Losing Weight is 80% Diet- BS

crazypeachs

i am the same way for me its more like 50-50 i have insulin resistance pcos and hashimoto the only way i see the lbs move is when i move low cals and not exercising i wont shift a lbs

i had hashimoto's (before having my thyroid removed due to cancer) and have been diagnosed with pcos. i feel your pain. i have to exercise or i can't stay within my calorie goal. i get hungrier and have less self-control on my non-exercise days. last week i was eating all my exercise calories back (it was a bad week), but this week i'm doing better. and i find if i exercise in the am it's even better.

i have a very sedentary job, so i walk in the am and over lunch. it works better for me. some days i lift weights over lunch instead of walking, but i have to do something. and when i exercise i prefer healthier foods. i still have most of my chocolate in my drawer, it's been there for 3 months. does chocolate go bad?

rybo

I've seen a little of both sides.

In my 20's, as a gym rat/muscle head I could (an did) eat anything and everything. No issues with weight. IF I started gaining a little in the mid-section, a slight adjustment in eating would take care of that. I was about as close to being able to out work a bad diet as it gets.

Early-mid 30's stopped the weights, but not the eating. Got soft & squishy.

Then I started running regularly. Weight loss was good, but I needed to tightly keep an eye on my eating. Couldn't out work my diet. Except in the very high mileage weeks of marathon training. Then I was stuffing down ice cream to keep from losing too much.

Currnently I lift & run, I do eat a lot because of the exercise, but FAR, FAR more sensibly & better quality. I work hard but am no longer trying to out work bad eating. The best combination is when hard work & proper diet compliment each other, not fight against each other.

notworthstalking

For me it's diet. My issue was not eating enough, then getting really hungry and eating way too many calories in junk. Now I think before I eat, and I have more energy to work out, work harder at work, get jobs at home done, and play with my kids. I exercise to get fitter, get stronger and for fun.

Wgbn32

I totally agree with the OP. I can not lose weight on diet alone. Exercise, for me, is 70% more important. I can lose more weight exercising and eating junk than I could not exercising and eating fruits and veggies. There is also something about my rest days where I tend to want to eat more. I was literally thinking about this yesterday. On my exercise days I may feel hungrier, but I feel like my appetite is in control. I don't overeat as much.

Its like my body wants to hang on to every ounce of fat and I have to force it to get rid of it (ie. exercise).

SarahSmilesCA

I totally agree with the OP. I can not lose weight on diet alone. Exercise, for me, is 70% more important. I can lose more weight exercising and eating junk than I could not exercising and eating fruits and veggies. There is also something about my rest days where I tend to want to eat more. I was literally thinking about this yesterday. On my exercise days I may feel hungrier, but I feel like my appetite is in control. I don't overeat as much.

Its like my body wants to hang on to every ounce of fat and I have to force it to get rid of it (ie. exercise).

YES exactly this!

SarahSmilesCA

Ok I have learned, don't post something and leave all day.:embarassed:

I am really sorry I was not here for this discussion, but I want to put a cap on it from the OP perspective (since I am the OP lol)

I appreciate everyone's comments...well most of everyone's. People are entitled to their opinions but my mileage DID vary. Yes I do think a diet is important and that a calorie deficit works...to SOME degree. But diet has not been the most important factor in my weight loss this time. Exercise and macro choices are at this point. I will explain if you care to read...

I know I am not alone in this, people like Dave Aspery and Gary Taubes have lost weight on different paths. It is not all about calorie in and out - Metabolism is the most important factor in weight management. Not calorie intake, especially as you age and especially if you are 50 lbs or more over weight. And with that exercise and food choices directly affect your metabolism and how you burn energy, not just how much you put in but what you put in, and what you do with it once it is in.

