Michael,

If you don't mind sharing, what is your eating plan like? Kudos on a job well done.

Ed

Exactly, what does a days menu look like? And congrats.

Hey guys. I can appreciate the frustration - I lost 45lbs and I swear every pound lost improved my life immeasurably. The only trouble is, the root cause of my weight gain returned, and now the weight is returning, up 11lbs in the past 5 months. Make sure you make changes that you can sustain.

I used Microsoft Excel to keep a tab on my progress, makes for some interesting graphs!


Michael, congratulations, dramatic difference and I bet you feel better too. What was your workout?

My basic problem is that I like to eat and drink.

Yes, Michael!!

Nicely done. Tell us some more about your program.


KT

The year after I graduated high school (20 and a bit years ago) I was 207 and 5'10". I was pretty heavy into weights, but I was fat, period.

Since then I have been as low as 150 (first marathon) and currently just a hair under 170. I have been weight training and exercising for 25 years, and have developed all different types of body shapes.

My simple advice. Do not pick a weight. State a goal of being healthy or feeling "right". The number does not matter, as long as you and you GP feel you are healthy.

I have chosen total fitness over all out strength now finally. My marathon time is down, and my strenth is about 80% of what it was when it was my only goal. I feel and look very fit. Get to a point where you feel "good" and "fit" to you.

What I do and what other members do is rather unimportant, what you do and how you feel is important.

Cross train! It took me 18 years to realize that one needs to vary the method in which they burn calories and inprove their overall fitnesss. But do not, at all costs, become a "student" armed with knowledge and no practical experience. I get a kick out of folks who are 20-30lbs overweight telling others how to get it shape base on the knowledge they gained from reading.

Get educated, but put it to work. And remember, anything you do, 2 mins, 5 mis or 2 hours is better than not doing anything. Lastly, listen to your body, if it says enough, than it is enough.


Cheers

Trekkor, you need to eat 5-6 meals a day.

If you do not wake up hungry in the morning your metabolism is too slow.

Typical day for me when I am on diet.

7:00 a.m.

- Egg whites (2/3 cup) Oatmeal (1 cup)

10:00 a.m.

- 4 hard boiled egg whites, banana

1:00 p.m.

- salad with 3 cut up chicken tenderloins in it (frozen bag of them in BJ's) with balsamic vinegar, fist full of almonds


4 p.m.

- 1 cup of turkey chili (I have recipe if you want it)

7 p.m.

wife prepared dinner, normally some sort of combination of chicken breast, and veggies.


I dropped 20 lbs in 6 weeks eating like this.

I also weight trained for 30 minutes each morning and did cardio for 30 minutes each morning.

6 days a week, Sundays rest.

trekkor-

southbeach diet was the trick for me, along with consistent exercise. I lost a little over twenty pounds. the bottom line burn more, eat less and don't over do it initially or you won't stay with it.

also the mayo clinic has a great men's health section www.mayoclinic.com.

if you choose southbeach, let me know as I have the menu's on word/excel.

good luck,

dale

No trouble Fishcop;
105kg = 232 Lbs
85kg = 187 Lbs
5'11" = 1.8 m

BTW, Congrats on the great diet program Michael!!!

I'd love to see some actual eating programs posted too...........

No more McDell Sandwiches on Sundays:
http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1200565135.jpg

You are absolutely right: slow & steady is the way to go. If you try some drastic diet that takes it off too fast, not only is that not healthy, it’s not something you can stick with for the long term.

Remember, if you diet until the weight is off, and then go back to your previous lifestyle, you’ll just put the weight right back on again. That’s why fad diets don’t work and slow & steady does. Instead of a fad diet, you need a new lifestyle, one that includes exercise and healthy eating, to keep the weight off.

Same is true with your exercise. If you attempt killer workouts from day one, it will be hard to stick with the program. Find some exercise that you like enough to stick with it, and start slow. As your fitness level increases, gradually increase the difficulty of your workouts to match.

Good luck!

5' 11" and 205# here
Would like to get to 185#
Lowest I've ever been as adult is 165#, that was 20 yrs ago after first engagement broke up and I started working out a lot, so not hoping to get to there again
Normally I lose weight in summer from riding bicycle to work, then ready to put on "hibernation weight" in winter, anyway that's how I rationalize it
This summer I got the Vespa, didn't ride the bicycle, so went into winter heavy
Didn't overeat during holidays, I don't have a sweet tooth
But have been eating so much red meat lately, I am sick of it
If I see another roast leg of lamb I will toss - seriously, I have been cooking up a storm lately
Going to eat almost all veg-fruit-fish for a couple months, then hopefully weather will be nice enough to bicycle, yes I am a weather weenie

Hey guys,
Sorry for the delay in replying. Here is a basic overview of my plan. There are MANY specifics that I'm not going to get in to partly because it would take up too much space but mostly because this is my doctors bread & butter (pun intended) and I don't want to see it spread all across the interwebtubes. If you REALLY want the full scoop set up an appointment with Howard Flaks M.D. in Beverly Hills, CA. His number is: 310-858-7641. Dr. Flaks is a funny little South African "nutbuster" of a doctor who has a little bit of OCD, fabulous air and a real penchant for the color blue! But the guy knows what he's doing and has been practicing for over 20 years with stacks of successful before & after photos. Okay, with that out of the way, here's the rundown!

