The Officialish FOFC Weight Loss Dynasty

[Radii]

Originally Posted by Alan T

have you considered doing weight workouts? I don't do much heavy lifting myself, but weight lifting in a structured workout routine has been shown to burn off weight as it consumes a very solid number of calories. Plus my understanding is weight lifting has a direct effect on increasing testosterone

I've been doing some weight training for the last 3-4 weeks (a mix of bodyweight exercises and using a bowflex we have in the house), this will hopefully increase my resolve to stick with it.

I'm going back to see my doctor in another week and a half or so (not sure why I need to go back in for this, but the nurse was insistent, whatever) to talk about it and figure out what to do. Business as usual until then.

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-In: 305.8(-0.3 lbs., -34.1 overall)

A stagnant week on the scale, which I'm chalking up to multiple factors, mostly due probably to the body finding a new equilibrium as it usually does after a big drop like last week, and also the first week of core exercises brought with it considerable soreness the first couple of days which has an effect as well.

Overall it went well, sorted out some balance issues with the squats and other than a couple fairly minor departures from my food regimen it was another good week. I'm expecting a better scale result next time.

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/1: 308.8
3/8: 306.4
3/27: 304.2


I had been stuck bouncing between 306-308 for nearly a month.

In the past week I've dropped my calorie intake from 2200 calories/day to 1900. I have (TMI maybe) started taking Miralax daily for some... digestive issues i've been dealing with off and on for more than a year now, at the suggestion of my doctor. It seems to be helping. *hopefully* the weight loss starting back up again is more due to the calorie change though :P

I've complained about calories a lot here before. LoseIt would tell me to eat 2600 calories a day. MyFitnessPal says between 2200-2400 depending on the deficit I chose. There's a calculator on reddit's r/keto sub to figure out protein/fat macros for low carb dieting. It tells me to eat 2400 calories/day.

Maybe I just have super duper slow metabolism?

Anyway, at 1900 calories on low carb, I am not hungry very often at all, I can sustain this. On a higher carb diet last year, even w/ healthier carbs, I found that below 2100 calories or so I was very hungry all the time and it just didn't work. This feels like it can work though.


Last year when I was eating healthy and exercising a lot I would see short bursts of weight loss followed by weeks of stagnation. It seemed to be the norm for me. So lets see if things stagnate again now that I've seen a small drop, or if the calorie change (and improving the old digestive situation) will allow this to keep going :P

Remember, 294 is where I was at last fall, and the lowest I've been in 10 years or so, so getting back to that is the first big goal. 10 pounds to go for that!

[Radii]

Originally Posted by Radii

I'm going back to see my doctor in another week and a half or so (not sure why I need to go back in for this, but the nurse was insistent, whatever) to talk about it and figure out what to do. Business as usual until then.

So I needed to go back to the doctor b/c he wanted to redo the blood test and make sure it wasn't an anomaly. It wasn't. We're cutting my testosterone dosage in half and will re-test in 3 weeks.

I hate that i have to change something right now, b/c fat is practically falling off of me right now, and I hate to do anything to potentially upset that, but, gotta do it.

On my doctor's scale I weighed 10 pounds less than I did 2 weeks ago. I checked in here at 304.2 on Thursday. Today I was at 301.4.

[Brian Swartz]

Woo-hoo! Almost there!!

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-In: 303.8(-2.0 lbs., -35.8 overall)

I've now passed the 10% body weight loss mark, as the 306 plateau finally gave way and I started losing for the first time in almost two weeks over the weekend. Other small victories included 'burning the ships' by taking three pairs of pants(44s and 46s) to Goodwill, good improvement on the core exercises(I can take the training wheels off on the pushups after knocking out 5 regular today), and feeling better in general though it's been up and down. It's like my body can't decide whether to be healthy or not, probably a changing-of-the-seasons thing with Michigan doing it's usual Winter -- no summer -- no spring -- no who knows what thing for this time of year.

For April, my goal is to keep getting stronger and put 300, which I can smell now, in the rearview mirror by month's end.

[BYU 14]

great job guys!!

