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You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (2016)

• tfigment 4y ago
  Recommend book by Herman Pontzer from last year. "Burn: New Research Blows the Lid Off How We Really Burn Calories, Lose Weight, and Stay Healthy" Listened to on podcast 'Why is this happening with Chris Hayes' for 1 hour summary on it.
  • juanjmanfredi 4y ago
    I admit I'm distrustful of such a dramatic title. The central message from the originally posted article is that losing weight is mostly a matter of maintaining a caloric deficit. This is has been understood for some time now. What is the "new research" that is so important, in this case?
• marcodiego 4y ago
  Whatever people tells you how to eat, if you decide to eat less than 1200 Kcal, consider that this is less than the minimum required for a standard person to stay alive (whatever a 'standard person' is).
• Vladimof 4y ago
  yeah, exercise is not for losing fat... it's just for staying in good health
  • elmerfud 4y ago
    You're not wrong because it's about calorie deficit of which exercise can help you achieve. Also since the way fat gets "burned" for weight loss is by exhaling carbon atoms, aerobic exercise can assist with this process. As always do not add more mass than you expel.
    • BenjiWiebe 4y ago
      I don't eat particularly healthy, and I don't exercise much, yet I'm perpetually borderline underweight. Why does the math not matter for me, while the next person watches every calorie, goes on long walks, and yet struggles to lose any weight?
      • seppel 4y ago
        > I don't eat particularly healthy Because it is about the amount you eat and not about eating healthy (whatever that means anyway).
      • mahathu 4y ago
        Because the next person enjoys eating more than us?
      • MisterSandman 4y ago
        I think you know the answer to that question, but are trying to make a point, which is IMO very valid. I don't care if you call it genetics or luck or just who you are, but people have different bodies and tend to default to different sizes. This idea of "one diet fits all" does not work. You need to do what is and feels right to your body.
        • dubswithus 4y ago
          I think people shouldn't trust their instincts on this particular issue. They should consult a nutritionist and weigh all their food.
        • TameAntelope 4y ago
          This is just not true; people are different, but we're not generally that different from one another. It's vastly more likely that an underweight person isn't eating enough than it is they're genetically predisposed to being underweight.
      • HidyBush 4y ago
        I think that if you're going to make such a strong statement you should back it up with data. Are you really convinced there is some misterious thing at play that keeps your weight down? Then actually record everything you eat in a week and what physical activity you do and see if your perception matches reality
  • notatoad 4y ago
    this is another one of those things that's true in a sort of broad sense, but factually incorrect. exercise burns calories, and burning calories makes you lose fat - that's just basic math. but exercise makes you hungry, and to the article's main point: people are terrible at estimating calories. a one-hour easy run, a two-hour bike ride, or a full day of alpine skiing burns what's basically an irrelevant amount of calories. if you're taking in any extra amount of calories, normal amounts of exercise doesn't help you lose weight.
    • edanm 4y ago
      It's not just that exercise makes you hungry, it's also that deliberate cardio exercise can lead to you unconsciously moving less throughout the day, therefore reducing your total daily expenditure, in effect cancelling the whole effect of the exercise. E.g. If someone were to run a marathon, especially if they're untrained, they would be too tired to do anything else during that day (I imagine). You can theoretically try to counter this by also using a step counter to make sure you keep moving throughout the day, but at some point you might be too exhausted for even that to help. That said, most people don't move or exercise nearly enough, not for weight loss nor for general health, so for most people's situation you're probably right, adding some exercise is a net benefit. It's still much easier and faster (and more important in the long run) to control caloric intake.
• Sparkle-san 4y ago
  This seems like a good primer on how to look at food differently. The problem with diets is that people relapse due to the fact that dieting is done through force of will and willpower is limited. For long lasting change, you need to reshape your relationship with food and be content with what and how you eat. Understanding some of the things in this article can be a good place to start.
  • formerly_proven 4y ago
    Modern food is kinda weird in how high-energy and very energy-dense food is the default and cheap, and it somehow is more expensive to buy less calories.
    • pixl97 4y ago
      2 primary reasons. A reservoir of easy to store for long periods of time food source is a national security issue for every state, so it tends to be subsidized everywhere. Stable foods can be shipped and stored more cheaply. This coupled with the native desire for salty/sweet/fat puts the modern human at a terrible disadvantage in our current environment.
  • tayo42 4y ago
    its exhausting to do that. Im switching my diet up a little to bit to reduce cholesterol and some liver enzyme thing lately and Im starting to get tired of thinking so much before every meal and shopping trip. wish it was easier to not fall in to unhealthy traps. so many labels, and so much meal planning.
    • micromacrofoot 4y ago
      What worked for me was starting simply. I started with one meal that I got really good at making, and then introduced another (and when I make it I make plenty extra to cover later laziness). I know roughly how many calories it is, so I barely have to think about anymore.
      • 4y ago
• OrvalWintermute 4y ago
  I remember some food tasting good when I was younger. I do not remember food tasting this dang good though.
• lr4444lr 4y ago
  Someone finally wrote this article. So refreshing. It's obvious when you live with a fat person why they have trouble losing weight, even when they're on a diet: they're usually not actually following it. Whether they don't understand portion sizes for calorie math, or look at calories at all, or eat things that they say "do not count", there is almost always a failure to understand what and how much they are eating.
  • sharken 4y ago
    It's more like they DO NOT want to believe how small portion sizes are required to consistently lose weight. Even if there was a device that could scan all food before eating it, they would still exempt some meals with the "do not count" argument. Rule of thumb, that if a meal is easy and fast to prepare, then it is probably not suited for a diet. To lose weight you have to do a lot more exercise than you think consistently. And you have to eat a lot less than you think. Most people just don't have that kind of willpower.
    • treeman79 4y ago
      Wife switched to calories counting a few years ago. It was shocking how small the portions were. She lost 90 pounds doing that in under a year.
    • trevorishere 4y ago
      Went from 230 to ~155 without exercise by calorie restriction alone (600-1200cal/day). It IS possible, though likely unhealthy to accomplish without exercise (I never, ask they say, consulted a doctor prior to the self-imposed restriction). Exercise was uncomfortable until I had lost weight, now I can do 15+ mile hikes with a 60l backpack. I don't want to discourage anyone from doing exercise at any time in their goal for weight loss, but it is possible to lose weight by calorie restriction alone.
