What does it mean to lose weight in a SENSIBLE and SUSTAINABLE fashion?
NovusDies
Posts: 8,940 Member
It occurs to me that we have never actually discussed this topic even though many of you probably saw me mention this as a requirement when I provided the LL link.
I think the specifics of the definition are going to be different for different people but here are the highlights of my thoughts and I, as always, welcome feedback.
Sensible
In a nutshell sensible means that a person is losing weight in a whole health fashion. Losing faster than recommended and risking the side effects of poor nutrition is not sensible. Overdoing exercise, excessive fasting, crash dieting, using get-thin quick internet/tabloid methods are other examples (not a comprehensive list) of things that are not sensible. This does not include "named" diets. I encourage anyone that is struggling to control their hunger to try ideas like low carb or intermittent fasting. Just know that they are tools and that a calorie deficit still drives weight loss. A diet is a fad if you decide to do it for the wrong reasons. It is a means of success if you try it and it makes your road easier. Easier does not mean the scale moves. Easier means that you struggle less.
Sustainable
Sustainable means that a person understands that weight loss alone is not the measure of a successful plan. I have lost some weight many times. I have done it in very terrible ways. I was one of the stupid people using that pharmaceutical that bound to fat to keep it from being digested and it often leaked out of your rear. I lost weight. It wasn't sustainable.
Simply put a sustainable plan is one that you can still (mostly) easily do on your bad days. If you can do it on your bad days you won't need that much motivation, willpower, or discipline to do it on your easy days. If everyday is a struggle and you need huge amounts of motivation and accountability you probably need to tweak your plan some more.
A sustainable plan is flexible and forgiving. It needs to bend in the right places because your life doesn't stop just because you choose to lose weight. You also don't stop being human and making mistakes when you start losing weight either.
I think the specifics of the definition are going to be different for different people but here are the highlights of my thoughts and I, as always, welcome feedback.
Sensible
In a nutshell sensible means that a person is losing weight in a whole health fashion. Losing faster than recommended and risking the side effects of poor nutrition is not sensible. Overdoing exercise, excessive fasting, crash dieting, using get-thin quick internet/tabloid methods are other examples (not a comprehensive list) of things that are not sensible. This does not include "named" diets. I encourage anyone that is struggling to control their hunger to try ideas like low carb or intermittent fasting. Just know that they are tools and that a calorie deficit still drives weight loss. A diet is a fad if you decide to do it for the wrong reasons. It is a means of success if you try it and it makes your road easier. Easier does not mean the scale moves. Easier means that you struggle less.
Sustainable
Sustainable means that a person understands that weight loss alone is not the measure of a successful plan. I have lost some weight many times. I have done it in very terrible ways. I was one of the stupid people using that pharmaceutical that bound to fat to keep it from being digested and it often leaked out of your rear. I lost weight. It wasn't sustainable.
Simply put a sustainable plan is one that you can still (mostly) easily do on your bad days. If you can do it on your bad days you won't need that much motivation, willpower, or discipline to do it on your easy days. If everyday is a struggle and you need huge amounts of motivation and accountability you probably need to tweak your plan some more.
A sustainable plan is flexible and forgiving. It needs to bend in the right places because your life doesn't stop just because you choose to lose weight. You also don't stop being human and making mistakes when you start losing weight either.
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Sensible to me, means you can stand in the check out line at a grocery store anywhere and read the headlines on the magazines in the racks and chuckle to yourself on the outrageous promises on how to lose weight. That sound to good to be true, well because they are.
I often go to Pinterest for recipes for low carb. And some of the things that people swear by on there. There should be a roll your eye button.
I have tried a few wonky things in my day, totally can admit to that. The worst by far and was under so medical supervision Opti-Fast. Did bad, bad things to my liver enzymes took a long time to recover from that episode.
So what I have finally learned sensible to me; is eating foods that appeal to me, dishes that I can prepare and do not have to buy a bunch of special foods. And not have to take ten different supplements because some celebrity is saying it is good for us to do so. Mostly likely they are not doing so either.
