"You'll gain weight from starving yourself"

Cait_Sidhe

I have to say that I agree with everything the OP says. I experienced it myself. I was on a 1 1/2 year plateau from a 1200 calorie diet and eventually gained 20 lb back due to lack of self control and not being honest with myself about portion size. I was never in "starvation mode". I was simply eating too much and not admitting it, and this was due to depriving myself for so long. I developed binge eating habits that I've never experienced in my life.

I have been exactly the same, tried all the VLC diets going and always broke and ate my weight in brownies, and went "**** it, there is no point I can't stick to this", put back on all the weight I lost (if not more), got depressed and started starving again. Finding MFP and eating at a sensible, sustainable deficit has been life changing.

You didn't gain weight from the VLC diet, you gained because you binged.

Um, I believe that's pretty much exacly what I said. And the binge behavior came from limiting myself to a VLCD.

Warchortle

People think you get lean by starving... I knew someone that suffered scurvy in this day in age. Seriously? The United States throws away enough food to feed the entire world and people are giving themselves things like scurvy... like an orange a week would prevent that! People don't realize when you lose weight it's not all going to be fat. It's why people from starving countries don't look like sports models and have a bloated stomach even though they're starving. Their bodies don't have the muscle to sustain a 6 pack, which is what people assume they're going to have when they eat < 800 calories a day.

My ex said that maintaining flexibility was a bad sign from her doctor because it means over the years she's not only gained fat, but lost muscle mass. A lot of people are too focused on a weight number when they don't take in the entire picture. It's why every person is different. You can't compare your BMI / BF% / Metabolic Rate / Strength etc. to others.. you should only compare yourself to a version you've left behind in the past. If you are a better version of yourself whatever that may be tomorrow than you are today.. you've succeeded.

The companies are succeeding. They keep shoving the phrase "lose weight" when that's not at all what it's about. They'll start with "lose weight" then go into shenanigans like "build muscles, have lots of energy, lose fat, lose inches off your waist"... because they want to make customers think they CAN'T succeed without someone or someTHING that they don't already have. Every person has the ability to achieve, but sadly we have been given broken tools to do it.

myofibril

I think starving yourself is a poor way to achieve long term weight maintenance. It is far better to work with your body than against it. You can lose weight and indeed keep it off after starving but it is a lot more difficult.

Having said that, the problem with these types of discussions is they routinely equate starving solely with restriction of energy (ie overall calories.) There is rarely discussion of starving as a restriction of nutrients - the need to nourish the body.

This is completely the wrong way round - the far more problematic issue is lack of nutrients, both macro and micros. If you have covered off your nutritional bases then lack of total energy intake becomes far less of an issue (although it still remains so.) Macros and micros are far more important than TDEE in my opinion (unless you are obese and then the trade off becomes more in favour of overall calories)

The problem with VLCDs is that when most people slash calories they also slash nutrients (although the two things are not necessarily synonymous - you can reduce calories sometimes significantly but keep nutrient levels high.) If you are attempting a VLCD you must, must, must ensure that your diet is watertight to ensure meaningful long term success.

spamantha57

Also you could totally screw up your metabolism. I practically feel like I'm a poster child for that without meaning to.

I started gaining weight a few years ago due to health issues - I never really had a problem with food. I was active all growing up, then for a couple years I was practically bed ridden, where the max I could do was my laundry & cook myself dinner. I lived alone, couldn't go to school or work & didn't even really walk outside my home.

Went from around 110 to155 in a couple years (I'm only 5'2" and 100-115 pretty much all my life.) Doctor kept telling me to eat less & less & when they eventually told me to eat 800 cals, that was one of the signs I had to stop listening to them. I was only getting around 1,000 a day & the food I ate was healthy to begin with.

Now that I'm able to be active again & start losing weight, it's hard as hell to do it on 1200-1400 cals. But since I can be active again I'm focusing on that (along with eating well of course) and going with the idea that once my body starts getting on track more, it'll adjust to be more normal with the right nutrients & exercise for loss.

In conclusion, don't fvck your ish up.

(Disclaimer: fasting or cleansing is fine IMO for the right reasons & done in a stable manner; just don't starve yourself or think eating 800 cals of fast food a day is the thing to do. It's not.)

spamantha57

Macros and micros are far more important than TDEE in my opinion

Thank you. That's one of the smartest things I've read on here all year.

lhourin

Macros and micros are far more important than TDEE in my opinion

Thank you. That's one of the smartest things I've read on here all year.

Ditto. But not even going to get into it! :P

jdhoward_101

I'm with OP on this one, and i too have learnt it from experience. I used to starve myself, and it was great, i would lose pounds and pounds in a matter of days and it would be great! Then, something unexpected would happen, like i would go out to a resturant for a proper meal with some friends, and think, 'sure, i'll just have a plate of steak, i deserve it, and i'll just starve more tomorrow!' However, once i started eating, i couldn't stop, and that one naughty plate of steak would turn into a three day binge, in which time i would put all the weight back on and feel like a failure.

It's taken me a very long time to accept that actually, to lose weight you need to eat food. There are still times when the thought of eating 1200 calories a day terrifies me, and i think there is no way i'm going to lose weight eating that many calories. Sometimes that voice can cause me to go back to my old ways and start trying to starve myself again, and it is a real mental effort to push past this, to tell myself that i will only lose the weight and keep it off if i eat at least 1200 a day.

In short, yes starving works, and the process is logical, but it most definitely is not the way to go.

Also, let's all remind ourselves of the other downsides of starving yourself; constant fatigue, loss of enthusiasm for everything, cramps and physical pain, crippling hunger, uncontrollable and emotional mood swings...it's no sort of way to live. Stay healhy people!

ShoShoyi

Macros and micros are far more important than TDEE in my opinion

Thank you. That's one of the smartest things I've read on here all year.

Ditto. But not even going to get into it! :P

I agree that you will need to get in the right amount of nutrients and eat right for health benefits. But to lose weight, it is still necessary that the calories added up from those macros and micros sum up to be a deficit from TDEE. A person can eat a 100% clean diet but if it isn't at a deficit, I'm fairly certain that there will be no weightloss. Of course, I agree that people then take this to an extreme and feel that to lose weight they'll need a huge amount of deficit but actually this ends up completely impeding weight loss because then it's depriving the body and leading it to believe that it's a famine.