      • mikevm 4y ago
        > Exercise was uncomfortable until I had lost weight, now I can do 15+ mile hikes with a 60l backpack. A simple walk on an incline (5km/hr @ 5% incline) can help you burn 400+kcals/hour. You can probably eat at 1500 kcals and start your day with a walk like that on the treadmill while watching some TV show :). > .. but it is possible to lose weight by calorie restriction alone. Indeed it is! :) If you're obese or severely overweight, it's best to just do a PSMF to lose weight as quickly as possible. Btw, at 230lbs you can easily do strength training which will help you with body recomp (stimulating muscle growth while burning fat). A good rule of thumb for a PSMF is 9.7x[protein intake]. For example: given 1.6g/kg*104kg = 166g of protein per day we get: 166g * 9.7 kcal/g = 1610 kcal. So your daily calories are at 1610 kcal max, and you need to eat at least 166g of protein (the rest of the calories can be filled with carbs/fat). I suggest min 50g of fat per day for men.
• wswope 4y ago
  Gonna throw out an plug for Nutritionix and their calorie tracker iOS app for anyone inspired to go that route by the article - I tried a lot of options out back when I used to do serious powerlifting and it’s by far the best UX I found for recording macros. They’ve got a barcode scanner, a great DB of common fast food options, and you can even freetext stuff like “200 grams of chicken thigh” and record stuff that way if you use a food scale. Eyeballing calories becomes way easier after a few months of practice and pays off for life. Was able to get all the examples listed spot on except the popcorn, which I had no frame of reference for.
  • jimmaswell 4y ago
    Sounds the same as the app I've had success with, Lose It. Also highly recommended.
• deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
• SnowHill9902 4y ago
  If you squat, deadlift and walk enough, and are generally healthy, you physically won’t be able to eat yourself fat.
  • scarface74 4y ago
    You can just do the math and see how much exercise you have to do to make any difference in your weight loss. You definitely can’t “walk” your way to weight loss
    • huntertwo 4y ago
      Walking 5 miles a day can be done in an hour and a half and can burn ~250-500 calories. That’s half a pound to a pound of fat per week, which is pretty significant.
      • scarface74 4y ago
        250 calories is nothing and most people are going to think it gives them the chance to eat that extra bagel that’s going to be more than 250 calories. Are you really suggesting that people walk and hour and half with the intention of burning 250 calories? There are a lot of reasons to exercise. But weight loss isn’t one.
        • huntertwo 4y ago
          You shouldn’t be eating excess cookies if you’re trying to lose weight. That doesn’t negate the effect of walking for an hour (the most base of exercises)
          • scarface74 4y ago
            And just like the Nobel Winning Economist says about why people don’t save for the future, “none of us are Homo Economicus”. The same can be applied to diet. No one is a completely rational being. You tell me that I have to walk an hour to burn off 250 calories, I’m not going to bother and neither are most people. Every study shows that exercise is a completely ineffective method to lose weight for most people. I mentioned in another comment that yes I did eat like crap and lost and maintained weight by exercising in my mid 20s to mid 30s. I was also a part time fitness instructor, taught 10 hours a week (spinning, step, weightlifting, cardio kickboxing) and I trained for runs and I lifted weights three times a week. I had a commitment device to go the gym - regularly scheduled classes that I taught and got paid for. I had to be in shape. I would teach 2 hour classes on Saturday and Sunday and teach during the week. Most people will never commit to that level or intensity of exercise. Even now, I have a home cardio gym and the only time I watch TV by myself is when I exercise.
• amelius 4y ago
  • micromacrofoot 4y ago
    is there data behind this?
    • amelius 4y ago
      • bee_rider 4y ago
        Can you be a little more specific? Wikipedia seems to mostly say that the science is still a work in progress, and at least I don't see much support for the claim that it reduces weight while allowing for the same calorie consumption.
        • amelius 4y ago
          Yes, it is a work in progress, but there are some positive results. My point is that hiding this fact is not telling the whole story.
      • teolandon 4y ago
        Is this trolling?
    • gonehome 4y ago
      I think he’s wrong - iirc intermittent fasting helps because it just makes it easier for people to maintain a true calorie deficit.
  • caloriesdont 4y ago
    Nope https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2114833 https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2114833
  • layer8 4y ago
• doctorhandshake 4y ago
  I am bothered by the author’s written use of ‘quote-unquote’ in place of actual quotes. This is a spoken form of scare quotes and takes ‘write like you talk’ too far for me.
  • likeclockwork 4y ago
    I agree. It's not even wrapping any text! It's just 'quote-unquote" used by itself as a prefix modifier on the next noun phrase. Disgusting.
  • dheera 4y ago
    It does make it more accessible if you're passing it through a TTS engine for reading.
  • bowsamic 4y ago
    “Write like you talk” has been a genuine abomination on the internet. It has destroyed a lot of spaces for me
    • jrootabega 4y ago
      Like it's kinda super awful(ish), child-esque.
      • bowsamic 4y ago
  • Barrin92 4y ago
    it has a different meaning because it puts more emphasis on the author distancing themselves from what is being said. Just putting things in quotes in text may just be a value neutral quote. Writing it out is a rhetorical device because it's difficult to quote sarcastically in written form. It's basically the textual version of doing quotes with your fingers in the air. From the text: Most of these quote-unquote marketed protein products are nothing more than glorified chocolate bars. The “Health Halo” effect of food is when consumers believe foods that are advertised as healthier have fewer calories
• almost_usual 4y ago
  People consume too much, a lot of calories also come from beer and alcohol. This video by Alan Thrall really put it into perspective for me. https://youtu.be/klKAzJ4FUzg?t=715 https://youtu.be/klKAzJ4FUzg?t=715 He’s a well known power lifter who owns a gym. He walks about 20,000 steps a day and works out 4-5 days a week. He consumes ~2800 calories a day. I’d say unless you work in manual labor or are a professional athlete you do not need to be consuming nearly this much.
• grangerg 4y ago
  Reminds me of this short comedy bit from Richard Jeni ("Stop eating, you fat bastard"): https://youtu.be/V7GnOyd_z1w https://youtu.be/V7GnOyd_z1w
• carlycue 4y ago
  I've had this unbearable urge to binge eat and it started a week ago. I'm sure it's something psychological that is causing this but I can't isolate the root of the problem. I have tried to fight it by taking walks, being social but it's failure every time. I always cave in and eat all the fast food, ice cream, cookies I can get my hands on but literally nothing seems to get rid of the urge to binge. How can a person get rid of the binge eating virus?
