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I tried out-training my diet for 18 months
- rmays 6y agoJust eat less. It's not hard
- Insanity 6y agoI guess obesity and obesity-related disease being a major cause of death would contract that it's "not hard". It took some serious lifestyle changes for me to become and stay in shape - and habits _are_ a hard thing to change. ;-)
- yourapostasy 6y agoThe "it's just" crowd entirely miss what really needs to be addressed by the targets of their pithiness: the satiation mechanism. For everyone who gets upset at the "it's simple...", "it's just..." (CICO, eat less, stay out of the kitchen, etc.) tone-deaf preachiness, remember that their satiation mechanism works very different from yours. Figure out how to hack your satiation (it is very different for different people), and you have started to unwind the stack on how to address your intake challenges. Start your rabbit hole research with the search string "long term induced satiety" (but without the quotes), and branch off from there. That starts you off with physical and chemically-constrained satiety, but there are cultural, mental, social, financial, and many other factors at play as well that might be dominant in your particular situation so go in those directions if it makes sense to you. YMMV.
- ijustateacookie 6y agoThanks for the tip, time for a rabbit hole
- hmate9 6y agoYou should write a book.
- XCSme 6y agoPersonally (I'm not that fat) I tried eating less to get a nicer body, but whenever I do so I feel tired or dizzy when exercising. Yes, I lose some weight, but it also feels that my powers are gone. I now eat whenever I am hungry as much as I want, but exercise more. I no longer have the dizzy problems.
- cies 6y agoEat less calories, or even better: less calories that you actually absorb. You intestine cannot extract every calorie, especially those in unprocessed (fiberous) plant cells get excreted. I find eating more helps me: eat more volume/weight, of less calorie dense foods. Diets like WFPB and raw mornings-and-or-afternoons do that for me.
- mrfusion 6y agoI forgot where I read it but a cool rule of thumb is aim for foods with 1 calorie per gram or less and you’ll naturally lose weight. Good luck finding many foods like that or enjoying them though.
- cies 6y agoDuring my raw fruity mornings and lunches I actually look for calories: which I mostly find in tropical fruits. Also: not trying to lose weight, more trying to build some :)
- dkersten 6y agoYou do know that when you eat less, the amount hungrier you get is greater than the amount you’re eating less, right? You do know that it’s been proven again and again that willpower doesn’t work? Telling someone to eat less to lose weight is technically correct, but in reality is useless advice. And no, it really is hard. Maybe if you got lucky with a great metabolism it might be easy, but a lot of people don’t have that and will struggle. It’s not about eating less and more about eating correct.
- amwelles 6y agoEating less is a simple concept, but not necessarily easy. The author specifically mentions struggling with binge eating.
- watwut 6y agoIt is incredibly easy to diet yourself to nutritional deficiency of some sorts. While still gaining weight.
- amwelles 6y agoA well-balanced diet will certainly make you healthier and feel better! If you are eating more energy than you're expending, you will gain weight. If you are eating less energy than you're expending, you will lose weight. This is well-researched. I think, from my experience and from the experiences I've read of people who have lost weight and kept it off, the key is finding a sustainable diet. One that your future, goal-weight self can be trusted to follow even after you're done losing the weight. People tend to get to that point and then go back to eating like they did when they were overweight, which reverses all the hard work they did.
- deleted 6y ago[deleted]
- brianmcc 6y agoThanks for sharing. I enjoyed the read. In a similar boat myself, my fondness for beer, pizza and dark chocolate Hobnobs kind of undoes the occasional bit of running and weight training :-) If you want an unsolicited bit of internet feedback I'd suggest your writing would be even better without the puns - it's engaging enough without them - but that's purely a personal opinion.
- ijustateacookie 6y agoThanks for the feedback, I'm always playing around with different styles to see what people enjoy more or less. Replies like this go a huge way in helping me fine-tune. Thanks for reading--and good luck with the pizza battles.
- est31 6y ago> I would walk 500 miles — around 15,000 to 20,000 steps a day Obvious typo here.
- travisporter 6y agoI think he was referencing a song as a pun. It’s around ~3-4 miles actually right?
