How have you lost weight?

[singingpinkmonkey]

Can anyone share with me what they have done to lose weight?

I'm feeling a little overwhelmed with all the various plans and diets and would rather hear what actual people think!

I have 4 stone to lose!

Thanks!

My fitness pal. Eat less calories than I used. Lost a lot of weight 4 stone+ still use it to maintain but nowhere near as religiously

I've gone from 16st10 to 12st over the last year and a bit ish.

My top tip is don't bloody diet! It's a mental thing, if you are "on a diet" then you can "break" it. Cue "oh I'll start again Monday so can now EAT ALL THE FOOD.

Been there done that.

You know inherently what you should and should not be eating and also how YOU eat. Are you a grazer or a three set meal? Do you like a good breakfast or is tea your main meal? Do you have weak spots in the day?

For me I accepted I am a grazer, I need to snack not big meals so I found "healthier" snacking options to keep me on during the day, I also know I bored eat at night so have mini chocolates like milky ways I can have.

I also like carbs, I just do do, sometimes tea is a microchip sandwich it just is. Telling myself I'll ever be a salad eater is asking for failure.

I also like a Chinese once in a while so I have it as a Sunday treat, and if my mates/family are going out for a meal I go and have what I want. I'm not on a diet, so it doesn't matter if I have a big meal and the pudding once in a while.

Ok now I've reached as far as I'm getting without becoming a "salad" person for that last stone so now I'm exercising more. Not kidding myself I'll get there if I have to give up carbs!

My fitness pal here too.

I’m late 50s and have never dieted before but my BP had suddenly gone up and the GP said if I didn’t lose some weight I might have to go on medication.

I liked the idea of a simple system to log my calorie intake. I’ve only been doing it three weeks and have lost 8lb. I wanted to diet slowly otherwise I knew it would just go back on.

I eat the same stuff, just less of it. Works for me so far!

Cycling to work. I always thought it was too far but now I've done it everyday for a while and I feel so much better about myself.
I also eat less shit, allrecipes is a good website. You can chose the healthy recipes and maybe try cooking from scratch?
I've lost a stone in two months btw

Thanks both. I will check out My Fitness Pal and try not to get too disheartened like I normally do with slimming clubs. Thanks so much for replying to my post. X

Intermittent fasting. So only eat between midday and 5:30pm. No booze. Very limited chocolate, etc.

Swapped lunchtime sarnies for quinoa salad.

Added an extra pump class, a spin class and an extra 5k run into my weekly exercise routine.

Fasting. Eat dinner by 8pm and don’t eat until 11am next day. I’m not a breakfast person and doing it over night means it’s pretty easy. Haven’t given up any treat foods (or wine). Lost 2 stone and at ideal weight now. Lost weight at steady rate too. Maybe over 4ish months.

I can;t recommend this but for the last 9 days I've had an awful stomach virus. I'm definitely lighter now. No appetite...

Normally I give up wine for a while- the odd G&T is ok- and no snacking between meals. I have invisalign braces so it's easy to avoid snacks as I can't be bothered to take them out to eat- I'm lazy!

Another vote for MyFitnessPal. Eat everything but less of it.

Don't ever change your diet. Take what you currently have and adjust it slightly and, most importantly, weigh and log it all honestly. Also only set the loss rate to 0.5lb or 1lb a week. That way you don't starve yourself.

I have also linked my activity tracker to it so that it gives me my actual calories based on my activity throughout the day.

I lost 4st from May to Oct. I ate 1450 cals a day and drank loads of water. I got a fitbit to monitor steps, calories in and calories burned. I do at least 10,000 steps a day, usually 12 to 18k. I bought 2 x 1kg weights and most days I'll spend 15 mins jogging on the spot or dancing whilst holding the weights. My biggest tip is to search a Facebook page/group called PinchofNom.com. It's geared up for Slimming World members and therefore talks of syns,free foods etc, but there are some genius ideas for food optimising! It's easy to Google calorie content of most foods. I credit the tips and tricks for me sticking to a diet and maintaining for 7 mths so far! Good luck on your journey.

Hi singing,

I read Gretchen Rubin's 'Better than Before', which helped me to begin. I have just been slowly attempting to reduce my consumption of sugar and white carbs. I also listen to 'The Eating Coach' podcast. For me I have accepted that the most key thing for losing weight is to change my eating habits, and have made that my focus.

Good luck to you, be kind to yourself x

I should add that I have lost 1st 7lbs in the last year. I only have another 7lbs to lose, but have found that doing it slowly has helped me keep it off, even when I have 'setbacks' like holidays or Christmas! when my self control goes out the window.

Nothing more complicated than eating less and moving more. Log EVERYTHING in MyFitnessPal and walk everywhere. Then run if you can. I’ve lost 3st2lbs in 10 months and gone from running 30sec to doing my first half marathon on Friday. Not that I’m nervous OR ANYTHING.

5:2 diet track using MyFitnessPal.

Also exercising 3 to 4 times a week.

Eating really delicious new food and have not found it too difficult.

Good luck.

