Hard work and understanding our bodies before weight loss - with pictures

johnturnerbradley · April 2016

I think it is funny that there are so many fad diets in today's society and everyone is looking to get from a beach whale to beach buff in 6 weeks or less.

Please do not get me wrong, a lot of people do lose weight / fat from these diets and it is a more superior and healthy way to live than the times before that has left them with a figure that haunts them and drains their confidence when they look in the mirror.

But how sustainable are these diets and do we really get what we want from them?

They key aspect in my opinion about losing weight is to separate today's lifestyle habits and even fad diets with the actual purpose we, as animals gain fat.

As every 'expert' has informed us, we store fat after overindulging, something that I was guilty daily of. 11 weeks ago, I looked in the mirror and convinced myself that I was a little bit plump but heyho it is not the end of the world and at least I have clothes that still make me look fairly attractive. I strongly believe that we convince ourselves that we look a stone lighter / 14lbs than what we actually are and this is where life in general gets in the way and we enjoy the copious amount of glutany we indulge in.

Firstly, to gain from any diet you must exercise. This is a must and I would suggest only if you are very obese cutting the calories is a good start but it has to be just the beginning.

If I were to tell you, you would lose 3 times more weight over a 12 week period from incorporating 3-4 times of cardio / weights in your new diet regime per week, would you believe me?

Well so far so good from myside, I eat between 1000-1200 calories a day, sometimes a little more. Then providing I have melted 300-600 calories in the gym I allow myself 1 cheat evening meal and one cheat day... In the cheat evening meal I do tend to reduce the carbs, as an example a homemade chilli con carne with no rice and as much cheese as I can possibly eat with the meal. I give myself a medium sized portion and probably have another, again with cheese. Then on the cheat day I eat what I want and as much of it as I want, providing the cheat meal was not the night before. If your cheat evening meal and cheat day do fall next to each other, then you have 5 days to burn the calories and still lose 2-4lb per week.

When I do 'cheat' I make sure the day before and the day after I have a calorie deficit and only consume 1000 calories and occasionally after a mad cheat day I will only eat one meal. The following day, I burn 300-600 calories in the gym and then have a small dinner with 2 diet protien shakes in the day.

It is very important that you eat protien or even better buy some diet protien whey and have those as a substitute meal. This is basically what Brands such as herbal life do anyway.

After my calorie deficit day, I then make sure the day after (2 days after my cheat day) I resume with a work out and keep to the 1000-1200 calorie mark. I do believe you would then be able to have your cheat meal either that evening or the next day (day 3).

The purpose is, our bodies are taught to survive on rare calorific meals and then we have a lower calorie consumption the next days. We cannot change the set up of how our bodies work and in my opinion you can speed up your motablism but if you have a weak motablism like myself then you will never change that for life. There are no studies to say you can naturally change the way your body digests food / distributes fat from dieting / excersing unless you have put on a significant amount of muscle.

So in essence, when you are dieting, exercise 3-4 times per week with some resitance training (2 times per week minimum) and make sure you are pushing yourself so you are sweating for at least 25 minutes. This for most people means 40 minute cardio.

You do not have to run at 10km per hour nor swim like a shark is chasing you :-). But get the heart rate up and even walk on an incline at a slow to medium pace for 40 minutes 3-4 times per week and I assure you, you will lose weight, tone and look better within a 3-4 week period.

I weigh myself daily or every other day, the first 5lbs will mainly be water weight but it is important you drink lots of water and avoid sugar. Sugar is the enemy!!

When I have weighed myself after a cheat day I have put on 8lbs before but I know that is temporary and I will get back down to that the previous weight within 1-2 days.

Take multivitamins and ensure you listen to your body.

Remember, your body is programmed to store fat and it is up to you to tell it to use your fat stores as energy not the calories you consume. People will disagree with my view / experience but it is working for me.

Join that gym and when you do reach your target weight feel free to over indulge again but you have to pay your body back with a calorie deficit over the course of the week to keep that fat off.

Good luck!

The first picture was of me 10-11 weeks ago and the next is me today.

LisaTobyHopeLewis · April 2016

What type of food do you eat regularly and arent you hungry? Do you think this is different for females???

johnturnerbradley · April 2016

Hi Lisa,

Firstly I am not a health professional but after looking at and trying so many diets all of them really boil down to one philosophy. Tell your body to use your fat stores as food rather than the calories you consume.

If you look at the atkins diet - reduce your carb intake. Carbohydrates release energy and when you cut them out you also cut out lots of sugar. Such as bread, startchy carbs like pasta etc. When you cut out the food that gives you energy your body has to use the stored energy it already has.

My story so far has been exactly this and yes I do get hungry and crave certain foods, but I do take appetite suppressants twice per day and pre-workout supplements before I go to the gym as I do have energy but not as much as I would like to burn those calories and for me to get that energy it would mean eating more food.