- scatters 6y agoA mile is 1500-2500 steps, depending on your stride length, so that would be at least 10 miles.
- ijustateacookie 6y agoI'm glad someone got it lol. Really need to work on my humor...
- Sophistifunk 6y agoIt's a joke, Joyce.
- weinzierl 6y ago> There’s been a misnomer floating around the bodybuilding bro-science industry for ages: >> 1 lb of extra muscle = 50 extra calories burned per day [..] > But in reality — those 50 calories are a myth. Studies estimate muscle burns only around 4.5 to 7.0 calories per pound per day. This was new to me, I always heard that building muscle is key to permanent weight loss and that increased metabolic rate from muscle mass is the main reason.
- ijustateacookie 6y agoIt certainly helps, just much less than is usually promoted. (7 calories vs 50). Thanks for reading!
- toopok4k3 6y agoPermanent weight loss is all about diet. Use a smaller plate, order smaller portions etc. Less foods that contain a lot of fat or sugar edit: and a big thing on how to stay on good diet is fixing behaviour, remove situations where you do bad choices on diet.
- alltakendamned 6y agoMaybe it is because maintaining muscle requires not being very sedentary, not the actual metabolic impact.
- swyx 6y agoYou had me at "To keep reading this story, get the free app or log in." gripping read.
- MaxBarraclough 6y agoOutline's version: https://outline.com/bLuVKB https://outline.com/bLuVKB
- dec0dedab0de 6y agoThe meals that some athletes eat are outrageous, so there has got to be something to maintaining a high metabolism. You'll never do it with just walking and weight lifting though. When I was way skinnier I had hobbies and habits that had me doing high intensity cardio multiple times a day. As those went away I gained weight, even though my diet has not changed much. I'm sure getting older is a big part of it too. I have no answers though, I was sure not drinking, and being on chemo therapy all year would help me lose weight, but somehow I gained.
- throwaway2245 6y ago> As those went away I gained weight, even though my diet has not changed much. I'm not sure if this is your point, but if your "calories in" stayed the same, and "calories out" significantly decreased, it's expected that you would continually gain bodyfat until you reach a new equilibrium point. That seems to have been what's happened. If the amount of exercise changes, your diet should optimally change with it - but perfectly managing your habits in this way is hard.
- ijustateacookie 6y agoI'm much more a believer in diet is 90% of the results these days, I just need to tinker until I find one that I can stick to more easily. And definitely agree about the athlete diets--I was skinny all my life until I stopped playing sports 3-4 times a week. Oh, I also met my wonderful friend called beer, which certainly didn't help. Good luck with your own journey!
- watwut 6y agoI had similar experience. I had not done high intensity activity tho, I walked a lot multiple times a day and had trained non competitive sport 3 times a week.
- snowwrestler 6y agoHigh levels of activity burn lots of calories. The author of this blog post made a simple mistake: he thought that if he had big muscles, he would burn a lot of calories even when sitting still. That doesn’t happen. The only way to burn a lot of calories is to do a lot of physical activity. Edit to add: controlling diet is more effective than adding activity for most people in rich western societies because most of those people do not have the time, inclination, or opportunity to do a lot of hard physical activity every day.
- 3pt14159 6y agoI was about to hit 200lbs (90kg) almost a decade ago and I freaked out. I poured into learning everything I could about nutrition. I got down to about 11% bodyfat—167 lbs / 76kg with a good deal of muscle—before mellowing out a bit. It's simple: 1. Self-propelled motion to get around. Ski, bike, run, or even walk. Don't own a car. My friend sold his and bought a huge bike that his kids and groceries fit into. Yes it is possible. I've biked in -30C weather. It's not that bad. 2. Fiber, protein are your best friends. Some fats are kinda friends too, especially from veggies or fish. Sugar is the enemy. All other carbs treat like acquaintances, except for starch which can be safely eaten if it is cold where it acts like a fibre. Potato salad with bacon bits and green onions: Yes. Hashbrowns with pancakes: No. 3. Body weight workouts at least once a week. They're a bit fanatical over at https://www.reddit.com/r/bodyweightfitness/ https://www.reddit.com/r/bodyweightfitness/ but the program is good. Follow it but don't push your self too hard. I got wicked tennis elbow when I was approaching a muscle up and had to take a year off. That's it. It's simple. I don't understand why Weight Watchers even exists. Just cut out the sugar, move around, and eat more plants.
