Frank Lanz Reveals Struggle to Maintain Weight-loss

I went through it pretty fast, but I didn't see any mention of activity or exercise. I personally have a hard time maintaining my weight when I'm not exercising regularly and/or being relatively active...I always have a hard time in the winter for this reason and usually put on about 10 Lbs...not to mean punishing workouts that ultimately grind you down either...just moving your body everyday. When I'm moving regularly (and I don't really do anything outlandish) maintenance is pretty easy.

As an aside, I found this maintenance meal plan...I guess kind of bizarre:

Young, who is not treating Luntz, was concerned about his one-meal-a-day routine: “You don't have to eat the second you wake up if you're not a breakfast person, but you don't want to let hours and hours go by… You’re starving and then when you eat that one meal, you don't even know when to stop,” she said.

Her menu suggestions for weight maintenance included:

Breakfast: A hard-boiled egg and a slice of whole wheat toast with some avocado.

Lunch: Salad with grilled chicken, with 1-2 tablespoons of olive oil-based dressing, plus some quinoa or beans.

Afternoon snack: Apple with peanut butter.

Dinner: Grilled salmon with sautéed vegetables and a healthy starch such as brown rice, wild rice or a baked sweet potato.

For me, this kind of menu would be an aggressive weight loss menu plan, not a maintenance plan...I'm not sure on what planet an adult male would maintain on that unless the lunch and dinner portion sizes were just huge. I'd absolutely be starving on that...it seems like you'd really have to load up the portions to even hit 1500 calories.

My overall takeaway from the article is that his approach in general to losing weight and then also trying to maintain that loss was aggressive (on numerous fronts) and highly restrictive. That is going to break down pretty much anyone mentally.

Do I have to say what I'd type if he were here? Because really, I'm semi-secretly not a very nice person, and a story like this taxes my patience.

He dropped 60 pounds in 6-7 months, which is pretty fast as an average rate, and started at 238 pounds at 5'9", BMI 35.1. He did have health reasons to go fast at first, but I don't think he probably really needed to go that fast for that long, to achieve what was needed for health reasons. Around here, we'd probably tell him not to do that, rather to slow down as loss proceeded. One of many bad things that can happen from fast loss is hormonally-based snap-back hunger sometime in the early stages of maintenance. At 170, BMI 25.1 (still overweight, but his "ideal weight"), or maybe at his regain to 190 (BMI 28.1), he's hungry. Surprise!

If the article is to be believed, he tried pretty much every faddy tricksy thing, to achieve the weight loss. Around here, we'd probably tell him that all that faddy stuff is non-essential for most people, and that it would be a good idea to find a sustainable routine that can keep him reasonably full and reasonably happy long term, that the fad-stuff is good if it's helpful and sustainable for you, otherwise pointless. One of many bad things that can happen when people don't experiment, find, then groove in sustainable habits during weight loss is that they crash and burn in maintenance. Now he's crashing and burning in maintenance. Surprise!

He's a well-off guy, evidently, so he hired a chef and dietitian to hold his hand. Sweet. Cynically, I'm wondering if they built some job security into the situation: Clearly, he needs them in his life, or he can't maintain (who knows, maybe can't *with* them in his life). He essentially learned nothing, perhaps in part because he hired people to do it for him. His new routine doesn't make him happy, so it's hard to stick to. Surprise!

This may be unfair, but looking at his "after" photo, he still looks a bit on the doughy side, thinner but not especially fit. The article mentions 10K steps (another thing I'd argue is also faddy, in the sense of hyped beyond its universal necessity, but it does help many people to get more NEAT in their day). He doesn't mention trainers or workouts. The National Weight Control Registry analyses suggest that increased exercise helps people maintain a healthy weight after weight loss. He mentions finding scale drops "motivating". Any of us who've gotten through loss to reach maintenance know that we'd better have found an alternative motivation source(s) by then, or found a way to rely on something other than motivation (like practical, enjoyable - or at least tolerable - habits).

Because of the pandemic, he lost weight under unusual, constrained conditions, and it sounds like when he was back in usual conditions without the constraints he struggled. Again, that seems like a failure of foresight.

He may be a wealthy guy, but if he's running a public company somewhere, this story would give me pause about buying stock in it: Lack of foresight, poor planning for future conditions, no risk-management strategy, following fads, no indication of *personally* learning from others' experience (he hired surrogates), etc. As an aside, it's kind of ironic that a pollster dude doesn't seem to have paid any attention to the National Weight Control Registry, as far as anything the article implies.

If he were here, I'd tell him to get some exercise/fitness goals as a substitute for scale-weight motivation, expect a long period of difficult adaptation because of suboptimal approaches during weight loss, find a personally-satiating routine with good nutrition that's practical for him and his lifestyle (i.e., lose the fad attachment, think n=1). (In a real thread, I'd probably tag PsychoD for some science and tough love, but I won't tag him here to take his time with theoretical discussion.)

He seems to have gained weight in the first place by sheer sybaritic rich-boy self-indulgence in his 20s ("I ate whatever I wanted to eat, whenever I wanted to eat it. So if I wanted an ice cream cone, I had; if I wanted cake, I had it. If I wanted a second plate of spaghetti, why not? By the way, let me emphasize, I was happy."), and he let that baby-feline run until major health consequences arrived in his 50s. Now, he's decided he'd rather be fat and happy, vs. thinner and healthy. That's his choice. Choices: We pretty much all have some.

In the last analysis, I'd also want to tell him to stop whining, because it's pointless and self-indulgent, but I probably wouldn't because I do try to pretend to be a nice person 🙄, having found that to be more effective as a way to influence people. Why even bother typing, if not trying to do so in a way that people will consider the advice? 🤷‍♀️

psychod787 wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

Do I have to say what I'd type if he were here? Because really, I'm semi-secretly not a very nice person, and a story like this taxes my patience.

