How I have lost over 100 pounds and don’t know how

https://medium.com/what-i-learned-today/d5da698ee2ba

by mooreds • 13 years ago

154 159 13 years ago

medium.com

ry0ohki• 13 years ago

I thought the article was going somewhere different, but it appears the answer is "diet and exercise"...

whazzmaster2• 13 years ago

It's tough to for any author to reduce the concepts of weight management beyond 'calories in' and 'calories out.'

I've been on a weight rollercoaster for the past 10 years, varying between 180 and 230 lbs and I've read many of the same books the author names, and while they all may lead to self-discovery on what makes YOUR body tick, none of them contain the mystical ONE THING that will cause you to lose 20 lbs in one week. In this I agree whole-heartedly with the author.

For those that are very overweight, I do highly recommend the advice to change your diet first, without starting an extensive exercise regimen. Many folks' regular diet is so bad that just eating healthy food and drinking water will cause them to lose 5+ lbs in the first week. You need to buy-in early on to the idea that exercise isn't about burning off the food you ate (as that's impossible) but about raising your metabolism and conditioning your body.

yummyfajitas4• 13 years ago

It's also not very hard to lose 5lb if you are morbidly obese.

Harris-Benedict predicts that an individual should have an equilibrium bodyweight depending on their activity level and mean caloric intake. When your actual weight deviates from equilibrium, you will approach it along an exponential curve.

This means that if you alter your diet, your initial loss (or gain) will be rapid, while later losses/gains will be very slow. Graphs here:

http://www.chrisstucchio.com/blog/2011/weight_stability.html

stephengoodwin• 13 years ago

I didn't lose 20 lbs in 1 week, but cutting wheat, corn, and dairy from my diet and upping my vegetable intake to 5-7 servings/day has caused me to lose 30 lbs over the past 4 months.

VLM6• 13 years ago

"diet and exercise"

He went in the "personality diet" direction, not just diet, which was pretty weird because he basically went paleo although is being very careful not to use the phrase. Tip toe all around it. I don't know if there's a legal explosion going on or what about the term, because I've noticed this elsewhere.

The Paleo thing is pretty easy to implement if you know anything about food, most of the time, the more recently it was added to the rich western diet, the less of it you should be eating. Just make a ranking and try to reasonably optimize at the store. Pretty simple and cheap and easy to implement. Tastes pretty good too.

It really pisses people off because there's no diet industry personalities to make money, no guilt inducing neo-puritanism, no weird expensive foods to buy. Kind of a post-capitalism diet, other than I have to haunt my produce aisle at the store about twice a week rather than once a week back when I mostly ate "psuedo-food" out of freezer boxes. I do spend less money on food, so what I waste in extra gasoline becomes just a rounding error.

dalmaer3• 13 years ago

I am sorry that you think I tried not to mention "Paleo". I agree that many of the changes were Paleo, but I also don't know how much of the other things affected change. Over time I have also morphed the Paleo items of the diet. I don't think everyone needs to label things.

I also enjoyed: http://tedxtalks.ted.com/video/Debunking-the-Paleo-Diet-Chri...

cwzwarich4• 13 years ago

It really pisses people off because there's no diet industry personalities to make money, no guilt inducing neo-puritanism, no weird expensive foods to buy.

Grains and legumes are a lot less expensive than grass-fed beef.

mbrameld• 13 years ago

While the answer boils down to "diet and exercise" the point of the article was explaining the changes in mindset it took to get the author to change his habits. Knowing that diet and exercise is the most effective way to get healthy and putting that knowledge to practice are two different things entirely.

billb2112• 13 years ago

I don't get the title at all. It seems like a very concerted effort using a bit of trial and error, changing things, seeing what works, what doesn't and having success. Or did I miss the joke?

rjh296• 13 years ago

Agreed. At first I thought he'd just woke up on morning and been like "Wow, I've lost a lot of weight".

kokey• 13 years ago

I was thinking more along the lines of the title being what most people in London are thinking on a Saturday morning.

jstsch• 13 years ago

Within two weeks I lost ~20 pounds.

More than a pound a day, I can almost not believe this. In pure fat that would be about 5000kcal a day.

whazzmaster2• 13 years ago

For the very overweight this is very likely; running a substantial daily caloric deficit just by eating healthy and drinking water will cause large early losses. This isn't sustainable, however, and really just kickstarts the process. As someone nears a breakpoint (different for everyone) they'll fall into the one pound per week rule.

Nav_Panel• 13 years ago

When you start a low carb diet, you immediately lose a considerable amount of water weight. It's why people consider Atkins to be a scam (as they would immediately lose 5-10 pounds only to gain it back just as fast when they stopped dieting).

However, I have some personal experience eating low carb, and the rate of weight loss, for me at least, was around 2 lbs/week, as predicted by my food/calorie tracking app (MyFitnessPal).

firasd• 13 years ago

It's loss of water weight. Low carb dieters shed initial water weight very quickly.

If I understand correctly, it's because some carbs are stored in the liver compounded with water as glycogen. When you start low carbing, the glycogen starts being used and the extra water is released (via your kidneys).

I started carb reduction without reading much about it and experienced the classic effects: quick weight loss, dehydration, muscle cramping, sudden loss of appetite. Maintaining hydration and electrolyte balance is important when adjusting your body towards using less carbs.

VLM6• 13 years ago

Well, about twenty implies not much better than one sig fig, so I'm not willing to go more precise than around a pound/day.

A pound of fat is a mere 3500 calories. Why can he only be losing pure 100% fat? As a farmer rule of thumb a pound of raw cow is only about 1000 calories. I looked it up on google and its actually closer to 1300. Anyway the point is that your average people-of-walmart dieter probably biologically internally resembles a cow more than, say, a tank of olive oil, so I'd expect a delta-one-pound for a human to be much closer than 1300 or so input calories. If on the other hand you are a tank of biodiesel wondering how many calories of olive oil to add to weight one more pound, then sure it'll take 3500, but us mammals are more "a bit over a thousand cal per pound" in overall bulk average. Not this 3500 foolishness.

