I went from 245lbs to 165. Ive been at 165 for almost a year

[ANGRYLLAMA]

Im only going to be here shortly but I feel after finally reaching my goal of loosing all that fat I need to share what worked and didnt work for me. I hope maybe it can help some of you.

It all started in 2006 with a very very bad depression.. I went from 200 some pounds to well almost 250.. Im sure many can relate to me in some way. but I had been a a nice steady weight gain long before that going from from 150 next thing I knew I was 175 then 190, 200.

for the longest time I believed I could not loose any weight.. I tried different diets. working out and I was never noticing any results.. at all.

And the worst part of it I had no life what so ever.. my dating life was a complete joke. and more like non existant!!

I tried Pills. Im sure a lot of you are familiar with many of them. "they burn the fat away" lmao non of them worked. I probably spent a good $2500 on a slew of weight loss pills..

Im making this short but after trying probably every way and gimmick known to man to loose weight known to man. some worked but results were very hard to keep.. and I would gain that weight back.. I came to a realization that..

Being thin is a way of life.. its a life style.. Yes some people dont have to work at it all.. some are just lucky and can eat mounds of crap and still keep a healthy weight..

This realization came from just hanging out with my friends.. my friends are very active people. and for the most part eat healthy and maintien thier weight.. we had all gone out to eat at a restaurant.. I was the first one to order. I ordered an appetizer and my meal. the waitress moved on and my friends began to order.. first friend ordered a salad.. no dressing. next friend just asked for water. and so did the last.. when the appetizer arrived I was the only one eating it.. no one wanted my deep fried chicken strips.. so out of curiosity I offered my appetizer figuring that they probably thought that it was only for me and not for everyone else. first friend says "no its fine I havent done a single thing today and plan on not doing anything so I cant really eat something like that. and my other friends gave a similar response.. I was baffled but It made sense.. that entire day I had spent it just lounging around on my laptop. watching TV played some Xbox.. and here I was eating easily 800 to 1000 calorie appetizer by my self!!! let alone I had not eaten anything all day so my body had probably figured I was starving and I would be eating all of these calories in one sitting.

I kept a close eye on my friends eating habbits. and they had differed a lot from mine..

1. they had a healthy breakfast every morning

2. they had set scheduales when they would eat and it was constant every day.

3. they adjusted thier intake to what thier physical activities were going to be for the day.

4. they were active.. Im not talking about athletes or people who run a marathon here.. just simple work outs. a nice jog or just a lot of walking...

VS me

1. I rarely ate breakfast!! and if I did it would usually be about 3 sausage biscuits from Mc Donalds and several hash brown things or some Ihop and all kinds of crap.. bacon was my favorite!!! omg did I love bacon.

2. I would randomly eat.. each day was different.

3. regardless if I had attempted to work out or if I was going to lay around all day and do absolutely nothing. I would eat large amounts of food or high calorie food.. like an entire pizza or two an in entire day followed by hours of lounging around on netflix. that sort of thing.

4. my active part of my live usually involved a lame jog once a week sometimes once a month. I would come up with excuses and reasons not to run.. or work out.. "oh my joint hurts" "Im not feeling so well" "oh this work out is deffinately not for me" "Ill do it tommorow" "Im way to busy today" "its too hot" I could probably write a book on excuses and reasons of why not to work out.

Implementation

when it came time to finally implement my friends life styles into mine I had to do it by trial and error.. I was well aware some things would not work out for me and some would so I would test each out.. I had become very aware that being thin is a life style.. anyone can get fat.. I was the perfect example of that..it was time I had made a change.. I knew that it was going to be a long road.. and that patience was key.. and that I needed to had the internal motivation and strong will to stick to what I was doing..

My motivation.. I was done being a loner and a looser... Yes this might sounds shallow but in all reality its to truth.. I wanted to be able to pick up the kind of girls I like.. wear nice clothes I was tired of the all the man boob jokes I was done with all the fat jokes I needed to face reality and realize that being fat is not okay. I was done giving my self excuses for why I was fat and realize the all bull shit about "its in your genes your just suppose to be fat" I was not going to accept that anymore! I was not born weighing almost 250 I did that to my self!! I made my self fat..

If you dont have the drive or mental will you will always fail!!! your going to start a a diet.. your going to fail eventaully your going to say something like hey Ive been doing awesome this week I deserve a snickers!!! its all down hill from there.

The first change I made was my food.. I had to start at the source of it.. It would be pointless to change my diet and start working out if I wasnt going to change what I was eating.. it was very hard.. I did stumble a couple of times but I pushed through..

