Weight loss, what do I do?

[Gonnagetgoingreturnsagain]

I’m 54, menopausal and just come off anti psychotic drugs after being on them for approx 2 years where I gained 2 stone.

This time last year I was on a psychiatric unit and the food was absolutely vile there so I ended up skipping breakfast and dinner there and instead had a homemade big salad which was brought in for me every day (with walnuts, feta cheese etc). I also had one Philadelphia snack pot, fruit salad pots and in the evening simply had dips (guacamole, salsa etc) with ritz biscuits and also Pringles. I lost about a stone doing this though. Only exercise was walking round the unit.

So does this mean that’s the easiest way for me to lose weight? I wasn’t calorie counting. Low carb has worked for me plus fast walking in the past too.

Huge congratulations on the weight loss and more importantly on the recovery, that's a massive achievement! From what I can tell of all the research (and I am not a scientist/ dietician), eating one or two meals a day or eating in a narrow eating window is absolutely fine for weight loss and may be beneficial for some people and in some ways to prevent over eating. The old wisdom of breakfast being the most important meal of the day may be very true for some/many people but by no means all. Personally I haven't eaten breakfast for many years, I never feel hungry first thing in the morning and I'm certain I don't snack more or less if I do eat earlier in the day. I just find it easier to stick to a calorie deficit if I have 2 larger meals over an 8ish hour window from 12noon - 8pm ish compared to 3 smaller meals and/or snacks between say 7am - 9pm. But others may find the reverse is true.

The other thing that can work well for some and again it's a very personal thing is eating a pretty repetitive diet - so long as what you're eating has a good variety of fruits and vegetables, enough protein and fibre etc, I don't think it matters hugely if you eat very similar things day to day if that's your preference and makes it sustainable for you. For me I do prefer a little more variety but I have meals I eat over and over, big salads similar to yours, fruit and yoghurt for after dinner etc.

The other thing that I find really, really helps is increasing exercise / activity levels. It is true what they say that you can't out-run or out exercise a bad diet but (a) the benefits to physical and mental health of regular exercise go far beyond weight loss (b) when you are a small menopausal woman your TDEE (how many calories you burn to maintain your weight) will already be low, to lose more weight you need to go into a calorie deficit so you then need to cut further. Therefore burning even a few extra calories through exercise per day makes a massive difference to me, the difference between feeling really restricted and having a little bit of flexibility.

Well done on getting well enough to get of your meds

As you have found out, those meds really dont help keeping the weight down

The eating just two meals a day would have been more helpful for you then snacking on what really are high fat/sugar/salt UPF products

I dont do breakfast either , dont have time or appetite and you have to remember it was Kellogg's who coined the phrase that breakfast is the most important meal of the day

You need to find your TDEE - how many calories your body needs to stay the same , and then punch in how much you would like to lose each week to get a calorie deficit number . They keep your calories to that

How you use your calories is down to you. I only know that out of my 1400 needed calories, if I ate a tub of dip and chips , that would wipe them out mostly , and Id still be hungry , so I prefer to have a proper plate of food - tonight it was steak, broccoli, mushrooms and a wee handful of air fryer chips

I dont avoid carbs, only I make them work for me So wholemeal rather then white bread, wholemeal pasta and brown or wild rice- you do actually eat less and stay fuller for longer. I eat a lot of grains and beans instead of spuds and rice. And I dont panic about carb heavy veg - the nutrients from said veg balances the carb intake . I keep the meat lean and go easy on the dairy - enough for calcium intake but no longer working my way through a block of cheese and a packet of crackers Time I fit in my dietry needs - oily fish, rainbow of veg and fruit, etc etc etc , there's not calories left to be eating foods that arent feeding me and leaving me hungry