Finally maybe TMI but at the fattest weight I was ever at, given my height, a basal metabolic rate calculator estimated me at around 2500 calories just laying around doing nothing, like in a coma. But I like long distance hikes and stuff like that and even just housework burns more than the catatonic basal estimate. So I can easily see 3500 cal going out per day, cutting intake back to a "mere" 2200 calories per day coming in, net big mammal carcass equivalent of 1300 cal per pound, ta da, loss of a pound a day still eating a chezeburger for dinner.

Its quite achievable.

zerohp• 13 years ago

Obese humans are nothing like a cow internally. Cows going to slaughter have between 19 and 26% body fat. Obesity in humans starts around 26% for men and the people-of-walmart you're imaging are 40-50% body fat. Cows are also herbivores and process food in a different way than humans.

This kind of bad logic is why people have such a hard time tracking calories to lose weight.

billybob255• 13 years ago

It's definitely not fat, when people with horrible diets eat less sodium they lose a surprising amount of water weight. I've seen estimates an extra 400mg of sodium being retained leading to an extra kilogram of water.

adventured2• 13 years ago

I lost seven pounds in the first week when I started changing my diet. It was primarily by significantly reducing my sugar intake (snacks, soda, and sheer easy calories). I was nowhere near this guy's weight, but I hit a high of 197 and freaked out and began changing my lifestyle.

It's clearly possible that he lost 20 pounds.

jimbobimbo• 13 years ago

Depends where you start from. If guy starts from 300 lbs, it's not a biggie to lose that much "water weight". I started from ~170 lbs, lost ~5 lbs in first month, but it took me five more months to lose 20 more lbs.

cliveowen• 13 years ago

That's an awful lot of words for saying that eating right leads to a healthier life.

Way too many people tend to write a poem to express even the simplest idea. Concision is paramount in communicating.

raymondduke2• 13 years ago

Exactly.

unclebucknasty2• 13 years ago

As I read the article, I became pleasantly surprised at how it evolved into a story about a guy learning to live a more holistic life vs just one of losing weight.

I think that evolution was the author's journey, and it was what he was trying to communicate by recounting it for us.

dalmaer3• 13 years ago

Thank you. This is not a post from a diet guru trying to sell anything. This is a personal story about how one change is leading to a mindset change. The details of labeling a diet are not the point. Thanks for seeing a bigger picture.

dirtyvagabond2• 13 years ago

I felt like he was sharing a lot more than that, especially his personal story. So I found it a very worthwhile read.

Also: "Make me re-think the “wisdom” of the food pyramid, “low fat” diets, and nutrition vs. exercise"

I thought that was a great one liner... I believe that critical, honest analysis of official dietary guidelines and conventional wisdom around our diet is something we need much more of.

Jedd• 13 years ago

Seems to be a lengthy yet incomplete summary of the first 1/5th of The Four Hour Body (cited, at least).

Likewise I don't know where the 'I don't know how' bit fits in, given there's a massive explanation of how provided.

I am guessing written by a North American, given the 'we' in "I am frustrated with the lack of understanding that we have around nutrition, exercise and health". I shall assume the 'we' refers to 'people near me'.

boneheadmed• 13 years ago

There is a real problem for a subset of people regarding food addiction - particularly to sugar and certain carbohydrates. I am personally aware of people who have lost 50 to as much as 300+ lbs through a 12 step program called FA. It is not for everyone, but for some it has been a life-saver. http://www.foodaddicts.org/

justindhill2• 13 years ago

Am I the only person who enjoyed reading this guy's story? I'm happy that he's found a lifestyle that works for him. The amount of skepticism and criticism in this thread is off the charts...

eshvk2• 13 years ago

The HN demographic overlaps with a huge demographic who have spent quite a bit of time reading through and analyzing different health based lifestyle choices. It gets annoying to hear the same damn story repeated again, except under a pretty link bait title.

shadowfox• 13 years ago

Might also have something to do with having a large number of people with strongly held opinions.

dalmaer3• 13 years ago

I appreciate that. It is very interesting to see people jump on what I did or even more did not say in one post about a personal experience.

I think people need to realize that:

People are just trying their best!

Holy negativity. And in that I appreciate your comment Justin :)

supercanuck• 13 years ago

I just noticed you are the author, but I am a lurker and very much enjoyed some of your book recommendations and personal anecdotes. It has inspired me because I can tell your thought processes are similar to my own, so it resonates.

In the sea of HN pessimism, I thought you'd appreciate hearing from a stranger.

kareemm• 13 years ago

It takes guts to put yourself out there like you have and leave yourself vulnerable to strangers on the internet. So, good for you!

Thanks for sharing your story - I enjoyed it too. And remember, haters gonna hate.

justindhill2• 13 years ago

Sure thing fella. Keep on truckin'. :)

bestest• 13 years ago

front page? seriously? you guys don't cease to surprise.

jacques_chester• 13 years ago

HN has lots of people who read a diet book that taught them a Deep Secret about weight; they're bursting to share it with the unenlightened masses. So up they go.

vajrasar• 13 years ago

I've read an awful lot on the topic of weight reduction. I wont say that the article states something unique but I do appreciate the detailing. Good read.

nmerouze2• 13 years ago

He doesn't know how but he knows he loses weight by dieting and exercise, link bait title.

Furthermore, what he describes is a typical low-carb diet which works by suppressing your immune system (my experience with a low-carb diet, and the experiences of most people I know who have done a low-carb diet for long enough). After burning all your fat, you will get sick as hell (I had a 1 month fever at my lowest weight before deciding to stop it).

People with great metabolism can be fine on low-carb. But if you're seriously overweight, your metabolism is probably not great.

Slow carb diet by Tim Ferriss is a bit better because you ingest more carbs (and the cheating day maintain your immune system).

If you have cold feets/hands, inflammation (swollen gums for example), bloating, slow pulse, low libido or anything not normal, then your diet is not the right one.

sethammons• 13 years ago

How low did your body fat percentage get down to? I've been 'mostly paleo-ish' for two years. I know people who have been strict on the lifestyle. There are only health-gains talked about. By low carb, do you mean you avoided vegetable carbs too? Did you try "no wheat/gluten/processed foods" but still a metric tonne of veggies and non-lean meats?

nmerouze2• 13 years ago

I did paleo for 9 months. No wheat, gluten. Veggies, some sweet potatoes and nuts, lots of meat (lean and non-lean). I lost 30 pounds (I wasn't really overweight). I don't know my body fat % at that time but I pretty sure it was lower than 15%. Exercising 3 times a week (Weight training).

