

Well when I started pull ups I actually started with chin ups and my form wasn't that great. I hurt my elbows and my left elbow has been very slow at healing. So I decided to maybe get more serious about taking off another 10 to 15 Kg. After all, if you are lighter there is less work to do a pull up and my elbow needs more time to get stronger. Finally I was willing to face the misery of a calorie deficit. Only this time the hunger is very mild. I notice it, but it really doesn't bother me. In my case the difference is shocking. On a suffering scale I've gone from a 7 or 8 to about a 2. That might not sound horrible but craving food hour after hour and fighting the hunger pains all the time really got to me.

So my point is, it is a lot more complex than just not eating so much. A couple years of harder and harder workouts probably changed something in my body. I'm not very well versed on hormones, but it seems likely that something has changed. So it isn't as simple as eating fewer calories, after all most of us have to work and live with other people. So it is a struggle to figure out just what we can do. Some people probably deal with the pain much better than me and I deeply respect them for that. It just wasn't very easy for me to get to the point where I'm at today.

Now I do have an advantage, the Japanese diet is heavy on carbs and salt, it is otherwise pretty healthy. Eating is expensive but eating faddy junk food is even more expensive. So the basic diet probably helped me a lot.

Oh my white bread loving, carb swilling kids are slender. My 15 year boy has about 9.5% body fat. I'm constantly trying to get him to eat a more calories. My 12 year old daughter has 12% body fat. Japanese girls do tend to gain a little fat in the teens and a lot of them need it. My kids are only half Japanese but now they look pretty Japanese.

dykask

I should clarify my 2 year plateau was caused by me mainly just trying to create a calorie deficit by working out. I didn't increase my meals except allowing some ice cream and was careful with most of what I ate, but I started snacking mostly on nuts to keep the hunger down. I kept increasing my workouts though. I ended up mostly in a steady state. I did trim down a bit but my weight slowly gained.