Sustainable is simple find something that will be a way to eat that lasts long beyond the time of losing weight. And this is where for decades I have had issues. But this time I have really worked on behavior modification as to how I view food.
People should get together to enjoy time spent with friends and family first. And food should be secondary. Where for so long it seems like it has been the reverse. Some people when I have explained this to them, they get it and like the idea. Others think I am stark raving mad. And I get that too.4 -
It occurs to me that we have never actually discussed this topic even though many of you probably saw me mention this as a requirement when I provided the LL link.
I think the specifics of the definition are going to be different for different people but here are the highlights of my thoughts and I, as always, welcome feedback.
Sensible
In a nutshell sensible means that a person is losing weight in a whole health fashion. Losing faster than recommended and risking the side effects of poor nutrition is not sensible. Overdoing exercise, excessive fasting, crash dieting, using get-thin quick internet/tabloid methods are other examples (not a comprehensive list) of things that are not sensible. This does not include "named" diets. I encourage anyone that is struggling to control their hunger to try ideas like low carb or intermittent fasting. Just know that they are tools and that a calorie deficit still drives weight loss. A diet is a fad if you decide to do it for the wrong reasons. It is a means of success if you try it and it makes your road easier. Easier does not mean the scale moves. Easier means that you struggle less.
Sustainable
Sustainable means that a person understands that weight loss alone is not the measure of a successful plan. I have lost some weight many times. I have done it in very terrible ways. I was one of the stupid people using that pharmaceutical that bound to fat to keep it from being digested and it often leaked out of your rear. I lost weight. It wasn't sustainable.
Simply put a sustainable plan is one that you can still (mostly) easily do on your bad days. If you can do it on your bad days you won't need that much motivation, willpower, or discipline to do it on your easy days. If everyday is a struggle and you need huge amounts of motivation and accountability you probably need to tweak your plan some more.
A sustainable plan is flexible and forgiving. It needs to bend in the right places because your life doesn't stop just because you choose to lose weight. You also don't stop being human and making mistakes when you start losing weight either.
I read this three times this morning!...I really needed this!2 -
I think I need to go back to basics this lockdown has done me no good at all, it's been like an all inclusive holiday with all the food in the house.
Snacks and alcohol have crept up, they were always there but they're in excess at the moment and very much off plan.
I'm going to reset my weight on here too, I'm considerably up since my last low so it definitely isn't water weight.....
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I'm glad this came back up to the top of the threads! I have never thought of sustainability quite in this sense, and I like it. I always think about "sustainability" in terms of "What method makes me not hate life?", because I know that I will have to do this for life if I want to lose all the weight and then maintain it.Simply put a sustainable plan is one that you can still (mostly) easily do on your bad days. If you can do it on your bad days you won't need that much motivation, willpower, or discipline to do it on your easy days. If everyday is a struggle and you need huge amounts of motivation and accountability you probably need to tweak your plan some more.2 -
I think most of us know how to lose weight...it’s the maintenance that will be the biggest challenge!...1
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I think most people THINK they know how to lose weight, but what they think is necessary has been predicated upon what they've learned from media, the diet industry over the years, fad gurus, and even the medical community, and much of what comes from those sources is misinformation at best, and outright false information at worst. and this is proven by the tiny percentage of people who lose the weight successfully and keep it off successfully.
Look at what most people do when they start a diet plan: they think they have to sharply cut how much they are eating (doesn't matter that they only have 20 lbs to lose; they MUST eat less than 1200 calories a day - and I've even seen men doing that! And sadly, there are doctors who are telling this to their patients!). they think they can only eat "healthy" foods and sharply limit what they'll let themselves eat - in some cases, cutting out perfectly nutritious foods. they think they need to follow the latest fad, whether it be low fat, low carb, paleo, carnivore, vegan, whatever. They think they have to strong-arm their way through never eating pie or cake or cookies or a hamburger or soda until they finish their diet. They think they must start an extreme exercise program or spend an hour a day at the gym. And if you ask the average person who starts this, you'll find that they think they only need to do this until they lose the weight, they aren't thinking long term or true life-style change. So couple the extreme changes with the idea that its all temporary, and you have a recipe for failure right there.