- ijustateacookie 6y agoAwesome! I also don't own a vehicle on purpose these days--it forces me to walk for miles almost every day, which I've grown to love. I haven't heard about that starch foods being okay when cold thing, care to elaborate?
- hedberg10 6y agoDon't believe it. It's simply portion sizes. Just look at McDonalds meals. It's shocking how much they've grown. It's been a while since I looked it up, but a normal meal in the 50s was what is today a kid's meal. Hamburger (1), small (!) fries (that might not even be sold anymore), and a small drink (250ml). Want to eat pancakes? Eat a small amount. With butter. It's fine. Don't eat a stack that is shown in ads. Want fries? Eat two normal potatoes fried in beef fat. Not potatoes the size of a human head. It is conscious work to retrain your stomach, but it is possible. I'm saying this as somebody who just ate 2 slices of bread (1 sandwich) and now feels like I can't move, where before I'd easily eat 6 slices. That was my breakfast (at lunch), I haven't even had an earlier meal. No bodily exhaustion, no pain, no excessive time commitments, no money (you even save money!), no feeling the need to punish and taking revenge on yourself, just being conscious. Works well with alcohol consumption, too. Ask me how I know how those big red wine glasses which fit 25% of the bottle are bullshit, same as pints. Those are two portions, easily. Look at old photographs: The glasses are tiny.
- ilikeatari 6y agoI had a similar experience. In 2014 I was up + 40 lbs, started exercising and lifting heavy 4 to 5 times a week. I did clean my diet just a tiny bit and did loose 15 lbs or so. But amount of work was insane. Now in 2019 I started fasting and biking for fun and BAM! 25 lbs down with so little effort. I always struggled to do this. I always was amazed how people can eat clean and smaller portions constantly. For me not eliminating but minimizing sugar and carbs to some extent helped with cravings. Also just skipping a meal is so much easier now if I am not all carbed out! Also mentally fasting fits better for me. Life happens, I will eat cake :-) But after feast, there will be fast.
- ijustateacookie 6y agoWhat kind of fasting do you play around with? I've tested out a bunch and even did intermittent fasting for more than half a year -- I enjoyed it but I'm pretty sure it started screwing with my sleep schedule. Great to hear your results, awesome stuff.
- ilikeatari 6y agoThank you. I took it really slow and first few months I did IF and skipped breakfast. Then one time a week started skipping all meals in 24h period. Finally I got to the point were skipping meals for 48h was possible with water and bone broth if I am really hungry. All of this seemed impossible if I had something carby or sweet day before. For some reason it’s much easier if I have veggies/unsaturated fat and some protein. In terms of sleep I experienced same issue. I was so energetic and could not sleep as long. It went away 3ish weeks in.
- jm20 6y agoThis article’s title is a little misleading, because the whole thesis seems to be “you can’t build enough muscle to compensate for a bad diet.” This is probably true, however you absolutely can out-train all but the worst diets, if you’re crazy/fit enough. It would mostly happen through cardio, HIIT, and sports however, not pure weightlifting. If you were to play two hours of full court basketball a day (with intensity, not walking up and down the court), and combine that with a weightlifting routine, you could probably eat whatever you want without gaining much weight. The problem is most people’s bodies would break down with that kind of activity level.
- jmnicolas 6y agoYes, there are no fat guys in special forces units even though they probably eat 10k calories every day (I'm speaking of the 'intensive' training phase).
- qayxc 6y agoIt'snot the calories that count - it's the kind of nutrition you get from them. You can easily starve yourself to death by only consuming "empty" calories - you'd get fat and fatter but eventually die from undernourishment.
- falcolas 6y agoYou can also kill yourself by not consuming enough fat (aka Rabbit Starvation/Protein Poisoning). Nutrition isn't a simple thing.