On Nutri System I should have been in a minimum of a 1000 calorie deficit DAILY and over time that should have provided about a 1.5 lbs of weight loss PER WEEK, but it did NOT. I had an active job and I walked every day. I stuck to the program faithfully for six months and lost less than 6 lbs. That is a NOT successful diet, but it WAS a calorie deficit. And this whole notion of starvation mode is just ridiculous. Calories in vs Calories out either works ALL the time, or it does NOT work well enough to base the whole success on it. You can't say calorie deficit works, but only if it is not TOO MUCH of a deficit??? Come on. More deficit should equate to more loss if it is all about a calorie deficit (that is math). We all know that more deficit does NOT work. Our board is LOADED with testimony of people who ADDED calories, and lost weight. That proves diet are not what it is all about.

If a person has any metabolic resistance issue or autoimmune disease (I have two, hypothyroid and PCOS) and many people 50 lbs overweight or more DO have those issues, then the whole calorie deficit issue is not going to be as effective for them and they need to look for others solutions to improve metabolism. I did. It is called exercise and balanced macro ratios. Yes I eat in a calorie deficit, but nothing close to what was suggested by the likes of Weight Watchers, Nutrisystem or the medical world of whom push extreme calorie deficit as the ONLY way to lose weight.

I have learned that every time I put myself in a major calorie deficit for long term WITHOUT exercising it reduces my metabolism. So now I can and will gain weight on less calories (which pretty much blows the whole BMR and calorie deficit science out the door- two people, same age, same weight and height, and same health level can respond completely different to 1200 calories, wth???). A life time cycle of deficit dieting produces NOTHING but a constant cycle of losing and gain and getting there on even LESS calories than each time before. THAT is what calorie deficits alone do.

To the person who asked about my exercise:

3 days a week I do heavy resistance training (New Rules) and 3 days a week I do cardio for 90 min, broken up into spinning classes with HIT and swimming. I use my Polar HRM to track calories, granted they have been known to be off, but I burn close to 5,000 calories a week. THAT is why I have been successful! I am burning energy, not just reducing my intake of it. And every month I stay in shape I am burning calories more efficiently and making it more difficult to put it back on because now I burn energy at a more effective level.

Yes, I have a ticker too. It says I lost 40 lbs and that is since Dec 26, not a shabby weight loss in that time frame and it has been MOSTLY from exercise, IF, and macro choices.NOT just calorie deficit. I focus the LEAST on my diet deficit throughout the week, no joke. I eat what I want in moderate portions (not those little bitty portions that WW or NS want you to eat), I log it, I make sure it is under my calorie goals(most days), and I try to make good choices (sans the ice cream cone I get once or twice a week). But at least six times in five months I have had huge refeed days…and gained NOTHING back in the long term. I figured one weekend I should have gained at least 5 lbs from my calorie intake, and it should have taken weeks to get it off due to the deficit needed.I actually LOST 2 lbs that week. Go figure...all I know is my experience has taught me it is NOT all about diet at least not 80%.

I cycle calories, I cycle carbs, I intermittent fast, I balance my macros, but the most important thing I do is get off my *kitten* and go to the gym 5 or 6 days a week in a fasted state rather than sit in front of the TV all day and that consumes at LEAST 50-60 percent of my attention (not just 20%), so much more than the few minutes I spend putting food in my mouth.

Losing weight is definitely not 80% diet for me

SarahSmilesCA

When I put a lot of focus on my food I don't seem to lose much, but when I put focus on exercise I start losing weight.

This is EXACTLY what I mean

chrisdavey

When I put a lot of focus on my food I don't seem to lose much, but when I put focus on exercise I start losing weight.

This is EXACTLY what I mean

That just means that your exercise is putting you in a cal deficit of which you would not have been in without it.

I have no idea why people try and pick %'s for diet and exercise. They go hand in hand. The %'s are artibtrary.

carissar7

Ok I have learned, don't post something and leave all day.:embarassed:

I am really sorry I was not here for this discussion, but I want to put a cap on it from the OP perspective (since I am the OP lol)

I appreciate everyone's comments...well most of everyone's. People are entitled to their opinions but my mileage DID vary. Yes I do think a diet is important and that a calorie deficit works...to SOME degree. But diet has not been the most important factor in my weight loss this time. Exercise and macro choices are at this point. I will explain if you care to read...

