To think being huge would make me lose weight quicker?

[Givemeallthechocolate]

Am I being U to think that being a BIG person (I started out at 21 stone in December) and I've tried to control my emotional eating, which hasn't always worked particularly well. But I'd managed to lose 6lb when I weighed myself last week. I was chuffed and it gave me the motivation to start being quite strict with myself and actually dieting.

So I read about this diet where you eat 700 calories per day, and it's supposed to reverse diabetes by changing the way your cells, pancreas and liver react to sugar. I'm not diabetic but I am insulin resistant, and I had a lightbulb moment and thought. I can do that!
I got through the week and I feel really proud, but I only lost 3lb.

As a very hefty person who was consuming 2500 calories at least per day. To cut down to 700 surely I should have lost more than 3lb?

I'd expect a normal ish weighted person to lose that kind of weight on that kind of diet.

ExConstance is correct. The blood sugar diet is 800 cals and should only be done for 8 weeks.

If you're not a diabetic why not look for a more sustainable way to lose weight? That way you are far less likely to get bored / lose heart / pig out on crap when it gets tough.

Your loss so far is great - well done and keep going

I think your body knows when it's more or less at it's ideal, healthy weight and will try and hang onto those extra pounds

This is bullshit
Read Stephan guyenet

Op the only way to lose weight and maintain the loss is to change your eating habits and do moderate exercise. You can starve a few pounds off by fad dieting but you'll stop doing at and put everything you've lost back on. That's even more true for emotional eaters. Ofcourse 700 calories a day will make you lose weight but you'll never keep it up and if you did you'd do yourself serious damage. If it was a healthy, achievable miracle cure for diabetes (type 2) then the NHS would have everyone doing it. Dietary changes can reverse type 2 diabetes but that's through adopting healthy eating practises not through starving yourself. Ditching the huge amounts of dietary sugar which land people at the door of diabetes is what helps them lose weight and reverse the disease. There is no quick fix cure. Changing what a how you eat is the only way to get weight off and keep it off. You're doing well so far, keep going.

I'm not saying this as some preachy skinny bitch btw. I'm a big girl too but I'm 1st 3.5lb less of a big girl than I was in January. If I can do it you can do it and so can other people. Someone mentioned the my fitness pal ap and I'd recommend you download that so you can see how your calorie intake is going. I also am a slimming World member and I find that very helpful. Keep on going and you'll get there.

I did the Eight Week BSD exactly a year ago (started when Lent started!) and I found it worked really well. Never felt hungry on it, loads of good recipes on there. 3lbs in a week is fast weight loss. If you lose the same next week, that's almost half a stone in a fortnight! Good luck with it all, I've lost nearly 4 stone since last year and feel so much better.It's sometimes slow progress and I am still not at my ideal healthy weight but am determined to get there! PS, find something that weighs 3 lbs and carry it around for 30 mins or so. You'll soon realise that it's quite a lot!

Dieters always have a rapid initial weight loss. It's encouraging but it's pretty much all water. After that it should slow to about 1-2 pounds a week, that's a sensible and healthy rate of loss.

700 calories is too low, it's not healthy and you won't sustain it. Slow and steady is the only way for long term weight loss.

I'm not saying this as some preachy skinny bitch btw. I'm a big girl too

Nice.
Calling slim girls Skinny Bitches.

and people say fat shaming is bad.

Wtf! 700 cals a day will screw your metabolism up and you'll never maintain the loss because as soon as you eat a normal diet again the weight will pile back on and more!!

I completely agree that "famine mode" is nonsense - at least it is for me. I lose weight when I skip breakfast, and in the past when I barely ate for 3 weeks following a break up I was tiny.

Personally though I think different people's bodies respond differently to different diets and people need to just find out what works for them. I expect very few people will find 800 calories a day works for them long term OP, so maybe set yourself a fixed number of weeks to try it for?

*Nice.
Calling slim girls Skinny Bitches.

and people say fat shaming is bad.*

I hate this too. It's not appropriate to make sizest comments to anyone, fat, thin or somewhere in between.

I didn't think flyingelbows meant slim people were bitches; i am size 10 so probably slim (though of course i don't feel it) and didn't take offence. I thought it was aimed at the kind of person who has always been slim and has no idea what it is like to struggle with their weight yet hands out patronising advice to those doing their best and finding it hard.

I also think fat shaming and skinny shaming is a false equivalence because society reveres skinny women, but that's an issue for a different thread.

Op just remember that 1lb weight loss a week for one year equates to three and a half stone! Slow and steady wins the race...

You need to calculate your Basal Metabolic Rate - for long term sustainability it is best not to eat less than a 10% deficit with respect to calories.
As you lose weight you will need to revise it though.

Another bit of advice was think about what you would eat as a slim person and eat that.

Boring but effective is portion size. Many overweight people don't know what an actual normal meal size looks like.

I don't think "skinny bitch" is any more acceptable than "fat bitch".

skinny bitch
fat cow

They're all nasty and shouldn't be used. Even jokingly.

The first 6lb it took me 3 odd months to shift!
To those who asked, yes I believe it's called the blood sugar diet, I'm keeping things as natural as possible, which means 700 calories is giving me loads of food to eat.