  • Buttons840 4y ago
    Last time I had a feeling like this I was sick with the beginnings of Covid. If it's an unusual urge, you might want to follow it.
  • notatoad 4y ago
    sometimes you just want to eat. one of my favourite weight-loss tips is from youtube cyclist phil gaimon: instead of trying to eat less, set a goal for eating more of something with a very low calorie density. he was eating a whole 1lb pack of spinach every day. that's a lot of spinach, it'll take a lot of snacking to get through to the point where it's actually difficult to eat that much. but it's only 100 calories.
  • s1artibartfast 4y ago
    In my experience, you could be craving something you are not getting in you diet. Try multivitamins and a gallon of water a day. If that doesn't cut it in a coue weeks, get a comprehensive blood panel.
• jimmaswell 4y ago
  600, 2000, 120, 700, 1400. Got the popcorn perfect, pretty close otherwise. Guess years of calorie tracking paid off.
  • superfrank 4y ago
    Same. I calorie counted religiously for over two years almost a decade ago and to this day, I'm still able to eyeball the calories on most things. My guesses were 800, 2400, 100, 400 (assumed cream and milk), 1200. I've basically maintained my same weight from age 23 to 33 and I think knowing the calorie count of most things plays a big part in that.
• thepasswordis 4y ago
  Keto diets are both safe and effective. I have yet to meet somebody following one who didn't lose weight. I feel like this topic is basically resolved. Stop eating carbs.
  • Smaug123 4y ago
    I got bad news for you: I know multiple people who lost weight for two months (as anyone can on literally any calorie-restriction diet) but simply couldn't follow it for much longer than that. I myself stopped being keto a couple of days after the evening crying started.
    • thepasswordis 4y ago
      What is the bad news? It sounds like they stopped eating healthy, and got fat as a result of it. Eating a healthy diet for two months doesn't mean you can go back to eating trash and expecting to stay healthy.
      • Smaug123 4y ago
        Your advice is not actionable. I know several people including myself who were simply unable to action it for longer than the two months that anyone can stick to any diet. If you are capable of sticking to a diet that literally brings you to tears on a daily basis, then sure, but do realise that you're probably in about the top percentile of willpower. (I imagine you were not in fact brought to tears by this diet, or you wouldn't be recommending it; in which case you may not be aware that it's not a panacea.)
        • thepasswordis 4y ago
          Are you saying you were brought to tears because you weren’t eating carbs? I have known many people who have lost weight very successfully by switching a healthy, safe, and effective low carb/keto diet. In fact I’ve never even heard of crying being a side effect. How are you suggesting these things are even linked?
• csours 4y ago
  I weigh 350 pounds. I'm very obese. I know this. When I was a teenager, I looked at people who weighed 300+ pounds and though, how do you get that way. Don't you realize that you are gaining weight? Don't you know that you just have to eat less to lose weight? Anyway, now I realize that I am hungry. It never goes away unless I eat a significant amount of food. My body told me to eat, so I ate. It doesn't even take that much extra food to gain a lot of weight. One extra piece of cake a week is a few pounds in a year. If you live a few years, it adds up. You gain weight in kilograms and lose weight in grams. Hunger is a sensation that happens inside a person's body and mind. You cannot compare your hunger to my hunger. So many diets talk about not being hungry while you are on the diet. I've been to dieticians and told them I'm hungry, and they suggest eating more protein or more fiber. That does help, but I still feel hungry. There is a very good chance that someone is writing a reply with some suggestion as to how I should eat so that I'm not hungry. Thank you for the thoughts, but realize that you don't live in my body, you don't know how I feel, you don't know what I've tried. Hunger sounds like a problem to people. Hunger feels like a problem inside the body. People still tell me I shouldn't be hungry. Maybe part of the solution is realizing that eating to satisfaction is ... bad for some people. Maybe it's Ok to be a little hungry. Anyway, these are just some thoughts. I'm down 30 pounds from my max. I think I have a good mentality now, but it took years to get here.
  • gonehome 4y ago
    I’ve never been on a calorie deficit and not been hungry. Calorie deficits are always a little unpleasant imo. It’s just suffering through that to get to a place where you want to maintain (which is much easier). I’ve lost 73lbs, 53lbs, 35lbs (different times and gained weight over years in between). Each time the calorie deficit sucked. There is a 3 day hump and two week hump of misery until you get kind of used to it sucking, but I wouldn’t say it’s ever great.
    • itake 4y ago
      +1. I find drinking water and being hyper focused on a work or personal project distracts me enough from my tummy to get through those humps.
• seo-speedwagon 4y ago
  The TLDR really is that counting calories is the only way to truly know. If you have a very regular diet it’s not too hard. For example I eat the same breakfast every day, and a handful of different lunches. So it’s easy to know what my macros are for those meals. Incidentally at one restaurant I like, I always get the salad, because it’s one of the highest-calorie options they have.
• ahallock 4y ago
  It really is this simple. I never do explicit diets because changing food AND calories can lead to quick failure. I just continue getting the same food and reduce the amount--small fries instead of large. Next time, half the small fries. Introducing healthier foods and exercise should be done separately IMO
• rileymat2 4y ago
  > You're Not Losing Fat Because You're Eating Too Damn Much (Even When You Don't Think You Are) I read through the whole article, it is true, but the headline is wrong, you are not losing weight because you feel miserable. If it was just an issue of calorie restriction with no other effects, yes, this would be the reason.
  • rileymat2 4y ago
    It is essentially, a 5 whys meeting cut short.
• throwaway20220a 4y ago
  n=1, but I’ve increased my iodine intake to the recommended daily dosage (ca 0.2mg), and have noticed (among other benefits) that I have to try quite hard now to gain fat. Probably something to do with thyroid hormones.
• stank345 4y ago
  Yeah, the proximate cause is eating too much but the ultimate cause has to be systemic if we're getting more and more obese all the time.
  • spicyusername 4y ago
    I am inclined to put that the other way around. The ultimate cause is consuming too much, the proximate causes are various elements of modern culture (i.e. Bigger serving sizes, more readily available snacks, alcohol consumption, etc).
    • Ygg2 4y ago
      If it wasn't synthetic we wouldn't see animals growing fat from eating leftover food. I think sugars and processed food increase hunger rather than reducing it.
