weight loss diet
 

what do you guys think is the best way to lose weight by changing what you eat?

like should i eat less, lss fats, less carbs, less fruits, more fruits?

i dont know


are things like peaches, cheese, french bread, wine, pastas, apricots, rice, green beans, and similar things god to eat?

You don't lose weight by changing what you eat; you lose weight by consuming fewer calories than you expend.

I agree with Aardork.

What I'm currently doing is trying to make a "lifestyle change"; diets do not work!!! Depressing, but true. In my eating disorders class, we learned that 95% of people who lose weight by dieting gain it back within 2 years. And 98% gain it back eventually. If you're gonna make a change, it's gotta be for life.

That being said, I'm trying to learn how to eat fewer calories. I really really think people eat more calories than they realize. Keep careful track of your calories for the next few days, then see how many you need to cut out to be at 2,000 (or whatever your specific need is). I'm currently keeping my calories between 1650 and 2100 per day, and I'm very very slowly losing weight (probably about 1 pound per week).

But losing weight slowly is good. The slower it comes off, the slower it'll come back! It may take me a year or more to get to my desired weight, but once I'm there, I'm there!

Wow - really? What are you doing to keep from getting hungry but yet maintaining a <2000 calorie diet?

I'd love to know, because I could probably use a life style change. My diet usually consists of red meat and coffee.

Do you have to put up with the bullshit of eating rice cakes and shit like that? I just LOVE food too much to be able to sacrifice taste. ;_;

is the taller you are and more muscle you have have to do with the amount of calories you can eat?


i cant see a 4 foot girl eating the same amount as a 6 foot guy to los the same weight...

im 6'5 and got a lot of muscle....i just have a tummy that i want to slice off

I changed my diet, because I decided I wasn't going to be 193 pounds anymore (at 5'7").

I normally consumed between (estimated) 2,500 - 3,500 calories a day. Fast food almost every day, lots of snacks/deserts, etc...

For the past 3 months, my diet has been 1,000 - 1,500 calories a day. Usually a Lean Cuisine meal for lunch, maybe a 100 calorie snack pack, fruits or vegetables, then about 400/500 calories from a healthy fast food dinner (or homemade).

By "healthy fast food" I mean ordering:

TACO BELL
----------
1 Ranchero Chicken Taco (Fresco Style) Cal: 170, Fat: 4g
1 Beef Crunchy Taco (Fresco Style) Cal: 150, Fat: 7g
1 Grilled Steak Soft Taco (Fresco Style) Cal: 170, Fat: 5g
TOTAL: 490 calories, 16 grams of fat

This fills you up like nobody's business. Plus, it's still less calories and fat than a single Big Mac (560 cal, 30 fat), and you get a lot of protein. Fresco Style means they replace the cheese/sour cream/sauce with "fresco salsa," which is tomatoes, onions, and cilantro. Very refreshing, especially when they put on a lot.

WENDY'S:
Side Salad with Fat-Free French Dressing Cal: 110, Fat: 0g
Small Chili Cal: 220, Fat: 6g
TOTAL: 330 calories, 6 grams of fat

And I don't even use all the dressing on the salad, so it's less than that.

By making use of the nutritional calculators on these fast food websites, you can actually make yourself a healthy meal (however, most of their items will be restricted from your diet). I still can't eat anything from McDonald's or Burger King (and truth be told, I haven't had a hamburger in about 2 months), but this Taco Bell option is damn good, so I'm happy with that.

Good luck with your lifestyle change, it's worked for me and I've lost 45 pounds so far.

EDIT: As for not getting hungry...

At the beginning of the change, I was still hungry, and it takes willpower to overcome that. The urge to eat was a habit for me (I was bored, I would pick up a donut, etc...). After about a few days or the first week, I no longer had a real hunger drive. Right now I could probably go a full day without eating, and I wouldn't even notice it. Your stomach shrinks and you become accustomed to healthy food. Now you don't have so much sugar and salt coming into your system, and you aren't craving your next fix.

