Weight loss - according to my own example, 96% of internet is lying

[Ritza]

Hello people

I would like to share this with you because I am confused about pretty much whole internet telling lies about weight loss

It has been established throughout many forums, blogs, articles etc, that loosing weight is a matter of dieting much more than it is exercising and that is just plain simple lie. Please listen to my story:

I am 29, I was always a sports type. At the age of 21 I had to retire from pro-basketball due to severe knee injury and lack of crazy amounts of money to actually repair it. And that moment was when I first discovered that "mainstream beliefs" may be completely false and that someone is a big F'in liar when it comes to standards in medicine, and science overall.

After an in-game injury (I just fell, like taking a sniper shot to the knee) doctor told me that my knee is completely destroyed - Femur, tibia, meniscus, all shattered. And that I need a serious intervention not available in my country and it needs (at the time) around 30.000 Deutsche Mark or Euros, cant remember the currency at the time, to be operated in Vienna or Moscow.

So, playing pro-ball dreams shattered just like my knee, I was asking myself will I ever walk again with a knee like that, being that doctors told me several horror stories about my recovery.

My father, while in a war several years ago, made friends with a dude doubling in alternative medicine (older fella, lived in 80's in Shaolin for several years, now lives in Brazil), contacted him and he came to my city to check out my knee. 6 months of his therapy and year and a half later - I could run, I could even dunk again (being an extraordinary feat cause im 182 cm / 5.9 inches tall). Doctors - "amazed". X-rays suddenly "dont make sense" and cetera

Living in a fu*ked up country, I actually managed to replace sports carer with IT carer and became successful programmer, but I still managed to live a life of a sports person - regular streetball (3 vs 3) matches, weekly football with friends, some extreme sports and mountain climbing and hiking became my interests. Without thinking about it and with the fact that I am IT worker, I had a great body (abs, pecks, whole package) and I never thought about dieting, I could eat whatever I like.

2011 - serious motorcycle crash. I just bought my dream-bike - CBR 600RR, and a dude disregarded my right of way (I was going straight, he was turning) and trashed me completely, destroyed my bike, broke my other leg (fibula + tibia) and I cut my face while landing, 8 stitches.

4 months with leg cast, in just 4 months I went from 182cm/82 kilos (5.9 / 180 pounds) to 105 kilos (231 pounds)

serious fat problem - couldnt get the girls like before, couldnt do my regular stuff, sports, and so on. Even Hiking became a problem this way.

So, I started interesting in weight loss for 1st time in my life, in 2013. My problem was that my stomach could take big food intake but I didnt needed it anymore, like that.

So - I listened to the internet. Apparently the "food" is the biggest enemy of the weight loss. I have read hundreds of articles telling me that "not taking a Twix bar is MUCH more effective than running half an hour and so on" I learned all about Insulin, Ketones, how they replace glucose in brain, how being starved makes you "loose weight by doing nothing" . effects of LCHF, Atkins, Cyclic-Keto, what to eat and what not to eat.

My trials:

LCHF - shi*load of ugly tasting foods, max determination (dont get me wrong, when I decide and start something I go all the way), eating and working, less physical activity cause of overweight, 4 months result - 3 kilos less.

Cyclic Keto - eating Fish, mushrooms, meat, and eggs pretty much (I took notice of fats importance in Keto and followed a program from Livestrong site) was awful, tired all the time, brain hurting, 2 months of it - 3 kilos less.

Counting calories - Ok, lets eat various foods but let's make it less - painful and annoying, 1 kilo less in one month.

Then I ran into this article:

http://sciencenordic.com/exercise-better-health-dietary-changes

Someone from Sweden doesnt agree with 96% of the internet!

All aboard the One-Punch Man train (not literally). I abandoned dieting. I rearranged my whole working routine (advantage is that I work from home, outsourced), and made a different approach. I started doing this (with no regard to ANY advice is it good or bad)

8 Tabata routines daily, jumping jacks, Dips, squats and various other exercises, one of them being Tabata sprints (fatty running down the street, but with a mind of steel)

I eat ANYTHING that I like. Mostly healthy and organic, but I eat Pizza, Macaroni, when I want to.

result:

lost 6 kilos in first month, total 11 kilos in 2 months. Looking MUCH better, all muscles returning to previous form and visuals. After initial burn pains of Tabata and the mental pain, I completely changed my mind-set regarding exercise. I feel extremely joyful, and looking forward to every time-mark where I need to go and train. Tabata's make it so that organize my work time and free time. Only disadvantage being sweaty and hyped 8 times a day.

