I am needing some support and help.

EMOTIONS:
This is where I am failing... After doing all the right things and stepping on the scale I get sooooooooo frustrated and that's when I tend to gorge on crap food.

So much of this stuff is mental. Don't wait for motivation. Don't look for inspiration. Don't search for willpower. Those are limited resources based on our emotions.

You're going to have to sit with your portions and gut it out. Measure and weigh, then sit for a few minutes. Find the deeper meaning. You're going to have to retrain your brain. Immediate gratification creates deep ruts in our brains. We become a looper. Ask me how I know.

To break all of these unproductive cycles with food is going to take time. A lorra lorra time. To kale with creating a new habit within 21 or 30 days. That's a bunch of malarkey. It's going to take giant month hunks of time, focus and consistency.

Sit with your portions. Regardless if your plate is decorative with delicate tiddlywinks or just placed on a paper plate...sit and reflect. Find your deeper meaning and it will create momentum. Momentum will take you much further than willpower, motivation and inspiration ever will.

You won't need anything or anyone to jack you UP. You'll be able to keep yourself moving forward during the midnight hours when no one else is around. How you speak to yourself matters. You only have 5 seconds before the brain will talk you out of everything including your dream weight.

You choose. You decide. There's only choices and consequences. You want your dream weight so fight like hail for it. On a one meal at a time basis, day by day you will get there. Focus. Keep your head engaged every step of the way.

Do you know that heavy lifting may lead first to water retention, immediately after? Muscle tissues needing repairment or such.
Do you weigh in once a week? Maybe you coincidentally pick a day after eating more carbs, having a more intensive training or sleeping less. Just a thought.
Not that I didnt ever so ofter feel like grabbing a 🔨 after stepping on the stupid ⚖! 🤷‍♀️
Do you feel stronger, fitter, more energetic than before? That's what matters most!

Are your 2,500 days the days you're "gorging" or do you mean that you're eating 2,500 on your heavy workout days and you have additional days where you're eating a lot more than that?

2,500 isn't that much for a runner, especially a tall man. If this feels like gorging to you, it seems like there may be some perception issues at play.

After weighing 382 pounds, it makes sense that loose skin would happen, hence the jiggle. Seconding the tape measure suggestion, and maybe progress pictures, and maybe dexa scanner. Your workout plan sounds like you're doing a slow recomp. So the above measurements may be more relevant than the scale. I also second the concerns about high tuna intake and risk of heavy metal poisoning.
Also curious what is in the canning liquid with the green beans... I'm guessing high sodium, and maybe even a significant number of carbs, differing widely among manufacturers. And while you looked very nice 15 years ago, keep in mind that we can't turn back time. You've collected experience and it's going to show. All the best of luck on your journey!

thedrewmancometh wrote: »

janejellyroll wrote: »

Are your 2,500 days the days you're "gorging" or do you mean that you're eating 2,500 on your heavy workout days and you have additional days where you're eating a lot more than that?

2,500 isn't that much for a runner, especially a tall man. If this feels like gorging to you, it seems like there may be some perception issues at play.

No 2500 calorie days are what I consider healthy high calorie days. Gorging would be a 4000+ calorie day which I haven't done in a few weeks. I had a meal plan that built up through the week. It was something like 500 monday, 800 tue, 1200 wed, 1700 thur, 2300 fri, 2800 sat, 3500 sun. This allowed me to eat heavy on the weekends when I go on long runs. I was averaging 2000 calories a day. This past monday I stopped that and switched to small grazing meals and averaging about 1750 calories a day. I am not sure how that will work out this weekend with my long runs.

This is just my perception: I feel like if I was constantly switching up my goals, it would be very difficult to measure progress and tell what was working and what wasn't. You've got extremely low calorie days and extremely high calorie days. If you're eating 3,500-4,000 calories when that isn't what you usually eat, that's going to cause temporary water retention as your body deals with the extra carbohydrates, sodium, and just pure volume of food in your system. So you're regularly temporarily increasing your weight, peeling that off, and adding it again. This in itself isn't necessarily a problem, but it means that you're going to need to take a longer trend view of your weight than someone who is regularly eating around the same amount each day. As you probably know, running can also cause weight swings as your body is dealing with recovering from intense activity. So you're swinging all around on the scale, concluding that things aren't working, and then making changes based on that.

I personally find it very difficult to maintain a deficit while actively training for marathon/ultramarathon distances. Anything over 250 calories seems to impact my running and leave me vulnerable to intense hunger that is mentally challenging. When I eat a little less than what I need each day, I can slowly lose fat while not impacting my running. And my personal experience is that you don't really miss 200ish calories a day. When I read your post it sounds your long term trend is to shoot for a really aggressive deficit, which is leading you to snap and "gorge," and this is resulting in you never really losing any weight.

1,200 is WAY too low for an active person your size, even on a "lazy" day. As a runner, your hunger isn't necessarily going to be tied to that day's activity. I personally feel like it would be very beneficial for you to figure out how much you need to maintain your weight, based on your activity, and then create a deficit from there. If the calorie cycling is something you find helpful, there's no reason to stop that, but your current cycling sounds kind of arbitrary. You want to go into your long runs fueled, you're going to have to eat more than 500 or 800 calories a day. No wonder you're "snapping" after days of compliance to that kind of plan. I weigh 110 and I can't imagine training on your intake.

Please feel free to disregard if I'm misunderstanding or this isn't helpful, these are just some thoughts I had while reading your post. As a runner, you know that leaner is better (up to a point). The missing piece right now is ensuring you're fueling your activity in a way that isn't going to compromise your emotions and lead to really high calorie off-plan days because I am convinced that is what is driving your lack of progress with weight loss. At the end of the day you weigh this much because you're eating enough -- over time -- to maintain that weight. You're trying to tackle it by driving your calories really low on other days, which is just making the problem worse. I think you need to tackle it from the opposite side -- try to reduce the days when you are eating more than you need.

Wow your struggle is real!!! I thought my struggle was crazy!!! I have nodules on my thyroid and it makes my body do some weird *kitten*. But when tested it's so perfect!! Dr. Make me wanna wear orange!!! I haven't focused on me lately at all!! Been moving and stress eating like a moron!! My family doesn't get my needs. Emotional eating like a pro lately!! I know what I should be doing and I can't get motivated!! This feeling of being alone haunts me!! I have no advise for my self let alone anyone else. But I thought I'd just say you are not alone!!! Here to grind and struggle with ya if you need someone to talk to vent to or just cuss at!! Here I am!! Hahaha gonna go work out and do all I can to make today the best it can be!!