A lot of this is psychological, too. What I did at the beginning of my diet change was look at all of the fast food nutritional calculators. This will scare the shit out of you. To see how much empty calories and fats you normally consume from a standard burger, fries, and coke is incredible. It got me off normal fast food for a long, long time.

BTW, I also take a few vitamin supplements:
1 One-A-Day for Men
1 Vitamin C
2 Super Omega-3
1 Vitamin E

This is just so that I'm guaranteed to get some necessary nutrition daily.

And I really recommend buying some of the 100 calorie snack packs to replace a normal snack. If you pace yourself, a single bag lasts you as long as any other snack (since you get like 15-20 pieces in each bag, depending on what type it is). Sometimes I take 2 bags to the movies instead of other snacks.

Of course. The taller you are (well, the more you weigh), the more calories your body burns just to maintain its normal state.

If you don't want to lose your muscle, don't eat less. You'll start losing the muscle before the fat. Just do more cardio; run for twenty minutes in the mornings, or something like that. Then again, specifics depend on how large your ''tummy'' is.

TRUST ME, I struggle with this stuff too. I'm convinced that I must have an amazing metabolism, because I was definitely eating about 4,000 cal/day... I have a food fetish.

Now you might not like to hear this, but... try the sugar-free foods. I know, I know, I balked at the idea at first, too. Like diet soda? Took some getting used to. That stuff is nasty when you first drink it. But honestly, it took me less than a week, and then I was fine with it. Switching to diet soda alone helped me cut out about 600 cal/day. Just try it for a week, and if you still hate it, you can go back to regular... if you drink soda at all.

Some sugar-free foods are pretty good. There are these really good chocolate-mint cookies at publix that are sugar-free... they still have calories, but not as many as your average cookie. Sugar-free jell-o is quite good, too; most people say it tastes like regular jell-o. My newest discovery is hot tea, which is zero calories (the peppermint kind) and pretty good--just add a bit of honey, honey.

But you know what? It's really hard at first. Well, it's still really hard now... I've only been doing this for a coupla weeks. But I feel good about it, and I think... I think... maybe I'll be able to make a lifestyle change. I've been looking up calories for fast food and stuff. I don't restrict what I eat, but if you're only going to allow yourself 2000 cal per day... you're gonna be less likely to go for that 1100 calorie sub from jimmy john's (R.I.P. veggie sub). And you will get hungry. But I imagine that will diminish over time.

My dad is an inspiration to me. He's a big man (about 250 pounds, I think), but he's recently made a lifestyle change and cut out sugar. He still eats chips and peanuts and fattening stuff, but no more donuts. That alone is helping him lose weight--I can tell he's thinner every time I go home! He and I made a deal that if I took at least 3 insulin shots per day, he'd lose at least 1 pound per week.

I have super high metabolism so nothing I eat seems to put any weight on me. I am 5'11 and currently at 130 pounds. that is considered the ideal weight but I do have a budgy tummy that i would like to get rid of. would exercise be the key to getting rid of it or lowering the calorie intake?

I lost 25lbs this year by not eating when I wasn't hungry, and ceasing eating when I was full.

I still eat candy and drink mountain dew, but I have maintained a weight of 160lbs with no variation.

Don't "diet". If you want to lose weight, and keep it off, you have to change your lifestyle as a whole.

Which means eating less, eating healthier, exercise atleast 30 minutes a day, plenty of sleep, and drinking lots of water.

Cutting soda out of your normal habit also helps a lot.

But honestly, there's no real gimmick to losing weight. If you lose a ton of weight in a short period of time, it's probably not healthy.

Cutting any important food out of your diet is not a good idea. You need balanced amounts of carbs, protein, etc.