- watwut 6y agoIf you look at diet of construction workers (outside a lot of physical activity) they eat absurdly lot compared with office workers. And they are not all that fat as office worker would. We have a lot of construction around our office and they eat in same places. They eat a lot.
- inglor_cz 6y ago
- mrfusion 6y agosomehow I’ve completely cured my bing eating habit. But unfortunately I’m not sure which change did it. Here are some of my best guesses? Fixing my vitamin d deficiency Multiple day fasts every few weeks Probiotics Sleeping better and getting enough sleep Not having any time alone to be bored
- jmnicolas 6y ago> Multiple day fasts every few weeks Beware: I did it for a few years, but it burned all my motivation. I can't even fast a day now.
- mrfusion 6y agoCan you expand on that? r/fasting is a good resource if you want to get back into it. Electrolytes seem to be key. Plus keeping distracted.
- jmnicolas 6y agoA couple years ago I did multiple days fast for about a year then I did a 15 days fast. My stomach wasn't hungry but my brain wanted to eat. This experience burned my motivation to basically starve myself and now I can't even do a one day fast, the mood isn't just there. > keeping distracted This is probably the key. I was bored to death and was watching YT cooking videos.
- fiblye 6y agoBoredom is a really overlooked one. If I’m outside and doing something all day, or I’m really involved in reading a book or painting something, over half a day will pass before I realize I forgot to eat breakfast. But if I’m relaxing, wasting time on the internet, or not really doing much, I get an urge to grab a snack or have a glass of milk that’ll hit me once an hour.
- kortex 6y ago"Dopamine boredom" is a thing. There's a pasticular qualia associated with my ADHD meds wearing off that feels not unlike a combination of tired and hungry, even after I've eaten. What clued me in was my go-to binge in this state: chocolate (xanthines, fat a sugar). I wonder how easily others can learn "I'm not hungry, I'm understimulated"
- k__ 6y agoTraining and diet is a frickel thing. You can train away 1000kcal in an hour, which can be 1/3 to 1/3 of your daily requirement. This is relatively much. You wanna lose 1kg? Just train 7h. At 2kg a month you don't even need 1h of training a day. Problem is, food can be very calorie dense, two cookies can have as much calories as a whole meal. Also, I read somewhere that there isn't really a sane upper limit of calories the body can ingest per day, something around 50k - 60k kcal IIRC. This means, your diet can catch up no problem with any amount of training you do.
- hirundo 6y agoIn 50 years of yo-yo dieting I've tried most things, including large quantities of exercise. Many worked for a while. I've lost > 100 pounds four times ... before gaining it back. Now I'm trying something new that's working quiet well so far, 30 pounds down in 2.5 months. The real difference is that eating this way transforms me into a non-fat person behavioraly: I now stop eating when I'm full, which was a magic act only other people could do before. And now I just eat once or twice per day, not out of willpower, but because now that's all I want. You may not want to hear about the food that does this for me. I sure didn't. As desperate as I've been, until recently I just closed my ears to it. It's a bad fit for me culturally, by taste (previously), training, and experience. But now I love it, and not just because it's working so well: Meat. And organs. Mostly beef. High fat. I went carnivore. It seemed gross and impossible back when I was a raw vegan. Now here I am. And it's not just the weight. It has cleared up multiple digestive and inflammatory issues. It started as a one month cleanse but I'm not tempted to stop. Many times a diet has worked for me because I was coming to it from a bad diet, and anything that got me off of junk food would have worked. Not this time. I had been on a clean very low carb diet for years, and managed to gain lots of weight on it after a large initial loss. Carnivore seeems to be reversing that, fingers crossed.
- fouc 6y agoThere are folks that exercise AT THE GYM for 2 to 3 hours DAILY just to out-train their diet. That's dedication.