He dropped 60 pounds in 6-7 months, which is pretty fast as an average rate, and started at 238 pounds at 5'9", BMI 35.1. He did have health reasons to go fast at first, but I don't think he probably really needed to go that fast for that long, to achieve what was needed for health reasons. Around here, we'd probably tell him not to do that, rather to slow down as loss proceeded. One of many bad things that can happen from fast loss is hormonally-based snap-back hunger sometime in the early stages of maintenance. At 170, BMI 25.1 (still overweight, but his "ideal weight"), or maybe at his regain to 190 (BMI 28.1), he's hungry. Surprise!

If the article is to be believed, he tried pretty much every faddy tricksy thing, to achieve the weight loss. Around here, we'd probably tell him that all that faddy stuff is non-essential for most people, and that it would be a good idea to find a sustainable routine that can keep him reasonably full and reasonably happy long term, that the fad-stuff is good if it's helpful and sustainable for you, otherwise pointless. One of many bad things that can happen when people don't experiment, find, then groove in sustainable habits during weight loss is that they crash and burn in maintenance. Now he's crashing and burning in maintenance. Surprise!

He's a well-off guy, evidently, so he hired a chef and dietitian to hold his hand. Sweet. Cynically, I'm wondering if they built some job security into the situation: Clearly, he needs them in his life, or he can't maintain (who knows, maybe can't *with* them in his life). He essentially learned nothing, perhaps in part because he hired people to do it for him. His new routine doesn't make him happy, so it's hard to stick to. Surprise!

This may be unfair, but looking at his "after" photo, he still looks a bit on the doughy side, thinner but not especially fit. The article mentions 10K steps (another thing I'd argue is also faddy, in the sense of hyped beyond its universal necessity, but it does help many people to get more NEAT in their day). He doesn't mention trainers or workouts. The National Weight Control Registry analyses suggest that increased exercise helps people maintain a healthy weight after weight loss. He mentions finding scale drops "motivating". Any of us who've gotten through loss to reach maintenance know that we'd better have found an alternative motivation source(s) by then, or found a way to rely on something other than motivation (like practical, enjoyable - or at least tolerable - habits).

Because of the pandemic, he lost weight under unusual, constrained conditions, and it sounds like when he was back in usual conditions without the constraints he struggled. Again, that seems like a failure of foresight.

He may be a wealthy guy, but if he's running a public company somewhere, this story would give me pause about buying stock in it: Lack of foresight, poor planning for future conditions, no risk-management strategy, following fads, no indication of *personally* learning from others' experience (he hired surrogates), etc. As an aside, it's kind of ironic that a pollster dude doesn't seem to have paid any attention to the National Weight Control Registry, as far as anything the article implies.

If he were here, I'd tell him to get some exercise/fitness goals as a substitute for scale-weight motivation, expect a long period of difficult adaptation because of suboptimal approaches during weight loss, find a personally-satiating routine with good nutrition that's practical for him and his lifestyle (i.e., lose the fad attachment, think n=1). (In a real thread, I'd probably tag PsychoD for some science and tough love, but I won't tag him here to take his time with theoretical discussion.)

He seems to have gained weight in the first place by sheer sybaritic rich-boy self-indulgence in his 20s ("I ate whatever I wanted to eat, whenever I wanted to eat it. So if I wanted an ice cream cone, I had; if I wanted cake, I had it. If I wanted a second plate of spaghetti, why not? By the way, let me emphasize, I was happy."), and he let that baby-feline run until major health consequences arrived in his 50s. Now, he's decided he'd rather be fat and happy, vs. thinner and healthy. That's his choice. Choices: We pretty much all have some.

In the last analysis, I'd also want to tell him to stop whining, because it's pointless and self-indulgent, but I probably wouldn't because I do try to pretend to be a nice person 🙄, having found that to be more effective as a way to influence people. Why even bother typing, if not trying to do so in a way that people will consider the advice? 🤷‍♀️

PsychoD for some science and tough love, but I won't tag him here to take his time with theoretical discussion.)
No need to Tag me Aunt Granny, I'm always stalking that Devilishly handsome young man @PAV8888

but I probably wouldn't because I do try to pretend to be a nice person
RIGHT....... Fact checker said, "thats a lie" You are one of the nicest people on here.

Truth is, I feel for Mr. Lanz. The hunger can be real. I think that Mr. Lanz is just below his settling range for his lifestyle, weight history, food history, and genetics. Honestly all the science is above me most days.(Starts singing, "All the science, I don't understand. It's just my job 5 days a week. Rocket Man!") Anyways, I like observational studies. When many people change their diet to a less refined, lower energy dense, higher protein, less rewarding diet, they lose weight without the natural compensatory responses we see in most weight loss. Why? Hmm... Not the place. Rapidity of weight loss? Well people who undergo weight loss surgery, lose weight rapidly, usually without the corresponding increase in hunger. They also have one of the highest rates of weight loss maintenance. Even they regain some weight, but still settle below their original weight, this with the ability to eat enough calories now to maintain that old weight. I think Mr. Lanz needs to take a dose of getting real. he might be able to maintain 200lbs, but this is far better than his old weight. IS it hunger or cravings? Most of us Western folks have no idea what TRUE hunger is. Anyways, JMHO.

I may get some disagrees but if this guy was my friend, I'd tell him to quit being a whiny little *kitten*. He had a huge wake up call suffering a stroke, lost the weight that was killing him and now says he's hungry. As @psychod787 says he doesn't know what hunger is. If he regains the weight, most likely he won't be as lucky when the next stroke comes around.

I'd tell him to get the counseling help he most likely needs.