Beware the Lindas of March! Slenderistas spring forward and March towards a 7lbs loss

[BitOutOfPractice]

So, winter has us in its icy grasp as March begins but by the end of the month we will be lighter, warmer and, erm, slenderer!

Here’s a link to January’s thread

Come and join us on mumsets best thread™️

Honestly Quimmy I am getting annoyed at 9.6! but you are right, it was only mid feb when I was still stuck at 10.2.

Non-scoundrel lives round the corner from my grandma weirdly in my hometown, so slightly unfortunate I am moving an hour away but I think that will stop my from diving in headfirst.

feezles up the water intake, that’s the key to solving bloat but you need to be consistent, drink a min of 2litres of water a day. With regard to spurious gains, hmm, you eating lots of salt or something? The maths doesn’t add up for those gains. Don’t falter, keep focussing on the averages

Thanks leesmum! I'm doing OK, still carrying extra Christmas bugger Lindas but plugging away, and otherwise, business as usual

Hairspray that made me laugh - exactly the kind of thing I would do, to lose like half a stone in a week and immediately become impatient for more. You'll get there, honest!

Feezles definitely agree with Not on the water. Sounds like you're gearing up for a whoosh - I assume you've seen that "jiggly fat" thing? I'm a firm believer, ever since a particular night last winter when I literally got up to pee around 7 times. Obviously I'd drunk a fair bit but not really much more than usual, the peeing was far in excess of what I deserved. It was like someone was wringing me out. And I looked appreciably smaller the next morning! So drink, drink, drink til you hit the "drain" button and look forward to a sleepless night spent mainly on the loo

Quim "enjoy a sleepless night mainly spent on the loo" that made me laugh out loud! That did just happen to me - terrible nights these past 2 days with noticeable extra thinness and scales following suit in the morning. I did not make a connection but I will never begrudge waking to pee again!

Right! I'm a liquid mission - and not the fun kind.

I wondered about salt, Not, but I looked back over MFP and there's nothing out of the ordinary for me.

What is the jiggly fat thing, Quim?

Hello Slenderistas, excuse me, I'm the girl from the Too Fat for Frankie's? post. I just need a little help here on what diet to use. I'm thinking 'The Diet Groove' but is it going to be as good as a personalized one like '90 Day SSS' ? Do you need a personalised plan? Or what do you recommend?
Thanks, ...and I AM going to be losing weight

Hi Loosing

If you don't mind me asking how much do you have to lose because then we might be able to give you some better advice?

I have lost almost 6st with the Blood Sugar Diet, other people do LCHF, Slimming world, calorie counting, shakes, egg diets, the hairy bikers all sorts!

How do you normally eat? home cooking, meals out takeaways etc.

What works for one person won't necessarily do well for another, it doesn't really matter what your plan is as long as you can stick to it and maintain a calorie deficit you will lose weight eventually!

Good luck with your "journey" it is a really hard road to start on but honestly it is so worth it in the end!

Ahem... 14.9
Would like to be nearer 10.9. Thanks. It's how you stick to it that I've always found so hard. Whatever you do for weeks on end, one day you relax, or just plain give up... and then all the progress slips away....

I was 15.3 don't be embarrassed, deciding you want to change is the hardest step! Have you dieted before? If so what has worked/not worked for you?

You could try 5:2 if you still want "treats" at the weekend

MFP might work for you, logging everything - nothing out of bounds as long as you are in your calorie limit

I did a few rounds of the BSD (8 weeks, 800 calories, low carb) and since the summer I have been modeling the patent pending Quim Method, 2 fast days, 3 good days, more relaxed at weekends.

If you are looking for a total lifestyle change that is sustainable for the future try reading "How to eat like a normal person" or look up the No S Diet, once I have reached my final goal weight that is how I am planning on maintaining.

Exercise can focus some people but I don't like it, just remember not to eat back anything you burn off!

This is the Best Thread on Mumsnet (TM) and you are more than welcome here!

