Needing advice on weight loss. Would really appreciate it.

On Aug 20, 5:10 pm, Doug Freyburger wrote:
Shauhnathan wrote:

I am a 23 year old (in 2 days to be exact) female and am 5'6. I've
always been semi- thin, but over the past few years, I have slowly put
on pounds. I did work as a waitress and got down to 137 lbs two years
ago, then got pregnant and had a baby, leaving me at 160, as of last
May.

A woman's figure improves permanently when she has her
first child. It includes some changes in bone structure.
Call it around 5-10 pounds above your pre-baby reasonable
low. So now it is realistic to expect that your new ideal
weight is in the range of 142-148.

I desperately want to be 130 lbs, which would make me about a size 6.
This is ideal for me.

It is no longer your ideal weight. In the movie Gone with the
Wind after Scarlet O'Hara gave birth she insisted that she
could have her figure and her baby both. More than just the
local culture passed in Gone with the Wind.

So I think your goal is 12-18 pounds below your new ideal
weight. You could get there but it would set you up for
unending unrelenting hunger. Not maintainable and of
questionable health value.

-----------------------Very interesting!

Right now, I wear about an 11. Since May of this
year, I have been really working out, consistently. I work out about 5
times a week. When I say work out, I mean a mixture of cardio and
weights. I typically do a full body workout (given to me by a trainer)
about twice a week and the other days I am there, I do cardio for
about an hour. This type of activity is much more than I have ever
done before in my life. I never consistently worked out before now.

Most excellent.

I have tried really hard to eat better since I started working out
consistently. I only drink water, diet drinks and ocassionally sweet
tea.

I'm a low carber so I cringe at the thought of sweet tea, but
that's me not you ...

My diet could definitely be better, though. I have my good days
and bad. Some days I stay right at 1,000 calories,

Let's work the numbers a bit. At a target weight of 142-148
your maintenance calorie count could be 1500 or a bit below that.
Loss work best at about 500 calorie deficit - Cut more and the
body changes its hormone balances to reduce resting
metabolism (commonly called "starvation mode"). At 1000
calories you have selected just the right target intake. Good job.

while others I
don't do so well and eat a fast breakfast, like a biscuit and then eat
out for lunch and so on. I pretty much always keep a running count of
my calories, but food is definitely one downfall to my losing weight.
I am very busy so I eat what is easiest to get to and I love to eat
out, which I know is very bad. I also tend to gorge at my mother's
house when she cooks. She always has cabinets brimming with fatty
snacks too that I can't resist.

One day off plan isn't a problem unless it erodes your resolve.
Calories work best when viewed with a weekly average anyways.
Average it out and see how close you are to 1000 by the end
of the week.

Obviously I have a really hard time dieting,

Who doesn't.

so I usually do extra
cardio to try and make up for the extra calories I've had.

Cardio is good stuff, but it is very hard to work out enough to
make up for even one piece of chocolate cake.

So, my problem is that I'm not seeing the results that I really want
to see.

Partially because you have selected an unrealistic goal.

I've only lost 12 lbs in 3 months.

Consider - Folks who've managed to keep it off 5+ years tended
to lose it at a pound a week. So your loss rate so far has been
ideal. Has there ever been a dieter in history satisfied with
realistic ideal loss rates? Probably not. But is your loss rate
ideal? Absolutely. And since nothing is wrong there is no need
for you to consider fixing that which is not broken.

-----------------------Good point. I just have to keep telling myself
that it's better to come off slowly- more likely to stay off.

At first, it was slowly coming off, but it has been
at a dead standstill at 147 for about 5 weeks now, which is very
frustrating.

A lesson from Dr Atkins that really applies across the board -
The last 10 pounds is supposed to be lost very slowly. Also
he defined a stall as 4+ weeks without a new low and also
without a lost inch (wanna bet you're smaller in those 5 weeks
so you really aren't stalled?). Add these together and it comes
out the last 10 pounds should take about a year.

Since you are now 6 pounds from the bottom of my suggested
goal range, you should expect realistically to lose a pound a
month now. So you may not like your current progress (no
dieter ever does) but you are doing just fine.

My clothes are fitting a little looser, I feel more toned than I did

Consider why Dr Atkins defined a stall in terms of both new lows
and also lost inches. Anyone with small amounts to lose (under
a hundred) is probably trying to lose size if they really think about
it. Weight is just an easily measured but not particularly accurate
side effect of size.

before I started working out, and my body fat has gone down from 28 to
24,

Good progress. More toning to go to edge it down farther.

My goal is to be where I want by December, and I have been
told this is a reasonable goal.

I disagree. How qualified is the person who told you that? Note
that I'm just some guy posting on UseNet so I don't have any
formal qualifications either. But how much is your wish to
achieve the unreasonable in the face of your already ideal
progress?

-------------------------------------The guy that told me that was a
personal trainer at my gym- The Rush. and he wasn't saying that in
particular about the weight goal, but he was saying that a
goal of a body fat percentage of 20 could be accomplished
by December if I continued to work hard. And I think I will be around
130, maybe a few pounds more when I get to 20 for body fat.

I am considering spending a couple hundred dollars on a weight loss
clinic to get shots consisting of half lipo-dissolve and half B-12.

Scam alert.

These are suppose to give you alot of energy and dissolve fat.

The B-12 will increase energy. Nothing wrong with that part of it
but you're a lot younger than the typical menopausal woman who
gets B-12 shots.

You can
also buy diet pills from this clinic that work with the program to
help you lose quickly. I am considering doing the pills too.

Let's see. Ideal realistic progress so nothing is wrong so any
change would be fixing something not broken. Combined with
reinforced unrealistic expectations. Combined with an offer to
buy pills. Check. What say you just send me the check
instead? I won't BS you about pills.