I had carb craving all-day long even after eating 2000+ calories. I was between 50g and 100g of carb per day (as recommended by Mark's Daily Apple and some others). At the end I feel bad, always tired (exact opposite than at the beginning) and I got very sick for a month (first time in my life).

I'm now eating fruits and protein (no wheat, gluten, processed food) and sometimes dairy. I feel far better for more than a year now (without fluctuations like with paleo). I've gained some weight (because my metabolism was really low) but I'm now dropping weight without any change. It is a long-term diet I'm not expecting to drop 10 pounds in a month (I've tried paleo again for a week recently and didn't even lost a pound BTW).

johnchristopher3• 13 years ago

I am more interested in his next post: "Five years later and I am going to tell you how I managed to keep the lost weight off"

I took some pills, specifically raspberry ketones, a multi-vitamin, and cod liver / fish oil. I went back and forth on these, and then decided to drop them. I may go back to the oils, but I think vitamins may be snake oil. It is hard to really tell though.

Vitamins are snake oil. Ok.

(And what the hell is a "dev aggregator" ?)

Calories in, calories out. Abs are 90% made in the kitchen. Go to the doctor when it hurts or feel unusual.

johnking• 13 years ago

Agreed up until calories in, calories out. I know what you mean, but that way of thinking is quite dated. It's clear these days that the macronutrient composition of the diet also needs to be taken seriously.

johnchristopher3• 13 years ago

I agree as well with your point.

carbocation5• 13 years ago

Doesn't matter from a chemical perspective, because the law of conservation of energy/mass is not violated. But it is true that hormonal response makes it easier or harder to stay with a diet.

rjh296• 13 years ago

People saying that are talking about -weight-, not fat.

lnanek2• 13 years ago

Actually there seems to be a fad right now in killing ab fat with cold: http://fellrnr.com/wiki/CoolSculpting

And the medical version: http://www.drnicklowe.com/article/zeltiq-one-year-on-is-the-...

There seems to be science behind it. Fat cells die at a higher temperature than skin is damaged.

Recent vitamin research are also in line with his comments. There have been studies showing taking more than the 100% recommended daily value can increase cancer rates. So if you are getting decent nutrition from your food, lots of vitamin pills are actually bad.

raymondduke2• 13 years ago

I think he contradicts himself by saying,

"I am the same person now as I was then. I am not a better person,"

and then, a few paragraphs down...

"Mentally I was so much happier, my mood changed and I was able to deal with other things so much better."

I think when you shed weight, you change -- both physically and mentally.

I wrote an article about phantom buzzing/ringing (when you feel/hear your phone ringing when it's not) and its occurrence follows the same principle of your brain making adjustments to your body. I think the key takeaway in this article is you have to "re-program" your mind, over time, to get certain outcomes.

bpatrianakos• 13 years ago

3/4 of the way through I thought I might be reading a big ad. But I'm glad this guy is doing well anyway.

suki• 13 years ago

20 pounds in first 2 weeks... vegetables... high protein... no sugar... purposefully didn’t start exercising yet... Gary Taubes ...

I've seen exactly this a few times. None of those people were very fat to begin with.

jmduke3• 13 years ago

There's a massive signal-to-noise issue in the fitness world, particularly because there's so much value to be made just by making some noise.

For anyone reading this post and inspired to lose weight, I recommend you keep the following basic tenets in mind when researching a plan/regimen:

1. You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses. (As a corollary, you almost definitely consume more calories than you think you do. Get a calorie-counting app.)

2. Being active isn't necessarily crucial to losing weight, but it is crucial to being more healthy. In particular, lifting weights will help your overall physique even if you're eating at a caloric deficit -- but the most important activity is the one that you like enough to make a habit. (Mine is biking, and occasionally soccer.)

There are a lot of huge fads right now -- in particular, intermittent fasting (eat once per day), ketogenic diet (eat lots of fat, eat no carbs), and liquid diets (drink lots of things) seem to be the rage. The reason fads can be successful usually have less to do with the specific mechanics and minutiae of their gospel and more to do with the fact that you're conscientious about what you're putting into your body and diligent about treating it well.

TelmoMenezes2• 13 years ago

The problem here is that mainstream nutrition "science" is also a fad. It is also a dramatic example on how the Internet + an incentive can produce better Science than the traditional grant (and lobby system). Many of the traditional dogmas of nutrition have recently come intro question: the idea that eating cholesterol is what increases cholesterol in your arteries, the idea that salt is bad for you, the idea that fiber is good for you and many others.

Regarding ketogenic diets, there are so many results and it seems to work so much better than what "they" have been telling us that the idea that this is a "fad" starts to sound a bit silly. Actually, some proponents of ketogenic diets are backing their claims with explanatory models, instead of simple epidemiological studies (which are, in my opinion, the lowest form of Science).

Check out this talk if you want to know more: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M6vpFV6Wkl4

edit: this talk provides some convincing arguments against your assumption #1.

eshvk2• 13 years ago

1. You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses. (As a corollary, you almost definitely consume more calories than you think you do. Get a calorie-counting app.)

True. For those who find it a pain to use one, I recommend sticking with it for a few months at least initially. After a while, your mind gets attuned to the idea of how much food is enough for you to be satiated. So don't obsess about getting every calorie in, it is easy especially if you are reading online communities to see people freaking.

I don't like the go weight lift or run recommendation for a person who has never run or hates the gym. Most are there because of systemic lifestyle issues. The best way to do that is to start at the core, hang out more with active people, doing entertaining things that also get out outdoors. After a while of doing that, I feel like you will naturally gravitate towards taking care of your body.

There are a lot of huge fads right now -- in particular, intermittent fasting (eat once per day), ketogenic diet (eat lots of fat, eat no carbs), and liquid diets (drink lots of things) seem to be the rage. The reason fads can be successful usually have less to do with the specific mechanics and minutiae of their gospel and more to do with the fact that you're conscientious about what you're putting into your body and diligent about treating it well.

