Dieting advice

[Wishbone]

Okay I'm in my late 30's and for the first time in my life I need to go on a diet. I have lifted weight's 3-4 times a week for the last 20 years without interruption. I'm fine with my upper body but have developed a stomach.

I'm 6-0, 185lbs. and want to drop 20lbs. by summer. My question is I've been on a crash diet where I drink a glass of milk for breakfast, eat a banana for lunch, and eat a very small healthy dinner and have doubled up my stomach crunch's. I started this a week and half ago and I've lost 3 lbs. Shouldn't this be quicker???

Now I don't expect overnight results but for those of you that have dropped this type of weight what can I realistically expect?

[ronronnie1]

You have till summer, so chill. Don't do crash diets. You'll lose weight/flab, but it won't last. This sounds lame/corny/whatever, but you have to make lifestyle changes. If you're drinking regular Coke/Pepsi, switch to diet. If you snack on cookies/candy, quit. It's really that simple. Also, keep doing the crunches like you've been doing. By Summer you'll have a flat stomach. Heck, by early Spring you'll have a flat stomach. If nothing else, there's always liposuction. Good luck.

[native]

You've been lifting for 20 years 3-4 times a week and weigh 185 lbs at 6 ft. That's not bad at all. Your goal of losing twenty lbs at that height will be very hard to do but it can be done.
First let me tell you that you can't spot reduce fat loss. So doing crunches in hopes of losing stomach fat won't work. Fat is lost from head to toe. If anything you are strengthening your abs but only making them bigger (hypertrophy) and it will make your stomach look larger because of the increased size in your abdominals which pushes the superficial fat outward.
Continue to lift the weights but I would start doing HIIT, tabata, complexes. Essentially these are workout methods that give you very little rest between exercise sets. The nice thing about this work out style is you are in and out of the gym in under 30 minutes. Look up these styles of training.
Now the question of diet. I'm guessing your 3 lbs of weight loss is due to somewhat decreased food but mainly due to decreased Na and glucose in your diet. Na holds water & decreased glucose will decrease your muscle size/glycogen stores. You have to eat to lose buddy. If you need carbs in your diet then start front loading your carbs in the AM and decrease or cut out after 5pm. If you do eat carbs make them green in content except in the AM where oats or whole grains can be eaten. Increase your protein intake, omega 3 & 6 Fa's & water intake.
This is only general info. I could talk all night on this stuff. If you want more info I can help you with some informative sites and articles. Good luck...

[old okie]

Crash diets make you feel as if you're 'really' doing something, but they just don't hold over the long run.

Several things my family dr. advised: limit fats, count calories, drink plenty of water, skip caffeine as much as possible, always have breakfast [just select your choices carefully], limit fast foods, keep up the exercise [and add more aerobics to your routine], give up the soda/coke/pop [whatever you call them], but don't "deprive" yourself. If you're really craving something, eat it, BUT reduce the PORTION size.

We have adhered to such a routine for years, and it really works.

Good luck w/your goal. It is a realistic one as you've given yourself several months to get there.

[Wishbone]

All good advise so far guys, I really appreciate it! Btw, the crash diet is a temporary thing to try and drop weight as quick as possible. I hoped it would happen fast and then I can obtain a more normal diet plan to maintain. I have cut out all junk food and soda's which I was very addicted to. I drink only water, milk, and a lot of non decaffinated tea.

I have never ran in my life. Just never really needed to until now. Everywhere I've read it seems like running may help me the most. With the upcoming cold fronts on the way it may be a bad time to hit the pavement for the first time. So I will wait until it starts to warm up for good and give it a try.

I will use you tips and advise and keep you posted. Thanks again.....

[Oh GAWD the Smell!]

Six feet tall and 185...And you lift weights 3 or 4 times a week and have been for a couple of decades?

That doesn't compute. I'm 5'11" and when I'm 185 you can see my ribs. 200 was a comfortable weight for me when I was lifting, and my abs looked like moguls. If I weighed 185 right now, my mom would be showing up at my house every day with a couple of pot roasts and some apple fritters while asking about my health.

But I'm a big meaty guy with shoulders a mile wide...I guess if you're a naturally thin person all over, that's not much of a stretch....So I guess you can ignore this post

[kevinpate]

Ok, someone my size is probably the last person in the metro to give out deiting advice. On the other hand, it is possible I know what to do and simply do not do it.

As for your crash diet, there is a reason that term is used, and it's not because it gets you a date with a much younger Angelina Jolie.

small meals, 4-6 a day, balance the nutrition, exercise daily, alternate cardio and endurance routines, everything in moderation, including ease out the caffiene you're still dealing with.

By the by, the rate you are dropping is not alarming, but I really would not suggest you escalate it. Big fast drops are for folks who must do it and have it to do, and it isn't actually a good idea for the chubbabubbas like me to get all crazy with it either (not that this is a real concern for me personally.)

Luck with it. Weight drop is in my future, to make sure I have a future, but it will be a slow methodical process, somewhat necessary when the appropriate time frame and the total weight to shed are long term matters.

[Hawk405359]

No, it shouldn't be going quicker. Weight Loss doesn't move on the path of the Biggest Loser.

Odds are, with your exercise regimen, you don't really have that much to lose. So what you have is going to be slow coming off. You can't spot build either, any weight that comes off will come off from the easiest place first, and the stomach is the hardest place.