On Aug 21, 12:17 pm, Shauhnathan wrote:
wow, so the site said 118-155? whew I can't imagine being 118. I would
be all bone! But my goal is 130. I may make it a little higher because
130 really might be too much to lose for me. As of this morning, I am
at 143.6 so I've lost a couple pounds very recently, probably due to
eating fewer calories. some people are telling me they can really tell
I've lost alot and one person today told me I shouldn't go overboard
and that I look great as I am now. But, I was about the same height in
high school and I weighed about 130 my sophomore year and wore about a
size 6. It steadily increased from there. Now I'd like to be back in a
6. I think a 6 is a reasonable size for me. It's average. I think I
would be about 130 to be in a 6.

Interesting though, Doug, that you said a woman's bone structure
changes so she shouldn't try to go back to the previous ideal weight,
pre-baby. I hadn't ever heard that, but it's possible that I could
look too thin at 130 now.

About the clinic, I had pretty much already decided to nixay that
plan. I would hate to hear in 10 years that it was causing cancer and
since it is so new, you never know.
I am going to keep going the same, old-fashioned way- diet and
exercise. I mean, you're right, it IS working and why fix it if it
isn't broken.

I'll keep you all updated if you'd like, unless I am boring you to
death.

Ya, most women would look and be too thin at 118, but remember this
guideline is based on health and longevity, so it includes people who
are genetically very small-framed, perhaps like some of the fashion
models. What I did was keep reevaluating my goal as I got closer to
it. Actually, I started wanting to be 155, my high school wrestling
weight, but once I got there, I decided to lose some more. You can see
how you feel and look when you are nearing your goal. What happened to
me was since I had to dramatically change my routine, it became much
easier to continue working out and permanently eating much less. Had I
set 135 as an initial goal, that would have seemed unrealistic even to
me, but I really like it down here. I wouldn't be surprised if you
decided to go on to 130 and then even 125 once you get there. I'm
retired with time on my hands though, and I never was so successful
with my many diets when I was working...pressure from work, my wife's
cooking, business meetings, not so much time to work out, etc....all
flimsy excuses now that I look back on them, since many people work a
lot harder than I did and manage to do it, but that's what I usually
attributed my yo-yoing to. dkw

Shaunathan,

You are doing a great job of starting to control your weight.

Maybe you want to re-examine some of your goals and, in my opion,
definately chagne your use of adjectives.

What you weigh in the next few months- how important is that? I mean,
compared with how much you weigh 2 year from now. Or 3 years from
now? Or 10 years from now?

I try to get people to look at 5 year spaces.

That is pretty much how people gain weight: 2 or 3 lbs a year. Then
one year they gain 6 pounds and suddenly they are fat comparted with 5
years ago. Those 6 lb years seem to come every 5 years.

People say "losing weight isn't easy"

They are lying.

Not delberately, no. Those lies will make you fat, though.

What I mean is:

Keeping the weight (that you have already lost) off is HARD. Losing
weight is easy.

Losing weight AGAIN after re-gaining it and *then* trying to keep it
off? HARD HARD HARD,

Losing weight is VERY easy.

*Controlling your weight* is maybe what you want as a goal.

You might not want to make "the easy part" easier or faster at the
expense of the hard part.

Take it slowly. Be good to yourself.

With as much as I work out and do cardio, I've only lost 12
lbs in 3 months.

That word "ONLY" ? ?

That word "only" is an expensive word. Do you want to pay the price
for using taht word?

You have lost 12 pounds. People notice.

Trust me, if you are 23 and some people SAY they noticed, there are
guys that are noticing your figure. Only the way they might express
it is "Hello! How ya doing?"

At first, it was slowly coming off,

You are losing weight at a rate of a pound and a half a week for 8
weeks. That's 75 lbs a year. That is 375 lbs over 5 years. FAST.
You are losing weight fast.

Not "slowly." You are only losing weight "slowly" if you don't care
what you weigh two years from now.

You are working out hard. Do you think you could stay motivated to
work out this hard if you aren't losing weight from it?

Like "I won't workout if it won't help me lose wt?"?

I ask because in 6 months, in a year, in 2 years, in 5 years, you will
need to work out to maintain a slender weight.

If your workouts are so hard that you need to be losing weight to
motivate yourself to workout? That is a road to "having to relosing
the weight you regained when you stopped working out." Ouch. Ouch.
Ouch.

You might want to figure out how much you want workouts to be part of
your life.

If you are successful at weight loss, you will have to watch your
eating and exercise when you are no longer losing weight.

Find physical activities (volleyball? Swing dancing? winning races?)
that will reward you for working out, when you are done losing weight.

People lose weight and then say "Mission accomplished." (You have
heard that phrase, yes?)

When you are done losing is when the hard work STARTS..

Be patient with yourself during this part. There are plenty of things
that will make the weight loss faster - but they will make the hard
work harder, too.

Think a lot about what you can live with for a decade or two.

Michael (Just finished 6 months "re-losing." Looking at the hard part
now.)

"Gving up smoking is easy, I've done it dozens of times" Mark Twain.


On Aug 16, 11:10 pm, Shauhnathan wrote:





but it has been
at a dead standstill at 147 for about 5 weeks now, which is very
frustrating. I know that I am gaining muscle which weighs more than
fat, but I still think I should be losing more weight than I am. My
clothes are fitting a little looser, I feel more toned than I did
before I started working out, and my body fat has gone down from 28 to
24, but I still don't have results like I would expect for as hard as
I work. My goal is to be where I want by December, and I have been
told this is a reasonable goal.