That's interesting, I'll keep that in mind about the Magnesium! And, yeah I forgot about the grape family, Grapes loosen me up as well as cherries. Mostly my problem fruits are apples, oranges, pineapple, etc. Anything acidic. Causes dry mouth swelling, but I'm good with bananas or grapes and such.
About the water, yeah I drink tons of water, like 8 8 oz glasses a day. At minimum, I'm getting 32 oz per day. It does nothing for the stool by itself for me. It remains dry unless I give it some help. It's horrible, I just can't go through this too much longer. The problem is economics right now. I am completely dependent on others for my dietary needs, and I have to do calorie counts and work around, it's really, really beyond frustrating.
With my own money, I'd do a world of difference, as I have in the past.
Krampus, that's interesting what you say about your experience. So it can't be a genetic factor with Japan, it's got to be cultural. I wonder what it is that the average thin Japanese person eats that gets things moving softly. The entire nation can't be suffering the horrors of constipation, lol.
I am an anglo American, but I have a Filipina stepmother. I believe the Philippines obesity rate is even less than Japan's, something like 2.9% compared with Japan's 4.1%. Somewhere around Vietnam's and just ahead of countries like Chad and Mali.
She is extremely thin around 78 lbs when I first met her, but probably around 95-100 right now. So I had already lost 150 lbs when I first got to know her, and I'd be getting to a normalish, mid-range obese range and people would be telling me how good I looked and that I should "quit", while she was "disgusted" by my "lazy" self and that I had no "self respect" because of my size, and so she'd probably not see me as thin until I hit the 140-160 range, it just makes me feel like a monster.
Truth be told 160 is my ultimate goal as well, but I will do a full account when I hit 200 and see where it goes from there, how I look and if it's easy to maintain and whatnot. I'm a long way from there though.
At any rate, thanks everyone.
I like the idea about getting more beans into my diet, that makes sense that chili helps loosen me up! And, I never really gave it thought that store-bought white bread might actually be low in fiber and just have carbs, interesting. I kinda took it for granted that all bread had fiber, that makes a lot of sense.