Advice/complaint

ConflictedJedi wrote: »

Hello there! So I’m starting my journey about 2.5 weeks ago. First I was trying to go for loss of 1.5 pounds a week. I wasn’t happy gaining pounds within my second week even tho I was fine under the 3 pounds by 2nd week format. So. I’m going harder. 16:8 IF timeframe AND lower calorie intake for the 2lbs a week loss. Idk how smart it is to do so. But I’m tired of not being happy with myself. I ideally have 30-40 pounds to lose. Today is my 2nd day with this new fasting format. Let me tell you, I AM starving!!! It wasn’t so bad yesterday, but maybe since I ate a tad earlier due to my work lunch schedule being rushed. But I can use advice or support to keep this up!

Y'know, maybe it's just that I'm hedonistic and kinda lazy (because I am), but personally I would never add tactics that make things harder. (I lost weight fine anyway, maintained the healthy weight for 9+ years since, BTW.)

Faster loss isn't necessarily better loss, and making the plan more difficult to follow makes it less likely to succeed. How happy will you be with yourself if this derails?

You asked for a 1.5 pound weekly loss rate. You actually lost 3 pounds in two weeks, sounds like, right on target. Scale weight jumping up and down by a few pounds day to day, sometimes even week to week, is absolutely normal. If at appropriate and consistent calorie level, it's mostly about water retention fluctuations and different amounts of weight in the digestive tract, not about fat loss.

Fat loss is much slower, even when fast. Two pounds a week of fat loss is a whopping 4.6 ounces per day, barely over a quarter pound. Your pound and a half per week would be just under 3.5 ounces per day. Our bodies can be 60%+ water, and that will shift by multiple pounds daily, not to mention the part where an apple or the contents of a water glass weigh the same in my digestive system as in my hand, until fully metabolized. Those latter things will play peek-a-boo on the body weight scale with the slower fat loss rate.

The water retention in particular is part of how our healthy bodies stays healthy. They know what they're doing. We don't want to mess with that: Better to understand and accept it.

Because of all those fluctuations for reasons other than fat, it's going to take at least one full menstrual cycle (to compare body weight at the same relative point in at least 2 different cycles) or 4-6 weeks for those without such cycles, to get a reasonable experience-based estimate of actual fat loss. Fat loss shows up in the many-week trend. Water and waste are day to day changes. Muscle mass changes take months, absent some dire disease.

Honestly, if fasting or two pounds a week make it harder, why do it? Losing any meaningful total amount of weight, like your 30-40 pounds, is going to take many weeks to months. (It took me a bit under a year to lose around 50 pounds, faster at first, close to 2 pounds a week, ultra slow near goal weight in order to stay healthy.)

If you were actually able to lose 40 pounds at 2 pounds a week, which is (a) probably not achievable, and (b) probably not health-promoting, it would take 20 weeks. Can you keep this up for around 5 months?

I'd suggest making an easier plan. A sensibly moderate, achievable, relatively easy weight loss process can get a person to goal weight in less calendar time than some aggressive plan that causes bouts of deprivation-triggered over-eating, breaks in the action, or even giving up altogether because it's Just. Too. Hard.

As a bonus, a more gradual plan can help a person find and practice eating and activity habits they can keep up long term to stay at a healthy weight, ideally permanently. I don't know about you, but I can't keep up white-knuckled motivation or willpower to continue some extreme routine for the rest of my life, but I want to stay at a healthy weight that long if at all possible. Being at a healthy weight turned out to be a huge quality of life improvement for me.

Give it some thought. I'd recommend going easier rather than going harder, because of the potential positive impact on health, plus the higher probability of success. I'd recommend settling into a routine you can sustain, not the too-common "lose weight fast then go back to normal" that is the standard recipe for yo-yo weight loss followed by regain of those pounds plus friends.

Best wishes, sincerely: I'd like to see you succeed!