This has been a lifelong mystery to me. I mean, it all depends on the person's body, right? I really don't know much about my own body's (insert all those terms here). I do know that I've always been somewhat chubby, although I didn't look like it. There was a time when I used to play a lot of basketball and I guess that was the only time I looked thin. Now, I don't know. I drink a lot of water, so it doesn't look like I'm gaining a lot of weight, but it also doesn't feel like I'm losing any weight either. I only exercise a max of ten minutes a day, most times it's just five minutes with a lot of other walking around and movement. I heard that if you lose chips, pop and all that junk food, you'll at least lose a pound each week? There was also a time when I stuck with salads and Subway sandwiches, but I eventually got sick of eating that all the time.

Aside from nutritional value and all that healthy mumbo jumbo, it doesn't really matter what you are eating, but the thing you have to do is make sure you're burning more calories than you are consuming or storing or whatever, so your best bet is to fit in an exercise routine to go along with eating less. Do a lot of cardio, limit your portions, and slowly you'll burn off the excess weight. You may even need to write down an exact list of what you eat and figure out how many calories a day you are putting in your body and figure out how much to cut it down to and what to cut down or out while maintaining a sensible exercise program.

I don't eat out much anymore, and that has made a huge difference on me. Personally though, if I were to go on a diet, Subway is the way to go. Especially, when you add all the veggies, with no sauce. Healthy stuff I say.

Where I live, I eat fairly well... although sometimes I eat mainly junk food.... :( Pop and candy is all my diet somedays.

At the same time, sometimes I get really busy, or forget the time, and I don't eat for about twelve or more hours. Then when I do eat, it isn't much. Just enough to satisfy me. So I say my diet is around 2 500 calories a day... although the health of it might be a little low... :(

The best advise I can give is to simply quit drinking sugary drinks of anyt kind. That includes coffee, juice, soda etc etc etc. Try switching over to diet softdrinks, or simply drink lots of water to prevent cravings. Sodas make up for nearly half of the calorie intake of most Americans. My fat ass brother lost tons of weight by quitting soda cold turkey and drinking nothing but water with his meals. He went from 250 to 180 in 4 months. And he's never felt better in his life.

^^^ Yeah, that's true. I have noticed that whenever I do drink pop, I feel fatter, yet when I drink water, I feel lighter. Sugary drinks just leave a "full" feeling.

I just wish I didn't have cravings for fries so often or let alone, fast food in general.

to lose weight faster
 

hiiii, its really gud that you wanna lose extra be coz itz d cause many other problems.I had lost 10lbs in 2wks. I am now at around 18 lbs. Some fat burners which makes you look perfect then you must try diet pills,they can help you to reduce fat in a healthy way. And should try sueshealthcenter's other weight lose products

It's really a matter of attitude. As blue mentioned, you can't approach the problem by saying "omg, fucking fat around my belly, what's the quickest way to get rid of it?"

You need to realize and accept that you're in for the long haul. And by accept I mean meditate on the fact for a few days, weeks if necessary, until you thoroughly understand that there just is no easy way out.

Everyone has problems and they're different for each person. You need to tailor your lifestyle changes (diet and exercise) so that they target your problems. Most people know intrinsically what a proper lifestyle is: no junkfood, no pills, balanced diet, enough water and sleep, an hour or more of exercise every other day etc.

The key idea though is to identify your problem. If you know what the problem is, you're 80% done. Personally, I have had (and still do) several problems and I'm working on fixing them.

My first problem was exercise. I think my body is built to handle weights instead of running. I still run ~20 minutes every other day but I lift weights for 20 minutes before and after that. Now this is probably drastically different for you - it's all a matter of listening to yourself.

Second was food. I've found that I can't tolerate meat or excess sugar. I just feel like shit when I consume either. Same goes for coffee. This is probably different for you but you really have to listen to yourself intently. If you eat meat and you feel like shit the day after - bitchy temper, sweat that smells like stale horse shit, pimples, unusually oily skin - you know something is up. Thank the good god my mom is vegetarian as well and I get to eat decent food. :)

Next up was water. I usually drink between 3-5 591 milliliter water bottles each day. I've found this is an equilibrium position for me and it works out pretty good.