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/1: 308.8
3/8: 306.4
3/27: 304.2
4/3: 300.6

So after going a month without losing any weight despite eating at least a 25% calorie deficit according to every website out there (and for some sites closer to 35%) , I dropped 7.5 pounds in 8 days. That's slowed/stopped over the last 3 days, so now we'll see if I'm going to continue a pattern of stalling for weeks followed by big bursts in weight loss, or if my body will decide its ok to shed a little weight with any kind of consistency at all.

[Radii]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

(I can take the training wheels off on the pushups after knocking out 5 regular today)

Nice! I'm doing bodyweight exercises for everything but my back (I don't own a pullup bar and am afraid I'd rip the house apart if I had one). I've progressed past the regular squats, but am still doing knee pushups. My lower body was always way way stronger than upper.

Congrats on your progress, under 300 soon!

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Radii

Nice! I'm doing bodyweight exercises for everything but my back (I don't own a pullup bar and am afraid I'd rip the house apart if I had one). I've progressed past the regular squats, but am still doing knee pushups. My lower body was always way way stronger than upper.

Congrats on your progress, under 300 soon!

I don't own a pullup bar either.. and that might be ideal for me, but there are other ways to work upper body muscles without a pullup bar. Here are a few I do:

1) Bench press (can also do push ups instead) - Strengthens the pectorals, deltoids, triceps and biceps
2) Rowing - Strengthens the rhomboids
3) Overhead pull - Strengthens the triceps.
4) Curl - Strengthens the biceps

So for instance, the overhead pulls, I usually do with weights, but you could also do it with a waterbottle or can of soup or whatever. The angle of the exercise gives the benefits even with lighter weights.

[Radii]

I have a bowflex, I'm using it to "replace" the work that would be done by pullups (or whatever lesser variety of them i'd have to do since i've never done an actual pull-up in my life).

I was using the bowflex for all of my strength work except for legs, I'm too tall to use the machine for squats. So I did some googling to see what I could do and tried some plain bodyweight squats, and holy crap they felt effective. That sent me down a rabbit hole of looking up full exercise routines and progressions for other bodyweight exercises and that's what I've been working on.

[MacroGuru]

Originally Posted by Radii

I have a bowflex, I'm using it to "replace" the work that would be done by pullups (or whatever lesser variety of them i'd have to do since i've never done an actual pull-up in my life).

I was using the bowflex for all of my strength work except for legs, I'm too tall to use the machine for squats. So I did some googling to see what I could do and tried some plain bodyweight squats, and holy crap they felt effective. That sent me down a rabbit hole of looking up full exercise routines and progressions for other bodyweight exercises and that's what I've been working on.

There is an app on the Android called You are your own gym...it's all different body weight workouts if I remember correctly.

[Brian Swartz]

Originally Posted by Radii

My lower body was always way way stronger than upper.

I'm the same way. I pretty much expect to regularly progress with the squats, while any improvement in upper-body is a cause to celebrate.

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/1: 308.8
3/8: 306.4
3/27: 304.2
4/3: 300.6
4/9: 299.4

So things stopped for about a week with my weight hovering in the same spot every day, then has started moving again the last couple days. First weigh-in under 300 today.

294 is still my first major goal in my mind, to get back to where I was in the fall and then to continue progressing, but it is nice to see a number that starts with '2' again.

[Brian Swartz]

Woo-hoo!! Fantastic.

[Alf]

Well done Radii !

I haven't been posting lately and you may guess why : I am not making any progress, nor additional effort though. At least, that proves me than no effort ends up in no result.

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-In: 302.3(-1.5 lbs., -37.6 overall)

A decent week, had a birthday party for my nieces on Sunday which threw me off my eating discipline and probably cost about a pound. Digestive system didn't care for it much as I don't eat any rich food at all normally.

I'm a week, maybe two away from cracking the 300 barrier and am pretty much in rhythm with everything, which is actually the most dangerous and tempting part of the process for me. There's a tendency to think gradual progress is automatic, metabolism is pretty much at peak and cravings are somewhat worse than they were most of the last couple months, so vigilance is most definitely a necessity.

