To ask what the best weight loss plan is?

[superstarheartbreaker]

Eat less , move more? Aside from which, which way of eating is most effective/ healthy?
I'm so confused with all this Atkins, harcombe, paleo, slimming world, 5:2diet.
I'm doing low carb but eating high fat stuff just dosnt feel right. Also missing rice.

for me: more walking. less junk food.

i eat very healthily but have too big portions and then add the junk on top. when I cut out the junk I lost weight. got stressed.. ate junk food, put some back on.

Well I am in the second week of Slim Fast now. I didn't stick to it at the weekend but I did very well during the week.

I am really hoping it works, if it doesn't I think I am going to have to ask for a gastric band :(

I'm just starting week five of the sugar quitting plan from Sarah Wilson's I Quit Sugar book and have lost 6lbs so far. I've cut out pretty much all refined sugar, most fruit (for a while) and most white carbs. Eating lots of salad, veg, cheese, nuts, and feeling really good with no calorie counting. I've also switched to full fat milk and yoghurt so high fat is working for me. My skin was already pretty good but I think even that has improved.

I'm currently doing weight watchers. It is working very well for me for the following reasons:

1. I need guidance on portion size so points per certain amounts of food tell me what I can have
2. I can eat whatever I want to as long as I count the points in it and don't go over the weekly allowance
3. I can cook for the family and just have a small portion of it if it is something high calorie. I have to say also that I eat cheese and have a bit of chocolate every day. I don't feel like I am on a diet just that I am more aware of what I am eating. I have lost 23.5lbs in less than 12 weeks which for me is very good.

Hope you find something that works.

Cutting out processed sugar - no lattes, coke, squash, sweets, ready meals, Fast food etc.

Eating roughly 1100-1500 a day of veg, proteins, dairy and complex carbs.

2 litres of water a day.

Allowing myself a day off every 2 weeks.

Have lost 2-4 pound a week doing this, and I haven't even started exercising yet. But I did used to be a bit of a sugar addict so that may be why.

I lost a great amount of weight and kept it off for 4 years until I fell ill on Slimming World. It taught me to cook from scratch and how to eat healthily.

But I'm following it using my fitness pal as my medication makes me stuff my face. By using MFP, I find I control my portion sizes better.

MyFitnessPal is an excellent start.

I personally dont like limiting what I eat so Im low carbing for now. But I flit between 5:2, myfitnesspal and low carbing.

And bitchpeas possibly the best username Ive ever seen on Mumsnet, slightly gutted I didnt think of it first....

Iv found sw to be the most for me to loose weight and keep it off. Must admit I'm not strict with it but does work for me

Try to figure out what your weak spots are, then figure out how to make it easier for yourself not to succumb to them.

E.g. I will gladly stuff my face with chocolate when I get back from work, if there isn't dinner ready/cookable within 5 minutes, or if I'm tired. So I don't buy chocolate at the supermarket (literally remove it from my basket at the checkout, since I always pick it up on the way around!) and use meal planning/slow cooker to make sure dinner is ready. Plus going to bed a bit earlier.

It doesn't always work, but it doesn't involve deprivation, restriction or hating myself. Actually I feel better as there is more nourishment from a cooked meal than a bar of chocolate or five.

If the problem is lack of exercise, take stairs rather than elevators, park at far end of car park etc for a week. Then continue if it helped. etc

Good luck!

PS everyone is different, that's just what worked for me. Keep trying until you find something that works, and remember that something will. Don't give up :) and be nice to yourself.

I'm not one of those 'eat less, move more' people unfortunately. I lack portion control and control in generally with food. I've used weight watchers for years and it's kept me very stable weight wise.

For me the best idea is to combine calorie counting with eating a good amount of protein and cutting down on sugar. I find it easier to keep within the calorie counting limits if my blood sugar isn't being sent all over the place by what I am eating and protein fills me up more than carbs. But I completely agree that from a calorie perspective you could eat 4 mars bars a days and that's it. But it would take a better person than me to be able to stick to a calorie deficit whilst eating loads of sugary carbs.

I love Slimming World. It's basically just low fat and low sugar but I love pasta and potatoes and they're not restricted. It's really easy if you're cooking from scratch, and it's flexible. I lost almost 3 stone in 4 months last year before I got pregnant again. Now I'm on it again and I've lost 11lbs in 5 weeks. And that was with weekly boozing and treats.

Good luck.

