Top Tips for Losing 100lbs (beyond CICO)

Welcome! I am also trying to lose about 100lb, 6 gone 94 to go! My motivations are all the things I love to do but are so difficult at this weight! Add me if you want to!

No motivation. Motivation can be lost.
Why do you need a carrot dangled in front of you? Acquire some discipline and you won't need to ask yourself every day "Why am I doing this?"; you'll just do it because it's what you set out to do.

I started in April with 125 pounds to lose. Now I'm down to 77 pounds left. Seeing progress even if it's slow helps to keep me motivated.

I agree with drinking water. To me, that seems to be the piece that makes it all flow, no pun intended. I've tried so many diet fads from shakes and smoothies this, to programs and cleanses that. And yes, to some extent it's all worked but there was ALWAYS a side effect that eventually made me stray... Whether it was constant exhaustion, crankiness, hitting long plateaus, or always feeling hungry; there were always reasons why it was so much easier to stop than to continue. Especially when I had a hard time seeing that I wasn't only going to drink smoothies for the rest of my life or only eat from a certain list of foods for the rest of my life.

What I've found that's worked for me is honestly just drinking lots of water (I allow myself a cup of coffee in the am but beyond that I exclusively drink water), eating clean, and having the kind of attitude and mindset and that allows you to lose weight. Stay positive, determined, and ambitious to meet your goals!

I've struggled with my weight my whole life for one reason or another. And although I started my current journey the heaviest I have ever been, it's also the most determined I've ever been and I'm seeing better, more positive results now than I have in the past. And really all I did was stop eating pre packaged foods, stop drinking my calories, and get focused. I changed my mindset about food from one of indulgence to one of necessity. Now don't get me wrong, I will forever be a lover of food, but changing the way I think about it has helped me establish boundaries with myself and with the things that I eat so that MOST of the time I am eating for the nourishment and health of my body.

For example, cake doesn't have to be a completely unhealthy indulgence, but buying and/or making a cake from the store makes it unhealthy. I make just about everything homemade, from scratch so I have the ability to control what goes into my food and therefore into my body. I use fruits and spices to make "indulgences" sweet and give them flavor so that I can cut back on the processed/refined sugars. When water gets boring I squeeze lemon, drop frozen berries, or sprigs of mint into it to liven it up. The key is really to find things that work for you and continue to add to your repetoir of things you like. Don't be afraid to experiment with recipes. Stay in that frame of mind that food is fuel, nutrients, and nourishment for your body. If you have a bad day remember that tomorrow is a new day with a fresh slate. Don't let the small/minor setbacks throw you completely off track.

I've also found that it helps when you surround yourself with like minded people both in person and online. That way you can share your goals with them and you then have someone other than yourself to be accountable to. I don't know about you, but if I know I'm getting together with my friends in a week and half of them know about my weight loss goals, I don't want to see them and be like "well I'm a slacker and haven't been doing my due diligence..." That's embarrassing to me. I'd so much rather them look at me and be like "girl you look great!" Or them ask how my journey is going and me be able to say "I had a few minor setbacks, but I'm on track now and I'm meeting my goals."

When you set your goals make sure they're realistic. And always set your end game goal, but make smaller more easily attainable goals in between. For example, if someone's ultimate goal is to lose 150 pounds they might split that amount up a bit... On average people healthily lose approximately 2 pounds per week depending on their situation. There's 52 weeks per year so you might give yourself 1 1/2 to 2 years to meet your end goal (if you do it earlier than that's great!)... So let's split your goal up and say every 6 months you'd like to lose 50 pounds... Now you've just given yourself trimester goals that are much easier to meet than the 150 pound end goal. And you can go even further by saying, I'd like to lose 10 pounds per month to contribute to meeting my trimester goal and my end goal. And you can then even break that down into weeks by saying OK I'd like to lose 2 pounds per week to contribute towards meeting my monthly goal of 10 pounds. That way you have wins in between meeting your bigger goals.

And when meeting these goals one of the mistakes I've made is by rewarding myself with some sort of food or culinary indulgence. I found that that is no bueno, simply because it brought me right back to the wrong frame of mind where food is mostly an indulgence rather than nourishment. Instead I reward myself with doing things or with guilty pleasures... Like I LOVE designer boots and purses... So if I meet my trimester goal then I get to reward myself with a single more spendy item that I've had my eye on. Lol. Or for my monthly goal reward I'll do something smaller like a wallet or a new pair of pants. And then for a weekly goal I will reward myself with going to the movies or buying a new movie, or getting a sitter and having a mommy night out/off, or a mani/pedi. Or my friend sets aside a jar and everytime she meets a goal she puts money in the jar. That way the jar becomes a reflection both of her hardwork in her weight-loss journey AND of how far she's come. Then when she meets a big goal she allows herself to empty the jar and spend it on whatever she'd like. There's lots of ways to set goals and reward yourself without the reward having to lead back to food.

Any-who I hope this helps. It was waaay more than I thought it'd be. Lol.

Don't deprive yourself. Fit treats and things you like into your calories. Make your plan one that you can sustain for life.

And the biggest; small losses add up.

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What has helped me reach my goals?