    • medvezhenok 4y ago
      There are a few other variables that could play a role. (1) Share of physical labor jobs vs office jobs (2) Increased hormone and pesticide use in agriculture (dropping worldwide sperm counts is an underreported story, might or might not be related) (2A) Less nutritional content in food - has gone down 60% since 1940s according to some studies; likely from over-farming. Need to eat more to get the same nutrients. (3) Food deserts (related to (1)) - where healthy food options are rare (4) Less general socialization (internet makes it less necessary to go outside, etc)
  • indymike 4y ago
    I got diagnosed with type 2 diabetes two years ago. I switched to a super low carb diet (30g per day). Contrast that with a 16oz Mt Dew, which has 77g. Or a bowl of cereal at 36g plus whatever is in the milk. I ate all kinds of protiens and fats - cheese, meats, fish, veggies just to quell the hunger. I lost about 58 pounds in a year. Most of what I lost was fat. Two years later, I'm still doing a very low carb, but keep it under 50g per day. My weight has stayed ±3 pounds. I'm pretty convinced it's the super-high carb load everyone is eating three times per day.
• OJFord 4y ago
  > Now, I’m not sure about you, but I’ve never seen someone drink an actual [sic, 200ml] serving. Most people are going to be filling that glass to the top. This [pictured] is a full glass of OJ, coming in at 350 ml. Personally I'd have less than that, 100-150ml maybe. Not calorie counting and never have. /Shrug/ And I agree with other commenter on the quote-unquote annoying writing style. I'll tell you why in a second. Ok here's why: it's annoying. I'll let that sink in.
• mattlondon 4y ago
  This article is quite accurate I think. I use MyFitnessPal on and off. It is easy - you just scan the barcode and it tots up the calories. MFP is excellent at making you face up to what you are actually eating. At first it was a huge eye-opener for how many calories were in everyday things - like a slice of bread is 80-120 calories etc. The article mentions fruit juice too - that was a big one for me as well. I figured that since I was not eating loads of pizzas and burgers etc that my calorie intake was probably "normal" but boy was I wrong and MyFitnessPal really helped understand that. Likewise it was good for a reality check that the 20 minute run actually was only like 150-200 calories burnt, not 750. That was good, but where it really helped though was in measuring stuff out, and to realise what a serving really was. The biggest culprit for me was breakfast cereals - 30 to 45g of cereal is not a bowl full - it is a fairly pathetic covering at the bottom of your bowl. For years I was probably having like 4 or 5 (... or more!) servings of cereal (i.e. a full bowl, like it looks on the packet or on TV adverts!) a day without realising. I'd recommend people give it a try, if only for a couple of weeks to get a grip on what the calorific levels of some of your staples are, and what a serving actually looks like. It is eye opening.
  • Blackthorn 4y ago
    Just want to note here that I recently switched off MFP for Cronometer because MFP had a literal week long outage and is architected in such a way that it must phone home in order to save anything like a recipe you make. So that was a whole week where I couldn't save a new recipe. I've found Cronometer to be a lot faster in every way, and actually has an up to date database and when you scan something it doesn't have, it lets you scan the label and updates the database. Highly recommend. Only problem is what's endemic to apps in general right now. They want a subscription instead of buying the app outright. That's gonna be a no from me, dawg.
    • codemac 4y ago
      Cronometer I found was missing lots and lots of food items and restaurants though, and that makes it harder to report. I unfortunately travel a fair amount and this means I can't just make restaurants a "cheat meal" some days. I try going to the grocery store while traveling, but it takes so much more time when I'm taking taxis and trying to cook in a hotel room. HOWEVER This is a lot of whining and excuse my brain is probably using to let me eat more when I travel.
• nostromo 4y ago
  And if you are going to work out, lift weights. Don't just do cardio. In fact, many people won't have to do cardio at all. Cardio doesn't help you look and feel better. Build muscle, and that muscle will burn calories, even when you're asleep.
  • 0x737368 4y ago
    I love doing cardio, especially running gives me a rush like no other. If people don't want to do cardio you don't have to do it, you just have to adapt your calorie intake accordingly. But for those that don't mind it or even like it it's a neat way to squeeze out some more calories for a delicious meal or whatever. I do agree that resistance training is important and often forgotten part of fitness. Having muscles means extra BMR and you will look better when you do lose that extra weight as opposed to that skinny fat look.
  • friedman23 4y ago
    This is terrible advice. Do cardio, it's good for you, also do weight training, it's also good for you.
  • TameAntelope 4y ago
    Are you kidding me? I love strength training, but cardio will absolutely make you feel better in nearly every active activity you do. [0] [0] https://health.clevelandclinic.org/the-many-benefits-of-a-cardio-workout/ https://health.clevelandclinic.org/the-many-benefits-of-a-ca...
  • throwaway675309 4y ago
    False. Cardio in the form of high intensity interval training is absolutely beneficial for your heart. I do agree that you should not neglect anaerobic training.
    • edanm 4y ago
      I think cardio in other forms is just as beneficial.
• lvass 4y ago
  In my non-expert opinion, this is almost as good as it could be. People should face the harsh truths about their habits. I just dislike the underlying assumptions that things with fat or whatever is bad, every single macronutrient is great, just don't fucking overeat them. Also, life is absolutely better without sugar.
• DocG 4y ago
  That was well written. Thanks! Info was legit, but mainly I liked how well it was written :)
• at_a_remove 4y ago
  It's pretty unpleasant for me. I have a metabolic disorder for which even a mild caloric deficit of ten percent can send me to the ER, during which the recommended treatment, besides the painkillers, is roughly a pound of sucrose delivered via IV. That's not fluid, that's a pound of sugar they want in me. And they want me on a high-carbohydrate diet, to boot. Weight loss for me entails either being in pain or taking the meds to mask it and being unable to function. Previously, I could just diet, cut down, whatever. Now, cutting down for more than about a couple days starts it off. Even missing a meal can set it off (as well as infection, lost sleep, a wide array of medications). I have considered a celiac plexus block over Schedule II meds, then I could say a big fuck you to the pain because the wires have been cut.
  • deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
• cj 4y ago
  > The golden child of the food industry: organic produce. Even though studies have shown that organic food doesn’t have any additional health benefits versus conventional While this may be true, I was able to go from 240lb to 185lb (I’m 6’2) in 10 months by: 1) Eating only organic, non-gmo, and gluten free 2) Only shopping at expensive health food stores that only carry specialty brands (no Oreos or Poptarts in stock!) 3) Eating a vegan diet ..So why did those things cause me to lose weight? Simple: by dramatically self-limiting the categories and types of food I allow myself to eat, it’s simply harder to overeat. I don’t care about the vegan lifestyle or philosophy, but I love that it broke my habit of eating cheese and crackers every night. When out at a restaurant, while I would normally order a burger, I’d end up with a salad (the only vegan thing) And eating only organic/non-gmo/gluten free? Same reason: it dramatically reduced the variety of food I was able to buy without breaking the 3 rules above. I pick up a bag of chips, and if it’s not organic gluten free, right back on the shelf it goes. And why shop at expensive health food stores? Not because the food is better, but because when everything is priced 50-100% higher than a regular supermarket, so I bought less food. Do you really want that $8 bag of chips? —- All of this is to say: if you’re looking to lose weight, don’t care so much about any specific diet, etc… think about your eating habits and how to change them. If you’re motivated to lose weight and have the determination, I recommend going vegan paired with eating only organic. Again, not recommending it because vegan or organic are magic diets (they’re not)… BUT by following an organic vegan diet you are forcing yourself to completely rethink nearly all of your eating habits, and once you break your current eating habits, you can begin to form new (healthier) eating habits. Best part is that I didn’t gain the weight back since the way I lost it was by changing my habits and the way I think about food, rather than caring about calories or dieting. If you’re overweight, it’s because of your eating habits. People who say “eat fewer calories, you must be in a deficit” aren’t wrong, but it’s hard to do because it requires so much thinking constantly about portion size, etc. Weight loss can become much easier by establishing 1-2 strict “eating rules” that you commit following and that are simple to remember, Honestly, I could have achieved the same weight loss by coming up with a silly rule like “I will only buy food that comes in blue packaging” instead of vegan/organic. You need to figure out a way to change your eating habits, period. If my approach doesn’t resonate with you, think of something, anything, that will get you to replace your current habits with new ones. Even if that means telling yourself you’ll only eat food that comes in blue packaging.
• gpsx 4y ago
  When I started the article I thought it would be completely misguided, but there was a lot of good information inside. I just don't agree with the emphasis on counting calories. As the article says, we are bad at it. But supposing we could do it perfectly, then what is the right number we should ingest? Besides, we eat for more than just calories. Nutrients are more important. Your body might tell you to keep eating after you get enough calories because it is missing something else. Our body has an amazingly good, built in mechanism to control what we eat without us consciously tracking our input. The only problem, as mentioned in the article, is some modern foods throw off our system. So don't eat those. I don't find avoiding processed foods or even foods with processed sugar a sacrifice in any way, at least from a pleasure point of view. Disclaimer - eating refined sugar gives me headache so maybe that makes it easier. (Fruit does not give me a headache. Fruit cooked in the oven at high temperatures to caramelize the sugars does. ? )
• armchairhacker 4y ago
  CICO is one of the few things in nutrition which is 100% fact: if you’re not losing weight after months, you’re eating too much, and if you eat less, you will lose weight. But CICO alone is terrible nutrition advice, because hunger - true physical hunger - is not something anyone should live with. Those people in the Minnesota Starvation experiment? They were thinking about food 24/7, obsessing about it, it became nearly the only thing they cared about. One of them reported when watching a movie, he would pay most attention to the few scenes with the characters eating, not the action or romance or the actual plot. Furthermore, your body really does have sort of “starvation mode”: it won’t lower your RMR to 0, but it will cause brain fog, tiredness, loss of sex drive, mood dysregulation, and ultimately depression. You stop getting pleasure from anything except food. Furthermore, you can get “physical hunger” even if you’re gaining weight, if your hormones are messed up. A cited example is hypothyroidism, which has symptoms like brain fog, fatigue, mood disorders synonymous with starvation. And you can avoid “physical hunger” even while losing weight, if your hormones are in check, you’re not in too steep a calorie deficit, and you’re getting enough nutrients (aka eating whole foods). This is why people emphasize eating nutritious foods even when you can reach the same calorie goal with junk foods. There’s also the willpower component. Nutritious foods can improve your mood and give you more willpower, so it’s easier to eat less. They also tend to make people less (mentally) hungry. Generally when losing weight it’s a good idea to not just focus on nutrient-dense “whole” foods, but also low-volume and satiety-inducing foods. Nuts and whole grains are generally considered healthy but they’re also calorie-dense so it’s easy to pass your daily calorie needs them without getting full: in contrast, lean proteins and non-starchy vegetables are low-calorie and filling, it’s much harder to gain weight on fish and broccoli. Eating in a smaller time window and eating less meals (IF) also makes it easier to not overeat. But even with IF, volume eating, and sometimes keto, you can still deal with physical hunger if your hormones are just messed up. To see if it’s your hormones first you need to stick to a consistent diet for at least a couple weeks: you will probably feel hungry and tired the first few days of any diet but that’s just your body adapting. After a few weeks if you’re “doing everything right”, including eating truly “healthy” foods (whole foods), eating low-calorie foods, and eating a moderate but not too steep deficit from your estimated TDEE; if you’re doing all that and either you’re not losing weight or your still white-knuckling it and getting symptoms like tiredness and hair loss, you should see a doctor and get your hormones checked.
• analog31 4y ago
  My family mostly cooks at home, and we avoid heavily prepared ingredients, e.g., instant meals. I've never computed the calories, but I just looked up a few things. I can't even think of what to put in a pizza, to bring it up to 2370 Calories. I think a benefit of home cooking with mostly basic ingredients is just that we're engaged in the process, making it much harder to "hide" Calories in what we make. Also, we don't expect the food to be as yummy as restaurant food. I also don't feel bad about the fact that I can't make an "authentic" restaurant pizza.
• jurassic 4y ago
  I've struggled with weight my whole life. The only thing I've figured out for sure is that cutting out nearly all added sugar is essential to keeping my calories where they should be. Firstly because of the calories in the sugar. But more importantly because I believe sugar makes me hungry and causes me to overeat other foods.
• occz 4y ago
  The title statement, while true, is not really useful, because it fails to tackle the really interesting question, which is why we are eating more calories than our bodies expend. Particularly interesting is why this started happening around 1980, and not before. Food was calorically dense enough and available before that point. I recommend checking out the writeup by Slime Mold Time Mold on this subject - see it here: http://achemicalhunger.com/ http://achemicalhunger.com/
• szastamasta 4y ago
  I’m tracking my calories intake for more than 2 years. Every meal, every day (due to my fitness goals and I’m very serious about it) and I totally agree, that if you haven’t nazi-tracked your calories at least for a while, you have totally no idea how much do you eat. People can miss-judge their daily intake by 1000 calories easily. Most people simply confuse calories with being full. It has nothing in common. You can eat 400kcal and be full and 1500 and be hungry. There’s no other way to gain or loose weight, but to track calories.