Sustainability is not something that is included in most diet plans, even though its a vital component to success. Now if I were a paranoid, suspicious-minded person, I'd say that the exclusion of sustainability is purposefully done by the diet industry because if people lost the weight and kept it off, they wouldn't need their services anymore
But in all cases, a person who truly wants to lose the weight and better their health needs to look at the long term picture and make adjustments they can live with in the long term.
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I guess I meant that anyone can lose weight!...it’s keeping the weight off that is the challenge!...I have lost over 100 lbs three different times!...once counting 1200 calories a day, once on the infamous Phen Phen and once by not eating much at all except meat...I am looking forward to getting the weight off and keeping it off!...and keeping it off in a sustainable way!2
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It occurs to me that we have never actually discussed this topic even though many of you probably saw me mention this as a requirement when I provided the LL link.
I think the specifics of the definition are going to be different for different people but here are the highlights of my thoughts and I, as always, welcome feedback.
Sensible
In a nutshell sensible means that a person is losing weight in a whole health fashion. Losing faster than recommended and risking the side effects of poor nutrition is not sensible. Overdoing exercise, excessive fasting, crash dieting, using get-thin quick internet/tabloid methods are other examples (not a comprehensive list) of things that are not sensible. This does not include "named" diets. I encourage anyone that is struggling to control their hunger to try ideas like low carb or intermittent fasting. Just know that they are tools and that a calorie deficit still drives weight loss. A diet is a fad if you decide to do it for the wrong reasons. It is a means of success if you try it and it makes your road easier. Easier does not mean the scale moves. Easier means that you struggle less.
Sustainable
Sustainable means that a person understands that weight loss alone is not the measure of a successful plan. I have lost some weight many times. I have done it in very terrible ways. I was one of the stupid people using that pharmaceutical that bound to fat to keep it from being digested and it often leaked out of your rear. I lost weight. It wasn't sustainable.
Simply put a sustainable plan is one that you can still (mostly) easily do on your bad days. If you can do it on your bad days you won't need that much motivation, willpower, or discipline to do it on your easy days. If everyday is a struggle and you need huge amounts of motivation and accountability you probably need to tweak your plan some more.
A sustainable plan is flexible and forgiving. It needs to bend in the right places because your life doesn't stop just because you choose to lose weight. You also don't stop being human and making mistakes when you start losing weight either.It occurs to me that we have never actually discussed this topic even though many of you probably saw me mention this as a requirement when I provided the LL link.
I think the specifics of the definition are going to be different for different people but here are the highlights of my thoughts and I, as always, welcome feedback.
Sensible
In a nutshell sensible means that a person is losing weight in a whole health fashion. Losing faster than recommended and risking the side effects of poor nutrition is not sensible. Overdoing exercise, excessive fasting, crash dieting, using get-thin quick internet/tabloid methods are other examples (not a comprehensive list) of things that are not sensible. This does not include "named" diets. I encourage anyone that is struggling to control their hunger to try ideas like low carb or intermittent fasting. Just know that they are tools and that a calorie deficit still drives weight loss. A diet is a fad if you decide to do it for the wrong reasons. It is a means of success if you try it and it makes your road easier. Easier does not mean the scale moves. Easier means that you struggle less.
Sustainable
Sustainable means that a person understands that weight loss alone is not the measure of a successful plan. I have lost some weight many times. I have done it in very terrible ways. I was one of the stupid people using that pharmaceutical that bound to fat to keep it from being digested and it often leaked out of your rear. I lost weight. It wasn't sustainable.
Simply put a sustainable plan is one that you can still (mostly) easily do on your bad days. If you can do it on your bad days you won't need that much motivation, willpower, or discipline to do it on your easy days. If everyday is a struggle and you need huge amounts of motivation and accountability you probably need to tweak your plan some more.
A sustainable plan is flexible and forgiving. It needs to bend in the right places because your life doesn't stop just because you choose to lose weight. You also don't stop being human and making mistakes when you start losing weight either.