-Time
-Patience
-Knowing I'll have urges and having tactics to combat them
-Knowing Christmas/barbecues/vacations/etc. happen and that they're neither the end of the world nor necessarily a reason to derail long-term goals and progress
-When I reach a new boggle in the plan (I started traveling a bunch on the weekends, for instance) keep working at solutions until the new restrictions surrounding that life change fits in again with my long-term health goals
-Not letting injury/serious life issues (deaths, job loss, etc.) be an excuse to chuck the whole plan (but of course adjust to compensate for a while)
-Forgiving myself for temporary issues/setbacks and not letting them derail me long term
-When I'm overwhelmed with the steps I still need to take, reminding myself to look at how far I've come
-Recognizing the people/habits in my life who are hindrances to my health goals, and not letting them affect what I know is best for me
-Recognizing the people/habits in my life who are assets to my health goals, and focusing more time on them

Small, short-term goals are important to me. Once I got started, seeing the scale drop a couple of pounds each week drove me forward. If I didn't see it drop, that made me want to try even harder. The other thing was exercise. Without it, I don't think I would've made it. I had a few weeks in there that I couldn't exercise, but it was a struggle for me to stay within my calorie goals. Exercise made the difference between reaching the end of my day having eaten more than I intended and reaching the end of the day with a few calories left in the budget.

I am a big fan of cognitive behavior therapy and found a lot of helpful tips/tricks through that. I have to say the most helpful has been an index card that has all the reasons I want to lose weight listed on it. From simple things like cuter clothes and enjoying shopping again to deeper things like feeling less embarrassed and self-conscious in public or social settings.

When I am feeling down, struggling or like I want to give in, I pull out the card and re-affirm my reasons for doing this. I keep a laminated card at my desk and in my purse so it is with me majority of the time.

SideSteel wrote: »

I would suggest that you identify and implement habits that are supportive of the goal of maintaining a lower body weight than you currently have.

So for example, rather than thinking about your diet in terms of "I need to eat 1600 calories" I would think of it in a bigger sense as "I need to adopt life-long habits around food and exercise that will lead me to maintain near my goal weight"

Or something to that extent.

And some of those habits are likely to be things that MOST successful (successful at maintaining weight loss) people have in common.

For example I bet most people who have lost a significant amount of weight and are maintaining that low weight, probably limit junk food, probably don't drink many caloric beverages, probably exercise on a regular basis, probably don't eat out at restaurants at a high frequency, probably eat a reasonable quantity of fruits and vegetables, etc etc.

And of course there will be exceptions.

But, while you are tracking your food intake you should consider looking at these habits (sleep quality and quantity is another HUGE one) and pick one of them to focus on for a few weeks so that you can build this habit set in combination with food logging.

At some point you may even be able to stop logging should you choose to.

^^^^

Life changes is a big deal

I agree completely!

Get some active hobbies

The gym used to be new and weird. Now I se my friends and I have a great time. I miss it when I travel

Cycling is a favorite activity. I used to think 10-15 miles was tough. In time, now 40 is an average Saturday and I keep it at 17+ mph.

Those changes brought new friends and a new way to enjoy life.

I have a triathlon coming up

I will be taking up a martial arts class again.

It is all part of a new life with a different focus.

And as an active person it is easy to burn off a couple slices of pizza

daniwilford wrote: »

My three best weight loss and fitness purchases good walking/running shoes, digital kitchen scale and fitbit.

Cosigned

About 5 years ago I lost about 40lbs with CI<CO along with eating no processed foods and no added sugars. If I couldn't recognize where it came from (a plant or animal) I didn't eat it. It worked really well, I only regained the weight when I resumed eating processed foods - the beginning of my downward slide was a homemade muffin...

I now am re-losing that weight, but I now know that I can not go back to the way I used to eat - that's how I gained weight. This time I have prediabetes and more autoimmune issues, so I am following a low carb high fat diet, that is very low in carbs and putting me in ketosis. This has helped my health, but it also has he added benefit of reducing my appetite and getting rid of my very strong carb cravings. If carb cravings are an issue for you, you may want to look into a LCHF diet. It's something I can see maintaining for years if not life.

Good luck!

Stanford's Chronic Disease Self-Management Program taught me to troubleshoot and shed the guilt.
My weight loss team gave me accountability. I also had bariatric surgery which helped a lot.
I tried many sorts of exercise until I found some that I loved. Instead of seeking out what I should be doing, I just moved. If I love it, I'll keep doing it.
I found my motivations. Having an event to train for keeps me going.

daniwilford wrote: »

My three best weight loss and fitness purchases good walking/running shoes, digital kitchen scale and fitbit.

Absolutely this! A pair of shoes can make or break my desire to work out, and my ability to keep going once I start working out. Shoes are worth the investment.

I have a kitchen scale, and while it isn't digital, it's definitely one of the most helpful things I've purchased. I just bought a really cheap one a while back (because I didn't know if I'd stick to measuring food), and it is SO eye-opening. You wouldn't believe how wrong you can be while counting calories without a scale. Now that I use mine regularly, I might go buy a more expensive digital one at some point.

And lastly, the Fitbit!!! I just bought one last week and I am IN LOVE WITH IT. Since getting my Fitbit I am more motivated than I have EVER been to be active and lose weight. I guess for me, seeing the data laid out in front of me is not only informative, but a great motivator. For example, both yesterday and the day before I was heading into the evening with about 12,000 steps. But because I like nice numbers, I decided to put in the extra effort to end the day at 15,000 steps. I also spent several minutes running up and down the stairs at home because I wanted to earn the badge for 50 floors climbed. haha! Honestly, before my Fitbit, I was likely getting well under 10,000 steps on most days, and just generally not moving as much as I should. But seeing it all laid out in front of me helps me so much. I especially like seeing the little graph of my calories burned and heart rate throughout my workouts, it makes me work much harder than I used to, because I want to be proud of what I see when I'm done. Each time I burn more than my previous workout it feels like such a huge success.