I know I am not alone in this, people like Dave Aspery and Gary Taubes have lost weight on different paths. It is not all about calorie in and out - Metabolism is the most important factor in weight management. Not calorie intake, especially as you age and especially if you are 50 lbs or more over weight. And with that exercise and food choices directly affect your metabolism and how you burn energy, not just how much you put in but what you put in, and what you do with it once it is in.

On Nutri System I should have been in a minimum of a 1000 calorie deficit DAILY and over time that should have provided about a 1.5 lbs of weight loss PER WEEK, but it did NOT. I had an active job and I walked every day. I stuck to the program faithfully for six months and lost less than 6 lbs. That is a NOT successful diet, but it WAS a calorie deficit. And this whole notion of starvation mode is just ridiculous. Calories in vs Calories out either works ALL the time, or it does NOT work well enough to base the whole success on it. You can't say calorie deficit works, but only if it is not TOO MUCH of a deficit??? Come on. More deficit should equate to more loss if it is all about a calorie deficit (that is math). We all know that more deficit does NOT work. Our board is LOADED with testimony of people who ADDED calories, and lost weight. That proves diet are not what it is all about.

If a person has any metabolic resistance issue or autoimmune disease (I have two, hypothyroid and PCOS) and many people 50 lbs overweight or more DO have those issues, then the whole calorie deficit issue is not going to be as effective for them and they need to look for others solutions to improve metabolism. I did. It is called exercise and balanced macro ratios. Yes I eat in a calorie deficit, but nothing close to what was suggested by the likes of Weight Watchers, Nutrisystem or the medical world of whom push extreme calorie deficit as the ONLY way to lose weight.

I have learned that every time I put myself in a major calorie deficit for long term WITHOUT exercising it reduces my metabolism. So now I can and will gain weight on less calories (which pretty much blows the whole BMR and calorie deficit science out the door- two people, same age, same weight and height, and same health level can respond completely different to 1200 calories, wth???). A life time cycle of deficit dieting produces NOTHING but a constant cycle of losing and gain and getting there on even LESS calories than each time before. THAT is what calorie deficits alone do.

To the person who asked about my exercise:

3 days a week I do heavy resistance training (New Rules) and 3 days a week I do cardio for 90 min, broken up into spinning classes with HIT and swimming. I use my Polar HRM to track calories, granted they have been known to be off, but I burn close to 5,000 calories a week. THAT is why I have been successful! I am burning energy, not just reducing my intake of it. And every month I stay in shape I am burning calories more efficiently and making it more difficult to put it back on because now I burn energy at a more effective level.

Yes, I have a ticker too. It says I lost 40 lbs and that is since Dec 26, not a shabby weight loss in that time frame and it has been MOSTLY from exercise, IF, and macro choices.NOT just calorie deficit. I focus the LEAST on my diet deficit throughout the week, no joke. I eat what I want in moderate portions (not those little bitty portions that WW or NS want you to eat), I log it, I make sure it is under my calorie goals(most days), and I try to make good choices (sans the ice cream cone I get once or twice a week). But at least six times in five months I have had huge refeed days…and gained NOTHING back in the long term. I figured one weekend I should have gained at least 5 lbs from my calorie intake, and it should have taken weeks to get it off due to the deficit needed.I actually LOST 2 lbs that week. Go figure...all I know is my experience has taught me it is NOT all about diet at least not 80%.

I cycle calories, I cycle carbs, I intermittent fast, I balance my macros, but the most important thing I do is get off my *kitten* and go to the gym 5 or 6 days a week in a fasted state rather than sit in front of the TV all day and that consumes at LEAST 50-60 percent of my attention (not just 20%), so much more than the few minutes I spend putting food in my mouth.