It's funny. I spent a while doing lean gains. A couple of months were rather painful in terms of having to spend most of my time eating cottage cheese and tuna, finding it difficult to have dinner with friends. I was hitting all the marks though, then I got bored of it. A few months ago, I did something simple by being more mindful when I ate. I didn't particularly try to avoid any food group but I focused more on savoring it than as something to keep my mouth occupied while I listened to a friend or something. That got me way down on the scale than anything.

ef44• 13 years ago

For those who find it a pain to use [a calorie-counting app], I recommend sticking with it for a few months at least initially. After a while, your mind gets attuned to the idea of how much food is enough for you to be satiated.

But satiation is a built-in feature of your body. A healthy human body counts calories automatically, and governs appetite and metabolism appropriately to keep body weight in a narrow target range.

A calorie counting app is basically a prosthetic replacement for the part of your brain that's supposed to be doing the job automatically. And it's much inferior to the real thing.

Many people can at least remember a time in their youth when their weight was extremely stable, despite widely varying inputs. That's how it feels when your metabolic control systems are all functioning correctly. Many people assume that this ability naturally disappears with age -- but it seems much more likely that the system simply breaks down due to years of exposure to a very unhealthy environment.

seiji• 13 years ago

You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses.

Not entirely. Try eating 2,000 calories of pasta versus 2,000 calories of chicken. It'll do immensely different things to your body.

IF and keto are valid. Liquid diet is nutty. keto isn't exactly "eat lots of fat" -- it's avoiding > 30-60g carbs per day (and honestly, mostly sugars. carbs with fiber delivery (e.g. vegetables and limited fruits) are okay) while seeking out, but not adding "lots," of complementary fat (like avoiding fat free things because fat free just means "we added more sugar to compensate for removing fat").

If you have a limited memory capacity, just remember: fat doesn't make you fat. Your body turns sugar and things that metabolize into sugar (carbs, breads, pastas, rice) into fat. Your body doesn't take what you eat and just glue it inside of you. Food is like the input of a program generating very specific outputs. You can't feed the function "Add two numbers" 1 and 1 and end up with anything but 2. You (probably[1]) can't feed yourself carbs and carbs and carbs and end up with anything but lardass.

[1]: Though, people are different. We have basic guidelines, but a lot is still genetics. I know people who basically live off pasta, chocolate, and smoothies and still weigh 130 pounds without workout out significantly.

carbocation5• 13 years ago

fat doesn't make you fat

True, and it's why the low fat (== high sugar) marketing has done nothing to curb the obesity trends.

Your body turns sugar and things that metabolize into sugar (carbs, breads, pastas, rice) into fat.

True. Keep in mind that (most) excess amino acids also get converted to carbs, and then to fat.

crusso8• 13 years ago

You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses

Yeah, and if you want to reduce your chance of auto accidents, limit the amount of gasoline you put in your car.

I'm a bit sorry to come across as rude, but this advice and then your later dismissal of ketogenic diets reflects the extraordinary ignorance that inflicted us with the food pyramid and war on fat 40 years ago.

Understanding and controlling the insulin cycle is key to understanding nutrition and its role in weight control. I tried "eating less" for years before I gave a low carb diet a try and permanently changed the way I ate and thought about food.

If you had actually read the article about which you added a comment, then you would have read a process of discovery paralleled by myself and an extraordinary number of others.

Atkins and even others before him explained the problems with carbohydrates, especially simple ones, decades ago. Calling low carb eating (you can't eliminate all carbs) a fad at this point is either ignorant or just mocking.

jmduke3• 13 years ago

Your comment seems unnecessarily antagonistic.

I'm not sure how I dismissed ketogenic diets (I was on one for a year!) besides calling them a 'fad', which they certainly are.

This is definitely important! But it might not be necessary, as proven by the fact that people have lost significant amounts of weight without doing so.

If you had actually read the article about which you added a comment, then you would have read a process of discovery paralleled by myself and an extraordinary number of others.

I did read the article, and I'm not sure why you assumed otherwise. Most of my comment runs in parallel with the post (particularly being conscientious about what you do with your body.), though I don't think a process of discovery which leads one to assume multivitamins are 'snake oil' is particularly flawless.

rjh296• 13 years ago

It's seen as a fad because of the large initial water weight loss and the numerous myths about it, e.g.:

1) it's impossible to gain weight while in ketosis

2) the first time you go into ketosis, it has magical fat-burning effects that are lost after you go out of ketosis and back in

3) that ketosis is in fact magical in any way, and in any way better than simply -moderating- carb intake (as opposed to cutting it to 50g or under, and giving up delicious things that you enjoy).

Fact is, plenty of people have tried it as a magic bullet and eaten copious amounts of cheese and bacon only to find that, surprise, fats are insanely calorie-dense and things like salt can still happily make you hungry enough to overeat.

On the positive side, trying keto also permanently changed the way I felt about food - I permanently reduced my carb intake, increased protein and fat, and have a much better understanding of how high-carb foods create 'hunger'. And it happens to work very well for some people, which is awesome.

anonymous• 13 years ago

For how long have you maintained your weight? Personally, I lost 40 pounds and since then have got about 35 of them back over 8 years. I'm not going to follow any diet advice from someone who hasn't maintained their weight for at least 10 years.

encoderer5• 13 years ago

I think your post wins the "worst analogy in this discussion" award.

There is so much pseudo-science on every side of this debate that I'm against just about anybody who takes an absolutist position in the way you have.

Personally, from my own research and experimentation in my own diet, I firmly believe that weight is an I/O issue though good health is more complex than that.

While Atkins never specifically advocated for calorie restriction, it strikes me as common sense that some portion of new Atkins dieters experience positive results due to calorie restriction. It can be difficult to replace the number of calories in pastas, pizza, etc, in part just based on caloric density.

It's also confused by the fact that Atkins and other (if not "fad" then "theme" might be a better word?) diets have to change both physical, calorie I/O issues, and mental issues to truly be effective long term. While I truly believe that for weight loss, 2000 calories of fast food is the same as 2000 calories of lean protein, fruits and veg, after the period of strict control (the "diet") the person eating 2000 calories of fast food has not done much to truly change their habits and mindset.

