1200, VLCD, and EM2WL

Sarauk2sf

Try researching "Adaptive Thermogenesis"

Then, consider what exactly it takes to repair slowed metabolism. Might it be the weight gain that you ran away from crying from the EM2WL group? What you are advocating is intentionally slowing your metabolism, then using magic to repair it without weight regain. Your maintenance results speak for themselves. Oh wait, you weren't able to maintain on a normal calorie amount. That's right, you gained weight. So you have zero personal experience with successful maintenance, which is what you've posted in this thread. RIght.

While you are correct, I have not had any personal experience with maintaining weight, and I will be the first person to admit that I have probably experienced some metabolic rate slowdown as a result of my diet. I've done it wrong, I'll admit, by not starting with a higher calorie cut, and taking it down to see more results.

In my own defense I am an all or nothing kind of person, I have to press ALL the buttons! and try everything I can to see results. But the end of the minnesota semi-starvation study about how to refeed starving people in war torn europe clearly shows how to return to maintenance. I've only been cutting calories since September, and I only have 20 pounds left to go.

But my overall point in all of this was.. why do you guys say that 1/2 a pound a week is the only way to Jesus? it's mollases slow.

And Sau -

http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/permanent-metabolic-damage-qa.html

http://www.scottabel.com/store/product.php?productid=16172

http://www.fitwatch.com/weight-loss/how-to-repair-a-damaged-metabolism-456.html

http://www.jencomaskeck.com/2011/01/metabolic-damage.html

None of those apply to me, I have been strength training and seeing increases in performance and ability. 2 months ago I could barely lift 105 pounds on a bench press, and last week I was able to lift 145x6. All that metabolic damage talks about a loss in performance due to lean body loss. I don't know how I could be getting stronger when I am cutting this much at such a risk to my BMR...


UNLESS I am eating an obscene amount of protein! Which is also part of the advice I give to people, they shoul dbe eating at the very least their weight's worth per gram in protein, if not double that.

Who told you 1/2lb. Most people should be telling you 1lb a week is fine. Strength gains =/= muscle gains or even muscle status quo - it's called neuromuscular adaptation.

Siege_Tank

Who told you 1/2lb. Most people should be telling you 1lb a week is fine. Strength gains =/= muscle gains or even muscle status quo - it's called neuromuscular adaptation.

Like 40% of the posts above that refer to how dan does it. I know, I'm just happy that when I get to an acceptable bodyfat % I am going to be able to start bulking muscle how I want. Everything I read tells me that I should really wait for true muscle building until 15% bodyfat. Anything higher than that and you need to cut more before you start working on lifts and size gains with your muscles.

Sarauk2sf

I think you should look up "metabolic damage". Very real with lasting effects.

If by very real you mean bro hype, and a decent shield to hide behind when you explain why your results are taking ages to achieve.

A quick google search shows several pages that dispel that myth, and only a few seedy pages about how it's a very real danger, and how people who are eating well below BMR are actually gaining weight.

How about linking some of those 'studies'

I said pages. But I linked them anyways for ya

Love the bro hype!

From the first link:

There are several issues at stake here and I’m going to address them in reverse order. Certainly I have seen some weirdness occur (and there is at least one study to support this) where excessive cardio in the face of a large caloric deficit can cause problems, not the least of which is stalled fat/weight loss. In that study, the combination of a very large deficit plus about 6 hours of cardio seemed to decrease metabolic rate more than the diet alone. This is something I intend to cover in more detail at a later date.

Sarauk2sf

Who told you 1/2lb. Most people should be telling you 1lb a week is fine. Strength gains =/= muscle gains or even muscle status quo - it's called neuromuscular adaptation.

Like 40% of the posts above that refer to how dan does it. I know, I'm just happy that when I get to an acceptable bodyfat % I am going to be able to start bulking muscle how I want. Everything I read tells me that I should really wait for true muscle building until 15% bodyfat. Anything higher than that and you need to cut more before you start working on lifts and size gains with your muscles.

How about linking one?

Also, you should start lifting now - you will be losing LBM otherwise, no matter how much protein you consume.

neanderthin

Who told you 1/2lb. Most people should be telling you 1lb a week is fine. Strength gains =/= muscle gains or even muscle status quo - it's called neuromuscular adaptation.

Like 40% of the posts above that refer to how dan does it. I know, I'm just happy that when I get to an acceptable bodyfat % I am going to be able to start bulking muscle how I want. Everything I read tells me that I should really wait for true muscle building until 15% bodyfat. Anything higher than that and you need to cut more before you start working on lifts and size gains with your muscles.