  • lordnacho 4y ago
    Energy balance is a proximate cause though. It's not wrong that it works, the problem is how to actually make yourself do it. It's like how profit is revenue minus cost, that doesn't tell everyone how to make money.
• jimmydoreornot 4y ago
  While correct and useful advice for some people, this advice is useless for many (I suspect most) overweight and obese people. I'm on the border of overweight/obese. I can lose weight if I focus on losing weight. I've dropped from 100kg to 74kg and back. I've gone back down to 91kg and back. How? Eating less, of course. By counting calories. But here is the problem. Anything below 95kg and my body and mind is hyper annoying, constantly interrupting my thoughts (amygdala?) insisting that I go eat something. It is impossible to program computers when my brain keeps interrupting me. I simply cannot focus on anything other than eating. It's like a very slow motion breath hold... eventually you will come up for air. I find life so miserable at those weights that I eventually learned to accept my fate and I'll die early I'm sure, but at least life will feel tolerable until then. Why do some people's bodies/minds insist so insistently that they eat more when they clearly are already overweight? That's the question I would love to have answered. People often postulate the answer lies in the kinds of foods you eat, but I've proven that hypothesis wrong (for myself) many times. Avoiding sugars and fried foods and eating oatmeal, fish soup, salads, fruit and veg with lean proteins... does not make any weight difference for me, nor does it make low body weights any more tolerable. Sounds great, I'm sure it's healthy, but I've proven on myself multiple times that this technique does not work. Only counting calories works for weight loss (actually distance running works for me too), and it always leaves me famished and miserable. Going on a zero-carb diet might work. I've seen success stories. I haven't seriously tried it. When I've tried in the past I was craving bread so massively that I caved in.
  • mathverse 4y ago
    Have you tried protein heavy diet? Just try drinking protein whey protein powder drinks the whole day for a week and see what it does to you. I dont have a problem with losing weight but It's incredibly difficult and annoying to get lean and burn fat while building muscles. I literally cant force myself to eat more if I try to do at least 200g protein every day. 2xmozarella light (42g protein), 2x66 protein drinks (132) and I am on 174g of protein and I cant force myself to eat anything else.
    • msrenee 4y ago
      It completely depends on your lean weight, but 200g of protein is very high for most people who aren't athletes. I'm not in a state to work out whether the normal chorus saying that much protein will damage your kidneys is true or if I've just heard it enough times that it sounds true. Here's a publication that looks informative, but I haven't worked all the way through it and it may or may not support my presumption that 200 g of protein a day is too much for a male of average height who is not in an intense exercise regimen. https://jasn.asnjournals.org/content/31/8/1667 https://jasn.asnjournals.org/content/31/8/1667
• satellite2 4y ago
  The (always ignored) corollary of all this, is that fat people with stable weight have appropriate diets. People get fat by over indulging for short periods of time and then pay the price for very long time, even after correcting their behavior. To actually have a calorie deficit for long periods is a considerable effort that most people cannot sustain.
• lisper 4y ago
  It’s not that you’re eating too much, it’s that you’re eating (and drinking) too much sugar. Consume less sugar, and don’t eat when you’re not hungry, and you will be amazed at the results.
  • edanm 4y ago
    Sugar isn't specifically worse than other ways to consume calories, as far as I understand. The way we know this is that there have been many studies in humans, some with high-sugar diets and some with low-sugar diets, and as long as calories are equated, almost everything else about them is the same. Same amount of weight loss, blood markers look similar, etc.
    • lisper 4y ago
      References? Because I remember reading that the metabolic path for sugar (fructose in particular) produces some pretty nasty by-products. But that's not the main problem with sugar. The main problem with sugar is that it doesn't fill you up. In fact, it has the opposite effect: it makes you feel hungrier. So yes, if you eat the same number of calories in sugar or fat & protein that in and of itself will have the same effect on your weight. But the sugar will leave you feeling hungrier than the fat&protein, and that is what messes you up.
      • edanm 4y ago
        > References? Because I remember reading that the metabolic path for sugar (fructose in particular) produces some pretty nasty by-products. I'm not someone actually working in this field, I just read a lot and watch YouTube a lot on this topic. So I'm just going to give the first refernce I found on Google: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5174149/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5174149/. I'm mostly basing what I'm saying based on watching videos by Layne Norton, Mike Israetel and others, who are credentialed in this topic. > But that's not the main problem with sugar. The main problem with sugar is that it doesn't fill you up. In fact, it has the opposite effect: it makes you feel hungrier. I mostly agree. I think this effect is different for different people, but for the most part, sugar is less satiating vs. eating other foods. It's incredibly easy to overeat sugar compared to, say, overeating proteins (though both are possible). Still, lots of sugar-containing foods are pretty great to eat, e.g. fruits. They might have sugar, but they are usually incredibly low on calories for the amount that you're eating.
• mathverse 4y ago
  I have a different problem. I'd like to maintain my body weight and get even leaner but I just enjoy going out with friends and I can go out like every day. And it's impossible to go out and not eat/drink something.
• awsrocks 4y ago
• overcast 4y ago
  If not from eating too much, what am I losing fat because of then?
• nyjah 4y ago
  I see a lot of people mentioning counting calories and I've never had success doing that. I stick with Tim Ferris's 4 hour body method of only consuming meat beans and vegetables and getting the 1 cheat day or meal. There are a few other rules like eating 20g of protein right when you wake up, but I can't recommend his book enough to people that are struggling with losing weight. The biggest thing about his book is it makes you understand your body fat percentage and gives you more ways to measure weight loss than just what the scale says, which can be deceiving. Anyways, different things will work for different people, but everything takes time to adjust. https://www.amazon.com/Hour-Body-Uncommon-Incredible-Superhuman/dp/030746363X/ref=tmm_hrd_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr= https://www.amazon.com/Hour-Body-Uncommon-Incredible-Superhu...
• brailsafe 4y ago
  Guessed correctly on the the mocha, peanut butter, and popcorn :)
• pmlnr 4y ago
  kilocalories. I know that it's metric system, but ffs, at least an entry that tries to educate should somewhere mention it. It's not calories.