This is another great read for old and especially new members!2 -
Agreed! Good reminders.1
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It occurs to me that we have never actually discussed this topic even though many of you probably saw me mention this as a requirement when I provided the LL link.
I think the specifics of the definition are going to be different for different people but here are the highlights of my thoughts and I, as always, welcome feedback.
Sensible
In a nutshell sensible means that a person is losing weight in a whole health fashion. Losing faster than recommended and risking the side effects of poor nutrition is not sensible. Overdoing exercise, excessive fasting, crash dieting, using get-thin quick internet/tabloid methods are other examples (not a comprehensive list) of things that are not sensible. This does not include "named" diets. I encourage anyone that is struggling to control their hunger to try ideas like low carb or intermittent fasting. Just know that they are tools and that a calorie deficit still drives weight loss. A diet is a fad if you decide to do it for the wrong reasons. It is a means of success if you try it and it makes your road easier. Easier does not mean the scale moves. Easier means that you struggle less.
Sustainable
Sustainable means that a person understands that weight loss alone is not the measure of a successful plan. I have lost some weight many times. I have done it in very terrible ways. I was one of the stupid people using that pharmaceutical that bound to fat to keep it from being digested and it often leaked out of your rear. I lost weight. It wasn't sustainable.
Simply put a sustainable plan is one that you can still (mostly) easily do on your bad days. If you can do it on your bad days you won't need that much motivation, willpower, or discipline to do it on your easy days. If everyday is a struggle and you need huge amounts of motivation and accountability you probably need to tweak your plan some more.
A sustainable plan is flexible and forgiving. It needs to bend in the right places because your life doesn't stop just because you choose to lose weight. You also don't stop being human and making mistakes when you start losing weight either.
I often go back to our leaders original posts….if you haven’t done this, you are missing a lot of helpful and informative posts….this post is one of the ones I go back and read a lot!…maybe it will help some of you!1 -
Thank you Connie for finding this post. Lots of wisdom here. I think I’m pretty good doing sustainability. I can handle staying at my current weight fairly easily. But I still need to keep going to figure out how to lose a bit more without doing drastic changes to my life.2
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Struggling at the moment & these posts - as well as the “Thoughts & epiphanies” posts - also PAV’s wisdom & Bella’s work in progress - are giving me some big “light bulb”moments, but bl**dy h*ll, this path to a healthier me is getting harder and harder! Need some help please….
Weight loss was going so well, but have re gained (?) 10lbs 😒.
Currently taking antidepressants, but starting to taper those down now.
Life is not such a roller coaster any more and re engaging with MFP and less anxious down than earlier in the year.
I was warned some weight gain could happen on them, but really the gain is because I went too fast and the 1 to 2lb losses were to much and started to make me ill - increased fatigue, hair loss and dizzyness / nausea. (have couple of autoimmune disorders) so had to be sensible - took time out and basically refed!
Well, the weeks turned into s few months of inconsistent logging = the 10lbs, but at least I do not feel so rough!
Although I have around 73 to 88 lbs to lose (to normal BMI!), I’ve read and re read the wise posts in LL and pleased to say logging back up to scratch over the past few weeks!
This last week, I have had days where I have gone to maintainence calories & one day over that -by circa 200 calories
I am starting to lose again .. I think - 0.1 lb this week! 😳😏
I am not coping with the hormone effects of calorie reduction - my inability to sleep is miserable.
To the extent I have resorted to sleeping tablets, which is making me a tad uneasy… to say the least!
I don’t take them every night, but I have a demanding job and so can’t exist on poor sleep all the time - coupled with the cycle of no energy to function & thus adds to poor / excess food & exercise choices I then made….
So, I am well hydrated - 2 litres + daily.
Started to increase protein in diet (managing 20g most days from 14 -15g). Trying to reduce limit crap unnutritious foods too…
I’ve also started to incorporate weight lifting and resistance training exercises, eating back 1/2 or sometimes all of my conservatively, estimated exercise calories
I am having to exercise gently as far as my rheumy joints and lupus bod can tolerate.