[Brian Swartz]

It's been a fine weekend, and this morning the scale read 299.0! Hopefully it will stay in that ballpark as we head towards the middle of the week.

[Alan T]

Congrats Brian!

[Radii]

Awesome!

[FrogMan]

wow guys, great work!!!

FM

[BYU 14]

Awesome work guys, congrats to both of you!!

[path12]

Two weeks into Weight Watchers, down 8. Easy to stay full, hard to feel satisfied.

Like so much of life I guess.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

Goals:
Weight: 190 (I am 6' tall and have an above average frame)
Body fat: 21-22 % (For a 50 year old man, fit/fair is 23-26%, slim/healthy is 20-23%)
I set the Lose it site goal for weight loss of 1.5 pounds a week, which puts me at my target weight on March 9th (my Birthday)

Monday December 16th
Weight: 208.0
Body Fat: 25.2%
Muscle Mass: 33.6%
(Scale also does bone density and water weight %, not concerned with those as much)

Friday February 28th
Weight: 189.2 (- 18.8)
Body Fat: 21.7%
Muscle Mass: 35.3%
Adjusted goal date: Met

Still holding steady, weighed in at 189.6 this morning. Since meeting my goal in February I have gotten as high as 196.6 (March 26th and the end of our trip to Las Vegas) but that came off quickly and I have spent most of the time in the 190-192 range which is what I had hoped for. When on maintenance mode (just over 2500 calories) I limit myself to one "bad" food day a week and stick to my normal diet with bigger portions the rest of the time.

I usually gain 2-3 pounds the day after my cheat day, but I think that is more from sodium intake than anything else as it comes right back off and the only salt I add to my diet is a verrrry small sprinkle of sea salt to my Salmon and Chicken breasts.

Exercise wise I run a minimum of 5K at lunch every day Mon-Fri, so strength training (bodyweight and Bowflex) 4 nights a week and walk on Saturday and Sunday (4-6 miles each day) only taking an occasional day off from doing anything.

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/10: 306.4
3/27: 304.2
4/3: 300.6
4/9: 299.4
4/16: 297.6

New low, and only 3 pounds away from the lowest weight I got to last year! Now for the rambling.


So I'm keeping a spreadsheet with my weight daily. I've mentioned before that I seem to stall a lot. When I lost a bunch of weight last year just eating less calories and running a lot the same thing happened, stall for weeks, drop 5 pounds in a few days, etc. The same thing seems to be happening here too on a ketogenic diet with weight training being my primary method of exercise. My pattern so far:

1/10 - 2/8 - first month is easy, water weight to drop, etc. Went from 323-310.

2/8 - 3/4 - 25 days in a row, weight fluctuates between 308-312.

3/5 - 3/21 - 15 days in a row, some kind of trend downward but still pretty damn stagnant. Weight fluctuates between 307-309 (better than 308-312)

3/22 - 4/1 - lost 7 pounds in 10 days, woohoo, dropped from 307.6-300.5

4/1 - 4/14 - 13 days in a row, weight fluctuates between 299.5-300.5.

4/15 - 4/16 - dropped from 300 - 297.6 in two days, now to see if this is the start of another bigger drop or if I'm gonna spend another 2 weeks at like 296-298.


I dunno, I ramble here when I update, makes me feel better for some reason. Clearly things are working, keto/low carb is working so well for me and I'm feeling really good. I just wonder exactly how fucked up my metabolism/body are for this to be how I lose weight over the last couple years when I'm eating right.

[Radii]

Originally Posted by BYU 14

Exercise wise I run a minimum of 5K at lunch every day Mon-Fri, so strength training (bodyweight and Bowflex) 4 nights a week and walk on Saturday and Sunday (4-6 miles each day) only taking an occasional day off from doing anything.

Man, that is a pretty impressive weekly regimen there, nice job!

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-in: 299.7(-2.6 lbs., -39.9 overall)

So I bounced around some but stayed just under 300, and will spend the second half of the month getting some safe distance hopefully. Still a strong number this week, anything over 2lbs. is great. On the core exercises, I strangely have stagnated on the squats but made really good progress on the plank/pushups which is exactly the opposite of the way it usually goes.