Quim and Hair - I am sure you've said before, but how many calories do you eat on your fast days? Could you describe what you might eat on one of them? I'm going to stick to MFP for a while yet, but I've always toyed with the idea of trying 5:2 or similar.

16:8 actually really appeals to me, but I think I would find it too hard to work around DH!

I've drunk 5 pints of squash in the last couple of hours and I didn't even find it difficult. I definitely haven't been drinking enough!

Thanks for the welcome guys!

And i'm the bigger end of the scale here 13st4.5. I'm on day 2 and i'm starving (slimfast) well atleast i feel starving!
Actually thinking of giving the 5:2 a try, i did give it a go once but tbh i would probably take liberties and binge on days off which will get me no where.
Is it still 500 cals on Fast days or did they increase it to 800cals? There was an article about it a long time ago and i can't seem to find it. My willpower was so good last year but now i get to 8pm and i always want to binge, i would glue my lips together but that wouldn't be good.

Slimming world is good but i find cooking all the time from scratch such a faff especially when my kids won't entertain eating it. Tried the iceland meals but only a few are nice, some of them are totally rank.

Would love to have wine on weekends so maybe i should give the 5:2 another shot but make sure i don't overinduldge on non fasting days

HairsprayBabe, Thanks. What has not worked is consistant modertion / calorie counting or cutting out (say ) carbs permanently. So The Diet Groove loooks good on that - and I suppose similar to what Quim is saying / or like 5:2.

Just home from the gym which was so quiet...seems like the crowds from January have given up already!

I'm bloody starving and trying to decide what to cook for Dinner. Thinking veggie burgers with cauliflower rice and some sliced red and yellow peppers. What's everyone else having for dinner? I love hearing others dinner plans

That sounds lovely therealjudgejudy im having healthy living cottage pie with some baked beans

Therealjudgejudy I'm making Mongolian beef with brown rice and steamed veggies for our tea tonight.

I’m going to lower the tone with my dinner...frozen pizza and chipper chips In my defence, ended up working late & had to feed club going child in a hurry. Busy day meant not much eating so it’ll fit my cals.
For new folk asking about plans, I’m a member of team RH on Facebook and I use Mfp. I have a set number of cals for my weight & activity level. I reckon I might eat the most cals of everyone on here (not a stealth boast I swear!) The plan basically means you cut 500 cals from your maintenance calorie level to lose around 1lb a week. The reason the deficit is low’ish is to make it a plan you can do and not swerve madly off. I’m not going to go much further into it as it’s not fair to the people who run it and do such a brilliant job for me to spill it all out but really it’s not magic it’s just sense. Not for the faint hearted or sensitive, no excuses no moaning, just positivity & commitment...I shut up now, not a cult I promise😉

Evening, fairly good day until tea when I had some delicious fresh bread and pinched some left over scampi from my sons plate. Oh well , I try not to eat anything over 100 cals from 7pm onwards which in real terms means I’ll have some ringos or these seasoned chickpeas that I buy from Holland and Barrett . They are amazing and filling .
I’m back to work tomorrow for the first shift since the 1st of Feb . Thankfully on reduced hours .
I’m likely to have a Gin and slim tonight as well.
I think fluid makes a huge difference @feezels , I don’t really drink enough either . I’m going to increase as well.

We're having egg fried rice for tea! Sounds super bad but really isn't, according to my calculations, as it's packed with protein and veggies. Should come in at around 600 cals per portion. I haven't made it before so just hoping that 1) it tastes nice and 2) it is filling, because I'm starving!