Lastly is sleep and because I'm a university student, I'm not quite up to my standards here. :D

Ach well. I've started this routine about a month ago. Just last night, I was wearing a white undershirt and I looked at my left bicep in the glow of the monitor and I noticed muscle definition. It was totally a "DAMN STRAIGHT" moment :tpg:

just find a way to creativly eat what you like, and exercise, say with some DDR

WOW. 4,000 a day? It would make sense if you're working out or doing a lot of exercise....

I actually very rarely drink soda at all. When I do, it's always diet, if only because I prefer the saccharine taste of aspertame to the sugar present in regular cola.

I prefer to drink a shitload of iced tea. I wonder how bad that is? I drink bucket loads of water (at least a gallon a day), but I do drink a lot of this stuff: (And I mean A LOT)
http://www.4c.com/images/MPnews/T2Go.gif

I'm not a big choclate fan either - you know, I am starting to wonder why I am fat ahahha. I have a NASTY penchant for meat and potatoes. Maybe thats where my trouble lies. And BREAD, o my GOD.

Do you have any advice for that kind of thing, blue?
Wait, insulin shots? Can you explain?? O_O

One big thing I found out recently is caffine blocks vitamins and minerals from being absorbed and boosts carbs being absorbed. You won't be denyed everything, but it hurts your body none the less. I would recommend drinking water instead of coffee or soda. It may be a dramatic change, but it will definitely help you lose weight.

Edit: Insulin shots are what diabetics take to control their glucose levels. You only take insulin if you really NEED insulin. That stuff is rough.

Yea, thats why I asked. I don't understand why taking it while dieting would be a good thing....?

You will get a kidney stone.

If you are taking insulin, it means you are not being strict enough about your diet. You shouldn't rely on insulin, but if you need it, you gotta take it.

I think blue is a diabetic (from what I've seen in her journal) and she probably wasn't adherring to an insulin schedule so her dad made an agreement, keep healthy with insulin shots for a diabetes and he'll keep healthy by losing weight. Or so what I'm assuming

This is going to sound so much like an infomercial but I'll do it anyways. I recently lost 25 pounds over 5 months using Nutrisystem (google it). I've had a weight problem all my life, my lowest was 90 pounds during high school and my highest was probably 150 last year and I love food so I'd pretty much resigned myself to just having a love hate thing with it for the rest of my life.

I'll be the first to admit Nutrisystem is nothing special, the only reason it worked for me was because it forces you to control your potion sizes and encourages you to eat more lean protein, fruits and vegetables. Pretty much that's all there is to losing weight, you exercise a lot, eat less of everything, eat a lot of stuff that everyone knows is good for them and cut out the stuff everyone knows is bad. For breads and rice and things, I've pretty much switch my consumption over to whole wheats and brown rice. Because carbs, unlike what mainstream would say, is not bad for it, it's what kind of carbs you eat. Brown rice tastes like shit for a couple days but like everything, you get used to it just like white rice.

Also eating a lot of little meals during the day instead of 3 big meals helps you lose weight, you keep your blood sugar and metabolism stable which encourages your body to burn more fat instead of retaining it and you're more satisfied and won't binge as much.

What weight loss boiled down to, for me at least, was portion control and exercise. I used to eat far beyond the point of satisfaction and just eat to the sake of eating. Also exercise is key, I used to hate exercise and while I still do, now I move more and that really helps, even if it's taking the dog around the block.

Along "healthy" fast food:

A lot of people got annoyed with me in my journal, but I started replacing all fast food with Subway, which really, really helped. If you do it correctly, (a turkey sub, no cheese, no mayo, spicy mustard, all veggies, no oil, wheat bread) you really get your calories down - a 12 inch sub comes out to less than probably about 600 calories for a LOT of food (you can save half for later).

