Like I said, all I am saying is don't completely disparage these shows because of how quick the weight loss can be. As there does happen to be some science behind fat loss, weight loss, and what calories are burned from where for what work outs towards the end goal.
If you could perform workouts that burn nothing but fat, thus eliminating the need for energy from food to accomplish said workout, I doubt there is any one of us that would say no, we won't do that, we want to accomplish it slow and steady.
The energy from our fat stores, versus the energy from what we eat, both are used to accomplish a workout. No one would work out if they were told that you can not lose your fat stores by working out.
I am a firm believer in eating whenever my body says it is hungry. If certain types of work outs burn less energy from what I eat, and burn more of that wobbly stuff throughout my body. Thus I simply perform activities that are more likely to burn the energy I want to remove. Because apparently there is a science behind it.
And so you know, fat loss towards overall weight loss is a competition for everyone. We are competing against our bodies, and our bodies, compete against our minds and wills at all times. Weight loss is the hardest competition in the world, because it's a fight against two very powerful aspects of ourselves. It is a fight we should all try to win if it is our want.
Like I said a good discussion can be had. Shows like these may not be the pinnacle of examples of health and fitness, but it inspires research, discussion, and learning.
I always wondered why only two pounds a week could be the only healthy weight loss. Why not 1-4 or 1-6 why not half a pound only? Some quote that it creates harder strain on the heart. But why? If you lose weight you have less there to put strain on the heart. If that were true why does liposuction not end in more heart attacks? Others quote muscle loss. I have lost 6 pounds in one week very recently, and not a single pound of my recent weight loss has gotten me muscle loss.
Then it dawned on me. Maybe it is said 1-2 pounds, because the average person does not know how to lose weight quicker then that on their own in a healthy way. And I'll bet there is more science to that line of thought then strain to the heart and muscle loss because it's one to many pounds.
Again, just thoughts, and potential. I am not trying to change any of your beliefs, I simply believe in good discussion based off the research out there that has gone into this subject.
To me all of you losing one pound, half a pound, quarter pound or even less a week, and even staying the same or even a simple gain, are accomplishing leaps and bounds across the largest of gaps. You are all striving to win against the largest fight any of us can participate in. So no matter what the weekly weigh in says or the daily, or the hourly, what you are all trying to do or wanting to do is on a grander scale in my mind then you can imagine.
I simply enjoy the idea that maybe there is more out there that has yet to be learned that might still be waiting to be discovered by, well, anyone.
I feel like I've been fortunate to be able to indulge in my trashy TV habit without it affecting my weight loss or my mentality. I really do love watching Biggest Loser/I Used to Be Fat/Heavy on a regular basis, but I enjoy it much more for watching their attitudes change than their waistlines. I know that their goals are completely unrealistic for me and I can't remember a time when I wanted or expected to lose weight that quickly. But when I see lazy, whiny people turning their lives around and becoming more confident and put together, I do feel better about my own decision to change my life.
I know some people take these shows as gospel truth--"If I eat carefully and work out for one week I'll lose 14 pounds!"--and I hate that it may be breaking their spirit to change their lifestyle, but I still selfishly enjoy these shows quite a lot.
I always wondered why only two pounds a week could be the only healthy weight loss. Why not 1-4 or 1-6 why not half a pound only? Some quote that it creates harder strain on the heart. But why? If you lose weight you have less there to put strain on the heart. If that were true why does liposuction not end in more heart attacks? Others quote muscle loss. I have lost 6 pounds in one week very recently, and not a single pound of my recent weight loss has gotten me muscle loss.
You're in a fortuitous spot when it comes to holding onto muscle and losing fat because you're a guy.
I wanted to address this part of your post because the reason larger weight loss (for most people) is a bad idea is that the body burns muscle as well as fat when deprived of calories. Some people might think, "Okay, fine, I'll sacrifice a little muscle in my arms and legs to look thinner, as long as the weight comes off more quickly." But what they forget is that the heart is also a muscle; overly rapid weight loss can quite literally weaken the heart (not to mention reducing lean muscle mass elsewhere in the body and leading to even easier fat gain and less physical fitness in the long run).