[ronronnie1]

^^^I'd like to second Hawk's input. The last 10 pounds are the hardest to lose. Also, forget "weight," but rather focus on body fat. You may find that you gain weight, yet lose body fat.

And I've joked around with this before, but seriously, liposuction is only like $3K to $4K depending on the situation. A lot of doctors will do it under local anesthesia, but you have be stern for them to agree.

Whatever you decide, keep at it & good luck!

[gmwise]

I think the reasons for dieting needs to be look at too.
If you're doing it for yourself or health reasons, and not some romantic interest or some image you think you should have.
It will be hardest for you otherwise.
As in life if its genuinely desired it will happen.

[SkyWestOKC]

Reduce salt. I'm not on any sort of weight-loss diet, a buddy of mine is, he has cut his salt consumption in half and has lost 15 pounds in a about 3 weeks. Not sure if that's healthy - doesn't sound healthy to me, but that would be a quick way to crash diet. Just stick to the recommended values on salt, carbs, and calories for your height, weight, and levels of activity. Keep active. Regardless if you lose the weight or not, just exercise anyway.

[gmwise]

Salt I think encourages water retention/weight...could have been that.

[PennyQuilts]

I'm thinking if you are accurate on your stats that you'd have to disolve muscle to lose weight!

[rcjunkie]

In the past 18 months I've lost 75 lbs, my best advice is portion control and exercise. If I craved something I ate it, just cut down on quantity (pizza, 1 or 2 slices instead of 5 or 6), etc;, the biggest and most difficult thing I changed was to stop drinking soda pop, I use to drink Dr. Pepper and Mt. Dew by the quarts, haven't had either in over a year.

[gmwise]

I think its best to portion control more so then totally denial of a item.

[SkyWestOKC]

As Type I diabetic I use the portion-control diet. People think I need to cut out all sugar etc., but that is pretty far from the truth. 2 donuts = 60 carbs. 2.5 bowls of cereal (cheerios) + milk = 60 carbs. Either way, it's the same amount. Just watch what you are eating.

[rcjunkie]

If it taste's good--spit it out!!

When my Cardiologist first tried convincing me to get it shape, I told him I was in shape, because round is a shape, he laughed a little, then proceeded to guilt me into losing weight.

[flintysooner]

Take a look at SparkPeople for a good (in my opinion) site with tools for tracking nutrition and fitness and sound advice.

I think I would have been much better off had I never dieted period. But long term consistency is what is needed.

[RedDirt717]

Eat more often.

Crash diets dont work because it jacks with your metabolic burn rates and causes your body to store food when you go back to a normal diet.

Eat 4-6 small meals a day.

A yogurt cup for breakfast, granola bar and glass of skim milk snack, lean turkey sandwich for lunch, beef jerky snack, chicken breast with lemon sauce for dinner.

Add a more rigorous cardio routine to your work out schedule, Also add squats to your lifting routine. Instead of doing crunches, do hanging leg lifts until failure, it burns more calories and gives the abs a much better workout.

I've been blessed with freak metabolism, I'm 6'2 185 pounds but I've been a gym rat since high school football and have heard and seen some dramatic weight transformations through a variety a routines. Smart diet and smart exercise work every time. Add in a few days of nothing but stretching and light yoga and you'll be in ship shape in 3 months.

[mooshie]

From the info you posted, it sounds like you only do one type of ab exercises. Doubling up on your crunches are great an all, but you should really consider different exercises for your abs and core. I find that one of the best resources for exercise tutorials now is on youtube. For example YouTube - charliejames1975's Channel . After doing some daily workouts from her videos, I find myself getting sore despite regular working out my core.

[ImTheDude]

You need to stop the "diet" that you are doing right away, that is terrible for you. Your body is going to start storing up fat with you just having a glass of milk and banana for the the first 2/3's of the day. Eat some oatmeal/greek yogurt and fresh fruit for breakfast and a couple of other low fat small meals through out the day.

[ronronnie1]

If you can learn to eat less for the rest of your life, that would be optimal. There was a study not long ago that showed those who eat less live longer. What happens is that your metabolism slows down (good thing,) and people with slower metabolisms tend to live longer. Skinny people have slow metabolisms while fat people have fast metabolisms. Your size determines metabolism - NOT the other way around.

I'm always amazed at those infomercials touting their product that speeds up metabolism. I just sit there in wonder knowing that it's the opposite of what is healthy.

[gmwise]

But RR...

[RedDirt717]

But RR...

You wanna take this one?

[Of Sound Mind]

If you can learn to eat less for the rest of your life, that would be optimal. There was a study not long ago that showed those who eat less live longer. What happens is that your metabolism slows down (good thing,) and people with slower metabolisms tend to live longer. Skinny people have slow metabolisms while fat people have fast metabolisms. Your size determines metabolism - NOT the other way around.

I'm always amazed at those infomercials touting their product that speeds up metabolism. I just sit there in wonder knowing that it's the opposite of what is healthy.

Ummmmmm... care to back up your counter-intuitive statements with any actual citations of science and research?

As someone who has spent the last year very focused on this very issue to achieve my goal of losing more than 100 lbs by year's end, I've done quite a bit of research on this topic. Your perspective stands in stark contrast with 99.999999999% of all the experts (doctors, nutritionists and research scientists) that I've read, watched and visited with.

By the way, I made my 2009 weight loss goal just before Christmas. 106 pounds lost since Jan. 1, 2009. Still working on another 35 by the end of this year. And it wasn't because I got my metabolism to SLOW DOWN.