True muscle building, gotcha! Who would have thunk it.

prudism

And I ask, what is wrong with eating under my BMR, if what I am eating is nutritious and I have vitamins and supplements in my diet?

Eating under BMR for prolonged periods can, and usually does, result in slow build up of cortisol hormone. As this hormone builds up, your organs operate slower than normal, this reduces the amount of energy you expend in a day. It is part of the fight or flight response in which your body determines that certain activities should be temporarily suspended in order to ensure you can survive an immediate threat. It is not a system that we are meant to remain in for prolonged periods.

This is what ultimately causes people to plateau that have been eating under BMR for too long. Note that a few days or a week or two of this is fine. After a few months is when things start slowing down.

The way MFP itself works is it goes SOLELY by numbers. It ignores ALL hormones. The 1200 bottom is hard coded in. It is a "dumb tool". It is useful yes and a great starting point for many, but it is only as smart as the person using it.

Dan typically argues that you should eat UNDER TDEE and OVER BMR. This ensures you'll always be losing weight and also ensures your body's hormone levels do not freak out over excessive stress and too fast of weight loss. It is indeed slower than what most people want, but it is safe, sane, doable, and offers better long term success than crash diets.

EVERYONE here wants everyone else to succeed.

You are free to do whatever you want. Heck, you can stop eating forever and run 23 hours a day at 12mph on the treadmill if you want to. All I ask is that when someone gives you advice, reasonable advice, that you don't make threads basically to declare how stupid, dumb, rude, etc. you think they are.

+1 billion
[/quote
and 1 lol

Sarauk2sf

Layne Norton on Metabolic Damage

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QHHzie6XRGk&list=WL36825C9108E5F7AF&index=23

determinedbutlazy

So you're debunking it, even though you didn't TRY it?

I'm 5'7, weigh 188lbs and am comfortably losing 0.5 to 1lb a week at 1860 cals a day based on IPOARM.

Sarauk2sf

http://www.fitwatch.com/weight-loss/how-to-repair-a-damaged-metabolism-456.html

Venuto is selling his book - but even a quote from this article you are using to try to disprove any damage

"If you’ve caused metabolic damage as a result of following starvation diets or losing weight too rapidly in the past, it can be extremely difficult to achieve any further fat loss at all. The good news is, metabolic damage can be repaired. All it takes is the right combination of metabolism stimulating exercise and metabolism stimulating nutrition (NOT just a diet), all done consistently over time.

The big irony is that most of the diet programs that claim to help you get rid of excess weight, only end up making it harder for you in the long run because they use harsh metabolism-decreasing diets and not enough exercise (almost never any weight training).
It may take a little longer if you have really messed things up with severe starvation dieting in the past, especially if you’ve lost a lot of lean body mass, but it is never hopeless. Anyone can increase their metabolism."

Siege_Tank

Who told you 1/2lb. Most people should be telling you 1lb a week is fine. Strength gains =/= muscle gains or even muscle status quo - it's called neuromuscular adaptation.

Like 40% of the posts above that refer to how dan does it. I know, I'm just happy that when I get to an acceptable bodyfat % I am going to be able to start bulking muscle how I want. Everything I read tells me that I should really wait for true muscle building until 15% bodyfat. Anything higher than that and you need to cut more before you start working on lifts and size gains with your muscles.

How about linking one?

Also, you should start lifting now - you will be losing LBM otherwise, no matter how much protein you consume.

I am lifting now, I've been working on lifting ever since I fired my trainer in mid december. She had me focused on low weight, ultra high rep stuff.. which isnt bad, but I was seeing 0 gains in performance and strength, and I knew I needed to be encouraging my muscles just a little bit by going heavy every now and then

I eat at 2000 plus ex. using Dan's formula with about a 1/2 lbs loss per week

You missed some important points. Dan advocates a loss of about 1/2lb a week. He emphasises loss of body fat, not lean body mass. You need to consume that amount of calories because Dan assumes that following the road map you will also be following the other important points: lifting weights to retain lean body mass.