[BYU 14]

Originally Posted by Radii

Man, that is a pretty impressive weekly regimen there, nice job!

Thanks, but I think it is my OCD holding me to it, LOL.

Great job to you BTW, over 25 down!!!

[Kodos]

Great job to Brian S and and Radii. Nice to break out of the 300s and into the 200s.

I'm trying to break into the lower 180s this week after yoyoing in the upper to middle 180s since January 1st. I'm hoping spring allows more regular running which leads to more steady weight loss. Still, I'm the lowest I've weighed in a couple of decades. 185.6 as of Monday. I'm approaching 30 pounds lost. A solid week or two should put me over the top and put me within 10 pounds of my goal weight (170-175).

Keep on working, boys.

[BYU 14]

Great job Kodos

[MacroGuru]

Rough week as I had my kids for 10 days and we were doing so much I didn't have the time to cook like I usually do.

I packed on close to 3-4 pounds.

Back to the normality of life...for now.

It looks like i am going to be traveling again and trying to eat on my diet while on the road will be somewhat of a challenge, but we will see...

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/10: 306.4
4/10: 299.4
4/16: 297.6
4/23: 295.6

I had my followup bloodwork to see how my red blood cell mass (I think that's the measure...) is looking after cutting my dosage of testosterone in half 3 weeks ago. The good news is that its back in a normal range, which means I can stay on this dosage of testosterone. The bad news is that its not enough, my testosterone level is well below normal. I can tell, for sure, but its not as bad as I feared. I'm very, very glad I don't have to stop taking it entirely.


I've been eating basically the same, though I have been trying a few keto-friendly recipes lately, I made some hamburger buns and a pizza crust with almond flour, they end up super dense, tons of calories and fat but almost no carbs, they work pretty well, something I'll definitely do on occasion for some variety. I also made a low carb cheesecake w/ sugar free jello/cream cheese/heavy cream. It was ok, there's a slightly weird aftertaste from whatever the artificial sweetener in the jello is, so I probably won't make that again. I tend to avoid artificial sweetener stuff though, and absolutely won't touch most sugar alcohols, seems better to just enjoy all the things I get to eat like bacon every day than try to find some kind of fake cake or something

[Brian Swartz]

Originally Posted by BYU14

Exercise wise I run a minimum of 5K at lunch every day Mon-Fri, so strength training (bodyweight and Bowflex) 4 nights a week and walk on Saturday and Sunday (4-6 miles each day) only taking an occasional day off from doing anything.

I too am very impressed by this. I find it hard to imagine finding the motivation to maintain a lot of routine just to maintain, hard enough to do so while progressing.

Good to see others(Kodos, MacroGuru, path12) reporting in as well. Something small is always better than nothing!

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-in: 299.7(no change, -39.9 overall)

A great start to the week put me over a minute on the plank for the first time at 62 seconds, then I had some minor indigestion on Fri/Sat. and some fairly serious fatigue set in. I don't know if my body just got wore out or I've got some sort of strange virus or something -- I don't at all feel sick, just lethargic the last few days. Couldn't even get through my workout on Monday, I had to abandon the squats in the second set because I couldn't maintain balance, and pushups/plank were about 25% less than usual. Muscles just felt dead with no energy.

We'll see how it goes after taking my usual days off yesterday and today, but I still feel low on energy. Hopefully I can push through this and it's just a road bump, not a wall.

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-In: 297.3(-2.4 lbs., -42.3 overall)

I think I can safely say I've achieved safe distance from 300 now, as well as having finally broken through the 40-lb. threshold. I started feeling somewhat better Wed night/Thurs AM last week, and had one of the best, most exhausting workouts I've had in some time just a couple days ago, a complete reversal from the previous week.

APRIL BY THE NUMBERS

I find it's helpful to look at medium-term results to see how I'm progressing, so I'll be doing one of these each month starting with this.

Weight: 303.8 start, 297.3 end, -6.5 lbs. net(1.6 lbs. lost/wk). This is a very healthy number as most of what I've read suggests a goal of 1-1.5 per week, though it is slower than what I was doing the first few months. Still, quite pleased with this.