Any comments / more advice/ more support would be most welcome🙂
Thank you in advance Jan x5 -
Hi @Janatki,
From my countless years of battling my weight, I've realised that sometimes your mind and body are up for the challenge so you can really go for it, and at other times you need to take it much more slowly, and learn to be grateful for small incremental gains in health and fitness without trying to push for faster progress.
Well done for getting your logging back up to scratch. Good logging is - in my opinion - the best place to start. Even just doing that for a while is enough, even if it means you're just accurately logging eating above maintenance. Good logging lets you see patterns in your eating - the foods that you turn to over and over again, that bring comfort and which nurture you emotionally as well as physically.
I think for someone with chronic health issues, keeping a mood/symptoms/energy journal can also be useful. I don't advocate writing reams, but just a line or two each day commenting on how you feel bodily and emotionally can be really useful when used in conjunction with your food log. Using the two logs in conjunction helped my husband identify that he's intolerant to certain grains, even in the smallest quantities. Without the symptom log, he may never have made the connection just from reviewing his food log.
Once the logging is up to speed, you can then work on eating at a deficit. Not a big deficit - and not necessarily every day - but a modest deficit when averaged over the week.
I think macros are pretty important, and 20g of protein a day seems on the low side. The recommendation is to eat around 0.75g of protein for every kilo of body weight. So you should be aiming for somewhere around 60g day. Protein helps with satiety, so if you included some protein at every meal it would help you feel fuller for longer.
Personally I like to eat all my calories as 'proper food', and by choice I don't save any calories for snacks. That would be a deal-breaker for a lot of people. My rationale is that calories don't stretch far, and I don't want to waste any on empty calories - but for some people the empty calories are vital for keeping them happy and motivated. Only you know which category you belong to. But I would say that even if you do save calories for snacking, try to make your main meals as nutritious as possible. Really try to jam-pack each meal with as many nutrients as possible (without going down the mung-bean and tofu wholemeal quiche route. Ugh.) Make your food healthy, colourful and palatable, so you get pleasure in preparing it and eating it...food should nourish the soul as well as the body! And if you do snack, try and make some of your snacks healthy too. Half a tbsp of Nutella mixed into Greek Yoghurt gives you a sweet hit alongside a dollop of protein; stir in a few chopped walnuts or some pistachios too and you have a snack that's both indulgent and healthy. A flapjack and a Jammie Dodger are both high calorie treats, but the flapjack is the better choice from a nutrition perspective. Etc. etc.
But sometimes you just need the Jammie Dodger. And that's absolutely fine.
If energy levels and lack of time/motivation impinge on your food prep/cooking time, consider investing in tools that will take off the pressure. An Instant Pot pays for itself 10 times over in the course of a year and makes it so easy to batch cook soups, curries, chilli, stew, rice pudding, cheesecake, yoghurt etc....and an Air Fryer can be picked up for about £40 on Amazon and is great for chips, roasted veggies, falafel, crispy bacon and heating stuff from frozen such as fish fingers and veggie spring rolls without needing to faff around with putting the oven on when you want something hot and comforting in 15 minutes.
Exercise is the icing on the cake, and is important for mood, health and fitness but definitely ISN'T essential for weight loss. So I'd focus on the food side, and just get out for a walk or a potter on your bike when the mood strikes you. That way if you don't incorporate exercise calories into your baseline, you can eat back all your exercise calories if you need to, and still have a modest weekly deficit.
My sister has chronic health issues, and since we started in March she's lost 12lbs which is a loss rate of just over a third of a pound a week. She would love faster losses, since she has another 70lbs to lose, but she was happier when I pointed out that it's a loss rate of about 20lbs a year. She feels comfortable with her food allowance, doesn't feel deprived, and doesn't feel the need to go off the rails, because her calorie budget allows her to eat her favourite foods. She's now coming to terms with the fact that losing 1-1.5 stones a year over several years is better than trying to lose fast and then giving up because she can't sustain her motivation.5 -
No infinite amounts of wisdom here. And will try to come back to this once I get a chance with a bit more time. Obviously medications are both necessary and come with extra complications at times.
I will quickly second three things Bella mentioned.