Lipo wouldn't cause heart attacks because it isn't the quick removal of fat that is dangerous, it's the process of destroying muscle. Studies of people affected by famines or eating disorders show pretty clearly why sustained, rapid, unsupervised weight loss is a bad idea. Note that all three of those elements would be present for someone who tried a TBL-style weight loss program at home.
Your six-pound loss doesn't meet the criteria of those three words above because it isn't sustained. The people on TBL and Heavy are supervised (how well supervised is another issue). It's important to remember that despite supervision, people have already had to have medical attention and in one case an airlift to a nearby hospital for emergency care while on the show. That is NOT good behavior to model, nor is it realistic for the average Joe or Jane who wants the weight to come off more quickly. I don't have a camera crew following me; if I run until I pass out, I'd better hope that someone sees my dumb *** go down so they can call 911.
My doctor recommended losing no more than 1% of my body mass per week on average. From what I've read, that recommendation has a fair amount of research behind it. For some people--maybe even for most people--it isn't that the average person doesn't know how to lose more than that on their own in a healthy way, it's that there is not a healthy way for them to lose more than that. TBL and Heavy show people who are losing weight dangerously, but because they're being monitored, it's considered worth the risks they're running. I'm unconvinced that it really IS worth the risk, personally.
I say this with respect for our differences of opinion--please don't assume that I don't know I could speed up my weight loss by exercising for hours a day and eating 1200 calories a la TBL and Heavy. I know I could--I just disagree that it would result in sustained multi-pound-weekly weight loss or that it's even worth doing. I know because I've done a lot of drastic things in the past that DID take the weight off quickly and yet here I am with weight to lose.
I'm going to borrow Kaplods' excellent analogy from another post. For most people, drastic efforts to lose weight quickly are like holding your breath--you can only be successful at it for so long before something has to give. It isn't willpower or a lack of effort, it's simple biology.
I happen to not be a firm believer in direct calorie restriction. I believe in restricting the types of foods eaten as opposed to how much one eats.
For example, if I were on a 1200 calorie diet, but I was half way through the day, had already eaten all my calories and was literally starving IE stomach audibly growling, then why would I ignore my body when it is telling me something? Because I have to eat 1200 or I won't lose weight?
As for there not being a healthy way to lose more weight then the recommended amount a week, that would essentially require me to believe that what I am doing is not actually healthy even though I have sustained above a 2 pound average a week 3 pounds in fact for almost 9 weeks, and not only have I not lost muscle, but I am never hungry, and that one week with a 6 pound loss did have a lot more exercise included while still eating when I was hungry.
I believe there are healthy ways of losing weight in a quicker fashion, not because I believe it is a good idea for the average joe to try. But lets face it 1200 calories a day and exercising 6 hours a day is restricting oneself from eating when the body tells someone that they are hungry. If you are working out that hard a day, and your body tells you that you are hungry, you should eat.
While I believe that calorie restriction has some purpose, I believe that calorie restriction in this day and age, along with exercise is starting to take itself to far.
I think that calorie restriction, much like how are eating habits are supposed to be like to not put on massive weight, needs to be taken in moderation. If you work out six hours a day how can you sustain your body on 1200 calories like the biggest loser contestants, sometimes, if not always try to do? We have a natural metabolism, and the exercise burns more. When we ignore something that is literally screaming in our ears in a deafening roar because someone told us we had to or we would not lose weight in a healthy manner then there is something wrong.
I can accept the reasoning behind your beliefs in that it is studied regularly. But the science behind that reasoning, IE calorie restriction... I am told that I must have 1600 calories a day for my body to be fine. That this is what a male needs. This is pretty much solid health and fitness rules for losing weight.
I look at that science, and every fiber of my being screams how wrong it stands to be. Proven to work for decades, does not mean that it is actually correct. It means that it does the job that people want it to do.
Maybe I have a higher metabolism, maybe my body is more apt to burn fat as opposed to muscle, but when I eat an average of 2600 calories a day sometimes more to keep myself from feeling hungry, lose more then two pounds a week, and keep it going for two months I gotta ask myself why I was trying to restrict my calories in the first place.