As others have said Dan would also not have calculated a 1.5lb a week loss - he would have based it on a 1 lb a week loss at minimum,

And for the last time, he didn't say 1.5, I did. He calculated my cut based on TDEE -15%, which I thought was silly and molasses slow

neandermagnon

Try researching "Adaptive Thermogenesis"

Then, consider what exactly it takes to repair slowed metabolism. Might it be the weight gain that you ran away from crying from the EM2WL group? What you are advocating is intentionally slowing your metabolism, then using magic to repair it without weight regain. Your maintenance results speak for themselves. Oh wait, you weren't able to maintain on a normal calorie amount. That's right, you gained weight. So you have zero personal experience with successful maintenance, which is what you've posted in this thread. RIght.

While you are correct, I have not had any personal experience with maintaining weight , and I will be the first person to admit that I have probably experienced some metabolic rate slowdown as a result of my diet. I've done it wrong, I'll admit, by not starting with a higher calorie cut, and taking it down to see more results.

In my own defense I am an all or nothing kind of person, I have to press ALL the buttons! and try everything I can to see results. But the end of the minnesota semi-starvation study about how to refeed starving people in war torn europe clearly shows how to return to maintenance. I've only been cutting calories since September, and I only have 20 pounds left to go.

Bingo!! (at the bit in bold)

Seriously, you don't have experience in maintaining weight. Well I do. And I have experience in not maintaining it. My experience:

weight watchers: was losing weight at a rate of 3lb a week, and given that I was hardly doing any exercise, maybe 30-50% of that would have been lean body mass. I don't know the calories because it was all weightwatcher points, not calories, but I'm estimating that I wasn't eating much more than 1200 cals/day. I gained it all back again, without eating excessively.

the TDEE - 15-30% method: lost the weight without feeling deprived, made gains in strength, I measured my body fat percentage as regularly as weight, kept the loss slow, and considered the week a failure if I lost lean body mass instead of fat. I only had 1 week where I lost 3lb, and that week was not a good week as the loss included lean body mass. Every other week I was losing 0.5-1.5lb a week and most of the time it was pure fat. Pure fat loss weeks = success, even if the total amount didn't seem that much. When I started (I was obese) I was eating TDEE -30%, towards the end I was eating TDEE - 15% and only seeing very small losses week on week...... BUT as I said in my last post, I'm maintaining my new weight without effort. I don't track, I just eat what I want while watching that I'm getting enough protein, healthy fat, healthy carbs (and watching I don't overdo the carbs, healthy or not) and plenty of variety of fruit and vegetables. It's near enough effortless and my weight is stable. I'm now going for improving my body fat percentage (from 22/23% to 20%) and gaining muscle, and for that I am going to track as it involves bulking days and cutting days (can't currently exercise for medical reasons so right now I'm just focusing on eating enough protein and counting the days until I'm allowed to lift weights again lol).

I currently maintain my weight at around 1800-1900 cals/day (and I'm short, just 5'1") and lose on a cut (slowly) at 1580 cals/day. I won't cut my calories lower than this as I do not want any losses in lean body mass. and yes I lift heavy weights

That's my experience.

You say you're an all or nothing person, but your body works the same way as everyone else's. Sometimes less is more, and in the case of fat loss, less is definitely more. Save your "all or nothing" attitude for other things where I'm sure it's an asset. As far as weight loss is concerned, you need to change your focus from success = losing the weight as fast as possible, to success = long term maintenance and success = pure fat loss (i.e. without any losses in lean body mass)

Siege_Tank

I'm not saying I'm perfect, and Everyone knows that we all go through struggles, but maybe you could be a little more.. accepting/understanding/accommodating in other threads when someone gives advice that may not quite match up with things that you believe?

I just think that for very overweight people, or even overweight people, 1/2 a pound weight loss is fine, an amazing feat, but it doesn't provide much incentive for people who are looking to change their life, change the way they look and feel about themselves. It's helpful to be able to see your results measured in weeks not months.

For people who fit into the lean or healthy weight category, you're absolutely right, you shouldn't be cutting drastically, but for people who are 40%, 35%, 25% FAT, they should get healthy. an overweight or obese person cutting calories while working out is not going to risk metabolic damage. At my current weight for my height, my body mass index is still 28, closer to OBESE than healthy.

Sarauk2sf

I'm not saying I'm perfect, and Everyone knows that we all go through struggles, but maybe you could be a little more.. accepting/understanding/accommodating in other threads when someone gives advice that may not quite match up with things that you believe?

I just think that for very overweight people, or even overweight people, 1/2 a pound weight loss is fine, an amazing feat, but it doesn't provide much incentive for people who are looking to change their life, change the way they look and feel about themselves. It's helpful to be able to see your results measured in weeks not months.