It's not a long term plan, I just intend on sorting out my blood sugars, I am always hungry, and I feel that's been something to do with the insulin resistance. It's about 8 weeks I'll hopefully do this, then switch to slimming world.

I don't think my calories are low enough to go into famine. To go into ketosis it's something like 400 calories a day isn't it?

I'm not sniffing at 3lb loss, I just think when I've got 10 stone to lose the first few stone would go quite quickly!

I've not been very overweight but I've had times when I've been 1-2 stones heavier than I should be. I've always found slow and steady is the best way to go. If I were you I'd use myfitnesspal pal and log EVERY SINGLE THING. Eventually you will be able to work out the optimum point where you will be able to eat AND still lose weight. Mine is slightly lower than I had originally thought at about 1200 and that's with plenty of sports. I always aim for long term slow loss. 1/2 a pound a week or 1 pound a week is fine. It's good because I don't feel too depressed if I see I've put a few pounds.

Are you exercising?

This isn't just so I can lose weight and look less like a rugby player, which oddly, I really do!

But more about trying to reverse the insulin resistance instead of upgrading it to full blown diabetes. That kind of regimented calorie consumption has meant that I haven't got the ability to go, ah I'll fit in that one chocolate bar and take it away from lunch/dinner/breakfast. It means that I'm concentrating on what I'm eating, and I'm adding it all into the my fitness pal app, and I'm finding the most filling foods for my calories. It's meant that i eat PILES of vegetables, less fruits by them too. And fish. I never eat fish. I always prefer chicken or beef. It's forcing me to make much better choices that I wouldn't if it wasn't so regimented. I'd honestly otherwise fit cake/chocolate/crisps in!

Suchahysteria- I am using my fitness pal. It hates me for not eating 1000 calories per day! Refuses to tell me what I will weigh in five weeks. I'm upping my step count getting towards 10000 per day.
I'm also going swimming and I plan to enrol in an aqua size class too.

Everything goes in on the app though. It's great!

Congratulations in starting and losing 6lbs.
My DD is getting married in July and I had lost motivation to lose the 7stone I have put on since my 30's when I was really fit, smoking and dieting.
I have got myself a personnel trainers and am doing weights and doing Zumba gold ( less strenuous) and swimming three evenings a week.
My fit bit says I do between 12,000 and 20,000 steps per day.
I hadn't exercised for over 10 years!!
I have cut down on fat and am low carbing, with a treat of a bottle of wine over the weekend.
I have lost 10lbs in the first four weeks but I really dont feel like I am dieting.
To motivate myself even more I put photos of myself from all sides on FB to embarrass myself even more. If I dont go back with after photos all my "friends" will know I have failed.
Good luck OP its not easy but you WANT to do it so you WILL!!

How old are you, OP?

Firstly, congratulations on your weight loss so far. It isn't easy, and a 10lbs loss is an achievement - irrespective of whether it took you 10 days to 10 months to lose it.

In January 2016 I also weighed around 21st. I had tried every diet plan going over the years, including (but not limited to) Cambridge, Exante, WeightWatchers, 5:2 and plain old trying to eat more healthily. With each diet, I would do OK for a while but then end up reverting to former eating habits & put the weight back on (usually with interest). The most successful of these diets was Cambridge, where I lost 5st.

For me, what I needed was support - a whole group to keep me motivated through the crappy weeks (and there will be crappy weeks). I joined a Slimming World group in January 2016 and it is no exaggeration to say it has changed my life (no, I don't work for SW). I have lost almost 7 and a half stone to date, and have lost this at a steady rate over 14 months. I am now just over a stone away from my ideal target weight (ideal for me, healthy BMI etc.)

The reason that SW has worked for me (I think) is that although they tag it as "food optimising", it is basically healthy eating. Unlimited fruit, vegetables, lean meat etc., with treats like chocolate, crisps and alcohol in moderation - if you want them at all.

The thing is that you have to be able to view weight loss as a permanent change of lifestyle/attitude to food. A plan that is basically healthy eating, such as SW, is much more likely to become your new "norm" and help you create healthy habits for the rest of your life than something more drastic - such as Cambridge.

I have heard about some very odd advice being given by SW Consultants on MN - however, my own experience has been nothing but positive.

I've done a VLCD. The average weight loss was 3lbs per week. They do work and you can get the nutrients you need. Just do your research.

Museum of curry- only 26.

Sonyaya has read me correctly. I'll chuck some quotation marks in if it makes you feel any less offended but I'm sure the Op (and anyone not just looking to be offended) knows exactly what I mean when I tell her I'm on her team and I'm not some preaching eejit who has no idea what she's struggling with. If you want a pointless "I'm so offended" competition I'll see you 40 years of verbal and emotional abuse and assumption by people I know and people I don't and I'll raise you one "skinny bitch" to make an obvious point which needs little explanation. Get a hobby, ffs.

Starvation mode refers to the metabolic phenomenon where a persons metabolism slows after a prolonged period of starving as a means of trying to prevent starvation. If the person continues to starve they will continue to lose weight, but slower.

Then if they start eating healthily again they will find that they gain weight more quickly from less calories because their body has maintained this slowed metabolism.

It's not a myth it's an actual thing, people have just misunderstood it.