Taco Bell is a good option when you get fresco style, but it's really hard. I work there. Fresco style is just NOT AS GOOD as the actual, but again, you have to get used to it, I guess.

Even though ultimately it's about expending more energy than you take in, there are a lot of other factors so that it's not merely "calories in, calories out".

If you want my advice (as I am losing a lot of weight recently) go out and exercise for a good fifteen minutes+ a day, aerobic, and just watch what you eat. You'll lose weight, because your metabolism will get a MAJOR boost, which is what you want.

Weight lifting also helps, but for two reasons: (1) for the perpetually overweight, it can be difficult, and therefore you might do less than reccomended, and (2) it's too easy to focus on cosmetic changes when doing that (i.e. the guy with the huge gut working on his biceps is typical; he'd benefit more from a full body approach).

When you run, you don't lose many calories, but as your body chemistry changes to burn more naturally, you'll burn more when you're not exercising, which is the goal.

That being said, the last point to mention is that there is a fine line for a person to know whether or not he's truly hungry or craving foods for the taste. It's absolutely necessary to learn the difference. You should not allow yourself to be hungry, as that is counterproductive. However, you probably could go without eating 3000+ calories a day. Try to listen to your stomach cramps and if you're hungry, eat (well).

Just a bunch of quick tips:
Tack you eating patterning identify: what your eating when and why this will help you a lot in planning your goals .i.e if you eat when your depressed or stressed you need to develop better coping skills.

Aim for 2 pounds a week max, any more then that is ether very unhealthy or pure water weight.

For those in college see if your health center has any advice, my college has a dietician available for a nominal fee.

Change your environment: add reminders for yourself on the fridge keep fatty foods out of reach, healthy food in plain site, don’t have the food on the table after you serve it you’ll keep giving yourself second helping with out realizing it and so on.

Try the 50% approach reduced the portion size of fatting foods by 50% or eating them half as often.

Watch your fluid intake sweetened beverages and even healthy drinks like juice can add to your calorie level really quickly.

Find an exercise you enjoy doing: running, swimming, sports, poll dancing, doesn’t matter the point is that you can do it for life.

Be careful with sauces and dressing.

Eat slowly listen for you body’s cues that it’s full.

Eat more fiber beans oatmeal it help you feel full.

If you lapse one day and binge on crispy creams don’t beat yourself up over it just learn from it and move on.

If you eat frozen meals lean cuisine healthy choice and kashi make good options you can try.

Look for good recipes that suit your life style the net can help you here.

Subscribe to a healthy living newsletter or magazine to help you stay the course for life (one of my professors recommends nutrition action published by CSPI http://www.cspinet.org/nah/index.htm I find it too overdramatic for my taste, see the preview and see if you like the over the top tone or not.) Again find a publication you can read every mouth. Make changes for the long term

You're right Sass, eating bullshit things like rice cakes and starving yourself in addition to eating something that taste resembles something like stale cardboard is not a lifestyle I would prefer either.

My secret is eating small amounts but in multiple sessions. I'll eat what I damn well please, but I just can't take too much of anything in one sitting.
7AM: wake-up and have breakfast. Usually I'll opt for a piece of toast with a couple of eggs scrambled over (if available, I'll mix in some greenies, either chives or parsely and sprinkle a tiny bit of cheese over the hot eggs, yum). OR, a small cup/bowl of rice (about 1.5-2 scoops) with an egg over it over-medium or pickles.
10AM: 1 Riceball or 1 very small donut, also a cup of coffee (2 packs of sugar, 2 things of creme, usually no more condiments in my coffee than that)
Lunch: Salad or a medium size soup. Sometimes a half-sandwich. A burger (no cheese, no mayo, tiny bit of mustard + ketchup) meal with fries if I skipped either breakfast or the AM snack. Usually water for my drink, but I'll opt for a soda if I'm feeling drowsy or if I need to perk up a bit. Diet? No, but I tend to keep it to something less sugary, like doing half and half lemonade + sprite. I'm big on flavors, but not so much on sugar.
3PM: Snack. I'll usually have whatever I had leftover for lunch if any. Usually a couple pieces of chocolate (or a cookie/cracker or two) + sweetened coffee. I'll opt for tea if I don't feel like in-taking sugar in my drink.
6PM~8PMish: Dinner. Big meal. Get a good balance of carbs, fiber, and plenty of veggies for vitamin essencials. I opt for fish rather than red meats, simply because I grew up eating fish and tofu for my main source of protein, so that's what I like. If using ground meat, I use turkey. To me, nothing's better than a bowl of rice, a nicely char-broiled piece of slightly salted fish, a heaping helping of somekind of vegetable, and miso soup.

