Raspberry Ketones for the rest of us!

MoreBean13

There's a LOT of broscience/hoscience BS floating around the boards lately, and I can only assume it's because the new year has brought a new population of users, and unscrupulous jerks want to take advantage of the new people by feeding them misinformation and possibly sending them PM's offering them a convenient solution for the low, low price of 39.95. However, in the past year I have been moderately successful and I have a ton of very successful people on my FL, and I would like to offer some counterbalancing information from people who have been here a while and had some success.

So, I'm going to offer my own tips and words of wisdom, and hope others chip in some of theirs.

1) I am an add-exercise-and-eat-back person. My method is find your TDEE (without exercise) and subtract 10-20% for your deficit, but never more than 20%, and then add and eat back exercise calories. Others add their exercise to their TDEE- either way is fine and if you do it right, should work out to be the same over a week.

2) I have an HRM, but I don't use it really. There's nothing WRONG with using it, but I just think it's annoying to wear. Realize that an HRM is just another method of ESTIMATING your calories, and your actual weight loss or gain is the ONLY way to tell you if the numbers you're using are correct. Don't freak out over the details of if your run was 415 or 427 calories burned. It all comes out in the wash.

3) My nutrition method is this: Get your protein (I believe in 1 gram per lb LBM) first, and eat some vegetables every day (and fruit, though I don't really eat as much fruit as I should- I'm trying). That's pretty much it for my rules. I like fat and try to get 30-35% of my cals from fat as I find dietary fat very satiating and it makes it easier to stick to my calorie goals. I freaking love pizza and eat a half-pizza at LEAST once a week. With ranch dressing. I don't believe in food-group restriction or eliminating anything. I've tried that method in the past, and it never works for me long-term. Eating the foods I like AND sticking to my goals is a long-term solution. MOAR PIZZA!

4) SLOW DOWN. Weight loss is actually the easy part. The ultimate prize is maintenance. If you cut your calories too low, or eliminate too many things, you are setting yourself up for failure at maintenance. Here's the real scoop- if you go with too big of a calorie deficit, then you sacrifice muscle along the way. Muscle is MUCH more difficult to add back than fat, (ask any bodybuilder!) so when you inevitably regain weight, you gain a higher percentage of fat than you lost, so at the end of a yo-yo diet cycle, you are actually FATTER than you started (even if you end up the same or slightly lower weight). It's a curse. Don't do it!

5) LIFT WEIGHTS NOW! Not when you get to goal weight, not later, DO IT NOW! I've been a runner all of my adult life, and I still run, but nothing has changed my body like lifting has. I actually lift less often than most people, because I want to balance my running and lifting, so I do a customized full-body program 2x a week, allowing me to work on my running goals simultaneously. My progress is likely slower than if I were concentrating exclusively on lifting- but don't get me wrong- I'm still strong! Sidenote- lifting has made me a faster runner than ever before. Imagine that!

6) SLOW DOWN (the fitness version!)- You will not be able torun as fast or as far or lift as much weight as someone who has been working on it a while. There's no shame in being a beginner. You don't need to compete with anyone but yourself. Trying to do too much too soon is how you get injured. And while we're on the subject- you're running too fast. When you start out, it should feel like a slow shuffle. Trying to run fast is why people fail and quit running.

7) STOP MESSING WITH YOUR PROGRAM! Results take time, and if you switch things around every two weeks because you're not seeing the results you expect, you never will. You have to stick with it.

8) Stop telling your friends and family and coworkers and everyone else what you're doing. Opinions are like ***holes, and everyone will give you theirs and pollute your mind with all kinds of nonsense advice that you don't need, and then they;ll watch what you eat and make comments. Just do you and let the results speak for themselves. Later on, when people ask what you've been doing, THEN tell them.

9) CUT ALL EXCUSES NOW. Nobody is trying to sabotage you. You're not a snowflake. There are ways to make time, work with a budget, deal with annoying spouses, etc. There is a workaround for every excuse except your bad attitude, so knock it off.

10) DON'T GIVE UP! everyone makes mistakes. No mistake is the end of the world. Just get up tomorrow, clean slate, and try to have a good day. There's no point in dwelling on the past or starving yourself of exercising like crazy the rest of the week, just move on. It will be OK.

That's it. No supplements. No metabolism revving tricks. No pretending beans are cookies. No magic or fairy dust whatsoever. Just hard work, patience, and dedication.

OH, P.S., I'm 5'3", have a desk job (sedentary outside of exercise), and thyroid disease, and I lost most of my weight at 1650 cals/day. My macros set to 40C/30P/30F (though I think you should use the 1g/lb LBM method).

I went from this:


to this:




I'm not at goal and I'm far from finished, so I'm a bit nervous posting the pics, but I feel like I have to show my progress here. So I already know, there's work still to be done. Please don't feel compelled to tell me that, lol.

Now, please add your own NO BS words of wisdom!

MoreBean13

Woah, TL;DR.

Barbellerella

Now, please add your own NO BS words of wisdom!

All I got is, you are hawt!!! You must be doin something right girl :drinker:

Crankstr

Excellent post!

VelociMama

Fantastic read Bean!

My only point to add, from a former binge-eating junk-food-junkie, is for people who feel like they are out of control to take the time to figure out why and what they can do to change how they see and think about food permanently. Getting control over my eating habits has been the most difficult thing I've ever done. It has also been the most empowering and rewarding thing I've ever done.

1ConcreteGirl

Fantastic words, Bean!

Completely agree with all of this.

A few foundational things that I really appreciate: I measured myself all over and took all the pictures before I started anything. Measuring really helped me to see my progress even when the number on the scale wasn't moving.

