# Need to lose 40-50 pounds...



## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

...And I am completely clueless on how to do it as fast as humanly (and healthily) possible. 

Any tips? Suggestions?


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## kikachuck (Nov 10, 2003)

As somebody who has lost 50 pounds himself, the key thing to remember is that it is a marathon and not a spring. Lots of trial and error and make sure whatever changes you make are ones you can stick to or else you will put the weight right back on.

And please, for the love of god, don't think of it as a "diet"!


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## CopadoMexicano (Aug 21, 2004)

II lost like 1.5 ibs a day or 40 ibs in a month just by eating six small meals a day however I gained the weight back because of boredom. I havent been much upto date as far as nutrition and weight loss goals but what really worked for me was sprinting intervals in conjuction with the abs diet. Their is also a free online support forum bodybuilding.com that offers great advice on any goal and its free.


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## conscious (Oct 14, 2004)

cut carbs and sugar from what you eat.....


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## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

I may not know everything about smart eating, but I do know that for somebody looking to live an athletic lifestyle (which I am), cutting carbs is not a good idea.


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## ThomP (Dec 24, 2007)

PGVan said:


> ...And I am completely clueless on how to do it as fast as humanly (and healthily) possible.
> 
> Any tips? Suggestions?


Go biking... an hour a day, five to six times a week. It's healthy, and will let you lose a lot. I used that and lost 40 pounds in the first three months...


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## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

ThomP said:


> Go biking... an hour a day, five to six times a week. It's healthy, and will let you lose a lot. I used that and lost 40 pounds in the first three months...


Valid suggestion, however we're staring winter in the face. I know bikes are abundant in Western Europe (I just came back from Holland lol), but here in northern Canada, bikes go away probably around October. It was so cold last night that there was condensation on my car this morning. Another few weeks and it will be frost/ice.

I hope to get a gym membership, but the money situation in the next few weeks will decide that.


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## dullard (Aug 4, 2008)

A gym membership would probably be best but if you want you could probably find a used exercycle very cheap. People buy them, don't use them and then sell them for a fraction of the original price just to free up some space. I have seen this with most types of exercise equipment.


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## ThomP (Dec 24, 2007)

PGVan said:


> Valid suggestion, however we're staring winter in the face. I know bikes are abundant in Western Europe (I just came back from Holland lol), but here in northern Canada, bikes go away probably around October. It was so cold last night that there was condensation on my car this morning. Another few weeks and it will be frost/ice.


I used one of those stationary training bikes and watched DVD during training.

- Thom


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## nubly (Nov 2, 2006)

it all begins with what you put in your mouth 

cutting carbs helps a lot but its not the be all to losing bodyfat. just eat 6-8 small healthy meals a day. find out how many calories you need to eat to lose 1 lbs a week. cut out simple carbs, especiall sugars. eliminating sugars alone will help you lose a great deal. make sure you have one day that you eat more calories than the other days to prevent a dip in your metabolism. and yea, as kikachuck said, dont look at is as a diet but look at it as a lifestyle.


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## Beggiatoa (Dec 25, 2004)

Here's a crazy suggestion that really works.

Get some unpasteurized Braggs vinegar and take 1-2 tablespoons in water before everymeal. This will help control the insulin spike and it limits how much of the carbs you absorb.

Also, take some green tea extract with everymeal. That should help you lose weight as well.

and ofcourse, change your diet and exercise!

This is a good page to get info from

http://www.scientificpsychic.com/fitness/index.html

Check him out, he's 65 years old!


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## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

nubly said:


> it all begins with what you put in your mouth
> 
> cutting carbs helps a lot but its not the be all to losing bodyfat. just eat 6-8 small healthy meals a day. find out how many calories you need to eat to lose 1 lbs a week. cut out simple carbs, especiall sugars. eliminating sugars alone will help you lose a great deal. make sure you have one day that you eat more calories than the other days to prevent a dip in your metabolism. and yea, as kikachuck said, dont look at is as a diet but look at it as a lifestyle.


I am getting back into an athletic lifestyle. Carbs are not going to be cut. When I played hockey, my typical pre-game meal was a nice plate of pasta 3-4 hours before action.

I do not have time for 6-8 small meals per day. I just don't. I work for a living, and eating on the sales floor, where I am 8 hours a day, is a fireable policy violation.


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## Beggiatoa (Dec 25, 2004)

weight is gained by the action of Insulin. Insulin acts as a signal for your fat cells to store energy as triglycerides (fat). The amount of insulin released is proportional to the amount of fat stored. So, when there's a big sudden release of insulin, you're body interprets that as having more energy supply available than It need at the moment. So it stores the rest. Insulin is released in response to the ingestion of carbs, protein and fat. However, the release of insulin is far greater when you eat High glycemic foods...like white rice, bread, pasta, crackers. It's the carbs that make you fat, not the fat itself in food. 

