2 Months - Gained 2 Pounds - No Noticeable Difference

wow SNEWSOME! that description was amazing! Thank you for the information. It made lots of since and you did well!

That is not my words at all but I'm glad I could share it. There was a post a while back when I joined that I found that in. Banks is the original author!! I do not take credit for any of that!

Oh. okay. i thought you wrote it snewsome. but still thank you for posting. very informative!

Jenbusick - That sounds like a very reasonable way to start shifting my diet. I love barbecue and all fatty meats (pulled pork, barbecue beef...mmmmm...) so maybe I'll work on cutting back on those. Thank you

Oh, man, ME TOO! Had pulled pork (Moe's Original BBQ ) Friday night, and will probably have BBQ at a local place today (maybe brisket. I love brisket. And brisket loves me; I can never get it to leave!)

One of my best BBQ restaurant strategies is to Just Eat Half. I have to really psych myself up to it; it's hard not to just put the whole thing away. But if I only eat half my meal, I do fine at BBQ places.

Your body is like a bucket with a small hole in the bottom. The hole represents energy expenditure; that includes basal metabolic rate, exercise. You are constantly filling it though through your calorie intake.... obviously if we eat more than is escaping the water level will rise (not good if you are trying to lose weight). If you stopped eating altogether you will lose (initially) actual water weight first, especially if you go low carbs. This can be misleading, as your muscles are filled with a mixture of glycogen/water, as you go low carb, your body burns these stores and once depleted turn to burning fat, and in cases of extreme calorie restriction, muscle. The key to burning fat and not muscle is to burn more calories than you take in BUT (and this is a big BUT) gradually, so as not to trigger your bodies starvation mode response (slowing down your bodies metabolism, cannabalizing muscle tissue). You DO NOT want to burn muscle... yes, muscle weighs more than fat, but if you lose muscle weight, and still have the same fat percentage, you all of a sudden weigh less but are fatter relative to your bodyweight. Find a calorie intake to where you are in a deficit of 500 calories a day. This will burn 3500 in a week and that 3500 calories represents a pound of bodyweight, generally fat if you have a decent amount of protein. To put it in perspective, I am 200 lbs and I'm going with an 1800 calorie a day intake. To maintain I need 2300 calories, but I want to get to 180. On diet alone this will get me there in 20 weeks. But I do other activities, like cardio, lifting weights. This will factor in, and I expect to get there in 3-4 months. There are no shortcuts. You can try a crash diet, but you are just looking at water weight or muscle loss, not what you want in the long term. I recommend you take weekly photos to keep track of your journey, this holds you accountable and motivates you as the changes are slow, and to look back yesterday will reveal nothing, but to look back 6 or 12 weeks, now that will be true change and that will reaffirm you're on the right track. It's all diet I'm afraid, calories in vs calories out. You are either in a deficit or you are eating too much to allow the weight loss that you want.