Dessert: only if I'm feeling emotional the need for it. I've kinda grown out of the sweet tooth thingy and don't get much of a craving for cakes and such anymore.


There's a lot of lucky features I have that not everyone has. For one thing, I have a very small puny stomach. Mine is around 75-80% of what my normal size of stomach should be. Because of that, I really can't eat much in one sitting without feeling the urge to barf. So because my body can't sustain enough energy with the normal 3 meal a day plan, I have to eat as much small portioned meals as many times as I can during the day.
Another big blessing in disguise thing is that I'm lactose intolerant. I can't stomach things that are heavy in butter, creme, and cheese. I can eat a pizza slice once in a while but I can't eat more than 3 slices without regretting it later. Ice cream kills my stomach; the cold and the dairy of it just makes my stomach revolt in a vengence and I usually end up spending quite a bit of time sitting in the toilet.

Another thing is a trick I learned from Oprah: I stop eating no less than 2 hours before I go to bed. I try to keep a strict bedtime during the weekdays, so naturally if I don't have dinner by a certain time, I'll usually eat something really small (almost like a lite-lunch) or I'll skip eating for the night all together and just make sure I get plenty of sleep and have a big breakfast the next day.

They say to lose weight, just eat less. But if you would like to keep it off, you need some form of regular exercise. Otherwise, look forward to bouncing back.

One useful method is to record exactly what you eat every day: you don’t even have to calorie count. Organize it in a simple fashion: Breakfast, Lunch, Dinner, Snacks and Drinks. If you try it for a few weeks you’ll actually think about what you’re putting into your mouth more often. So if you’re snacking on chocolate every hour or drinking litres of coke each day, a record of those unhealthy habits will be staring you in the face.

I dont know about a diet, but i do know that for me sit ups and running helped me lose a lot.

It stays pretty nasty. I'd rather just quit drinking soda than go with diet soda. In fact I have quit drinking soda, but that's besides the point. The point is that artificial sweeteners are nasty, and I'm convinced they will give everyone cancer soon enough.

I've been slowly losing weight since the summer and I've just been doing a couple of things. When eating meat and you see a giant chunk o' fat, cut it off, and throw it out. When eating KFC or any kind of chicken, try your best to rip off the skin and not eat it. At dinner, eat enough, you don't need to feel bloated at every meal. When coming across snacks like chocolate bars, think to yourself whether you really need it or not. Drink water instead of pop, and if you're really in need of something sweet, drink some juice or milk. Indulging yourself is good but keep it to a minimum. Go to the gym, do some cardio. I go to the cross trainer, put it on max level and in 30 minutes that's 500ish calories. But you always have to remember that muscle mass is greater than fat mass so even though you're doing all of this, you might gain weight or stay at the same, but you now have good weight instead of fat weight.

While I was bored one day I read the following on howstuffworks and it kinda allows you to set a frame for yourself. I am burning this much, how much should I consume. What is my daily quota.

But when losing weight, never starve yourself, its unhealthy for both mind and body.

Good luck!



The following is from Howstuffworks.com
http://health.howstuffworks.com/diet1.htm

Your Body's Efficiency
Have you ever wondered why, for so many people (and especially for anyone older than 30 years old), weight gain seems to be a fact of life? It's because the human body is way too efficient! It just does not take that much energy to maintain the human body at rest; and when exercising, the human body is amazingly frugal when it comes to turning food into motion.