I, personally, have accomplished a lot by intermittent fasting (didn't know it had a name until later, to me it was just about not eating as much during the day in favor of a bigger dinner) and learning that it's OK to feel not-full. And to learn the difference between hunger and feeling not-full. I went from 210 to 170 and lost 55 pounds!! of fat during the process. I have a big dinner (usually 50% of my daily caloric intake) and dessert every night (another 20%). That's complimented by a lunch of around 25% of my daily intake. Very infrequent snacking. No breakfast, even on Gym days, and no soft drinks only water, aside from alcoholic beverages.

TelmoMenezes2• 13 years ago

1. You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses. (As a corollary, you almost definitely consume more calories than you think you do. Get a calorie-counting app.)

If this is true, why don't we become incredibly fat or skinny over time? It would require incredible precision to maintain weight. But a lot of people seem to be able to do it with no effort...

The reason why this is not true is simple: our organism is not a closed system, so this thermodynamics truism does not apply. We are able, for example, to excrete nutrients without digesting them. Our organism is way too complex for this bromide to have any merit.

codyb• 13 years ago

Also a 1000 calories of sugar are going to do far different things to your body than a 1000 calories of protein. That's why focusing on calories always seemed to be the wrong metric to me.

rjh296• 13 years ago

I gained 3 stone over a long time simply eating a very small surplus (50 calories a day) over a long time. People are -generally- good at eating the right amount of maintain their weight, but even a tiny margin over a long time can add up. Overweight people I know don't actually eat that much more than your average person!

Oh, and I lost that weight and more simply by - duh - eating less than my body needed. It's not an exact science, but it does work. If you don't think it does, you either have a very rare medical condition, or (sorry for the tough news) just need to eat less and exercise more, like everybody else.

potatolicious• 13 years ago

"If this is true, why don't we become incredibly fat or skinny over time?"

I mean, we do. One of the big tricks here is that your basal metabolic rate is not a constant. As your weight increases you burn more energy than before simply existing. If you're running a very slight caloric surplus this will be neutralized as your weight increases, thus stabilizing you.

yummyfajitas4• 13 years ago

If this is true, why don't we become incredibly fat or skinny over time? It would require incredible precision to maintain weight. But a lot of people seem to be able to do it with no effort...

Because the amount you require for maintenance is proportional to your bodyweight. If you eat more than you need, you become fatter. As you become fatter, the amount of calories you need for maintenance goes up as well.

The calories in/calories out theory explains weight stability perfectly. Thermodynamics is sufficient, no complex theories required. I do the math here: http://www.chrisstucchio.com/blog/2011/weight_stability.html

pessimizer• 13 years ago

We do become incredibly fat or incredibly skinny over time. Or our diets change at various points, changing the net trend at times, and our weights fluctuate around a mean.

The degree of "incredible precision" it takes to maintain weight is akin to the incredible precision it takes to ride a bike, a.k.a. not particularly incredible but challenging to some.

tunesmith• 13 years ago

Because, the amount of calories your body uses is affected by your metabolism level, which is in turn affected by what you put into your body, and when you put them in. Metabolism is also affected by physical activity, but physical activity is not the only thing that affects metabolism. Finally, genetics can also affect your metabolism.

discardorama• 13 years ago

I agree; it's basically a physics problem (calories_in < calories_out to lose weight), with the body's metabolism being a second-order effect. I went on vacation recently, walked around all day taking photos and visiting museums, and ate well; but still lost 12 pounds in 3 weeks, without even trying.

ufo• 13 years ago

he reason fads can be successful usually have less to do with the specific mechanics and minutiae of their gospel and more to do with the fact that you're conscientious about what you're putting into your body

Another reason is that most fads are effectively big lists of restrictions on what you are allowed to eat. Since finding things to eat becomes harder you often end up reducing the total calorie count as a side effect.

enraged_camel2• 13 years ago

>There's a massive signal-to-noise issue in the fitness world, particularly because there's so much value to be made just by making some noise.
>For anyone reading this post and inspired to lose weight, I recommend you keep the following basic tenets in mind when researching a plan/regimen...

There is something important to point out here, which is that the basic tenets you listed are simple, but they are not easy. If they were, everyone would follow them.

Most people don't actually want to lose weight. Rather, they want to already have lost weight. So they look for shortcuts that will get them there. That is why there is such a massive signal-to-noise issue in the fitness world. Fad diets and magic pills are invented because people are willing to pay for them.

People are fat because eating is a big part of their lives. They eat several huge meals everyday, plus snacks, and often times when they are eating one meal they are dreaming about and planning their next one. On top of this, food has become a "social currency" for them. Being able to cook delicious, unhealthy food at a family BBQ is seen as an admirable skill, and bringing a box of donuts to the office in the morning is seen as a way to score points with coworkers.

In order to lose weight they need to reverse that and make exercising and not eating an equally big part of their lives. They need to count calories, watch what they eat, do heavy workouts at the gym (none of this lift-pink-dumbbells or walk-on-the-treadmill-while-texting-friends bullshit), strictly regulate their sleep and wake-up times, and more. It is NOT supposed to be easy. It is supposed to be HARD. And as with all hard endeavors, success is a matter of discipline. Unfortunately most people don't have that.

jmduke3• 13 years ago

I agree completely, though I would phrase it as "most people don't want to be healthy: they want to be thin."

On top of this, food has become a "social currency" for them.

This is something I struggle with a lot (and I say this sipping a latte) -- so much of socializing revolves around food, it sucks to be the guy/gal who refuses the donut or orders a salad at the pizza place. Not to mention the black hole that is alcohol (though in my case, I'm more than willing to take the extra few pounds of fat if it means enjoying my whiskey and beer.)

In order to lose weight they need to reverse that and make exercising and not eating an equally big part of their lives. ... And as with all hard endeavors, success is a matter of discipline.

Absolutely. There are dozens of anecdotes about people who lose a serious amount of weight, hit their target, and then slowly regain all the weight because that's what happens when you're 160 pounds and you go back to eating junk. To use a poor metaphor, personal fitness isn't like an MMO where once you hit max level you stay there -- you've got to take care of yourself or else you'll wind up back at level 1.

forgottenpaswrd2• 13 years ago

"1. You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses. "

As a former chemistry student(I did not finish it, because I made engineering instead), I tell you you are oversimplificating how the body works.

