Hello there peeps. :).

[Drei Hundert]

Hey guys. My name is Mitch, and I'm graduating high school and moving on to college next fall. Last summer, I tried to lose weight, but I failed miserably.

I originally planned to go to a 2000 calorie diet, but I crashed, overate, and dumped the plan.

This time, I've made a new plan, In which I will eat for the first week with absolutely no goal, and then evaluate what I can do to slightly lower the calorie intake each week, as well as building a workout plan.

One thing that's gotten in my way with weight loss in the past is that I'm afraid if I lose weight, I will lose muscle mass.

I don't want to lose muscle mass. I've always liked being big. People don't start crap with me -- I like to feel the security of knowing I'm bigger than 80% of the people I run into in public.

So I'm trying to build a weight-loss plan that will shed fat and build muscle. The only issue is, right now I'm not in a position to afford a gym membership, and I don't have weights. So I'm doing pushups and situps and the such for right now.

I'm 5'11 and 260 lbs. I want to drop down to 200 lbs and build muscle as I go. I don't want to be thin, and I don't want to be tone, I just want to be strong and NOT fat.

I don't like the way people treat me because of the fat on my body, and I think it's time to get out of it.

I mean, I'm only going to be young once, so I feel that I need to lose these lbs before it's too late.

Anyway, hoping to hear back from you guys.

-Mitch.

 

[PLB]

Hey Mitch, welcome to the forum!

I think that you've got a good plan in place (decreasing your caloric intake slightly each week) which seems realistic and manageable in the long term. Once you get to a daily caloric intake that you feel comfortable with, then stick with that! As long as you keep up your physical activity, you should be able to avoid losing a significant amount of muscle mass. Try to do some strength training of all the major muscle groups at least 3 days per week with a day of recovery in between each workout. Since you don't have equipment, you may have to be creative when coming up with exercises. Try things like lifting something up from the floor (with proper form, of course ) and continuing to lift it until it's up over your head, squat jumps, lunges holding onto something with some weight, plyometrics (provided you have no injuries that could be aggravated), etc.

Try to do some form of cardiovascular training on most days of the week. I would suggest a mixture of low-moderate intensity activities like walking, cycling, easy hiking, etc. and higher intensity stuff like interval training, possibly graduating to high intensity interval training once your body can handle it - probably at least 8 weeks or more into your training. Interval training is a great way to improve your cardiovascular fitness, burn fat, and maintain muscle mass.

A great tool that many members use is to create a diary, which you can do here: Weight Loss Diary - Weight Loss Forum

This has helped many people stick with their plans and they get feedback on what they are doing.

Good luck, hope this helps!

 

[Drei Hundert]

Thanks PLB. .

I've actually made a diary, I did as soon as I saw the forum section. I immediately realized that I would do better if I was accountable to other people instead of just myself. Thankfully there are those resources .

Also, I suffer from kyphosis and scoliosis, and I frequently deal with back pain and have a hard time keeping my back upright. Is there anything I could do, or avoid doing, to prevent my back from deteriorating further?