Background: sedentary for about a year due to some spinal disc issues, gained about 25 lbs (not giving out exact weights/heights due to doxx)
Trigger: I started not to be able to fit into nice clothing and didn't want to buy new stuff.
Method: CICO (calorie counting) and maintaining a rowing regimen, followed recently by some weightlifting (basic barbell items).
Surprising findings: I was easily consuming a meal's worth of liquor each day via cocktails (check out my post history in /s/cocktails ...), and that I was using too much olive oil in my cooking (210 cal per Tbsp).
Helpful website: Nutritionix (nutritionix.com) has a large catalog of food and their calories. I wasn't super accurate nor did I try to weigh all my food or anything, but I intended to be within 15% on any given day's consumption.
BMI: Went from 28.0 ("overweight") to 24.2 ("normal").
Caloric Deficit: I had to make a reasonable assumption for sedentary calories burned per day for a person my age, weight, and height, but after the weight started coming off I could make a more accurate calculation of "true sedentary calories" (i.e. not counting workouts, whose calories I estimated separately). I've been burning nearly 1200 average calories per day for the past 72 days! They say not to go over 500 but I felt great and was getting the nutrients I needed, so shrug? They say the faster you lose the weight the easier it comes back... but knowing is half the battle! The other half is sticking to the good habits I have formed - choosing my foods more deliberately and slowing down on the alcohol.
Note: I kicked off my efforts with a "juice cleanse"... puts you in a severe caloric deficit and I found that helpful for habit-building, even if juice cleanses are a fad for their other advertised benefits. It helped to know I absolutely could not consume anything but those juices for those two weeks. YMMV.
I was pretty hard on myself re: workouts and eating/drinking less. I'm happy to be back at my original weight, plus some muscles. Now just have to maintain it! Getting older sucks in that way.
Background: sedentary for about a year due to some spinal disc issues, gained about 25 lbs (not giving out exact weights/heights due to doxx)
Trigger: I started not to be able to fit into nice clothing and didn't want to buy new stuff.
Method: CICO (calorie counting) and maintaining a rowing regimen, followed recently by some weightlifting (basic barbell items).
Surprising findings: I was easily consuming a meal's worth of liquor each day via cocktails (check out my post history in /s/cocktails ...), and that I was using too much olive oil in my cooking (210 cal per Tbsp).
Helpful website: [Nutritionix](http://www.nutritionix.com) has a large catalog of food and their calories. I wasn't super accurate nor did I try to weigh all my food or anything, but I intended to be within 15% on any given day's consumption.
BMI: Went from 28.0 ("overweight") to 24.2 ("normal").
Caloric Deficit: I had to make a reasonable assumption for sedentary calories burned per day for a person my age, weight, and height, but after the weight started coming off I could make a more accurate calculation of "true sedentary calories" (i.e. not counting workouts, whose calories I estimated separately). **I've been burning nearly 1200 average calories per day for the past 72 days!** They say not to go over 500 but I felt great and was getting the nutrients I needed, so *shrug*? They say the faster you lose the weight the easier it comes back... but knowing is half the battle! The other half is sticking to the good habits I have formed - choosing my foods more deliberately and slowing down on the alcohol.
Note: I kicked off my efforts with a "juice cleanse"... puts you in a severe caloric deficit and I found that helpful for habit-building, even if juice cleanses are a fad for their other advertised benefits. It helped to know I absolutely could not consume anything but those juices for those two weeks. YMMV.
I was pretty hard on myself re: workouts and eating/drinking less. I'm happy to be back at my original weight, plus some muscles. Now just have to maintain it! Getting older sucks in that way.
(post is archived)