At rest (for example, while sitting and watching television), the human body burns only about 12 calories per pound of body weight per day (26 calories per kilogram). That means that if you weigh 150 pounds (68 kg), your body uses only about:

150 X 12 = 1,800 calories per day

Twelve calories per pound per day is a rough estimate -- see How Calories Work for details.

Those 1,800 calories are used to do everything you need to stay alive:

* They keep your heart beating and lungs breathing.
* They keep your internal organs operating properly.
* They keep your brain running.
* They keep your body warm.

In motion, the human body also uses energy very efficiently. For example, a person running a marathon (26 miles or 42 km) burns only about 2,600 calories. In other words, you burn only about 100 calories per mile (about 62 calories per km) when you are running.

You can see just how efficient the human body is if you compare your body to a car. A typical car in the United States gets between 15 and 30 miles per gallon of gasoline (6 to 12 km/L). A gallon of gas contains about 31,000 calories. That means that if a human being could drink gasoline instead of eating hamburgers to take in calories, a human being could run 26 miles on about one-twelfth of a gallon of gas (0.3 L). In other words, a human being gets more than 300 miles per gallon (120 km/L)! If you put a human being on a bicycle to increase the efficiency, a human being can get well over 1,000 miles per gallon (more than 500 km/L)!

That level of efficiency is the main reason why it is so easy to gain weight, as we will see in the next section.

The Idea Behind Dieting
Let's imagine that you are overweight and you would like to lose several excess pounds. To lose 1 pound of fat, what you have to do is burn off 3,500 calories. That is, over a period of time, you have to consume 3,500 calories less than your body needs. There are several ways you can create that deficit. If you assume that you weigh 150 pounds and that your body at rest needs 1,800 calories per day (150 * 12 = 1,800) to live, here are several examples (some realistic, some not):

* You could lie in bed and starve yourself. Since you are lying in bed, you are consuming 1,800 calories per day. Since you are starving yourself, you are taking in no calories. That means that, every day, you create a deficit of 1,800 calories and, approximately every two days, you will lose 1 pound of body weight.

* You could consume fewer calories than your body needs. For example, you might choose to consume 1,500 calories per day rather than the required 1,800 by controlling what you eat. That creates a 300-calorie deficit every day. That means that approximately every 12 days, you will lose 1 pound of weight (12 days x 300 calories = 3,600 calories).

* You could consume 1,800 calories per day and then choose to jog 2 miles (3.2 km) every day. The jogging would burn about 200 calories per day, and over the course of 18 days you would burn about 1 pound of body weight (18 days x 200 calories = 3,600 calories).

* You could consume 2,500 calories per day and run 10 miles per day. You will burn 1,800 calories per day at rest and then 1,000 calories per day running, for a total of 2,800 calories. You are consuming 300 calories fewer than you need, so you would lose a pound every 12 days or so (300 calories x 12 days = 3,600 calories).

As you can see from these examples, the only way to lose fat is to consume fewer calories per day than your body needs. For every 3,500 calories that your body takes from its fat reserves, you lose 1 pound (0.45 kg) of body fat. You can create the deficit either by monitoring and restricting your intake of calories, or by exercising, or both.

The idea behind most diets -- everything from Weight Watchers to the grapefruit diet -- is simply to help you somehow lower the number of calories that you consume each day. That's all they do.

You're not going to build any muscle on the cross-trainer, sorry. All you can do during cardio is try not to lose muscle. And the best way to do that is brief, high intensity interval training. You should also perform resistance training. Both of these will continue to burn calories after you're done.

You know what's better than eating KFC and tearing the skin off? Not eating KFC! There's nothing wrong with fatty meats; fat is damn good for you. It's the damn breading on the outside and all the trans fats that'll kill ya.