For people who fit into the lean or healthy weight category, you're absolutely right, you shouldn't be cutting drastically, but for people who are 40%, 35%, 25% FAT, they should get healthy. an overweight or obese person cutting calories while working out is not going to risk metabolic damage. At my current weight for my height, my body mass index is still 28, just shy of OBESE.

You should have the wherewithal to consider what is advised and take that advice or not based on your personal circumstances. No-one forced you to do as such and there is not reason for you to be trying to say that VLCD's are fine without context, which is what you were initially doing.

Siege_Tank

Not to stick my head in the lions mouth, but how, on days where I haven't worked out for over a week, is the MFP recommended 1300 a VLCD?

Sarauk2sf

Not to stick my head in the lions mouth, but how, on days where I haven't worked out for over a week, is the MFP recommended 1300 a VLCD?

If you input your information in correctly so it has you at a lb (or even 1 1/2lb) a week loss...no. I would be concerned about getting sufficient nutrients though. I just don't see how you can be that low thought. How tall are you?

Sarauk2sf

In my own defense I am an all or nothing kind of person, I have to press ALL the buttons! and try everything I can to see results. But the end of the minnesota semi-starvation study about how to refeed starving people in war torn europe clearly shows how to return to maintenance. I've only been cutting calories since September, and I only have 20 pounds left to go.

You really should not be bringing up the Minnesota starvation study to be justifying VLCDs. The side effects included:

- They became obsessed with food and weight
- They smoked more, some non-smokers became smokers.
- Their testosterone decreased to castrate levels
- Psychological tests confirmed that their hypochondria, hysteria, and depression had all increased markedly.
- Their metabolisms dropped
- They had may other physical issues

XXXMinnieXXX

Using a body media my days numbers sick at home, not moving are higher than MFP says for working all day. Very few people are truly sedentary on here. Few weeks ago I worked 3/4 days, did no exercise due to my fybromyalgia being bad, ate 1700 with a spike day of 2000 and I lost 1.6lbs. I'm 215lbs and a woman so already burn less calories already.

For me EMTLW is not my thing, but eat more to feel better is and I feel a lot better eating 1700 than 1400. Do I think your calories are low? Yes? Do I think you should do what's best for you? Yes! Just soak up advice given and then consider it in future if needed. I managed on 1400 well but over time i felt weak and woozy... Something to think about!

I don't think it's fair to come on a forum and shame a person who has given you their time. You could have sent him a pm. MFP is for help and support and you won't get much with that attitude.

Sarauk2sf

Using a body media my days numbers sick at home, not moving are higher than MFP says for working all day. Very few people are truly sedentary on here. Few weeks ago I worked 3/4 days, did no exercise due to my fybromyalgia being bad, ate 1700 with a spike day of 2000 and I lost 1.6lbs. I'm 215lbs and a woman so already burn less calories already.

For me EMTLW is not my thing, but eat more to feel better is and I feel a lot better eating 1700 than 1400. Do I think your calories are low? Yes? Do I think you should do what's best for you? Yes! Just soak up advice given and then consider it in future if needed. I managed on 1400 well but over time i felt weak and woozy... Something to think about!

I don't think it's fair to come on a forum and shame a person who has given you their time. You could have sent him a pm. MFP is for help and support and you won't get much with that attitude.

Key point

Siege_Tank

5'5". 27 years old. I love working out, but aside from that, total desk jockey. I loathe my job (the pay is great, and the mental stimulation is exceptional, but no movement)

I take a multivitamin 3 times a day on cut days like this, have creatine, BCAA shakes, whey protein (which I will switch over to casein as soon as I run out of this whey stuff) and I usually add a dash (1/4 scoop) of preworkout to my BCAA and creatine shakes, just to get the extra aminos and creatine nitrates. The other creatine powder I use is mono.

ETA: I did not bring up the minnesota study to highlight the VLCD component of the study, but rather the main goal of the study, which was to find the best way to refeed a starving war torn population, like europe after WWII, and they did it sucessfully.

Junken_Diraffe

<~~~ Started out at 213, ate the mfp recommended 1200 calories plus eating back exercise calories and working out about a half hour 4-5 days a week, didn't lose a thing in over a month. Researched EM2WL thing, and decided to give it a try. Kept the workouts the same, but upped my calories to 1600. Lost 30 lbs in 3 months. Since then, I've lost another 30
And have been maintaining at 1900+ calories for the last 6 months.

Idk... Works for me.

ETA: I'm 6', 152-155, and 32 years old, if any of that matters.