Pushups: NA start, 67 end. This is the total number of reps in all of my 15 sets for the week combined. At the beginning of April I had just graduated from knee to regular pushups, and that first week I managed 40, so it's been a fabulous month for the upper body.

Plank: 45s start, 63s end(+40%). This is the best max. I managed, and the 45 at the end of March was the first one over 40 seconds I had done, now I'm hitting the minute-mark more often than not. Pleased with this as well.

Squats: 89 start, 105 end(+18%). I was stuck treading water for almost the entire month, but finally started to see a bit of progress on my last workout on Monday. The first week of April was 101 total, and I've been very close to that consistently. This is the one weak spot where I'd like to see more improvement.

My next weight goal is 292, 5.3 lbs. away, which is the point at which I'll hit 35 BMI. If May is as good as April I should hit that fairly easily by the end of the month.

[Radii]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

I think I can safely say I've achieved safe distance from 300 now

Yes, that is a really good feeling

Congrats on the progress!

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/10: 306.4
4/10: 299.4
4/16: 297.6
4/23: 295.6
4/30: 294.2

Consistent, steady loss for the last 3 weeks, hooray! Getting real close to 30 pounds down since I started keto.

Thing I learned this week: Cookies have evil magic powers. Even shitty ones. I made low carb/high fat chocolate chip cookies using almond flour and sugar free chocolate chips and a sweetener with no glycemic index (Erythritol). I didn't hate them, but I'm not sure I actually liked them at any point. Regardless, I grabbed one EVERY SINGLE TIME I walked through the kitchen until they were gone. So that's another thing I can make if I get some insane desert craving, but probably won't do again for a long time.

[path12]

Three and a half weeks in, down 10.2 pounds. Pretty much what I expected, my "goal" was 10 the first month and then 5/month through the end of the year and that should get me to a point I'm OK with.

I'm fine with being 20 overweight. Not fine with 65 over.

Pretty much just tagging on to my wife's Weight Watchers plan. Stepping up activity as well but man, once you are in your fifties it is so damn easy to injure yourself. Hell, even my dog tore his cruciate so walking him is out for awhile.

BTW this thread is nice support.

[Brian Swartz]

Consistent, steady loss for the last 3 weeks, hooray!

Super! If you are anything like me, that's a huge, huge motivator. Looks like you are just a hair away from your first goal!

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-In: 297.8(+0.5 lbs., -41.8 overall)

It was a weird week, and my weight has been a yo-yo all over the place up several pounds one day, down several the next ... really bizarre. I honestly have no idea what is going on. It was also the first week this year that I gained weight, which is a bit depressing. Espescially considering that my waist continues to slowly shrink noticeably ... I'm wondering where it's going to?

I did manage to continue progress on the squats that began last week, although the other two exercises were more stagnant. As a result, I was ready for another squats test today: the last one was seven weeks ago at the start of the exercise program, when I managed 10. Today that was more than doubled to 22, 11% of my goal of 200. That was a nice feeling, and I'll move on to a higher-rep workout starting next week and see how the legs respond to that.

[Kodos]

I hit 30 pounds off today. Started at 213.6 back in February of 2013, I believe. No fad diets. No trying to completely quit certain foods that I love. Just started making fresh veggies and fruits the bulk of my diet. Only thing I don't let myself have is soda (15 months or so). I've only had a handful of salads in that time. Started walking, then introduced jogging. Baby steps and persistence. 10 pounds or so left to my goal weight. 183.4 and dropping.

[Alan T]

Nice job Kodos

[Radii]

grats kodos!

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/10: 306.4
4/10: 299.4
5/10: 292.2


First goal accomplished. 294 is the lowest I got to last year before falling off the wagon. Getting below that means I'm at the lowest weight I've been in the last 10-15 years or so. I'm also at 30 pounds down since I started keto in January, which is solid.

I haven't exercised any in the last week and a half. Weight loss doesn't have a whole lot to do with exercise of course, but I do want to improve my fitness level as I drop weight, so I need to get back to that.

