I need three to five basic principles for weight loss

[Freaking0ut]

I’ve decided that I need to sort it out. I am 15stone. I need to lose 3 stone to be within a healthy BMI for my height. I’ve had two children and the weight has crept on. As I hit 35 I am noticing that it is going on easier and is harder to get off. My weaknesses are wine and chocolate. I like cooking and healthy food. I am slightly time poor but no more so than anyone else who works full time and has children!

I have done various diets, the 16:8 combined with 5:2 is the most recent, and I have come to the conclusion that all this does is disorder my eating habits. It encourages me to fast for half the day and then out of hunger I binge for the second half.

I have one year to lose the weight. It needs to be a lifestyle change. So I’m looking for 3 to 5 fundamentals that I need to do/not do to encourage the weight to come off.

Number one: Eat healthy and hearty breakfast every day.

I may use this post as a space to record things. I have to do something. Thanks for reading if you’ve got this far!

Michael Pollan summed it up for me with;

Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.

DS2 and I are losing steadily and without feeling deprived by following the No S diet combined with skipping breakfast (which neither of us miss anyway and personally if I eat breakfast I'm hungry again an hour later). Also we've cut our portion sizes.

So

Two sensibly sized meals a day

No Sweet stuff, no Snacks and no Seconds unless there's an S in the day (Saturday, Sunday or Special days like birthdays)

That's it.

Easy peasy.

Nothing forbidden. I had a McDs breakfast McMuffin the other day but then skipped lunch.

We have a pud, just at weekends and much smaller.

I hadn’t realised there had been more replies to my post, thank you! Loads more really good info. Parvuli thanks for your post, I think this is what I am endeavouring to do. I think all of the ‘S’ you talk about there are the reason I’m overweight.

Anyway, this week I have counted calories, logging on MFP. I also haven’t eaten any chocolate (managed to turn down a kit Kat chunky someone bought me yesterday 😇), and upon weighing myself today I have lost 3lb. So I am pleased with that as a starting point.

Thanks everyone for your posts, it’s extremely motivating.

Honeywort

Limit chocolate/wine/whatever your personal snacking downfall is to the weekend (my weekend starts on Friday evening)
Don't feel you have to eat if you're not hungry - i don't eat until I've been up for about 4 hours
Don't snack between meals
Watch out for empty calories in drinks

What I find really difficult is that I'm not good at being hungry! The afternoons are bad for me snacking . However I do try and eat my tea early during the week and don't eat afterwards. I can cope with hunger in the evening but not in the afternoons!

I’m quite extreme and the methods I use may not be to everyone’s taste but they work for me and I don’t have cravings or feel hangry
I have discovered that certain foods make me fat in that-once I start I can’t stop. So rather than try to have will power which inevitably fails my method is that I just do not eat these foods anymore.
The banned foods are cereals - wheat/oats/rice/corn - and soft drinks.
I severely restrict the following to a few times a year-booze, ice cream, potato products, milk chocolate.
I can get away with eating 85% chocolate regularly without triggering cravings so I have that.
It sounds extreme but it is well worth it