What I'm trying to say is, for any succesfull weight loss program, you have to cut back on calories. Typically, by eating 500 kilocalories less than you burn, you'll lose 1 pound of fat per week. This is the safe way to do it. Unfortunately, carbs tipically a higher carbs to nutriets ratio. At least the processed carbs. So that one piece of bread or pasta has almost all the calories you'll need in one day. So if you count your calories, you'll be eating very little food. However, fruits and veggies are normally low calorie, with some exception, so you can pig out on those without going over. 

For dinner, I had a sardine pita sandwich with spinach and olive oil. It was great and very healthy, except for the pita bread which had 200 calories. The whole can of sardines has 220 calories but also supplied 24 grams of protein. 

So, I can fill up with one can of sardines ~200 calories, but I cannot fill up on one thin slice of white pita bread with no nutritional value - also 200 calories. Instead of a sandwich, I could have made a spinach salad and stuffed my face. 1 1/2 cup of raw spinach has 20 calories. So I could have eaten 15 cups of spinach and that would have equaled 200 calories. I'm actually pretty surprised by this myself. Wow! Tomorrow..I'll ditch the pita and have a big 'ol salad. By the way, the spinach has lots of magnesium (about 60 mg for 1.5 cups) which will helps for anxiety. The pita doesn't.

Does this make any sense?

Unless you increase your activity levels by much, you need to cut simple carbs.

Another simple thing you can do is to cut back portions. Serve yourself a normal sized plate of whatever you eat but just eat half the plate. While you wont be stuff, you'll certainly feel satisfied after a couple minutes.


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## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

Beggiatoa said:


> Unless you increase your activity levels by much, you need to cut simple carbs.


No offence, but you have no idea what even just reffing a hockey game takes physically.

Carbs are not being cut.

Frankly, none of this calorie counting makes any sense to me. Label reading is like reading a different language. I am going in the direction of using common sense by getting more exercise on a specific program and eating less unhealthy foods.


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## Beggiatoa (Dec 25, 2004)

PGVan said:


> ...And I am completely clueless on how to do it as fast as humanly (and healthily) possible.
> 
> Any tips? Suggestions?


Cutting carbs all together is a dumb thing and it's not what I propose. My post above was meant to state the difference between simple carbs like pasta versus complex carbs, like vegetables.

However, you seem to have your mind made up about how to lose weight so whatever you choose to do, I hope it works. Just know that exercise alone is not enough. I know what some types of physical activities entail. I trained in Judo and Aikido for many years. I also go to the paintball range quite often. you have no idea how taxing shotting paintballs is!! lol But It's a helluva workout.

For a simple introduction to some of the concepts of dieting and nutrition, I really urge you to read this site. It's basically diet and nutrition from a geeks point of view. This guy read all the books and info out there and made a good page about it.

http://www.scientificpsychic.com/fitness/index.html

His premise is the following: Physical Fitness = Nutrition + Exercise


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## Some Russian Guy (Mar 20, 2009)

ThomP said:


> Go biking... an hour a day, five to six times a week. It's healthy, and will let you lose a lot. I used that and lost 40 pounds in the first three months...


Yeah, riding a real bike is, I think, more enjoyable than a stationary bike...
I go to gym to lift weight, but am reluctant to use that stationary bike or treadmill. Because it's really boring to remain for 30 minutes in one place at a time...


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## shychick2 (Oct 20, 2008)

I lost weight over about 6 months at the gym. I have also used DVDs at home. 
40 lb is a lot, how much you lose depends on how heavy you are to start with e.g. if you were not much overweight and muscular you would really struggle to lose anything.
You can eat less of the same things, or drink more water, eat a balanced diet with more fruit and veg and less fat/sugar. Cut out snacks, or only snack on things like fruit/veg/low fat. It is hard work, not a quick fix. I have heard it is healthy to only lose 1 or 2 lb a week.


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## socially inept (Mar 6, 2009)

PGVan said:


> ...And I am completely clueless on how to do it as fast as humanly (and healthily) possible.
> 
> Any tips? Suggestions?


fast and healthy do not go int he same sentence when it comes to fat loss.

if you want to lose weight healthilly it will take time

if you want to lose it unhealthilly you can do it very quickly

if you lose it in a healthy way it will stay off permanently. healthy is losing 2 pound a week so to lose 40 pound would take 5 months.
if you lose 2 pound a week then then 2 pound is guaranteed to be all fat. you achieve this by eating 6 meals per day , its not a diet cos a diet usually means depriving yourself and going hungry.

if you lose more than 2 pound a week its not fat that you are losing. most of it is water and muscle. you end up weighing less but still holding fat and looking awful - like a thin, saggy person. and you will put the weight back on becasue :

1)to lose more than 2 pound a week you need to dprive yourself and go hungry. that is always a struggle and hard to keep up. eventaully you are just gonna want to eat more. and when you do you will gain cos your body is used to eating less

