Over the past few months my mom has lost about 20 some pounds just from diet change. Mainly stopping fast food and eating out at every meal. I don't know what her diet is every day and I am sure she is still having somethings occasionally. But is it odd to drop that much weight in about 6 months time just from a little bit of a diet change? She doesn't work out at all and she wasn't really trying to lose the weight, just was trying to eat healthier foods. I just think it seemed really fast and am concerned.

Not if she is a big girl by any means. At heavier weights it is very easy to lose weight by making small lifestyle changes. This really helped to motivate me and it is something that should be embraced by people trying to lose a lot of weight.

I read a lot of heavy people on here complaining about the challenge of losing 100lbs or so. But what they should realize is that losing weight if you are 100lbs over weight is much more easily achieved than if you are looking to lose just 10-20. And that should be celebrated.

Without knowing what your mom was eating, I would nevertheless say, not a bit surprising, imo. If you read DAvid Kessler's The End of Overeating, this will make perfect sense. A lot of the fast food and restaurant food is essentially pre-digested so that it is rapidly & perhaps more fully absorbed. The idea is to make it highly palatable and keep you wanting more. It can also mask satiety signals and fool the brain into thinking you are still hungry. That book was an eye opener for me!

If she was significantly overweight, then the 20 lbs is even less surprising. But it doesn't hurt to get a check up. I would expect a medical problem to also present with other symptoms, e.g. fatigue.

From a simple calories perspective, that's about 400 cal/day over a 6 month period.

Thinking about the nutritional info in most fast food/restaurant meals, giving those up could certainly result in a 20 lb loss.

Eating out is killer unless you really watch the info on the menu.

20 lbs in 6 months doesn't seem extreme to me. I'd say that she reduced her calorie intake and she lost weight, which is how you do it.

Yea 20 lbs in 6 months doesn't sound extreme to me either. I am done about 5 lbs in two weeks from cutting out fast food and soda and other bad things, and focusing on healthy eating. I'm very overweight and ate way too much junk.

Her absolute weight loss isn't as meaningful a number as the % lost. If she was overweight, then it's not as significant a loss than if she was not overweight.

20 lbs in 6 months is only about 1 lb a week. There nothing dangerous about that at all. In fact, you can't get a whole lot more reasonable! You should be thrilled! Good for her for making smart healthy changes!

Ah, I should have given the initial weight. She was in the 180s. Which is the biggest she has ever been.

I just find it so surprising that diet alone can account for that much. She has some other issues she is getting checked out but her diet changed linked up to when the weightloss has begun.

I wish giving up fast food work work that fast for me! lol

In weight loss, diet is everything. I exercise to be healthy, but adjust my diet to lose weight.

For the first 3 months of my weight loss many years ago, I couldn't walk (I had busted my knee). Sure I hobbled a bit to the grocery store and stuff but mostly I sat. I lost 75 lbs in 3 months. Diet is definitely key.

Without knowing what she's eating it's hard to know. Obviously she switched to eating something else right? So she's probably eating salads and more veggies now. IMO diet is the most significant factor in losing weight. You can stop eating fast food but if you're eating home made burgers instead then the calorie counts will still be the same. People don't need to exercise to lose weight.