In truth I was looking to lose weight fast and as I am naturally competitive seeing that first 14lbs go within 3 weeks was amazing and I knew I had the process right.

Coming to the food, I eat a lot of protein and similar to the atkins diet no carbs 4 days per week. I eat Smoked Salmon, 2 egg whites and 1 whole egg with red chilli, low sugar soups, evening meals I have chicken rice and peas, homemade chilli con carne, stir frys, Tuna Steak, bolognaise but without the spaghetti, this is an example what I have 4 evening meals of the week and all are home made. My diet does rely on diet whey protein which I have straight after my workouts in the morning and when I train in the evening I have that for dinner.

But if I burn 3000 calories by cardio training a week and with a continued calorie deficit I do have 1 evening cheat meal and 1 cheat day as explained. Feel free to have mcdonalds, pizza, donuts, cheesecake, mountains of any food, 3 bottles of wine and a case of beer on your cheat day if you want to. Your body can only process so much nutrients / food in one day and the rest will come out as waste (sorry trying not to be too graphic). Then you owe it to yourself to then burn off the calroies the next day but hardly eating anything, so in reality you have burnt calories but your calorie deficit for that day will average out what you had on your cheat day.

The cheat day is what I call the refuelling day, I refuel and continue to train and train hard with one day training in the morning at the gym and then in the evening with a class or playing squash.

What has really done me a lot of favours is working out in the morning, having a healthy meal for lunch and then take a fitness class in the evening around 6-7pm and then only have a protein shake for dinner. This way your body has no choice but to use your fat stores as energy.

It is also important to try and incorporate some type of weights or resistance training in your regime twice per week. If you take a class in the evening and you use your own body weight or free weights then this is one of your sessions.

I still have another 7lbs to go, so I am not there yet.

As for, is this for women? We are all the same, so the suffragettes kept tell us men :-) and the human body all operates identically. Storing Fat is the body's way of surviving all those thousands / millions of years ago, now we have food in abundance our body still stores fat the same way it did then but we do not eat give our body's a chance to use the energy from the foods and this turns into fat but we just keep feeding it so it has to go somewhere.

The bottom line is, burn more then you consume, drink plenty of water and push yourself so you sweat till your t-shirt is soaked.

Hornsby · April 2016

Glad you found what works for you.

johnturnerbradley · April 2016

Thanks Hornsby, when I reach my target weight I will keep the same principle but to the extreme I am doing at the minute. I believe everyone has a 'true' weight and to prevent the weight ploughing back on I need to maintain it for 12 months. but lets see how it goes.

snowflake954 · April 2016

I think you need to read the thread on here--"Lyle McDonald nails it". It deals with female fat loss. HE is an expert.

ekat120 · April 2016

snowflake954 wrote: »

I think you need to read the thread on here--"Lyle McDonald nails it". It deals with female fat loss. HE is an expert.

This. We do not operate identically. Do you, as a male, menstruate? Can you get pregnant? If not, then our bodies do not operate "identically."

For example, there's some evidence that women don't benefit from fasting as much as men do.

I'm glad you feel your method is sustainable for you, but it would not be sustainable for me, physically or psychologically. A small, consistent daily deficit works better for me and many others. I've never needed to "trick" my body. In fact, I've found that the method you described actually leads to less weight loss for me.

You could reverse your reasoning to make the opposite argument, couldn't you? If you have periods of very minimal eating, when you eat a lot, your body tries to store it all as fat because it anticipates a period of undereating in the future. Not saying this is what actually happens...But if your reasoning is that the metabolism continues to work well through "underfeeding" because the "overfeeding"/cheat meals tell it food is plentiful, couldn't you also argue that the metabolism continues to be depressed through "overfeeding" because the "underfeeding" tells it food is scarce?

johnturnerbradley · April 2016

As I said in my original post - some people will disagree but even your concept is the same. A calorie deficit whether it be a huge amount or a little. It is the same principle.

yes you are right, your body will tend to hold onto more fat as it will think it doesn't know where the next piece of food is coming from, however if you continue to burn the calories then your body will not hold onto it.

If all of a sudden you start to involve unnecessary sugars in your diet and overconsume your body will of course hold onto it.

With regards to metabolism, you can encourage it by eating small regular meals but that will not last forever. Even someone with a high metabolism as they get older this will decrease hence putting more weight on as they age.

My metabolism has actually increased through this method, I tend to be able to eat what I want for 3-4 days as I did a couple of weeks back and only gained 3lb in water weight as I lost 3lb the day after the gym and 5lbs in total for that week.

You cannot lose weight by simply just increasing your metabolism. If you do resistance training then you will increase your metabolic rate and fat burning overall but again - if you are looking for a small reduction in weight then eat more and train less. if you are looking to really kick start your journey then eat less and train more - both ways as mentioned above result in a calorie deficit to lose fat.

Hard work and understanding our bodies before weight loss - with pictures

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