Waist of 38" - how best to knock off the inches?

[feudebois]

I know I need to diet properly - am 12 stone 4 and 5 foot 8.

I'm a bit clueless, I eat quite healthily (lots of veg) but also supplement with too much wine, too much bread and butter and more and more crap (crisps when the dcs have them, the odd chocolate bar). I also eat huge portions.

I've started running for 10 minutes a day. I'm considering giving up alcohol for the foreseeable future, I'm a crap drunk. I did dry January and by the end of it I felt tons better. Didn't lose any weight though

Any advice or where to post welcome!

Have a look in the low carb threads, bootcamp worked wonders on me. Hope it goes well for you.

Cut portion size gradually and either reduce fat intake a lot or carb intake a lot or both quite a bit. Exercise is great for your general health but won't make much difference to your weight unless you either do shedloads of it or seriously change your diet.

Ime, low carb is very effective but only if you're really strict about it all the bloody time. Low fat is easier to stick to (for me) and feels more like 'normal' eating.

I'm on a low fat diet for medical reasons atm (gallstones) and it's really made me realise what a lot of fat I was eating before and how easy it would be to reduce that amount significantly without really feeling I was depriving myself. So, not by cutting out fat altogether but by using, say, half the amount of oil/butter/peanut butter etc you would normally use. Choosing lower fat options whenever you can etc. I don't mean ghastly 'low fat' processed diet products, but things that are naturally lower in fat.

I eat a lot of fat. Not helped by low carb mantra that full fat is good. So I eat high fat AND carbs

I think drinking water, dropping booze and eating more veg will help. The exercise is just to get a bit fitter.

Exactly, feudebois! Doing low carb makes you stop demonising fat, but then when you quit low carb you're so used to fat no longer being the enemy that you carry on eating loads of it even when you're back on the carbs.

I had really bought into the low carb phenomenon and had accepted the currently popular opinion that the decades of official advice to eat low fat was old-fashioned nonsense. So when I was diagnosed with gallstones I was a bit worried by having to go on a low fat diet. But the weight fell off me at first (because I was being extremely strict and hadn't yet got my head around how much fat I could eat without triggering an attack). I'm now no longer losing weight but have stabilised. But I'm eating like a horse and still allowing myself quite a few small, not-too-fatty sweet treats. And yet the weight isn't going back on.

When my gallbladder has been removed, I plan to still eat lower fat than I did before, but cut the sugar quite a bit, to compensate for not being quite as low fat as I am now iyswim.

I'm an inch taller and was exactly the same weight as you in early December.

I am now 11 stone.

Low carb has really made a difference, both to my weight but also my skin, IBS and energy levels. I go to the gym 4 times a week and predominantly do weights with some HIIT cardio. I'm going to also start the Shred next week every other day to see if that makes a difference.

I'm aiming for another stone off but ultimately to feel good in my body.

Meal planning and also getting DH onboard has really helped me stick to it. Knowing roughly what we are going to have every night helps me to avoid ordering a takeaway.

We try and do 80/20 where we eat well 80% of the time. Saturday lunch is our treat meal and we have Nandos, sushi or burgers. Cake also features once a month.