Start Slow or Cut Everything?

Lietchi wrote: »

The idea is to change your habits long-term, to lose the weight AND keep it off. In that perspective, I think it's best to start slow.

If you just log your food intake as it is now, without trying to lose weight, for a week or so, you might already see some areas where you can make simple changes. It really depends on your specific situation.
For some people, just switching to sugar free soda will have a significant impact on calories intake, for example. Or reducing condiments. Or reducing the frequency of snacks, or finding lower calorie alternatives that taste good.

By introducing gradual changes, you're less likely to throw in the towel and give up.

Wishing you success!

While I agree the "just log for now" is really good advice in theory, I think for some people it may be hard to sustain the high learning curve of logging without getting any results for a week or more because they haven't actually changed their intake.

OP, if that sounds like you, you might want to log and aim for a reduced calorie intake, so you'll hopefully see some immediate scale movement (don't expect it to be huge -- even if you're very heavy, two pounds a week is a fast pace, although some people initially see bigger drops because of losing water weight). Don't worry so much -- especially at first -- about what you're eating and whether it's healthy. You say you have a lot to lose, and in that situation, the health benefits of just losing some weight are likely to be far greater than trying have all you food be "healthy."

Once you feel like you're comfortable with logging and able to hit your calorie goal most of the time, you can revisit the issue of whether there are specific foods you need to restrict or eliminate. Personally, I've found it much more helpful to focus on foods I need to eat more of to reach specific goals, like more protein or more fiber.

First, psychologically I find it easier to think about what I want to eat for my health than to think about things "I can't have."

Second, once I eat the things that help me achieve my nutritional goals, I generally find I have less room (both in my calorie budget and in my stomach) for less nutritionally dense foods.

Third, I believe that eating things that benefit you nutritionally is more important than not eating things whose biggest downside is usually that they're not nutritionally dense, or whose biggest downside is that people on the Internet claim that they're bad for you.

Best of luck on your journey.

I'm all or nothing. I know how easy it is to get off track, so I just don't bother. It's not worth it.

I looked a lot more at what I needed to add to my diet to make it more healthful than cutting stuff out. The only thing I really cut out was full sugar soda because I was drinking 3-6 per day. Even then, I weened myself down over the course of about a month.

I also decided to start brown bagging my lunch instead of going out every single day...but I kept, and 10 years later still keep one day per week out for lunch at work. My diet wasn't really particularly "bad"...the biggest issue was not getting enough fruits and vegetables, so I made that a point.

Do what works for you. Try one method and if it works stick with it. Any type of change and to keep it permanent is a journey not a race.

I'll chime in on the side of "slow and steady."

Some background: there is a very clear mathematical relationship, which holds true for all human bodies (and all living bodies tbh, but I'm pretty certain we're all human here), between the amount of energy one takes in and the amount of energy one expends within a given timeframe, that affects bodyweight. We refer to it here as "CICO." Stands for "calories in, calories out." Basically: It costs a certain amount of energy to be alive (CO), and you pay that energy bill with calories from food and drink (CI). If you remember your "greater than" and "less than" signs from your arithmetic classes in school, it looks like this:

CI>CO: weight gain (you took in more energy than it cost to be alive for that amount of time, so your body stores the extra as fat for a rainy day. Save just 100 calories like this each day for a year - that's just half a Snickers bar - and you'll have gained ten pounds of fat.)
CI=CO: weight maintenance (you took in exactly enough energy to pay your being-alive bills that day, no more, no less. If most of your days are like this, your weight will remain stable over time.)
CI<CO: weight loss (the amount of energy in your food and drink was less than it cost to be alive today, so your body has to dip into its "savings" (your stored fat) to make up the difference. Short yourself 100 calories like this each day for a year, and you'll similarly lose 10lb.)

So, I am almost 31 years old, and I am obese. Which means that for most of the past 11,000 days or so, my CI has been higher > than my CO. For the first few thousand days, that was fine, I was a baby and it's a baby's job to grow. I just never quite managed to shift out of that growth mindset after about day 5000, haha. However, for the last 565 of those 11,000 days, my CI has mostly been lower < than my CO, and as such I've lost nearly 70lbs in that time. (I still have about 35 to go, I think). I've done it by making small, simple changes to my daily food and activity choices - I want to make it as easy as possible to make the same good choice again and again, forever. So I plan and prep meals in advance; I pack afternoon snacks in my lunch and plan to eat them at 3 PM when I hit that slump rather than hitting up the vending machine; I find lower-calorie swaps for less-important-to-me foods to make room for the stuff I can't live without; I find ways to move more in my day-to-day; I find intentional movement that I enjoy and will keep doing. If something's not working, I make another change, because I have to find a permanent way of living my life if I expect the new body I'm slowly unearthing to stick around. Living the way I did for my first 10,000 days got me to where I was on my Day 1, and my daily routine and menu look much different now than they did 565 days ago, but if I had woken up on my Day 1 and tried to do all of the things that are part of my routine now, I would have failed. I needed to start where I was and build up to where I am.

Start by gathering data - you can't make changes if you don't know what specifically needs to change. Start by logging your food and activity as honestly as you can for a week or two, to see where your starting point actually is. How much are you currently eating? How much does your body actually need to sustain your activity level? How much can you increase that activity level, and/or how much do you need to decrease that intake? What can you change about your daily routine to make either of those things easier to do? Do you need to change the time you wake up in the morning, or go to bed at night? Do you need to change how or when you shop for groceries? Do you need to learn more about cooking or nutrition? Figure out one small change you can make and implement that for a week, see how it goes. If it sticks, add another small change. If it's too onerous, figure out a different change you can make and try that instead, until you find something you can sustain without feeling punished.