Because this science is proven to do the job we want it to do? Sure it does what we want it to and doctors/nutritionists/fitness instructors swear by it and it being healthy. Yet a person like me is unhealthy for losing more and eating nearly double what they recommend for a person losing weight, well I might be biased simply because I am my only example so far. But I can't help but feel insulted when people tell me that I am unhealthy (Not saying at all that you did) for losing more then two pounds a week but the only difference is they probably leave themselves feeling hungry some of the time if not all the time, and I never feel hungry except for the first sign of hunger when I eat.
Something about being told I am unhealthy by nearly all nutritional and weight loss science because I eat more and lose more weight and exercise a lot just does not seem right. Yes I know about the science, but the more I learn about exercise, nutrition, and health, the more I begin to question the science that more people use that achieves the results yet leaves people hungry. Not that this is the case for all, but any friend I have that does similar things always tells me the same thing...
I learned to ignore my body when I was hungry.
Something about this science scares me when I hear those words out of peoples mouths.
I agree that sometimes we need to strike out on our own. I'm convinced that there is no signpost reading "This Way to Easy, Rapid Weight Loss." If there were, we'd all be exactly the size we like and the weight loss industry would collapse.
And you're right that the phrase "I learned to ignore my body when it says it's hungry" sounds like bad news. In a sense, it doesn't matter what words follow "I learned to ignore my body"--it's probably not healthy behavior if it means overriding biological imperatives on a regular basis. I'm not at all a fan of going hungry and in fact I decided on my calorie level specifically because I wanted to eat enough good-tasting, nutritious food to avoid hunger and to actually enjoy what I was putting in my mouth.
One of the things I enjoy most about reading here is seeing that there really isn't One True Way. I couldn't live on low-carb; I tried it and got dizzy spells and after a couple of weeks, my tongue turned black and furry (no kidding, I looked like I'd been grooming my cat). I couldn't do low-fat, either, and felt miserably deprived on those plans. After my years of smoking and at 41 years of age, I couldn't do what you do and work out for hours at a time. Yet I see people all over 3FC who are having amazing success with these methods that would be totally wrong for me.
So I've adopted a lot more of a "live and let live" attitude toward what others are doing, unless what they're doing is obvious shenanigans like eating nothing but Colon Blow and lollipops or something. I've come to think it's more important that people keep searching, tweaking, and learning about what works best for themselves than to get disgusted that the methods popular on TBL aren't having TBL-like results for them.
We're all little genetic melting pots, the sum of thousands of ancestors who had all kinds of dietary restrictions placed on them by their environments; it stands to reason, then, that each of us loses weight in slightly different--sometimes even strikingly different--ways. When even present-day populations thrive on diets as different as we do, there's no doubt in my mind that we're all highly individual when it comes to eating what's best for us.
Believe me, I'm not saying that you must eat 1200 calories a day to lose--quite the contrary. I'm saying that there are people for whom 1200 calories a day results in ideal weight loss and that there are others for whom it just plain doesn't work that way. To return to the original thread, there are people--many, many people--for whom ultra-rapid weight loss from strenuous exercise and calorie restriction like we see on TBL does not work or, if it worked, would be unsafe.
My husband lost his weight almost entirely through exercise, as you did. More power to him. But that doesn't mean that calorie restriction, low-carb, low-fat, etc. are wrong--just different.
Last edited by Nola Celeste; 02-21-2011 at 03:55 AM.
I think it's pretty obvious that if you're losing 2-3 pounds a week (with an aberration of 6 pounds in one week) and eating 2600 calories that you have a higher metabolism than someone who struggles to lose weight on 1500 calories if both of you are working out the same amount. What I'm wondering here, though, is why you're so hung up on this "It's not unhealthy to lose the way I am" thing when, except for one week, you're losing 2-3 pounds a week. That's barely outside of the recommended norm. I don't think that anyone who says that rapid weight loss has the potential to be unhealthy would say that your occasional extra pound (and one time extra 4 pounds) is indicative of unhealthy weight loss. You keep likening your situation to that of the people on extreme weight loss shows. Unless I'm missing something, I don't think your situation is like theirs. Your "big loss" week was 6 pounds. Not 35.