People also need to realize that losing 2 lb a week isn't a healthy goal if you don't have much to lose. I am at 0.7 lbs/week because I have about 25 lbs left and I don't want to lose too much LBM with my fat loss.

If you have less than 25 to lose, you should probably be losing around 0.5lb/week. Yeah, being patient sucks, but gaining and losing weight can be a life-long process OR the lifelong process can be losing and maintaining. Either way, it's gonna take forever, so why redo all the hard work of losing?

BellaFe

You are awesome!

chubby_checkers

3dogsrunning

Damn. There are very few, if any, posts I wholeheartedly agree with on this forum (especially those ones that claim to be the "truth").
THIS post I do. I will be linking this in many future answers, hope you don't mind.

Well said, great points. Thank you

ETA - just read 1concrete (I think) post. Also great point.

Contrarian

Very helpful post. Thank you for sharing this.

yoovie

Licks page

DavPul

Well said!

etoiles_argentees

Beans, beans, good for your heart?

Thanks for posting.

DontStopB_Leakin

First off, you. look. FABULOUS. No need to be nervous posting those pictures, because you look absolutely BANGIN'!

Secondly, I am so effin' glad you're on my FL. Everything you said was spot on, and I agree with it 110%.

I'd like to add a bit about plateauing, though, because that seems to be another topic that attracts LOADS of broscience.

Sometimes, our weight loss comes to a halt. This doesn't happen for all of us, but it happens to a lot of us, myself included. Stalled out for two damn years. Tried EVERYTHING (well, all the wrong things, like cutting my calories too damn low), and the scale would not budge. If this happens to you, my best advice would be to either A. try upping your calories. The closer you get to goal, the smaller your caloric deficit should be. B. Take a maintenance break. This has worked for me twice already. Chill out with the deficit. Don't necessarily stop tracking, but up your caloric intake to maintenance for 7 to 10 days. You can even chill out on the exercise if you want. Trust me. It works.

Also, one more thing to add: This has been said so many times, but it's always worth repeating. Do NOT gauge your progress by the number on the scale. Take photos and measurements. Pay attention to how your clothes fit. So many times the number on the scale might say we're not making progress, but the smaller clothing sizes/measurements say otherwise. It is NOT all about the number on the scale. Not at all.


Just my two cents. Again, phenomenal post, Beansie!

vim_n_vigor

Awesome post! I'll take some of those keytones any day!

Windy_

bumping and reading again!

BurtHuttz

I didn't get big from not doing cardio. I didn't get big from eating too many carbs, or too much sugar. I didn't get big from a few bingey weekends.

I got big from a decade of not knowing what I was putting into my body and not really caring. The "healthy" choices I did make were illusions. Oh, the BBQ salmon salad - frickin fish and salad, right? Wrong, 1100 calories. Half an adults daily calories sucked up in the span of one, not-too-filling meal.

How did I get small? I just tracked what I ate and set calorie goals. I wrote down that "healthy" choice and nearly crapped myself knowing that I was not going to have anything else to eat that day. I wrote down the healthy! snack of a cup of almonds - 817 calories. By tracking what I ate I learned what things were worth. The calorie target was just a way of understanding where I should be in relation to that.

I still eat crap. Fairly frequently. Nathan's hotdogs? Yes please, sometimes three at a time, with cheese and chili. But now I know that when I do that, I need to plan on having a slightly lighter dinner, because that's a thousand calorie lunch.

The key is, now I know.

Losing weight feels good. Being healthy feels good. Being on a healthy diet feels good!! It makes me so sad to see people flagellating themselves about their 1200 calorie diet and going over 65 calories when that isn't the solution to the problem, any more than raspberry ketones or cleanses.

And I guess that brings me to my final thought. The only easy way is drastic medical intervention such as liposuction. You simply can't rush it with any cabbage soup, master cleanse, brand-name drinks, or diet pills. Even if you can sustain these things for long enough to see a significant loss, in the process your body WILL deteriorate and you will come out the other side metabolically worse and still not knowing how to life a HEALTHY LIFESTYLE.

Want healthy? Act healthy. You will become healthy. It's really, sadly, easy.

EvgeniZyntx

Bean for prez!
Leakramirez for vice!

Yes, all of this.
Enjoy yourselves, have fun at what you are doing, stick to it.

MacInCali

It was so nice to finally come into a thread and just simply nod my head in agreement rather than wanting to throat punch yet another person on the boards today.

You're awesome. Thank you for this!! :drinker:

Sublog

I can agree with everything you wrote completely.

Use your results as the ultimate method to adjust your methods. Don't get so caught up in the small stuff that really doesn't matter. In the end, just work hard, be consistent and good things will eventually come.

Getting your dream body will take you longer than you ever anticipated. We all have more fat and less muscle than we ever realized.

danasings

Fantastic read Bean!

My only point to add, from a former binge-eating junk-food-junkie, is for people who feel like they are out of control to take the time to figure out why and what they can do to change how they see and think about food permanently. Getting control over my eating habits has been the most difficult thing I've ever done. It has also been the most empowering and rewarding thing I've ever done.

Bean ROCKS!!! Thank you for posting this.

I like what Liz had to add, too, as I am also a (former) binge-eating junk food junkie...still working on that behavior being eliminated.

I do not as of yet have complete control, BUT - I am getting better at it every day. Practice makes permanent. AND - when I do slip up, I DO NOT berate myself, make posts in the forums or on my wall about what a f*ckup/loser/fat slob I am. I tell myself, "All right, Dana...you messed up. You're human, it happens. Now start again with your healthy eating habits and go lift something heavy."

So that's what I have to add. ELIMINATE negative self-talk. Again, practice makes permanent. It takes time, but if you stay consistent and "speak to yourself in a positive voice" (thank you, Chalene Johnson), you WILL get there.