With a machine you could talk about calories because the way an engine works is so simple. Fuel, oxidant+Energy init reaction->Output + Energy out.

Not so with the body. There are different processes the body uses to get energy, and it is very complex.

E.g When you eat sugary drinks you put immense amounts of sugar in the blood, very fast which are dangerous(if insulin is not released you die), so the priority of the body is getting this sugar out of the bloodstream, converting it to fat. At the same time your liver could not process anything else as the rate it has to work to get rid of the sugar is too high.

Countries like the US of America or Central Europe has an obesity epidemic problem, and what changed the most was food. 40 years ago Germans or Americans ate more than 8 kilos of butter and other natural fats per year. Now it is way less.

geuis• 13 years ago

Keto is not a "fad diet" and is not about eating lots of fats. The core of what it's about is recognizing fat is not bad for you, and that the 3 main legs of what we eat are carbohydrates, proteins, and fats. Reduce the amount of carbs to a minimum and make up for it with increased protein and fats.

Keto is backed up by a ton of science and real-world success. Just visit the keto subreddit and spend a few hours perusing, http://reddit.com/r/keto.

forgottenpaswrd2• 13 years ago

Imagine that you are not only releasing energy on the body. You are not using heat, like in a thermal motor.

You need a specific chain reaction for getting the molecules you could use to move your body, mainly this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adenosine_triphosphate

You need to make the molecules that make this reaction possible, for every sugar, fat or protein, it is different. Those supplies you need to fabricate or get in your food. Some are very common(inexpensive), some are not. E.g you will need oligoelements, or vitamins.

Not only that, but those substances need to be able to share the same space, not react with other substances, or being toxic to other parts of the cell. Some of them are and need other substances to carry them safely.

You also need other substances to carry them around. Some of them have water affinity, some not.

The output of the reactions also need to be non toxic and some of the are over certain concentration. Some sugars output metabolic reactions produce toxic materials. At high rates you need your body to protect the arteries from acidic conditions with cholesterol layers and so on.

Also what you need to fabricate has a delay. You can't fabricate your supplies instantly, so you have a control system, normally a series of PID controllers(we copied them from nature) to decide how much to fabricate given your normal diet.

So if you eat pizza every single day and caramelize all the sugars, and denaturalize the proteins , like you do at 200C plus, your body will get used to it.

There are fads, but there is also scientific knowledge people ignore. It is frustrating that people that ignore so much try to give advice to others.

You see medicine doctors talk in 2013 about calories, they have knowledge in some areas but are ignorant in others, mainly chemistry and biochemistry, they won't admit that.

theathgeek• 13 years ago

1. You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses. (As a corollary, you almost definitely consume more calories than you think you do. Get a calorie-counting app.)

I see this all the time on HN and like most things, there is truth in it, but it doesn't tell the whole story.

First and foremost, calories matter. Let's get that out of the way. They matter in that, yes, weight gain comes from eating calories in excess, loss from a deficit...normally (we'll get to that in a minute).

However, this is where everyone should be reading the rest very carefully, details matter here.

For one, if the ONLY thing you care about is number on the scale, eat at a deficit and you'll lose weight.

BUT, if you care about the type of weight you are losing (ie. losing fat vs fat/muscle vs muscle), you HAVE to care about the macronutrient ratios of those calories. For instance, I'm an athlete, recreational bodybuilder/powerlifter and fitness model. I work very, very hard for muscle gains. I don't want to lose muscle when I diet down for a show, competition or photo shoot. If I only cared about calories, I would QUICKLY catabolize my muscle. I need to keep my protein high, fat pretty high and the rest of my calories can come from carbs. In practice, depending on my goal at the time, I implement one of a variety of PSMF (protein sparring modified fast) & CKD (cyclic keto diet, which is Keto with carb refeeds) or TKD (targeted keto diet, which is eating carbs around workouts).

The problem with "just care about calories" is that very few people actually want that as the goal. Most people want to lose FAT, not muscle when they lose weight. If all you understand is calories, yes you'll lose weight, but you'll be losing fat and muscle. Most people, and I would guess everyone reading this, would rather keep whatever muscle they have, they need to understand how to SPARE their muscle when losing weight.

And if someone is overweight there is a very high chance they are or are becoming insulin resistant. If this is the case, Keto is actually appropriate for them.

Before I got into this world seriously, I just thought it was calories, like most people who haven't spent the time to understand the workings of the body. I literally wasted years trying to get lean with just a calories approach. It doesn't work that way.

Dewie• 13 years ago

There's a massive signal-to-noise issue in the fitness world, particularly because there's so much value to be made just by making some noise.

Yes, there are a lot of varying information out there, and a lot of those are conflicting. Case in point: just look at how many replies you got where people are disagreeing with you and each other about your recommendations... ;)

joe_the_user• 13 years ago

I am six feet tall, constantly 5-10 pounds underweight. I eat as much as I can, always. I scare people with the amount I eat. My usual helping size is generally twice what most people take (which can cause friction if I'm not careful). I never, ever fluctuate in weight beyond the five pound fluctuations.

You lose weight by eating less calories than your body uses. (As a corollary, you almost definitely consume more calories than you think you do. Get a calorie-counting app.)

Obviously this is true on some level but it's truth doesn't seem establish any automatic or definite cause-and-effect relationship between the amount of food a given person eats and their weight gain or loss. Some people may indeed find their consumption determine weight gain or loss. Fine but don't assume your experience will automatically carry to others.

I recall current research has shed light on some complexities of this. Perhaps someone has a link.

acconrad• 13 years ago

in particular, intermittent fasting (eat once per day)

FYI that is incorrect. Intermittent fasting simply refers to eating your calories in condensed time windows. For example, Lean Gains suggests eating 2-3 meals in an 8 hour window.

voidlogic5• 13 years ago

When it comes to exercise I'm always concerned by how many people, when making changes like this, omit strength training. Don't do that-

1. Without strength training (and adequate protein consumption) during negative calorie periods, you will loose muscle. Without strength training your body will happily shed muscle and fat, most of use really just want to loose the fat.