My eating plan consisted of two (2) meals per day. Each meal consisted of 3 oz. of protein & 3.5 oz. of vegetables. I could also eat 2 pieces of fruit, 4 Wasa crackers ( www.wasa.com ), and 2 dissolved bullion cubes per day. Now there are many rules about what types of meat (protein) I could eat and what vegetables & fruits weren't allowed but like I said, I'm not going there except to say the Salmon is NOT allowed due to it's high fat content (yes I know they're "good fats" but when you as heavy as I was all fats are bad!).

The most important thing he preaches is to drink LOTS of water! 10 cups or more per day. I did, and still do drink over 3 liters. By the way, water means just that, water! Coffee, tea, soda, crystal light, etc. don't count because once you add something to water it becomes a solution and is then processed differently in the liver. His whole methodology is based on a concept he calls "fluid balance". It basically states that when your body is dehydrated but is receiving an overabundance of food, it will hoard water contained in that food as, you guessed it, fat! Once you re-hydrate your cells and your body is convinced that all its cells will stay hydrated it will much more freely give of its excess fat supply. Like Flaks says "Drink your delicious water!". Yes you will be a veritable fountain of urine in the beginning, but in 3 or 4 weeks the bladder expands to accommodate the extra volume so it gets better.

The first week on this plan is the hardest. The first time you see what 3 ounces of meat actually is you almost want to cry! But the key is to lengthen your meals out to 15 minutes or more. This is not an easy thing to do given how little food you actually have in front of you during a meal but with lots of cutting and slowing down to actually taste the food it can be done. As a side effect of doing this my sense of smell became MUCH more acute! begining with the second week you get used to everything and it becomes much easier. Then when you visit the doctor for your first follow up (you see him weekly during the program) and see how much weight you lost, 15 pounds in my case, it give you all the motivation you need to make it through!

Good luck everyone,
Michael

Down to 229.


KT

Cool... I dropped 1 lb

Hey guys and gals,

I'm coming into this late but would like to jump on board and post my progress here. After years of occasionally dieting and then just returning to the previous weight (and then some) I have decided to make a change. I want to be there to see my grandkids. The other motivating factor is seeing 3 co-workers having medical issues due to their weight 1 had a stroke at 38 yrs old, another found out he is now diabetic, the last sleep apnea. Here are my starting stats - 40 yrs old 5'10" 210 lbs. This was me last week actually. We started a program at work to have a "biggest loser" competion. We have 12 people total trying to lose 250 lbs. total (10% of each of their body weights) in 13 weeks. The lady in charge chose Weight Watchers for us to track our intake. After 1 wk. I have lost 4 1/2 lbs.

I am more interested in making a lifestyle change and I know that means reducing portion size for me because I love to eat.

I also need to start a workout regimen. I have done a few things this week but I need to step it up big time.

Together we can all do this!

BTW, for every 30 pounds you lose, you gain 1" of ***** length (so I read in an article). Not only will you be happy, your partner will also be happy! Good luck to everyone. I do not mean to be nasty; I am just sharing what I had read. My apologies if this offends anyone.

BTW, I am 5'9, 160 lbs. I walk 4-5 miles almost every night. When I am bored with walking, I jog about 4 miles (I do not jog 5 miles --- way too much for me). My physical exam showed that I burn almost 2000 calories doing nothing. Also my blood pressure is excellent. BMI is also very good.

Now, for clarification and ying-yang, although I am super healthy on the outside, I am somewhat unhealthy on the inside. My cholesterol is 260. I am working on that. 260 is actually good as when I was a teenager, I was told that it was in the 300's.


If you are serious about cardio and you do not have the discipline, you may want to NOT buy the threadmill as there are too much invitations in the house for you to stop. Go outside. All you have to do is do half the desired goal; then, as you do not have a ride, YOU WILL BE FORCED TO WALK BACK HOME (50% + 50% = 100%).

Going to work is bad for my health and pant size. Yesterday the lunch room table had 3 boxes of doughnuts...I stayed strong and left with my usual banana and coffee....and half an apple fritter. DOH! That never happens when I work from home.

David,

I am the opposite; I eat more when I am working at home.



One more thing I wanted to share, I was told that when you lose weight, you are basically 'shrinking the fact cells.' The cells never go away and they will eventually act like compressed sponges. This means that when you consume food again, they quickly absorb anything, they expand quickly; thus you gain weight quickly.

Crap, I need to gain a lot of weight then. My wife hates it when I scratch the back of her eyeballs...

Hey Michael,
Thanks for posting your diet summary, and congrats once again; you're before and after photos are amazing!

However, there's no way I'm gonna be going on any kind of a starvation diet like that. I can drink the water, I can cut the junk food, but I'm not going to eat like a canary.

I'm making more of a lifestyle change than a diet per say; added some extra cardio and cut the crap down a bit while making my meals more healthy too.

Slowly but surely for me.

Legion: that's just sick man? ha, ha.