Yep, myfitnesspal too, paired to a TomTom Spark 3 watch (99 quid on wiggle, absolute steal) to count activity (circuits, jogging, swimming), daily steps and heart rate. Honesty with yourself on the good diary is critical though!

I use Sparkpeople (like MFPbut easier I think) and log everything I eat. I try to eat only when I'm hungry and then slowly and until I'm full but not uncomfortably so. I find it easy until my period when everything goes out the window for 9 days but then I continue and in 4 months have lost a stone and a half. I have been at this weight for about 4 weeks though but I am not disheartened. I never full bad or uncomfortably full by monitoring and it makes me more conscious of what I am using my calories for - I tend to work towards making every mouthful count.

Wow. Thank you all so much for your replies. This has given me a lot to think about.
I agree that perhaps I need to move away purely from the goal of losing weight but looking after myself.
I’ve just ordered a healthy cookbook from Amazon to give me some inspiration.

Slimming World, it really works and I’ve never been hungry. I’ve lost 2st in 4.5 months

Weight watchers, lost 5stone last year. Another 1 stone to go. Back on it now.

Also did c25k.

First time in years I’ve felt I’ve had the time and inclination to spend some time and money looking after myself. So concentrated on me for a while and it’s worked.

So I think for me it was more about the right time mentally, than the right diet.

Good luck 😉

I started the LCHF bootcamp on MN last May. Have lost 5 stone and am now at the top of a healthy BMI. Focussed on the last stone now to get nearer the middle of the healthy range. The next bootcamp starts Monday if you are interested (under the low carb bootcamp topic).

I lost 50lbs over the course of about nine months or so - from a BMI of about 33 I think to the top end of the healthy range.

What works for one person doesn't work for everyone, and people find they get on better with different approaches. I didn't want to "diet", and the idea of something like intermittent fasting is horrifying to me - I don't like feeling hungry. So I went for the "make generally healthier choices most of the time, and move a lot more". When I want to treat myself I do, but I'm conscious that I can't "treat" myself all day every day or that's not a treat it's just pigging out constantly. But say I go to visit family for a long weekend, I happily make and eat cake with them, I'll have a small treat or two at work when someone brings in biscuits, now and then I'll go out for a nice breakfast at the weekend. I tend to use things like fun size chocolate bars as more manageable treats too, since then I don't have the "well, the bar has been started..." temptation.

There's no food I've banned myself from eating, but in general I eat much less bread and pasta because it's quite calorie dense and I tend to gorge on that sort of stuff. I eat a lot of fruit and veg because it's less calorie dense so I can still graze and feel like I've had substantial meals, without having put away rounds of toast or a big bowl of pasta & pesto! As concrete examples I take a pot of carrot sticks to work every day to snack on in the morning, and typically I'd take a couple of apples and a couple of satsumas as well, or a pot of cherry tomatoes and some cucumber, to eat with lunch/through the day. I have a reasonable sized portion of something like veg and bean chilli or soup for lunch. I might have a small packet of crisps or some breadsticks or something to munch on as well. So that's quite a lot of food, but it's not a whole lot of calories really if you work it all out. Which I don't, because I can't be arsed with that sort of tracking!

On the "move a lot more" front I joined the local leisure centre gym and went from some leisurely cycling to work and the odd walk to typically doing 30-45 mins of cardio like crosstrainer/bike/rowing/etc plus a bit of resistance machine strength work, I'd say nine days out of ten. It's just a habit to get up early and go to the gym before work every morning now. When I got fitter I started running and now do parkrun. The fitness side of things has really changed my life, aside from the weight loss.

givemushypeasachance - loved your description of how you lost weight. I'm doing something similar, after a year of pointless yo-yo dieting. I'm being quite strict but also realistic and non-diety. I find the fruit thing helps. And more vegetables. And cutting down on bread (my downfall - I even think its a bit addictive). I also can't be bothered with calories and syns and weighing and all that dieting paraphanailia - though I know for some people its helpful. Want to lose about 20 pounds so all my clothes fit easily and feel better. I'm glad its worked for you. Here's hoping for me .

I've lost 3.5 stone since Sept.

I started eating healthily and less carbs (so apart from 2 days a week I only ate carbs at breakfast) and started exercising more. In Jan I started the c25k and now run 5k 3/4 times a week, I am thinking of starting to train for 10k. I also do a lot of exercise at home and do 10 mins of yoga every morning as well as 2 longer routines a week. I have about 1.5 stone left to lose so I am doing the low carb bootcamp on here to give myself a kick start.

I've learnt to love exercise more than I used to love food! You really have to want it though, I tried a few times over the last couple of years at losing weight but go in halfheartedly and quit within a couple of weeks. I decided in September I am going to lose the weight and I am going to give myself 1 year, after all whats 1 year in your whole life.

I’ve lost 2st, 10.5lb since January following slimming world.

I went to Weight Watchers and lost a total of 6 stones — over probably the same number of years, finally reaching my goal as I hit 50. I'd drop a dress size, maintain a while and repeat.

I still go to class every week.