Losing weight is definitely not 80% diet for me

What do you think you are doing by 'burning' calories? You are increasing your calorie deficit! A deficit is created not only from the calories you eat, but the calories you burn, too...like someone else above said, where the % comes from does not matter. Also depending on how much weight you had to lose in the first place, a 1000 calorie deficit is NOT something I would recommend to anyone, unless you have a lot of weight to lose and are medically supervised. Unless you were eating close to 3000 calories a day, there's no way you'd be able to lose any weight, let alone function properly on a 1000 calorie deficit, especially if all you were doing is walking during the day. Of course you didn't lose anything. Also your statement of 'more of a deficit should equal more weight loss' is simply not true, your body WILL respond with a reduced metabolism and in effect hold onto any fat/energy you provide it, making you gain weight. It's not as simple as a mathematical equation and it's not so black and white. Some of your statements I found to be very contradictory and pretty much answered your own question.

SarahSmilesCA

Losing weight is definitely not 80% diet for me

"What do you think you are doing by 'burning' calories? "

"Of course you didn't lose anything. Also your statement of 'more of a deficit should equal more weight loss' is simply not true, your body WILL respond with a reduced metabolism and in effect hold onto any fat/energy you provide it, making you gain weight. It's not as simple as a mathematical equation and it's not so black and white. Some of your statements I found to be very contradictory and pretty much answered your own question."
[/quote]


David Asprey lost 100 lbs and he did it on a 4500 calorie diet. I know many people on low carb diets that basically did the same thing. Deficit? I don't think so at almost 5000 calories, he did not exercise at all...and I believe he had a desk job at the time...
http://www.bulletproofexec.com/photo-abs-after-2-years-of-4500-calories-no-exercise/.

The guy from the Fat Head video has a similar story...calorie deficit is not the only way to lose weight

But I am not saying a calorie deficit is not important. I am saying DIET is not 80% of weight loss(that is what was in my title) . Metabolism is and if a person sits on their butt and just reduces calories without exercise you might lose weight in the short term but you won't keep it off for long. And you are reducing your ability to eat normal levels of calories for the rest of your life.

The whole point is the math does not work with calorie deficit and it should if a calorie deficit is the sum total of weight loss. If a BMR was 2000 calories (and that is what it was at the time when I was on NS) and I am consuming 1200, then my body should have tapped into my fat stores to provide the extra energy if calorie deficit it all that is needed for weight loss. It didn't. It reduced my need to burn 2000 calories(my body thought it was doing me a favor by reducing my calorie needs), and made my BMR lower...that is the WHOLE problem with a calorie deficit alone diet, especially if you are not exercising and building lean tissue.

Also you should NOT be gaining weight on 1500-1600 calories but people do when they do nothing but sit all day. I have seen it in my roommate. She does not eat much, but has gained weight consistently every year...She has a BMR of about 2300 calories...I am not even sure she eats 1400 cals a day.

jenniejengin

bump

Cait_Sidhe

My weight loss is 100% attributed to diet. Exercise helps in body composition. I gained back 20 lb eating at a surplus while exercising the entire time. Now that I'm weighing my food and metiulously logging, that 20 lb came off pretty quickly. My exercising has not changed.

pcastagner

.

pcastagner

A deficit is not when the numbers on your piece of paper say you are running a deficit. It's a situation where the total number of calories being processed and absorbed are less than the total number of calories being burned. Your metabolic rate plays a huge role in determining what is a deficit and what isn't. If you go into ketosis by avoiding all carbs, your ability to process the food you take in becomes compromised, which also can create a DEFICIT.

At first, I thought you might be just a really confused person, so I went to this David *kitten* Prey fellow's website to see what the diet is, and after that I concluded you are merely here to advertise the website, which tries to get you to sign up and buy some sort of magic coffee which will allow you to do a body recomposition with no effort.

I smell a scam, and you are either a victim, a paid spammer, or both. The claims made by that website amount to the biggest news in nutrition in the last decade. You need a bit more than a shot of some dude in a hotel bathroom to prove that.

geebusuk

I smell a scam, and you are either a victim, a paid spammer, or both. The claims made by that website amount to the biggest news in nutrition in the last decade. You need a bit more than a shot of some dude in a hotel bathroom to prove that.

Indeed.
A really impressive array of food-woo collated in to one bit.