I had chilli and rice leftovers from last night heated up with some extra veg. Not exciting but within calories

Not2b that sounds really interesting - can you tell me more? I’m planning to do a pretty strict month to lose half a stone but then I’d like to ease up and do something more sustainable for the longer term

Feezles the jiggly fat thing is the theory behind "whooshes": basically, when you're dieting, your fat cells deplete of fat as they burn it for energy, but as one of the many millions of clever ways our body has to hang onto fat, it fills the fat cells with water so they'll be easier to re-fill again when we catch our next antelope. The upshot is that people notice, basically, that their fat goes "jiggly" - having been firm and packed, it goes a bit marbled looking. Then at some point your body gets to a certain hydration %, it presses the "drain" button, eh voila - a whoosh. It was something they noticed in the Minnesota Starvation experiment, especially the several-trips-to-the-loo thing.

On a Fast Day I normally have a couple of cups of tea, a kale, carrot and apple smoothie, a couple of hard boiled eggs, and then in the evening I have something quick and dirty like a tray of roast chicken from the supermarket with a bit of mayonnaise, or a tub of soup. I started doing that because it made it easier to have the calories printed on the side, but I carried on because I find it much easier not to cook on a fast day!

I actually wasn't counting very closely before Christmas because I was maintaining pretty well, so I wasn't keeping an eye on nibbling, and with the mayo etc. I was probably coming in at more like 700. Now I'm dying to kick the Christmas gain, I'm going "Mega Fast": so today I've had a boiled egg, 2 Babybels, a couple of spoonfuls of Cottage Cheese and a Miso Soup, and 3 cups of tea. Surprising how little you can eat when you put your mind to it. I'll probably relax a bit again when I've got these last couple of Lindas off though.

I've been chugging water too Kiki and Feezles so with a bit of luck I'll see you at 3am for our fifth wee

iamlosingweight welcome, lovely to have you!

I can't do permanent cuts either, as you mentioned. I just get miserable and feel deprived and start randomly ordering pizza. It's not the quickest way to lose weight, but for me, saying I'm allowed things on the weekend enables me to be very strict with myself during the week.

Everyone's different though: lots of people need to keep their eye on the ball, because once they lose focus they can't get it back. I'm completely the opposite, if I can't see a light at the end of the tunnel I just start to despair, and after a bit of indulgence I feel quite set up for a day of eggs and smoothies. I am a firm believer that it's about finding a rhythm you can stick with - if that's 1500 calories a day, every day, then do that; if it's the 5:2, do that; etc. Try out a few things and find something that's the most "water off a duck's back" for you, and then you'll still be doing it in 9 months' time, whereas if you go hard and heavy trying to restrict like mad and run a 5K every night, chances are you'll lose half a stone and then fall off the wagon in a big way, then be too cross with yourself to be able to find the energy to get back on it. I've been there a lot!

Mystic Fast Days are still 500 as far as I know (800 is the Blood Sugar Diet, and that's every day!), but you'd still make progress if you eased in with a couple of 800 days a week. I'd give that a go if I were you, so you can find what foods you find satisfying, and what sort of structure works for you (some people eat one big meal, some people hold off until dinner time, etc.) and then you can maybe start shaving off a few calories here and there once you get used to it.

“When we catch our next antelope”, I love that!

Well that was little short of a miracle! 1.5 Lindas off yesterday's weight, and back to where I was on Sunday (more or less).

The jiggly fat thing makes total sense, Quim. I had definitely thought yesterday my tummy looked weirdly more flabby, and while I wouldn't claim it was suddenly flat and taut today (hahaha), it definitely looks better.

I'm going to try and keep the fluids up again today and generally increased in future - harder when I'm in the office (like today), but I'd be daft not to.

Morning all. Rubbish sleep so feeling a bit uck this morning - my gym workout aches are well and truly here, ahh the doms I’ve been expecting you! Got my appointment at last with physio person, no idea how to explain all my pains & aches. Totm has hit so that’s a pain, I was wondering why I felt so cranky and craved chocolate for the first time since lent. But in better news my scales is showing a new low and my average is at last creeping down. Fingers x’ed for a little loss this week.
I got completely confused when I saw the iamlosingweight in a sentence, kinda though is that what we’re all hoping for haha! Best of luck on finding something you can stick to iam