Dids's WSOP '05 Get Less Fat Incentive Plan.

[Redmen62]

For anyone who wants to avoid fast food permanently, read Fast Food Nation.

[lowroller]

Fast food is probably my biggest weakness, but that book (I only skimmed through it for about 10 minutes) got me off fast food, almost completely, for about 6 months.

That is HUGE, for me, by the way. [img]/images/graemlins/shocked.gif[/img]

I really wanted to see that documentary, "Super Size Me", but it never came out around here I guess. That is supposed to be another eye-opener.

[Monty Cantsin]

[ QUOTE ]
I would almost go so far as to say that anyone who buys a diet book and reads it is an idiot.

[/ QUOTE ]

I would almost go so far as to say that anyone who lives in Arizona is a fag. But I won't, because I wouldn't want to accidentally insult somebody.

/mc

[BassMasterK]

As a musician, I usually kept myself in pretty good shape, but two years ago I came out of a period where I was doing more recording and teaching private lessons, than gigging. Well I was about 4 months out from hitting the road and after looking at myself in the mirror with disgust I decided I needed to make a change. Not just go on some diet, but actually lose weight and be healthy and get back to looking good. Before I tell you what I did let me repeat a couple of things said here that I think are most important for you to remember:

The first one you said yourself : I don't need a diet, I need to change my lifestyle.

The second one was said by Alobar, who has given you nothing but good nutricional advice here: Calories in vs. Calories out. It's so simple yet people want to ignore it for more faddish advice like "No Carbs! Where else can you eat a pound of bacon and lose weight?" & "Don't eat at night, you gain more weight" & "Eat 6 small meals" & "Skip Dinner and only eat twice a day" and the list goes on and on. The simple fact is if you burn more calories than you take in, you lose weight. Simple. Period. My wife who was in nursing school at the time gave me this grand piece of wisdom and I took it to heart and the truth is it works. 1000 calories at midnight will add no more weight than 1000 calories at noon. It is all numbers. So here is how I went about it (and I found the changes were not really all that drastic to my lifestyle).

1) No fast food. You can eat so much more food for less calories and more nutrition if you can just avoid the fast food. Somehow the fast food industry finds ways to pack more calories into smaller amounts of food. When I found myself in a situation where I was with a group and we were eating fast food, I went with a grilled chicken sandwich no mayo, and skip the french fries. After I lost my weight I would occationally hit fast food. The first time I thought I was going to puke, my stomache was so used to good stuff.

2) If you drink regular pop, switch to diet. If you have to have a drink, get off beer and get into vodka and/or red wine.

3) Chips, cookies and french fries....depending on how fast and how bad you want to lose weight these are no no's. That being said, I am a jalepeno popper lover. I lost my first 10 pounds, I was rewarding myself with poppers. This leads me to the food secret to losing weight:

If you change your complete diet, it is almost impossible to stick to it because what we eat is actually a big part of ourselves. That's why people don't stick to diets that are totally different than what they are used to eating. Find things you like that are healthy for you. I love chicken terriyaki so for a few months I ate a lot of rice with veggies and chicken breast. Rice with fish and veggies. I fixed more veggies than usual and what I discovered is veggies that have come into contact with terriyaki sauce or BBQ sauce, rock the house. I started paying attention to how many calories I really put in my mouth.

Also, I let my stomache get back to a regular size. I was used to stuffing it to the point where I didn't feel full unless I was overfull and it became a habit. For maybe a week I ate about half to 2/3'rds the amount that I normally would. If I went back for seconds it was a few spoonfulls rather than a whole plate more. After a week I found I was full after the first plate and didn't need seconds. This was also a big part of losing weight.

Then the other part, exercise:

Muscle burns calories. After exercising with weights your metabolism stays higher for longer than after running. More muscle = more calories burned even while at rest. You don't have to try to get ripped but I know that lifting weights really made a big impact on my weight loss. Every other day I would lift, nothing too heavy, as a matter of fact it was almost cardio weight lifting. In between each set I would do 15 sit-ups, leg-lifts, or crunches. This gave my muscles a few seconds to recover before the next set but kept my heart rate up while I lifted. By the time I was done lifting I had done around 300-350 ab exercises, but in such small doses it didn't kill me. I discovered I actually did have abs.

The off days I would get some form of cardio be it basketball, running, bike riding. No matter how far overweight you are there is some form of cardio you can do and it is really important for healthy weight loss.

To tell the truth the hardest part was making the time to do the lifting/cardio. I had to force myself to make a 45 -60 minute break in the day every day. That was really hard but I told myself I had to do it for me. Even when I didn't feel like working out, I would force myself and once I started seeing the result (about 4 weeks) it was no longer a hassle. I WANTED to get in that 45-60 minutes because I knew it was making a difference. 3 months later I was looking pretty dang good at 40 pounds less.

I wish you luck. Starting is the hardest part, as well as keeping a positive attitude. If you do a plan like mine, don't look at the scale for the first month because you will gain weight as fat is turning into muscle, even if you can't see it. Once you get going you will find it easier and easier because it becomes a familiar pattern, and then a way of life.

[nolanfan34]

Awesome post, that is great advice, top to bottom.

I also agree that once you stop eating fast food all the time, it can taste pretty horrible once you get off it. I still like McD's once in a while, but I always feel like crap after eating it.

[TazQ]

Buy some free weights and do some research online. Thats all you really need and you'll see amazing results in 1-3 months.

[gonores]

I just skimmed the replies, so I don't know if this was covered, but one thing that will make life seriously easier on you is getting professional help, i.e. dietitians, personal trainers (assuming it is within your budget...don't skimp if possible). Knowing what exercises are best for me and what unhealthy food on which I can and cannot indulge to avoid a weight exposion makes my gym trips more efficient and my meals far from miserable. For instance, I'm not supposed to eat tropical fruits, but good-sized helpings of ice cream are just fine for me. It'll truly be eye-opening just how unique your body is.

[Duke]

[ QUOTE ]
I would almost go so far as to say that anyone who lives in Arizona is a fag. But I won't, because I wouldn't want to accidentally insult somebody.

[/ QUOTE ]

I thought they were retarded fags, but I guess I'm out of touch with the world these days.

Yeah, we all understand that you were offended, and we all understand that you think that of course he's offended now and that you showed him. The problem is that some people just don't get offended by anything. Not that that's a problem - I think that people who take offense to anything are morons.

~D

[BassMasterK]

I had two wierd things happen when I lost enough weight and was keeping active enough I felt like I could have fast food again. The first time I got a quarter pounder from McD's, man it tasted good but my stomach didn't want any part of it. It gurgled, it hurt, and in general I felt like crap. The next thing I tried was KFC a few weeks later. This didn't hurt the stomach at all, however within about five minutes of eating a fried chicken breast, I could feel this surge of heat in my body that made me feel flushed, almost high. It was really wierd. It's amazing how our bodies will adjust to crappy food when you eat it all the time, but when you go off of it and then try it again....your body tells you what it really thinks of it!

[Whistler]

First thing, get educated, a lot of the posts are a little off track for ya. Check out t-mag.com, its a bodybuilding site. Its a little hardcore, and a lot of stuff that they deal with is "advertisementish", but it has TONS of great info, trust me. Its a lot like this site, wade through the BS to find some good info. Also search t-mag for the T-dawg diet, or just talk to me on irc, I gots all kinds of good info for ya. lates