2. Muscle increases your base resting calorie use, and is a multiplier of any other exercise you do.

3. Muscle is important for maintaining bone health and general health as we age.

I have even had health professionals tell me that when it comes to daily routines, diet + 30-60 min walking + 30 min weight training is better for your body then regular intense cardio. Thats not to say you should shy away from a tennis match or soccer game, or fencing a couple times a week, but if we are talking about what we do every day-

BrentRitterbeck• 13 years ago

I've suffered with excess weight most of my life. It doesn't help that sit at a desk for up to twelve hours a day. There's more to losing weight than just calories out are more than calories in. You have to be active. I've been on a reduced calorie diet. Sure, you'll lose weight at first; however, if you don't develop a healthy lifestyle (getting out and doing things on a regular basis) the weight will just come back.

When I left for undergrad over ten years ago, I was heavy. During my undergrad years, I walked everywhere or rode a bike everywhere. I lost about fifty pounds in two years. I put all of it back on and more once I graduated and started working at a desk all day. I feel miserable everyday now because of all this excess weight I carry, which is why I've decided to start riding a bike again everywhere when I get back to California on Monday. I'm finally going to put the car to rest.

readme3• 13 years ago

I am annoyed at myself for letting me get to be ~300 pounds in the first place (the main point about that is that I let myself get that unhealthy, to a point where I increased my risk of death, which was irresponsible given the fact that I have family and friends)

Though I would feel worse about it if you did not have friends, either way becoming unhealthy is irresponsible because it causes a public burden. If you die, someone is going to have to come clean your body up. Whether any of your money makes it to the pocket of those people is irrelevant.

No one likes cleaning up dead bodies. Just because you are paying a doctor, does not mean you are 100% entitled and you aren't creating a burden. Doctors take an oath to help the sick. They have to help you in an emergency. Whether you are paying or not.

This for me is one of the major holes in libertarianism.

smackmybishop• 13 years ago

What the fuck?

readme3• 13 years ago

I did not think it would be a popular comment. However, I should clarify: I mean unhealthy by choice: e.g. intentional overeating, drug use, alcoholism, etc.

jes• 13 years ago

I consider becoming unhealthy as irrational, because it leads to a diminished quality of life for me and the people I care about.

readme3• 13 years ago

I agree. Also, I did not mean "you" specifically in my comment. I meant it generally.

The OP (your) story in general is great. I was just trying to pontificate on something unpopular.

mahyarm• 13 years ago

- Don't eat 600 calorie bombs from carls jr that fit inside the palm of your hand and don't fill you up still. Eat more satiating food for the calories, which is fibrous vegetables and proteins. Avoid liquid calories and other such things that are easy to overeat.

- Eat like my skinny indian friend. He takes a bite, chews it for quite a while, and then take another bite about a few minutes later. He doesn't do this on purpose, it's completely habitual. Such a slow eating speed really helps him stay skinny.

- Stop snacking on high calorie nuts, chips and bars. If you just habitually nibble on food that is in front of you until it's gone, recognize that and don't put food infront of you.

Someone• 13 years ago

Alternatively, and easier for some: put low calory food in front of you. It may be possible to grow fat from eating raw celery and tomatoes, but it certainly is harder than growing fat from eating burgers and chocolate.

voidlogic5• 13 years ago

It may be possible to grow fat from eating raw celery and tomatoes

Doing this with celery will be more difficult as it takes more energy to digest than is gained from it.

I had a humorous image in my mind of someone trying to get fat via only veggies, imagine the volume of food they would have to eat every day!

Examples: The Kimchi I had with lunch was 15 calories, the half bag of russels sprout I had last night (excluding the oil oil cooked in) 130 calories.

Edit: Why the downvote?

everyone• 13 years ago

Misleading title. Was expecting article on some mystery disease.

vmarsy2• 13 years ago

Interesting post, the author can be proud. Not being from the united states, and now living there since one year , here is my 2 cent , I think these are the most important points of the post and my own advices:

- Drink water only, no soda, even diet coke and whatnot.

- Avoid sugars (I'd say especially high corn fructose syrup).

- Eat vegetables, cooked in good olive oil in a pan, it's really good. I don't know about other oils, the Mediterranean lifestyle with olive oil works great, and olive oil tastes better.

- Avoid too salty food (preprocessed food will be too salty.)

- Sleep well, stop watching at screens (TV/computer/ipad) an hour before sleeping. reading a book before going to sleep is great.

Attempting to reduce the problem to : >" it's basically a physics problem (calories_in < calories_out to lose weight)" is completely wrong I think, the "Try eating 2,000 calories of pasta versus 2,000 calories of chicken" comment speaks by itself.

I disagree with the " “listen to your body, and eat when it is hungry, not because it is a certain time” routine. " Stick to regular hours for eating, breakfast, meal and dinner. But the most important is not to eat in between the meals. If you eat good food you won't even feel hungry

Finally, stop trying to measure everything, relax.

Proleps2• 13 years ago

no soda, even diet coke and whatnot.

Why?, there are a lot of diet sodas that do not contain any calories.

Avoid too salty food (preprocessed food will be too salty.)

Why, salt doesn't contain any calories.

Going on a diet is very hard in the first place, giving up these two things doesn't seem to make much sense. It will only make a difficult lifestyle change even more difficult.

dasil003• 13 years ago

Not gonna argue about salt per se, but how can diet soda be good for you? So it doesn't have calories, but what does it have to make it taste that way? Certainly nothing that is of any use to your body, and most likely is harmful in subtle ways that we won't find out for years if ever.

What is so bad about just drinking water with the occasional tea or coffee if you really need a stimulant?

mike_herrera• 13 years ago

Aspartame, the artificial sweetener in many diet soda products, is a controversial topic. For many years it was thought that it may cause insulin spikes or even increase the risk of cancer. But studies have shown that the folk-lore links between aspartame and cancer have been unmerited.

The most convincing argument to avoid aspartame has been a behavioral reason. Sweets beget sweets. By enjoying an artificially-sweet diet soda it will be easier to choose a conventional sweet treat if you wander back into the kitchen.

Also, as anyone who has abstained from sweets can attest, after a few days the idea of sweet candies just don't sound appealing.

toble• 13 years ago

I've seen it suggested that sugar-free drinks will result in an expectation of energy. The body gets none of that energy. It compensates by seeking more energy.

