Can I lose four stone in six months?

[SexAndCakes]

Typical post-Christmas realisation that working from home and general life stresses over the last few years have led to a very sedentary lifestyle, overeating and getting fat (BMI 28). I need to lose four stone to get to my ideal weight (BMI 21). This feels like a very long road and is combined with feeling generally low about some other life areas. I have also been overweight for a number of years now so feel like I have lost the sense of myself as a slim person IYSWIM.

I'd love to hear from others who have achieved this type of weight loss. Also, whether six months is a realistic timeframe to lose four stone without things like weight loss drugs (not eligible or I would welcome them!). I feel like I need the shortest possible timeframe to be motivated for this. The good news is that I currently have the time and resources to make it my focus.

YABU - six months to lose four stone is not realistic
YANBU - it can be done (ideally share advice on how please!)

Research the Fast 800 diet. I started it for about 4 weeks and found I very quickly broke bad food habits, lost a stone and felt much better. Then I fell pregnant. I plan on starting this diet again a few weeks after baby is born (not rushing into it as need to heal properly after a caesarean). Reading the forums about the fast 800, it does seem to be a diet which helps people completely shift their mindset when it comes to eating.

Download my fitness pal and start tracking calories. You will be able to lose at least 1lb per week if you stick with it. Probably more to begin with.

you are absolutely right to do short term achievable goals. 6 months might be pushing it for that much weight loss but August isn’t for 8 months.. more realistic and perhaps have a holiday booked to aim for?

I would not go with an 800 calorie diet for 6 months I think it’s restrictive, miserable and unhealthy. Focus on the journey as each stone lost will feel good and is an achievement. Good luck and I agree with other 9-12 months for 4 stone is more realistic with a focus on nutrition and exercise.

I Iost 4 stone in my 30s over about a year, with a small amount of exercise and sensible eating.

Fast forward to late 40s, it's taken me 6 months to lose 8lb, with working out 3 times a week, daily walking and 1400 calories a day.

When I was at my lightest I wasn't happy or healthy, I was a size 6 but didn't look well or feel great. Now I may be heavier but I'm also fitter than I was then. I'm disappointed not to have lost more having put in more work this time, but how I ate then wasn't sustainable (obviously, because I got fatter again!).

It's not full time, it's three days a week. Not that restrictive really

Absolutely you can - the very low calorie / ketogenic diets at around 800 calories a day will get you a stone a month weight losss easily. Once you’re in keto you’ll not feel hungry either, so it’s just a hard 4-5 days and then it will feel extremely easy. The meal replacement diets like lighter life are good as they have the nutrients you need in them and take any thought or decision making out of it. I’ve lost a stone a month with them whenever I’ve done it. Not cheap, but cheaper than fast food and binge eating and worth it for the immediate impact,

the only down side is that unless you change your long term relationship with food then you’ll go back to old habits. I personally find blasting weight off through fasting much more motivating than slow plod losing a pound every fortnight but I appreciate this approach is extreme and not suitable for anyone who has previously struggled with eating disorders.

but you asked is it possible, the simple answer is yes.

One thing that is worth bearing in mind is this.

You will get lots of people recommending eating as you already are but smaller portions- this only works if your diet is already good to begin with, but you eat a lot.

Other people will recommend vlc diets which are unsustainable in the long term.

Other will recommend low fat/high carb does and others will recommend low carb/high fat.

And all of these will work for someone at some point and for an amount of time.

Things to consider.

Your body needs a certain amount of fuel to just function. Even if you never got out of bed, your internal organs, digestive system, cardiovascular system, immune system, endocrine system, brain etc need calories just to function and their requirements will be more than 800 calls a day. That is your BMR.

You shouldn't go lower than that. Your body will be forced to use fat reserves but won't use them very well or efficiently. Your body will become used to surviving on a very low, unsustainable calorie intake and adjust its requirements accordingly. You won't necessarily notice these or recognise them immediately. But that cut on your finger might take longer to heal or that cold might linger for longer than it used to or you might develop heart arrhythmia.

Then, when you start eating 'normally' again, your body has got used to functioning on less so the 'excess' calories in your system will be greater, which is why people put back on the weight and more when they finish dieting.

Carbs (of all kinds) cause your body to release insulin. Protein does too but to a much lesser degree. Fat does not trigger an insulin response.

When there are fewer carbs in your body, your body will switch to burning fat rather than carbs as energy. Your body can't burn fat while there is insulin present. Insulin is a hormone which tells your body to store fat not burn it.

As someone else has said, vlc effectively starves your body of what it needs.

Muthaofcats

Done properly, keto should not be a low calorie diet.

Th aim of keto is to switch your body from utilising carbs to fat as its main fuel source. As such, you need to eat fat.

Otherwise, your body will respond no differently to it would to any other low calorie diet eventually.

Ask your GP about Orlistat/Xenical tablets, you might be eligible for them,

They're available OTC, but I believe they are half-strength compared to prescription.