I cut out everything with fat.. all take out foods.. any thing deep fried.. I was not in a condition to be eating those kinds of foods anyways.. all candy soft drinks.. I switched over to diet coke.. why??? because it has no dietary value at all.. Im coke drinking man and I did drink a lot of coke.. if I was going to have a soft drink it was going to be Diet coke/ pepsi or coke zero.. that is all I drink if Im going to have a soft drink.. no dietary value.. same taste why not?

I started paying attention to high protien foods.. chicken, fish, nuts, vegetable.. I stopped eating red meat..

it was easier than I thought it would have been... this transition took a month.. and in that month even though I was still over eating I noticed a fast change.. in that month I lost 10lbs.. not a lot but it was enought to note that my pants actaully fit.. "size 38 at the time" it was time for phase two

Phase two,

Eating on a schedule was a bit harder.. because hey sometimes I couldnt be taking a lucnh break or something like that.. or something would come up that sort of thing but my shcedule went as fallowed

1. breakfast at 6:00AM
2. lunch at 12:00
3. Dinner by 4:00 or 5:00.

that was it.. after another month of this I agian lost weight.. I was very proud of my self and I rewarded my self by buying size 36 pants!! and this time a Large not an XL shirt!!!

Phase 3 adjusting intake to physical work done

This is a hard part and it involved a lot of trial and error.. If I know that durring the day Im doing a lot fo phyiscal work I have a nice breafast with carbo hydrates and such.. fresh fruit.. and if any meat something like turkey or chicken there are all kinds of things you can make.

if I knew I was going to sit around I would eat something very lite.. in no way was I ever starving my self.. its hard at the start bec ause my stomach was still pretty big and it was not used to eating normal food servings but it did shrink and I can easily eat say one slice of pizza now and Im full!!! I compensated by drinking a lot of water.. eat my normal human food serving . drink a lot of water..

 

[ANGRYLLAMA]

hydrate hydrate hydrate... I drink a shit load of water these days.. it helps your body digest food. and it prevents you from conastalty feeling hungry.. I had read some where that most of the time when your hungry your actualy thirsty..

I kept at this for about 4 months.. I got down to 195 pounds.. size 34 pants.. and still wearing large shirts..

it was time to kick it up a nothch.. this diet change and everything I had done changed me a lot.. I was more out going.. strong... energetic.. I had a new spunk!!! I started working out.. nothing big at first.. I found some work outs online like some weight lifting.. running..

I started out with timed runs.. not distance.. 10min then 15. 20.. and so on.. it was very important that I would not stop running until my time was up.. these days I switched to distance and I can easily knock out a 5 to 6 mile run.. do pull ups!!! im very extatic about that.. push ups! and some other things I found..

this combined with my new eating habbits I quickly and in a very healthy way got down to where I am no.. 165lbs..

1 year... it took my one whole year... a lot of dedidication.. and strong will to change from someone who was getting made fun of and had no dating life to someone who can easily pick up those nice girls at the bar without even having to try..

Yes I did hate my self.. I had to.. If I didnt hate how fat I was then I would still be that big right now.. I had to love a thinner me.. I love how I am now.. Im healthy.. I dont get out of breath anymore.. I am fit. I wear a size 30S pant size now and medium to small shirts.. my legs and joints dont kill me anymore.. I have energy.. Im very out going..

And agian.. I cant stress this enough.. you have to loose weight slowly.. that was the key.. I didnt get from a healthy weight of 155 to 165 to 245 pounds over night.. that took years.. months.. days.. there fore I had to loose weight slowly.. and thats where I kept failing.. I wanted instant overnight results. lose 15 pounds in a week.. I threw all of those ideas out the windows and focused on something more realistic.. just loose some weight every month.. I made goals.. like 5 pounds.. maybe 10 pounds in a month.. each time I exceeded those amounts.. and I kept going..

Im going to stick around this forum if any one has questions..

My motivation was hating who I was.. why not??? I wasnt happy. I was depressed.. I had only ever had one gf.. I was killing my self with food.. why would I love my self like that??? why would anyone love them selves like that??? that why your all here right?? to find some way of loosing weight??

Im here to provide what worked for me..

these days I manage my weight by weighing my self daily.. because I know that being thin is a life style.. sometimes I wake up and in the morning.. see that in the last couple of days I have gained a couple of pounds.. and I adjust.. work out a little longer.. something like that.. and I maintian my weight.. I do have about 15lbs of muscle weight.. I work out.. I do consider that some weight I do gain could be muscle.. all I have to do is just feel around for some fat and figure out if Im good..

and i cant stress this enough.. DO NOT STARVE YOUR SELF!!! your gain all of it back.. your body goes into a survivale mode and things that its starving and its begins to store all that food!!! eat through out the day.. my normal daily intake is 1,000 calories if Im being lazy and not doing shit.. to 1800 caloires of healthy food if Im working out or biking..