Calorie counting works for me

I also try and make healthy choices, drink lots of water and cut down on bread

Not doing that at the moment so I really need to get back in the wagon

Slimming world doesny work for me and I can't have too many carbs

The eat less move more bit pisses me off, the excercise is good to have a healthier lifestyle although I have never lost any weight doing it but eat less of what?? Better to say eat less processed food or eat less junk

Whatever you do needs to be sustainable and enjoyable long term, otherwise we go back to old habits and start gaining weight again

5:2 here - been doing it for 4 weeks. It suits me - I can not eat for England, just cutting down is impossible for me. I've had issues with food for nearly 40 years now and I'm fed up with it. 5:2 is easy and I feel great.

The best diet ever for me was just the usual eat less move more. I ate 1200 cals a day plus my exercise calories (I did aerobics 5 times a week - just Davina DVDs which burn about 350 for the hour so the days I did that I added the extra 350 cals as food).

I lost 4.5 stone in about 10 months and I was very fit and toned. Sadly I didn't bother to try and maintain sensibly just started gorging again - took me 4 years to put it all back on plus another half stone.

I keep trying all these other fad diets and fall off the wagon. I need to get back to the cal counting but the exercise is the key IMO. It gives you more leeway to eat and it makes you look much better really fast.

I am no expert but I have trained most of my life. There are two schools of thought:

1. The weight loss school of thought - basically diets Atkins, slimming world, 5:2 weight watchers etc. what these diets do is not only make you lose weight you also lose the sum weight of your bone density, muscles, water etc. Weight loss focuses on the number on the scale rather than the amount of fat an individual loses.

1. The fat loss school of thought - Basically eat healthy. Eat whole unprocessed foods 90% of the time and eat less starchy carbs and high sugar foods. The fat loss school of thought focuses on reducing your body fat (healthy goal for women is said to be about 15%-20%). When exercising on a fat loss bases not only do you need to do Cardio workouts you also need to strength train. Without strength training, cardio will speed up fat loss but it will also cause muscle loss.

I understand everyone is different but I am a massive fan of the Fat Loss school of thought. I have followed it for a long time and it works for me.

If you want any more information it just google, weight loss vs fat loss.

On a low carb diet you don't lose muscle. You switch your body from burning carbs to burning fat, so it's fat that you lose.

My understanding (it may be wrong) is carbs bind to water. So eating less carbs will make you loss weight (water loss). This is why you loss so much weight on a diet like Atkins the first 2 weeks. It's mostly water loss. By then increasing your carb intake you will gain weight again (water retention).

Like I said I am no expert. I have followed my training most my life and it has worked for me. It's about what works for each individual.

Stop eating when you're full. I know that sounds obvious, but if I'm eating someone I really like, I will eat more of it than I need to, just because I'm enjoying it. I'm trying really hard to listen to my body and when it's sated, just to stop, even if that means throwing food that's left on my plate in the bin.

It takes a long time to physically fill up on crisps and biscuits. That approach doesn;t work with calorie dense food!

I don't feel full in time to stop so that doesn't work for me.

Another one here doing well on the 5:2 diet. If I was having to count calories every single day I would get fed up pretty quickly. However, the beauty of this one is that for five days you can eat well but just really, really count on the fast days. I don't find it so hard to stick to a small amount of food when I know that tomorrow I can eat normally.

And I don't find I want to binge on the non-fast days. On the contrary, I just really appreciate the normal meals and am not tempted to snack on thinks I don't need in between times.

How do carbs bind to water?!

When you low carb, in the first week or so:

• you lose water (the same as other diets
• you use up the glycogen stored in your muscles and liver (not like any other diet); this can count for as much as 7lbs
• you burn a small amount of fat

It's the using up of the glycogen stores that makes it different from other diets, and why you can see such a significant loss in the first week or two.

superstarhearbreaker as other PP have said, the best weight loss plan is one that works for you. Everyone is different and we all have different lifestyles that can make different plans easier/harder. It isn't as simple as 'one size fits all'.

But whatever you're doing, it always helps to have some understanding of why/how it works, so that you know what you should/shouldn't be doing!

Like others have said, my fitness pal worked amazingly for me!
I put in my target weight and it worked out how many calories I could eat per day. I was surprised at how many calories I was consuming in drinks like juices and the odd biscuit here and there.
I personally find it easier to control my weight through diet than exercise. I get a reasonable amount of exercise anyway, but if I up the exercise I naturally eat more and I find I get muscle under the fat and actually look larger.
I prefer to reduce calories drastically to shift the excess weight then eat slightly more and exercise to tone.