I agree. It would also probably involve more sustainable changes than mean you could keep it off.

I still think 800 calories a day for 3 days a week is restrictive and I would certainly be miserable on those 3 days. It’s wouldn’t be for me.

And as soon as you reached the target weight and start removing the restrictions op would recover that weight

I've done it OP. 3 months after my first baby was born I was higher than I was when I was pregnant (BMI 33).

I eventually got down to BMI 19 and have maintained around there for around 4 years (not including a second pregnancy but gained a more sensible amount the second time and lost it fairly steadily after).

But I think where you are unrealistic is the 6 months. Losing weight when you are close to a normal BMI is very slow. Like 0.5-1 pound a week unless you are eating <1200 calories a day. And you need to allow for small periods of gain, plateaus, and just general life (holidays, events, stress etc).

After 6 months I was at BMI 26. It took me another 6 months to get to BMI 22. It took another 6 months to go to BMI 19 (and I had the benefit of Covid which made me eat less - less takeaways and I used my daily exercise to do extremely long walks or runs).

Good luck. I did it all just by calorie counting. I still calorie count to maintain.

It sounds absolutely fine to me.

You'll need to lose just over 9lbs a month, which is roughly 2.3 lbs a week. This doesn't require crash dieting, or anything non-mainstream.

Do you think you'd do better on an approach where you aim to eat a similar amount each day, or would you prefer intermittent fasting?

I think your aim of establishing your TDEE and then eating slightly less than that (with a real emphasis on eating well - swop white to brown, add something fermented, and avoid highly processed foods; also cut out booze, losing both its calories and the urge to nibble that it all-too-often brings). Then also look at increasing your exercise - this won't in itself cause major weight loss, but if you don't adjust your TDEE based intake because of the extra activity, then it gives you a safety margin for the days you CBA to weigh things properly, or you have a celebratory slap up binge at Mrs Miggins pie shop.

MFP is really helpful as it takes away a lot of the guesswork about what your intake really is.

And if you get through the first couple of weeks, you're really likely to find that your appetite adjusts. It's OK in general to be hungry from time to time; you might experience it more when you first change your eating pattern, but it will adjust.

You could if you used something like Mounjaro or followed a VLCD or a plan like the 1:1 Diet. It would likely take a bit longer with just a calorie defect and exercise but this is likely going to be the way that will give you the sustainable weight loss. After all, there’s no point losing it in 6 months if you regain it in 3! There’s nothing to say you can’t do this, but do it sensibly and don’t feel defeated if you aren’t quite there in six months. Good luck!

She can’t use mounjaro unless she has weigh related health issues, or is an etthnicity where she’s classed as obese at a 28 bmi.

as she’s said neither, suggesting mounjaro like it’s just available for everyone and not a prescription med is very odd.

Also no point suggesting MJ when the OP hasn’t tried any other things before that might make her loose weight and I a way that provides them a healthier life

I've lost four stone since September but that's with MJ. On my own, assuming I was even successful which is doubtful, it would have taken me double that at least, probably way more. It's hard to stick to a calorie deficit for such a long period of time. I'd cut it down into smaller milestones such as getting under 25 first.

100% yes. You’d have to be very committed to stick to that calorie deficit whilst doing a fair amount of exercise, but MJ certainly made it doable for me. I wouldn’t have had the willpower to be that strict without its help.

I have lost weight without MJ in the past but it’s been a lot less and taken longer.

And 2.3lbs a week every week without fail is a lot unless you are very very overweight and have a high TDEE to start with. In isolation, 2lb a week doesn't sound much, but to lose that every single week for weeks and months on end is actually very difficult. To lose more than 2lbs a week, I would need to eat no more than 1200 calories every single day, interspersed with some 800 cal or so days. Which is what I do and how I am achieving an overall loss of 2.5lbs a week, but I wouldn't have been able to sustain that past the first few weeks without MJ.

To add some maths, 2lbs a week is a deficit of around 7000 calories a week, 1000 calories a day. That would mean, if your TDEE is around 1800 calories, you would need to eat 800 calories a day every single day for weeks. That's a VLCD. It's the kind of pathway they put pre-bariatric surgery patients on.

But a tdee of 1800 is very low. Average for a woman is 2400 odds. So a thousand less would be 1400.

No. Read my response again. I wasn’t suggesting she use Mounjaro. Her question was could she lose the weight in 6 months. I have simply listed the ways in which she would likely reach that target in the limited timeframe she is quoting.

My personal thoughts, as I explained, were that it’s best to do it sensibly with a calorie deficit and exercise plan.

You getting het up at the mere mention of Mounjaro is what is ‘very odd’.

@Queenofthejabs. My TDEE as a 5ft 4, 155lb woman (so still overweight) moderately active woman is 2100. If I was sedentary it's 1600 calories. I'd have to almost be athlete levels of activity to reach 2400!

You can plug your stuff in here to get an idea, OP:

tdeecalculator.net/