You want something sweet? Eat a piece of fucking FRUIT. Don't even think about calorie-containing beverages. Yes, you do get used to the taste of diet soda, and no, it probably won't give you cancer.

Well for one year, I gave up soda and coffee (since I put so much creme and sugar in it that I gained 10 lbs. since I became dependent on it as a daily essential) for Lent. Nothing in my diet changed except that I gave up coffee and carbonated drinks, but I lost 5 lbs by Easter. It was a slightly healthier plan than anything considering I was a college student at the time working 30+ hours a week. Granted though I did have to have a LOT of control over my bedtime due to the fact I couldn't depend on drinks to help me stay awake; I just had to get the ample amount of sleep I needed.

Doing the cross-trainer is good for burning calories, but I never said that was the only thing I did. Seeing as this was a weight loss thread I didn't post about weight training.
Yes, not eating KFC or chocolate is the best but sometimes it's hard to say no. Not in terms of willpower but in terms of you're at a friends and everyone pitches to get KFC. If everyone agrees on it, you might not want to be a dick and order something by yourself.

Be a dick! To steal a line from Dan John, fat loss is fucking war! Get out the big guns, man. If anyone gets in your way, mow him down. It's not supposed to be easy. You're not going to win if you run into battle with pants down around your ankles. Victory requires planning; bring a healthy snack so you don't get caught in that kind of situation. When I'm cutting, I don't eat my own birthday cake. Maybe you should find some more supportive friends or, I don't know, grow a pair and tell them you can't eat that garbage.

It's a weight loss thread so you didn't post about weight training? Did we not just establish that weight training should be a primary tool in body recomposition?

You don't have to get defensive. I may be an asshole, but only because I hear the same shit all the time. I'm certainly not attacking you personally for being misguided. I'm just trying to set everything straight so we can all be lean, happy people.

It's kinda funny how weight loss was and is a fad and everyone is an expert. (hey no insults, just saying)

It's basically routine, whether it's excersize, diet as long you don't commit to it you're not doing more then eating diet coke with fries. Get used to walking to places and drinking water, NOT diet coke or jamba juice and crap. Start cooking for yourself, it's so much cheaper and healthier.

I'll be honest, I'm sorta puzzled by people who wants to lose weight and most of them either don't need to, or they're nip picky about what they eat but don't hesitate to take a bite off of a chocolate bar or some guilty food they like. Train yo self!

Hi.

My doctor always says to just eat less, as in, not change what you eat, just eat less of it, and maybe change some of the bad things with healthier things. Like, if you went out for pizza, instead of eating four slices, eat two slices and a salad or something.

Exercise helps too, it's not too hard, if you have a treadmill you can set it to 2.5 MPH and walk a mile in 25 minutes. Easily enough time to watch the office while walking. I lost 9 KG in between December and February. Also, don't drink diet soda, it just makes you more hungry.

From my experience losing weight is not terribly difficult. I lost ten pounds over the course of one summer (mind you I'm not overweight, I'm at the lower end of the average bmi section), and I'm sure that peple who are overweight would lose weight twice as fast if you follow easy steps that I took.

Like everyone said, eat less. Did you know that you are only supposed to eat a portion of meat during a meal that is equivalent to a deck of cards? That's how little of (meat) you should eat! Vegetables, I say stack them up. No one can get enough of them. You can occasionally squander on ice cream or a pack of chips, but consider the portion of those as well. Don't eat like half a can of Pringles, and don't eat a cup of ice cream.

Second, get into some form of physical exercise. Cutting down on food alone is enough to lose weight, if you do it right, but exercise will make it go down faster. Not to mention make you feel better about your cardiovascular health. Engage in exercise that requires your heartrate to be high for more than 20 minutes, preferably 30 minutes. Jogging, fast walking, whatever. Do it at least three times a week. After that, stretch. Lengthen your muscles, and did I mention that stretching also burns calories? Same goes with weight lifting, which actually does the opposite of lengthening your muscles (that is why stretching is so important).