[Brian Swartz]

Fantastic progress for both of you!

[Brian Swartz]

Weigh-In: 295.4(-2.4 lbs, -44.2 overall)

Bounced back with an excellent week across the board. I was really worn out after the weekend and had a difficult workout on Monday, but made some progress in all aspects. It has become more difficult to stick to the eating plan the last few weeks, my appetite seems to be growing gradually.

Originally Posted by Radii

Weight loss doesn't have a whole lot to do with exercise of course

I found this interesting as my experience and what I've read indicates it has quite a bit to do with it. Not quite as important as what we eat of course, but quite important in building metabolism long-term.

[Alan T]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

I found this interesting as my experience and what I've read indicates it has quite a bit to do with it. Not quite as important as what we eat of course, but quite important in building metabolism long-term.

For me, just exercising was not enough to dent my weight issues back a few years ago. What happened would be that I would exercise and then just eat more because I was hungrier.

It was only when I started making better choices about what I ate, when I ate that I started losing the weight. The exercise is a very important part of being healthier and I believe that being committed to exercise will also help people stay committed to keeping off the weight, but it really feels to me like it was 80% diet for me to lose my weight.

[Radii]

Originally Posted by Brian Swartz

I found this interesting as my experience and what I've read indicates it has quite a bit to do with it. Not quite as important as what we eat of course, but quite important in building metabolism long-term.

Anecdotally I just see way too many people on reddit't keto sub doing progress updates who start out saying "I lost 75 pounds without doing any exercise and later on I found out I felt better and had more energy and just wanted to be fit and so I started lifting weights!"

I want to be exercising more than I am, or at least more consistently, as I really do want to be more fit as I lose weight, but when it comes to weight loss, I'm not beating myself up about it or anything

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/10: 306.4
4/10: 299.4
5/10: 292.2
5/17: 290.6

I believe this is 6 straight weeks where I've lost between 1-2 pounds. I counted calories a couple times this week and my protein intake has dipped a bit, I've changed my breakfast slightly to get a little more protein and a little less fat while keeping my calories where I want them. My current macros are aiming for 20g carbs/120g protein/157g fat a day to get to ~2000 calories, which is about a 30% calorie deficit.


So I put on a 4XLT shirt yesterday, one I bought when I weighed closer to 350, and it felt hilariously large. I own a bunch of 3XL and 3XLT shirts too that fit better (I'm 6'4" and most of my weight is in my gut, so the 'tall' versions have always worked out better for me). Out of curiosity I bought a plain 2XL T-shirt and tried it on, and it ALMOST fits perfectly. It fit comfortably on my shoulders/chest, but was a little tight in the stomach. Just a little. I'm going to have to buy new shorts soon as well, the ones I wear the most now are getting dangerously loose, hooray.


Lastly, food I'm trying out since I post about that on occasion:

Peanut Butter Cups - Keto-Style Fat Bombs FTW | screwed on straight

I'd mentioned not having much luck with dessert type foods, these are the exception. I used erythritol for sweetener instead of splenda. These things taste 100% like the 'real' thing. I made 18 of them so they ended up like 90 calories each, ~9g fat/4g carbs (the peanut butter I used had a bit more carbs I guess than what the guy used there). Seriously though, these things rival any full sugar treat I've ever had

[Radii]

1/10: 323
2/10: 310.8
3/10: 306.4
4/10: 299.4
5/10: 292.2
5/17: 290.6
5/24: 292.4

I'm pretty sure this is just an anomaly, throughout the week I actually got as low as 288.5 or so and was under 290 for most of it. I have felt like crap the last two days though, yesterday I was hungry all day which never happens. I also forgot to take my testosterone for like 4 days in a row due to some odd scheduling/wake up times, which leaves me feeling tired/weird all day too.

So anyway, 6 days in a row between like 288.5-290.4 then it spiked up today, but today is "official weigh in day" so I'm not gonna pretend it didn't happen.

If it doesn't go back to normal in a day or two then I'll religiously count calories for a week or so to make sure I haven't let portion sizes creep up or anything.