Logging and general mindfulness/monitoring/continued engagement: you're still in the game and that's a win by itself
There are times to push and there are times to just stay in the game. Don't over push success. And keep re evaluating how far you can try for incremental wins or at the least limit damage when at the other end.
And yes the protein. Check your log entries for errors because sub 20g seems very low. But that is even verging below minimum recommendations which happened to be about half the currently considered weight loss recommendations (check out examine.com protein level articles. And you don't have to buy or subscribe anything to read them). Usually would aim for at the very least 0.6g per lb of your top of normal weight range. Assuming health issues don't preclude.2 -
Hi @Bella_Figura!
I know you are right and need to stay in this slow mode….re exercise, have heard weight training helps to lessen the hunger hormone in some way and that is why I’m investing some time to it!
Had another run in with a med car driver on my bike in the Village; no confidence in cycling at the mo!
I cannot abide these sleep issues…. Going to see how it goes, but you may be right that just getting into logging and calories may be enough for now….
My protein isn’t 20 gms - it’s 20% of my daily - doh! But still not up to 60 gms! Will think on that…
I wish I could be as nutrient conscience as you are with my meals. Often am so snowed under at work, that I grab a sarnie, nutritious, but with little thought or planning and usually carbs are through the roof!
This afty though, with your post resounding in took a leaf out of @AlexandraFindsHerself1971 and there is a slow cooked Bean Chilli and Veggi Fajita Bake awaiting to be portioned out for the Fridge and Freezer. Will take the strain out of working and sorting out suppers this week! Though now,I have succumed to a glass of Apothic Red at the local, refused the offer of a bag of crisps though!
Your Instant Pot sounds amazing. I had a pressure cooker, which I used to cook Sunday Roast in,but that has gone to Pressure cooker heaven! I do have an Air Fryer though, will use it more as I am a cook who uses oils and this could help increase protein and reduce using them…. Found some recipes on an online blog - will try and get my protein up - Spiced Haloumi Bites sounds just gorgeous.
Your sister sounds like she will be on the right track following your advice… my mantra needs to be “Slow and Steady Wins the Race, though I’d just would have like a few more pounds off by now, just for my vanity!
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I love my air fryer!….chicken legs with a dry rub on them really turn out good and I love potatoes cooked in it!….one thing I do recommend is a good meat thermometer to use with it!2
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Re thinking protein @PAV8888
Do you rub your spuds with spices @conniewilkins56? Will give them a go!2 -
Re thinking protein @PAV8888
Do you rub your spuds with spices @conniewilkins56? Will give them a go!
I spritz with olive oil and put a little coarse sea salt on them….390 about 25 minutes and then check every five minutes until done…..so good!1 -
Thank you for so much good info in this thread. For me, the biggie, this time around, seems to be losing it slowly enough and learning how to actually maintain each loss. I would love to lose weight much faster but in the past, that has only lead to regaining it all back again.
I really, really want to keep the pounds I lose ....off....for good. So, I guess this falls into the sustainable side of things and perhaps, I'm even becoming a little more sensible about it. It has helped me to read here because suddenly I realize I am on the right track! I am doing my best to log my food and eat in a healthy, sustainable way, most of the time. I feel like I can do this for life, without suffering.
Once I got it through my head that everything is a choice, it just felt easier somehow. It's not like I can't choose to eat unhealthy stuff, once in awhile, if I want to and that helps me to feel - not deprived. I have been consciously choosing, in a much more aware way, if that makes any sense. Perhaps that is part of the sensible stuff -- making more conscious choices?
I seriously was a mindless eater, for much of my life. Whatever I wanted, most of the time, went in, without much thought at all. It was always afterward... when the guilt and the shame crept forward and the hopelessness took hold, that I thought about it all. Didn't stop me from repeating that behaviour, over and over, though.
These days, I decide what I'm going to have and if it's not the healthiest food going, I thoroughly enjoy it and I do not feel bad about eating it. Then, I do my best to get right back on track, next meal. i no longer beat myself up. To me, this seems like... what "normal" people do? I dunno. Maybe I'm becoming a "normal" person, a little at a time? Is that sensible? 4