Just one of many examples:
Why doesn't he like microwaves?

Did he, by any chance, fail to read the studies critcising microwave cooking, to see that the studies themselves were seriously flawed?

None of the "Research proving this diet works." does anything like that.
Scam.

JossFit

Ugh... so much fail in this thread.

First, weight loss and gain is 100% about diet. There are a million factors individual to each person, but the fact is that if you eat more than you burn, you will gain. If you eat less, you will lose. Hormonal factors, environmental factors and lifestyle factors all come into play, along with any medical issues that you have but it's ALWAYS CI versus CO. Period.

Second --

Look, if you seriously cannot lose weight through diet alone, and gain FAT (we're not talking scale weight) eating more than 1200 calories per day, there are two possible reasons;

1. You have a medical issue and need to see your doctor.
2. You dropped calories too low and have been dieting for too long. You are experiencing 'adaptive thermogenesis', and your body is slowing down it's metabolic functions to keep you alive on the paltry amount of food you are consuming.

I'm going to assume the latter is the case here.

What you need to do is reverse diet! Up your calories and get your body the nutrients it needs to function properly.

---

I too was one of those people who said that I couldn't lose on more than 1200-1300 calories a day, hours of exercise per week, 'clean' diet, blah blah blah. I was convinced of it.
The truth is that I had been dieting for so long that I really COULDN'T lose any more weight on that amount of activity, but it's because my body had adapted. I was roughly 11% bodyfat (check out my profile photos) and weighed 113 pounds at 5'4. I was RIPPED. My body didn't have any energy to spare!

My skin looked bad, I was having trouble sleeping, I lost my period for about 3 YEARS, I had no sex drive, I was moody and cranky, and I had nagging injuries all the time. Yeah, I looked awesome, but after several years of being so lean my body just quit on me. The maladies kept multiplying.

I had to STOP dieting and gain back a good amount of weight just to get healthy again, and I am still having hormonal issues.

I have since reverse dieted and am now losing about a pound per week on 1750 calories per day, ZERO cardio, with calories steadily increasing.

---

Now I know that you aren't going to listen to any of that. I'm not you, and what happened to me could NEVER happen to you. You are special, and your chronic undereating will never come back and bite you in the butt... right?

carissar7

Ugh... so much fail in this thread.

First, weight loss and gain is 100% about diet. There are a million factors individual to each person, but the fact is that if you eat more than you burn, you will gain. If you eat less, you will lose. Hormonal factors, environmental factors and lifestyle factors all come into play, along with any medical issues that you have but it's ALWAYS CI versus CO. Period.

Second --

Look, if you seriously cannot lose weight through diet alone, and gain FAT (we're not talking scale weight) eating more than 1200 calories per day, there are two possible reasons;

1. You have a medical issue and need to see your doctor.
2. You dropped calories too low and have been dieting for too long. You are experiencing 'adaptive thermogenesis', and your body is slowing down it's metabolic functions to keep you alive on the paltry amount of food you are consuming.

I'm going to assume the latter is the case here.

What you need to do is reverse diet! Up your calories and get your body the nutrients it needs to function properly.


Now I know that you aren't going to listen to any of that. I'm not you, and what happened to me could NEVER happen to you. You are special, and your chronic undereating will never come back and bite you in the butt... right?

+1

tomg33

The subjective experience of weight loss offers many illusions. Even when you think you're being consistent and accurate, the results can vary wildly. This is because you are not in fact being consistent and accurate, and you don't have the full picture.

RobynLB83

For me it's 80% exercise, and diet just falls into place. If I don't do intense exercise around 8 hrs per week, my metabolism just plummets, I feel like ****, and I start putting on weight. Even if I eat much less. If I exercise, I stay lean, even if I eat like a horse.

missdibs1

I think it is interesting that you assume the term diet (used by others) means specifically eating 1200 calories. Perhaps this assumption is your issue? You could have not been eating the proper ratios/under eating for your size and activity level/etc etc

Both diet and exercise promote weight loss. They are interconnected.