I had a friend who was a vegan, she was fabulously fit, tall slender and beautiful. Obviously Vegetarian was the way to go. She gave me a copy of Skinny Bitch, which turned out to be a hard core dose of Vegan doctrine. Horror stories of slaughter houses, mixed with a good spoonful of "shame on you for eating meat you fat ass." I attempted to be a vegetarian for about two days, but found that I felt horrible, and was eating more carbs than ever before. I'm sure proponents would say I was doing it all wrong, and vegetarian is not the same as vegan, but I won't go back.
Then I had a friend who struggled with her weight for a long time, and finally found something that worked for her. She was looking amazing and it was very obviously working. She directed me to The Primal Blue Print (a version of paleo). I read the book and felt convinced, this was the answer. I jumped right on board and lost 5 lbs the first week. Cutting carbs made me feel less moody, and less tired. I felt satisfied and never hungry, and hey I lost 5 lbs! But week two came and I lost nothing, and I was starting to get really tired of food, eating was becoming a tedious chore, and I wasn't feeling quite as chipper as I had the week before. Then week 3 I lost it, not weight, my mind. I hadn't lost any more weight and I was feeling awful, depression set in hard. It could have been the loss of fun foods, or the fact that I wasn't losing weight, but I think it was the loss of carbs. I found an article online that talked about how some people are in fact "carb cravers" and even though reduction in carbs is supposed to lead to less anxiety and depression, it can actually increase depression in these people. So I gave up and had a scone and felt like myself again.
When I was younger (17) I lost weight in the popular teen way and starved myself thin with good workout purge every day. I got down to 128 at my thinnest. It worked. And honestly some days I feel like this is the most effective method. But when I think back I was a gooey sort of thin, no muscle definition, which is what I really want. I find a nice hard body super sexy. I want to look fit and active.
I had gallbladder surgery about 5 years ago and prior to surgery I had to go on a strict low fat diet. It was intense and miserable, and I hated it, until I shed 28 lbs in two months, I felt amazing. I continued that path for several months and went from 199 to 175. I felt incredible, but I had plateaued and I was feeling diet fatigue. Again it was getting kind of boring. I was used to the life style change, but I wanted to be able to treat myself too sometimes. Unfortunately sometimes turned into most times, and over the winter I gained back 15 lbs. Then another winter came with a summer of no weight loss and I gained back 10 more lbs. Now here I am at 197 (according to my home scale). I thought I had kicked my emotional dependency on food, but like alcoholics you don't ever really leave it behind so much as you spend a life avoiding your vice. The sometimes threw me right back into my bad habits and then my unhealthy relationship with M&M's.
The clearest definition I have heard is burn more than you consume. Some diets will poo poo the idea of low fat saying it's not good for you, some diets will poo poo calorie restriction, while other hail it as the miracle cure for obesity. In my experience low fat/ portion control work. I'm not saying the other diets don't work, they just don't work for me. Which stinks, I mean who doesn't want to eat bacon and burgers all the time?
So my current plan is to cut back, and work on portion control, burn more than I consume and cross my fingers. My Fitness Pal came up with a calorie pal for me based on my height, weight and activity level. Simple enough... I hope..
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