2)becasue you lose a lot of muscle your motiabolism slows sown therefore you need less calories to function. this means that even if you eat a small amount you could still be having more calories than you need . when you eat more calories than you need you gian weight

*you can lose 2 pound of FAT (notice i sed fat and not weight) per week by eating 6 healhty meals a day, exercising with weights and cardio, and allowing youself a cheat meal or 2 per week

i would recommend body for life by bill phillips for the 1st 3 months and then switch to burn the fat feed the muscle by tom venuto (use the carb cycling method) for the last 2 months

body for life works brilliantly for beginners. but after 12 weeks you will need a more advanced approach as it gets harder and harder to lose fat so then i would recommned the burn the fat feed the muscle

or if you want to go the fast and unhealthy way then do atkins. but honestly its a struggle and will cause problems int he long run. dont be fooled by the massive weight loss int he 1st 2 weeks - its not even fat , its just water


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## fern (Nov 16, 2008)

Counting calories might seem like a hassle but it works. I set a strict 1,500 calorie limit for myself and since December I have lost 30 pounds (only 15 more to go). 

Losing weight is difficult no matter what method you try.


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## pokeherpro (Jun 17, 2009)

I went from 205 to 165 from June 2007 to December 2007...6 months...and my waist went from 44 to 36. I didn't do it in a really good way though, I ate about 1200 calories a day and didn't exercise. It shouldn't take 6 months to lose 40 pounds. If I had ate a little more, between 1500-1800 calories a day and exercised, I could have lost 40 pounds, in a healthy way, in 4 months.
Don't cut carbs. When you're making your diet plan, aim for no less than 1500 calories and have 20%-25% of the calories be fat calories. All you need to do is count your daily calories and fat grams and remember that there are 9 calories in 1 gram of fat. 
For example, yesterday I had 1500 calories and 40 grams of fat. 40 x 9=360 calories from fat. 360/1500=0.24. 24% of my calories came from fat. The rest came from carbs and protein. If you're lifting weights, then in addition to counting calories and fat grams, you should count the grams of protein you eat in a day. You want to aim for 1 gram of protein per pound of body weight.
Do all this for 4 months and you'll be in fantastic shape.
As for the exercise problem, someone mentioned buying used exercise equipment, I totally agree. I have a cheap elliptical machine and it's great.

Just realized this thread is like a year old lol.


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## indie85 (Jul 29, 2009)

The way I looked at it, it was less effort to simply eat less than go to the gym and work my *** off for an hour just for 200Kcals, instead I'll skip that snack bar every time thanks.
If you can manage on just tea and coffee (semi skimmed milk and only a dribble) til dinner, you can then basically have what you want till you go to bed as long as it isn't junk food. I went from 34inches to 29inches in a few months doing this, after a couple of days your body adjusts.


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## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

indie85 said:


> The way I looked at it, it was less effort to simply eat less than go to the gym and work my *** off for an hour just for 200Kcals, instead I'll skip that snack bar every time thanks.
> If you can manage on just tea and coffee (semi skimmed milk and only a dribble) til dinner, you can then basically have what you want till you go to bed as long as it isn't junk food. I went from 34inches to 29inches in a few months doing this, after a couple of days your body adjusts.


Am I reading this right? You're taking in nothing but coffee and tea all day until dinner? That's just not healthy.


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## indie85 (Jul 29, 2009)

PGVan said:


> Am I reading this right? You're taking in nothing but coffee and tea all day until dinner? That's just not healthy.


This is only when you want to actively loose weight, you need to eat less than your body needs to do this and for me its easier to cut food off earlier in the day than later, as that's when my hunger usually kicks in. Some diets do it the other way, i.e little to no food after dinner but for me that is harder.


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## Ash09 (Apr 27, 2009)

I would consider using drugs that increase metabolism like dinitrophenol to be a safer solution than missing meals. Not that I reccomend either.


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## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

indie85 said:


> This is only when you want to actively loose weight, you need to eat less than your body needs to do this and for me its easier to cut food off earlier in the day than later, as that's when my hunger usually kicks in. Some diets do it the other way, i.e little to no food after dinner but for me that is harder.


The only healthy way to lose weight without exercise is to have a calorie deficit (with healthy food choices) that will make you lose 1-2 pounds per week. Any more of a weight loss is unhealthy. Even better, is if you accomplish this with 5-6 smaller meals throughout the day to keep your metabolism high. You should also not eat within 2-3 hours of going to bed.

Of course, adding in exercise and building muscle helps greatly too. Muscle burns calories better than anything else. If you're too lazy to exercise, then perhaps you don't want to lose the weight that much.


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## indie85 (Jul 29, 2009)

I'm actually already at my optimum weight and no longer following that diet. I was giving an insight into what I thought worked best for me, take it or leave it.


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## PGVan (May 22, 2004)

My point was that just because something works, it doesn't mean that it's healthy. Anorexia works too.


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