- cycomanic 6y agoI used to be a lightweight rower when young and that seriously screwed up my eating habits for a long time. The thing is we used to eat almost nothing before competitions (I once lost 8kg in 2 weeks leading up to the nationals, from already 8% bodyfat), and once the season was over we would binge eat (still not gaining much weight though because we continued training). For a long time I did not have a being saturated feeling and could eat until vomiting. It's a bit better now, however I still need to do sports (road cycling mainly) 3-5 times a week as otherwise I gain weight because I eat too much (and I generally don't eat crappy food, just a lot). The upside is, if I had a period where I gained weight because I was not training enough, I will quickly loose it again when getting on a training regime. However, weight trainingdefinitely do not burn enough calories, I notice that when in winter when I go to the gym much more. I think the whole weights training for loosing weight has been pushed by the gym industry largely. Do cardio and HIT and you will burn calories much more quickly.
- cycomanic 6y agoJust to clarify. In general it's still the best to control both your diet and activity level and the balance of how much increase in activity and reduction in calories intake works best is I suspect highly individual. For me, due to my history I find increasing my activity level much easier. It also improves my psychological well-being as I know that how good I feel is strongly dependent on doing enough sport.
- mateus1 6y agoLoved the piece. Diet is a part of it but so are hormones. I've been overweight (90kg/200lb at 1,8m/6ft) since going to college and tried dieting but never managed to be lean. In my 20s I would diet and lose 20lb but then gain it again. Over time I convinced myself "that wasn't a big deal". I went to an endocrinologist last month and I feel like the scales have fallen from my eyes. Suddenly all that resistance to losing weight wasn't because I suck at dieting. It's because my hormones and my fat keep me from losing weight. The medicine I'm taking even drove away the binge factor. Even though I'm still at the start of my weight loss journey just lifting that burden from my shoulders.
- tacotime 6y agoCan you be specific about what specific hormone was affecting you and/or what medication is used to treat it?
- mateus1 6y agoMainly insuline. I'm taking semaglutide (brand name ozempic) once a week and it raises your insulin secretion, reducing hunger and fat storage. My visceral fat was high even though I don't appear fat. This fat is bad for pretty much all metabolic functions.
- e15ctr0n 6y agoRead The Obesity Code: Unlocking the Secrets of Weight Loss by Dr. Jason Fung to understand how hormones affect body weight. https://amzn.com/1771641258 https://amzn.com/1771641258
- PlugTunin 6y agoI'm 45, 5'9 and have a 30-inch waist. How? I subsist on oatmeal, eggs, milk, fruits & veggies, peanut butter, cheese in moderation, TONS OF BLACK BEANS AND LENTILS, rice, bread and pasta. Boring stuff. No meat. No soda. No fast food. Sweets and booze only on rare occasions. Black beans are good for your brain and leave you full & satiated for longer than most food. Their notorious side-effects -- to those around you -- are somewhat exaggerated. Fats and sweets make me feel lazy. I like to stay active (weights, hoops, doing things outside) but can slack for weeks at a time w/out consequence. I don't give myself credit for being disciplined -- just have good habits and decent genes. What I am proud of is that in spite of not being the most mentally healthy person, instead of turning to food or drugs to comfort myself, I use exercise, good food and a sense of humor to lift my spirits.
- AnonHP 6y agoI’ve found that it’s not easy to lose weight and maintain it by cutting calories. It requires serious and disciplined changes in the total portions of food (which is one factor) over a lifetime. Even with discipline, I lost a few but gained almost all of it back with just a few days of slippage. That was disappointing. Working out to compensate for a piece of cake or some other food is a total non-starter. You calculate and compare the calories (between food and exercise) and realize that intake control is the only place you can (as an average person) work on for decent results. This is all the more so if your genetic or bodily makeup is such that it’s easier to gain weight than lose it.
- amwelles 6y agoIt's well-documented that your weight fluctuates quite a bit from day to day. Mine goes up and down a pound or two. It has to do with the amount of water your body is retaining at any given time. Starting a new exercise routine will make your weight spike temporarily. Cutting your caloric consumption will sometimes dramatically decrease your weight, then you'll gain a little bit back, then it'll gradually go down again if you stick to a deficit.
- underseacables 6y agoIt’s very hard to near impossible to exercise your way to health. You must change what you eat.