Calories only count for healthy food.. if your going to be eating shit and counting that as part of your calorie intake for the day your already fucking up right there.. why?? because your not considering all the other stuff like fats and oils and god know what else.. this moslty goes for red meats. and deefried stuff.. you shoudnt be eating that anymore anyways..

now more on the starving part... when you start eating healthy portions vs your old portions.. yes your still going to feel hungry??? my stomach had to be pretty huge if I was able to eat an entire pizza in one sitting.... think about it!! a large pizza.. get a plastict bag.. and stuff a large pizza in it.. I did that and it really put things into perspective for me.. a serving size is about a slice. to two.. depending if your sitting around all day or being active.. so yes.. I was going to feel very hungry becaus I wans teating a meal meant for a family of 4!!! your stomach will shink and that will go away.. eating portions and to your calorie needs for the day is not starving your self.. as long as your eating nutritious foods..

Dinner!! I always eat something light.. why?? because Im going to be going to bed.. but that why I also eat dinner at around 4 or 5.. that gives my body 5 hours to digest that food.. I eat something like an awesome salad or vegetablt lasagna.. hell sometimes pizza or some awesome food.. but in portion.. why would I eat soemthing that has so much energy if Im going to bed soon???

I made my self very very fat because I was lazy.. I was over eating.. and I had a bad eating habbits.. if I wasnt over eating I was starving my self.. I realized that you need to be eating through out the day but no on crap... Im constantly snacking on carrotes.. mixed nuts that are salt free. and without any crap sugar glaze.. just regular old roasted nuts.. great protien!! jack links also have great prtotien too!! and are very lean but its still animal fat so watch it!!

and as much as I loved bacon I havent had it in a very long time.. bacon is pretty much fats cousin.. a very tasty cousin at that LOL..

its been almost a year.. and Im so used to thise its not like before.. before it seemed like a shore to stay thin... that why I call it a life style..

and even know.. once a month I like to endulge on a nice piece of cake and ice cream.. but I can do that.. because I adjust my intake for the day.. increse work for the day and days folowing.. and it wont affect me.. you cant be eating crap like that weekly or everyday.. I took a look at what humans were eating on the norm back in the day.. its not like you could walk up to a tree and picks some freshly grown reeses cups or go down to the ole big Mac orchard!

If you didnt notice I didnt sstart working out until I had a set normal diet.. and when I say diet I dont mean fucking starving my self.. Diet as the foods I will eat and wont eat. candy bars.. not part of my diet but I will have one sometimes like once a week.. and not the whole thing either.. about half then I toss the rest away in the trash. fat.. is a small part of my diet.. your body does need it but no in the beggingin since.. well some of you probably have several hundred pounds of it.. It was almost not existant in the begging for me since I did have about 100 pounds of it why would I need more??? when I can just burn off the fat I have.. Oils are good in small amounts.. like your olive oils.. dont over do it!!!!!

you have read several parts where i talk about protien.. I did not to some stupid faddish diet "atkins" or what ever it was called.. I increased my protien intake because msucled burn more fat through the day then fat.. "yes your fat does use energy" but since I was beggining to do more walking around and such. and not stting on the damn couch I needed a way to feed my muscles.. protien bars. nuts, fish, chicken, turkey.. things like that.. jerky!.

and agian Im going to stick around for several days to answere any questions... and support what worked for me.. it all started just by observing people for a while that have a healthy weight.. not all anorexic.. I observed for about 2 months... and I took what they did..

 

[Taras]

Thanks for sharing, I am currently in the rut you were before you started. I work in a restaurant too and we get a staff me as a cook so you could imagine the unhealthy choices I made up from time to time.

I would only eat once a day(stupidly large portion), which again helps my body to store fat since it thinks i'm starving.

I drank up to 2L of soda a day which is right there a ton of weight.

Now I was feeling down and last year I bought a omega vert juicer, great machine though I used it for one month (cutting out soda entirely and fast food, I did have the occasional deep fried thing from work) but over all I was eating a lot better and more regularly. I've prob gained 10+ more pounds since I stopped doing that so its back to it.

I am disappointment that I quit but I am happy to know that I have it in me to change.

I have started juicing again for this past week, I am cutting out all soda, red meat, anything deep fried or generally high calorie.

It's been a week and while it is still brutal to wake up in the morning, I am finding already more energy through the day and its only been a few days.

I will be getting a cardio bike for indoors since 2/3 of the year its winter or raining.


I only stumbled on these forums but its nice to read others success stories especially when it feels like they are talking about me

I am 5"9 and 260 right now. this is the heaviest I have ever been and it will be the last time.


I didn't read all of the last half of your post but I think it is important to mention (if you didn't already) is that you really need to commit no one is going to do it for you. Get a schedule and keep at it for 90 days, it will be hard, but if you can really commit and keep up with your new lifestyle choice I can bet you won't want to have anything to do with the old you.