• hypersoar 4y ago
  I'm sick of the "it's just calories in, calories out, idiot!" bullshit. It's at least partially wrong an woefully incomplete. Telling a fat person to eat less is like telling a depressed person to get out more. I know because I've been at the receiving end of both. For one thing, it ignores that the calorie consumer has feelings. First, running a calorie deficit makes you physiologically hungry. You can fight the hunger, but no willpower or strength of character is going to make it disappear. Going on a diet is a constant fight against your body. And that doesn't even get into the psychological reasons people eat. Articles like this one make no effort to account for this. They don't explore the negative effects. Being hungry all the time is really fucking distracting. And they certainly don't try to weigh those downsides against the potential benefits. And those benefits to dieting are very much "potential". Study after study has shown that diets don't work in the long term; people usually gain the weight back. The article smarmily dismisses metabolism as a factor. But losing weight slows your metabolism down. You end up needing to cut you intake even further than someone who's been steady at the same weight [1]. I've been fat and I've lost weight. My maximum weight exceeded my minimum (post-max) weight by about 100 pounds. Right now I'm somewhere in the middle. To the extend that I've had sustained weight loss, it has been by making gradual, sustainable changes to my lifestyle. And these changes haven't used weight as a target. Getting into running, replacing some foods with other foods, and working on my mental health are all fairly sustainable in their own right. They make me feel better and healthier. The correlated weight loss is incidental. When I did use weight as a target, I did more harm than good. Exercising and dieting to the point of passing out for a whole day after a long run did make me lose weight, but it didn't make me healthier. In fact, my running got slower. Leave fat people the fuck alone about their diets. The panopticon of shame and ridicule doesn't help. [1] https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/88/4/906/4650207?login=true https://academic.oup.com/ajcn/article/88/4/906/4650207?login...
  • paintman252 4y ago
    "And those benefits to dieting are very much "potential". Study after study has shown that diets don't work in the long term; people usually gain the weight back." I'm sorry, but this is misleading BS. Studies have found that diets don't work for most people cause most people just suck at sticking to diets, not because CICO is somehow fundamentally flawed. To imply the second is dishonest. It would be like saying that suggesting people to work out to get in shape is useless cause studies have found that most people don't stick to exercise plans. "Leave fat people the fuck alone about their diets." Unfortunately we can't. Cause obesity is a real public health crisis and diets is why. That's not to say that we should encourage fat shaming. But we need to be honest and not coddle people
• locallost 4y ago
  Here is a very specific counter example I heard recently: a woman contestant in one of those weight loss shows, overweight all her life, all her life on yo yo diets, doctors told her to lose weight if she wants kids since her hormons were messed up. Lost 200lbs in one year by dieting and exercising 6 hours a day, felt miserable, lost her period completely, doctors told her her body is behaving as if she was anorexic so she still could not get kids and of course unless she continued dieting kept gaining weight. So the images of people looking like concentration camp survivors does not mean much - in this one case the person finally looked normal, but her body did not work normal anymore. If anybody is interested: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jacqui-mccoy/id1440334876?i=1000558938306 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/jacqui-mccoy/id1440334...
• siliconc0w 4y ago
  I've lost a lot of weight before and obese -> overweight was relatively straightforward but I find getting from overweight to 'normal' weight a challenge. I've done it before with pretty austere fasting (many multi-day water fasts) but to loose some pandemic pounds I'm trying a more conventional wegightlifting+cardio+deficit to try and preserve more muscle. Even with a fitbit reporting I'm burning 3200+ calories a day and running a supposed 1-2lb/week deficit and I'm still pretty much plateauing. I'm at like 40%p/35%c/25f% macro split - higher protein is at least good for satiety. This article tries to dismiss metabolism but I think it's actually a hugely important factor. Your body is a magical machine that has a huge capability to adjust energy spend so you need to extract the most fat-burn out of each % deficit as possible. So optimally have to start at a 'bulking' surplus for a few weeks and then slowly nudge the nose down until you plateau and only then nudge further. If you just immediately go to -2lb a week or whatever you lose initially but after a few weeks invariably adapt and then you're kinda screwed, going further starts to get pretty bleak.
• eismcc 4y ago
  Great article. Even as an endurance athlete I struggle to lose weight w/o intermittent fasting and I can only do that in the off-season. Knowing your body comp also will help understand what’s going on - get a smart scale. One metric I find useful is that if you don’t wake hungry you are probably eating too much. Dial back slightly until you wake hungry.
• ProtoAES256 4y ago
  People like me who are obese(I'm Obese III) can't control the urge to keep intake food, which is a death spiral loop(we know!). I suspect that this is partially influenced by gut bacteria, which sounds like pointing fingers to blame something instead of not enough "self-esteem". It's more of multiple factors in motion, while the effects apart from self determination are heavily downplayed. I'm currently trying to shake down some of my weight, but as soon as I started consume less, my mind gets fuzzy and work will not get done. And my blood sugar gets dangerously low. Counterintuitive I know, heh. I hope for that one day I'll break the vicious cycle.
• redlights 4y ago
  Why the hell does everyone bring up calories for fat loss? I lost 45 pounds by not counting my calories at all (only in the beginning, when I didn't know any better). You lose fat by reducing insulin resistance, not by food intake. I didn't even exercise, I basically sat all day and those pounds flew off. I did intermittent fasting, learned to cook, and slowly started replacing my diet with healthier foods. I'll be honest, I lost a good portion by going keto and avoiding the majority of carbs but I quit because there's no way I could keep a diet like that long-term. Now I eat complex carbs and indulge in junk food once in awhile, with my diet being mostly whole foods. I keep a steady 150ish at 5'8. The more important factor is ALWAYS the psychological factor, which NEVER gets brought up in weight loss advice. If someone is obese or nearing obesity, they have a food addiction. They keep eating because they're filling a void in themselves. I'll be honest, I had to deal with it and if you're overweight and trying to lose weight you'll have to deal with it too. When I was overweight, I was also depressed and in an abusive environment so I ate the pain away. It's related to emotional nourishment, which unfortunately not many people get enough of these days and it fuels food addiction. It fuels any addiction, really. Most likely there's no one around the obese person who understands them and has any type of real, deep connection with them as a person so they eat to keep that void away. At least that's what it was for me, maybe it's different for someone else. That's the real reason someone can't lose weight, there's an underlying psychological problem fueling it. No mentally healthy person is overweight. No amount of "calorie counting" will solve the empty void someone who's obese is trying to fill.