Have we become a world of Puss*es, where Food corporations and Health organizations propose dieting over exercise just by the sheer fact that people nowadays THINK it is too hard to train, and that regular people cant pull it off ? Why is the idea of "eat less, eat this and that, much better than training" even real, alive .. ? Why are there many people even in this community that propose such stance ?

I would like to hear you thoughts on this, and please share your opinions, and thoughts about this. Cheers from Igor

 

[MrNiceGuy1]

I agree with you, Ritza, since I don’t wholly subscribe to the notion that diet is more important than exercise either, particularly the 80/20 rule.

Granted, each has its respective benefits, regardless of whether one is aiming to improve their fitness or reduce their level of body fat, but neither should be dismissed in favour of the other.

The term ‘dieting’ is something that I’ve never subscribed to either, as I learned a long time ago that the ability to increase or reduce body weight is largely dependent upon the intensity of exercise (whether it be cardio or resistance), in addition to understanding that the calories obtained from whole-foods simply support those aims.

Moreover, by eating a wide and varied whole-food diet, low in saturated fat, the body is able to benefit from the various properties that those whole-foods provide.
On occasion, I’ll also enjoy the same kind of indulgent foods you’ve mentioned without guilt, but that’s because I know that my regular food choices and intensity of my exercise allow me to do so.

Having studied nutrition, exercise and human physiology since my early twenties, the knowledge I’ve accumulated has allowed me to understand not only how the human body functions but also how modern day culinary tastes affect 21st century waistlines.

As for your Tabata regime, it’s unsurprising to hear about the progress you’ve made, as anaerobic training does strip excess fat, since it’s utilised as fuel once glycogen reserves have been depleted.

Concerning your ‘puss*es’ remark, I’d suggest that it’s more a case that 21st century living and eating habits have allowed a sense of laziness to endure, something that has led to the huge increase in ‘fad’ diets and emergence of the food and diet industry as multi-billion £/$ enterprise.

Due to the fact that 21st Century life is lived at pace like no other before it, those living within it are looking for equally quick resolutions towards their weight-loss ambitions, allowing them to get on with their busy lives.

Despite insistence to the contrary of diet companies, sadly there isn’t one, other than eating a sensible calorie/portion controlled whole-food diet and under-taking regular exercise (the more intense the better), since the human body simply hasn’t evolved sufficiently to meet 21st Century culinary tastes.

 

[AngryPanda]

Eat less will help you lose weight, but the thing is half of those diet plans are not sustainable (not to mention expensive or weird tasting) and you end up gaining it back as soon as you are off it. Exercise helps with digestion and metabolism (for me at least) not to mention overall health, it is sustainable and have a longer lasting effect.

I think the problem is America is very food centered. I see ads about food on TV, we reward and celebrate with food, we socialize over food, and we tried to get healthy only with food (since exercise takes time and is all sweaty blah blah blah). I usually watch everything on internet with Adblock on, but when I'm visiting relatives and watch TV with them (where you can't skip ads), it becomes so obvious with a food commercial every 10 minutes or something. And as I was setting up my weightloss plan I was like "ok, I need something not-food to reward/indulge myself when I reach a goal" and...... I couldn't came up with anything (except shopping, lol, but that's a whole other problem for a different forum maybe).

I've always been a nerd and hated the idea of sweating and exercise (when I lived in other countries I had to walk everywhere, so it was unintentional exercise, but in US where I drive everywhere, I actually have to set aside time, naaah). I have lost weight pretty successfully with diet but gained them back within a few month, it took me a while to face the truth that exercise is needed (not only for weight loss but also for general health) and it took me about a year of forcing myself to do it3 times a week before I stopped hating it or feeling like it's a hassle or punishment.

 

[Ritza]

Exactly my point - Once people "break their limiter" (yeah, I love One-Punch Man very much ) of mental pain caused by exercise, it becomes even joyful and fun to do it.

My first Tabata's were a horror. doing the 6,7 and 8th series in one Tabata felt like I was dying, no - felt like being tortured. and on top of that I programmed myself to do it 8 times a day like that.

Now - I only feel the extreme burn of Tabata, not the mental pain that was with it at the beginning. And being such an amazing exercise, I managed to increase my muscle volume: dips for example, larger chest, even though exercise should be considered Aerobic but is actually both (Tabata increases Aerobic and Anaerobic feats which is amazing)

Panda you are right about us as a civilization being food centered and that is ruining us, specially when we became a civilization of chair-sitters and only a small percentage of people are actually doing something physical for money.

MrNiceGuy - thanks for your post, I sincerely thought I was going to be bashed with my stance on the topic, but your reply was really a nice thing to read, thanks for the support