Just drink water. It's virtually free. Soft drinks allow for a huge profit margin because they have been processed and you have been programmed over years to like them.

vmarsy2• 13 years ago

I use salt in almost every meal, but not too much, It would be stupid not to put salt in the water when cooking pasta for example.

Everything in too high quantities is bad anyway.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/daviddisalvo/2013/03/24/study-ea... It's not affecting your weight, but your overall health.

Also salty food makes you thirsty, so as toble commented, you will drink more diet coke that will makes you more hungry.

I think a glass of iced tea (even with a little bit of cane sugar to remove bitterness) is better than a diet coke. I can't prove why, every people in good shape I know don't drink diet soda. Just try and see is my best advice !

shanev2• 13 years ago

Despite the sensationalist headline, the author knew exactly what he was doing. He basically did a paleo diet, and references a bunch of books that are popular in the community. Mark's Daily Apple features a success story like this every Friday: http://www.marksdailyapple.com.

dirtyvagabond2• 13 years ago

Agreed. I found the author's account inspiring, and I immediately recognized his overall outline as a basic paleo diet. I started down a paleo path fairly recently, hoping to lose a few pounds. I surprised myself by realizing after about a week that I was feeling so much better physically, I wasn't very concerned anymore about a relatively few extra pounds.

FWIW, it was the "Latest in Paleo" podcast that inspired me to try a paleo approach to life. It's one of the overall best podcasts I've had the pleasure of subscribing to: http://www.latestinpaleo.com/podcast/

I wish Dion all the best with making his success long term!

shanev2• 13 years ago

Latest in Paleo is a great resource to keep up with health news, and Anthony Coppola is a very inspiring guy. I really like Robb Wolf's podcast as well as it occasionally has some science (scary!) for us who like to geek out on this stuff: http://robbwolf.com/podcast/. I lost 45 lbs within the first three months. There's no way I'd eat any differently anymore.

moron4hire2• 13 years ago

If losing fat were as easy as "calories in = calories out", then more people would do it. While it is strictly true, the problem is that you we don't understand the exact equations for both calories in and calories out, and we often don't have control over the parameters. What will you do about you gut flora, which can alter just how efficiently calories in concerts to calories out?

There are many and powerful issues at hand. You cannot just dismiss the issue as thermogenic.

unkoman• 13 years ago

Of course it's that simple. People are just lazy slobs.

enraged_camel2• 13 years ago

>If losing fat were as easy as "calories in = calories out", then more people would do it.

It is simple, not easy. Do not confuse the two.

moron4hire2• 13 years ago

Bite me, Poindexter.

rfnslyr• 13 years ago

I've lost over 120 pounds. It's not very hard. I started powerlifting and eating extremely clean, counting all my calories, getting in 8-9 hours of sleep a night.

Now I can squat 315lbs+, Deadlift 450+, and bench 250+. Feels good.

antidaily• 13 years ago

Weight loss always seems to be the most compelling of all personal transformations. Maybe its the before and after pics.

garysweaver• 13 years ago

You can gain back a lot more than you lose, even if you get into a habit of "better" eating and more exercise for months.

You probably think that exercising and eating "better" should be fine, because anything you do for three weeks becomes a habit, right? Well, not exactly. Bad habits can be much harder to break, and you may not have really broken them the way you think you have: http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/form-a-habit.htm

Be really careful before a drastic change to your diet and exercise habits just to lose 10-15 lbs, especially if your doctor and the majority of those close to you don't think you need to lose weight. It can backfire.

However, a gradual change, especially when you can do it in a reasonable, sustainable way, can be a great idea.

iooi• 13 years ago

Figured I might as well take advantage of this thread to ask the opposite question: what is the best way to gain weight?

I stopped gaining weight at around 17 and have weighed 120 since. I wish I could eat more but I am just not that hungry every day, it's hard getting in my 3 meals.

dmourati• 13 years ago

http://www.scrawnytobrawny.com/

dhughes• 13 years ago

ctrl+f "gluten" and "paleo" yup, circle jerk is on.

I'm sorry to be negative but it seems such a fad people convince themselves and others gluten is equivalent to cyanide. We've been through the Atkins junk he even died from it. I know people with Celiac and it's a daily struggle it's not a trendy disease if you actually have it, you can't even have pepper since most commercial pepper is dusted with wheat flour.

Can't we all agree to valid nutritional information from independent double-blind studies nothing with "supports" or a pil helping your immune system (an extremely complex...you guess it a 'system' not one thing that can be affected by one molecule.)

I weight more now than I ever have and I know why it's because I started working shift work, stopped going to the gym, drank energy drinks and went to Starbucks daily. To get back to being healthy I reverse what I did wrong so back to eating buckets of gluten and carbs but be active.

I'm all for health and good nutrition but these days it seems like nothing is good unless it's some extreme diet. US and Canada beverages are extreme, food portions are extreme, exercise is extreme (bootcamps jogging? bah!), vehicles are extreme now diets are extreme.

b0rsuk• 13 years ago

“Let food be thy medicine and medicine be thy food” ― Hippocrates

As for myself, I don't know whom to trust anymore, but there are a few common themes: - varied diet is better - raw food (not processed) is better. You haven't evolved eating processed food. - use very little or no sugar. It's related to be above, really - humans used to be unable to get so much sugar.

espeed• 13 years ago

Wow, this is almost exactly what I did last year, and I had the same results -- went from ~260 lbs to 180 lbs.

Cut out wheat, cut out sugar except whole fruits (no fruit juice because as Lustig pointed out, "you get all the fructose and none of the fiber" to counter balance), cut out diet soda and caffine and now only drink water (spring, filtered, or distilled), cut out peanuts (they were causing inflammation -- https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4344167), eat protein in the morning and make sure I consume enough nutrients throughout the day to keep my system in balance.

For me, cutting out wheat was one of the key factors (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5693679) because I suspect the wheat/yeast was throwing my intestinal microbes out of balance (http://www.nytimes.com/2013/03/28/health/studies-focus-on-gu...) and causing inflamation so when I cut it out, things returned to homeostasis.

How I have lost over 100 pounds and don’t know how

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