• defensem3ch 4y ago
  this article sucks. because of widespread issues like hypothyroidism that aren't routinely screened for (in some cases yes but i don't think this is largely the case), there are serious endocrine and metabolic disruptions, so for the author to brush that off in an article that is clearly designed for people who are struggling to lose weight, it's just way off base. there should at least be footnotes for people to have their T3, T4, and TSH checked if they are struggling to lose weight at a caloric deficit.
• stevenicr 4y ago
  A couple things I wonder about, and maybe someone has research on them(?) Are many of us hungry because the food we are eating does not have the same vitamins / other nutrients that we used to get from more whole foods? From craving a sunkist / orange drink and consuming it - only to want more later - is this craving the nutrients in oranges / fruit and we eat something to satisfy the immediate hunger then long for more cuz it didn't absorb from what we ate? From processed shelf stable food, to industrial farmed foods that may sometime have less nutrients that a properly feed vegetable - we must be getting less vitamins and minerals even if we are getting some tomatoes slices and such in the meals right? I also have though for a long time that if there was less stigma for mood altering things.. some people I have known would eat ice cream regularly in a way that I think if they had the ability to smoke a joint they would not.. or find some other solace from counseling to spiritual stuff or exercise or mushrooms or whatever... I think we as a society do not have enough socially acceptable / sanctioned things to do to release stress / feel better doing things.. and what is it in ice cream that makes you feel different? chocolate too - is it dl-phenalmymine or something like that, it gives you a feeling everything is better / love feels a little? - you can buy that as a pill instead of consuming the calories for the feels - but it's not a popular thing. For some it's socially acceptable to reach for a beer or benzos, but I think we need better options, both short term feels and longer terms heals. random thoughts I hope someone else has found more info on.
  • stevenicr 4y ago
    Oh - and cooking / preparation methods - what has been researched about this and nutrients we are not getting because of them? From my very limited understanding - cooking some foods a bit helps to unlock calories easier and better - but certainly there must be a sweet spot where things are better and a point where more is lost than gained (?) Look cooking a food at 350 for 10 minutes is good, but cooking in 500 degree hot oil for 20 minutes burns away stuff? I was thinking about this when I learned that some folks have an allergy to fresh shrimp being cooked on a stove because proteins are being released into the air... well if you overcook them, or if you are taking cooked then re-burning them them again before eating, is there a substantial amount of protein or/and other things being lost? Like a 1/3 burger of high fat is cooked down to less than a quarter pound patty, are we still calculating the calories and protein of a 1/3 pound? I wonder the same with squashes and other vegetables when cooked a long time or and microwaved / re-cooked as well.
• matiasmolinari 4y ago
  My takeaway is that you should just grab a snickers.
• Lio 4y ago
  This article has some excellent advice. One thing I would add is about the importance for avoiding processed food when you can and why. Not all calories are equal and basically it's about if your body can absorb them or not. To borrow an example from Gerald Yeo[1] if you eat 400g of sweetcorn a large amount of it will turn up undigested in your poo. i.e. It's just passing through you and not making you fat. If you process that corn though, by grinding it up and making something like bread out of it, it will become much more easily absorbed by the gut. The calorie count will be the same on each packet but one case is clearly being used by the body and the other is not. Also, processing foods thends to strips them of flavour, so to compensate manufacturers will often compensate for that by adding in more salt, sugar and fat to get closer to that "bliss" point mentioned in the article. For the same absorption reason I personally try to avoid liquid calories where ever possible. e.g. no milk in coffee, keep the beers and wine to a minimum, etc. 1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5BE49fCRqo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i5BE49fCRqo
• nephanth 4y ago
  This may say some true things, but I sincerely hope no anorexic person ever finds this article.
• HumanReadable 4y ago
  My god there are many people in this comment thread who trivialise weight loss, clearly having never done it themselves. I'm a healthy weight, do heavy workouts 5 days a week and am in very good shape. When I cut my body fat down to ~10%, I go through hell in terms of hunger. There's not a minute I'm not thinking about how hungry I am, and how much I want to eat. I'm completely unable to do productive work, spending a majority of my mental energy restraining myself from getting food. It's very clear to me, that the only difference between me and someone obese is at what point our brains start telling us that we're hungry. The only purpose this article serves is to make people who have never struggled with diet feel superior.
  • sizzle 4y ago
    How do you have time to do 5 times a week? You must not have young kids with special needs I take it?
    • HumanReadable 4y ago
      yup, I'm 24 and single which probably gives me a lot more free time than many on this forum. That said I think you can get very far with a 35 minute workout 2-3 days a week, if you do the right compound exercises and push yourself.
  • pnt12 4y ago
    I think there are two approaches for that: 1. Count your calories and pick food that let's you stay within your goals. 2. Do intermittent fasting. After a few days, (some?) people's body just adapt and stop craving for food during the fasting hours - I was a late-night snacker but after doing it for a week, the cravings diminished a lot, so much that I stuck with it for a year.
• netmonk 4y ago
  I was writing a long reply te debunk this stupid article but find out it's better to share original source. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31386286 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31386286
• 0xCAP 4y ago
  What I've found out, after going from a pretty damn athletic lifestyle (10+ years of boxing) to turning into a full-fledged couch potato (smart working, working from home, pandemic, accumulated injuries preventing me to exercise regularly), is that the body is pretty forgiving as long as you keep it under a constant exercise routine, but it suddenly starts taxing you as soon as you become sedentary. Pretty recently I've taken a photo with a colleague coming to visit my hometown, and I couldn't recognize that fat f#@k in the photo which was supposed to be me.
• nojvek 4y ago
  I weigh more in my 30s than I did in my 20s. I’m realizing I’m slowly gaining weight year over year. I have more abundant food now. Now that we have kids. We have regular 3x meals per day. Also I feel more hungry nowadays. Not sure why. I feel like I stress eat. With kids and moving to Suburbs, I’m not hitting the gym 3x per week like I used to. I could use some tips on how new parents stay in shape.
  • MrBump_ 4y ago
    Honestly, get a trainer / coach. Ideally one who will help you both on the training and nutrition side. You can even get one of those online ones (it's what I did). When you have children, you don't have the time to think about this stuff yourself, so outsourcing it to a trainer makes a lot of sense.
  • HanShotFirst 4y ago
    Just chiming in that I am in this boat too. I find it easy to fast at the office, provided there's not some ridiculous snack brought in by coworkers. However, at home the sheer amount of food I see while I'm preparing it for the kids, who constantly want snacks, makes it difficult for me to resist eating. I've had a bit of success by "skipping" some meals and only eating the kids' leftovers. The stress of raising kids doesn't help either.
• deleted 4y ago
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