The Anti-Food Dilemma

We're pretty much culturally indoctrinated to think that all weight problems relate to too-much-food intake. That the real exercise needed for weight-loss is "push-aways". So it seems like a no-brainer that if you want to be thinner, you eat less.

This concept is so ingrained in most of us that even when we KNOW, intellectually, that we need to eat calories 'near' our basal metabolic rate in order to prevent our metabolism slowing down, it is often difficult to do.

Even though we may KNOW that for our body (this is my case) we need to eat regularly throughout the day, the more often the better, still, STILL!!, it is difficult to do it. At least for me. I'm working on that.

So, from late May to earliest June, I actually ate food. Not perfectly, no, forgot my supplements, should have had more water, failed the eat-every-3-hours test, but in general, every day I ate around 3 times. I was just restarting lowcarb eating. My calories should have been higher but they weren't terribly low.

I recovered from my months of high carb eating, and lost 24 lbs the first week, which is merely water/glycol of course, not fat. When I dropped the carbs, my body dropped the water it holds to process them.

From early June to the end of June, my eating sucked. There were a few days that I ate a few times and made it to nearly 2000 calories, but by few I mean... maybe three days out of that month. Most the time, I forgot to eat... I might get a couple slimfasts down a day... I just wasn't getting nearly enough calories. The new ketosis had killed my appetite, plus I'm lazy for cooking, and I have some issue with not-eating as a control thing I think (working on it!), so suffice to say, my calories were way too low and my eating frequency was too.

On June 5 I weighed 379. But in the whole of June, I varied from around there to 390, all over the map of that range, back and forth, as if my body couldn't decide what to do, and refused to go much under that. Usually when my eating fails like that, I don't vary so much, I just don't lose anything at all. Period. By the end of June, my weight was 378. Four weeks, 1 pound. For someone who allegedly has a BMR of nearly 4000 calories a day, and was only eating <1000 for nearly a month, that is not quite simple math.

Late on July 1 I decided to get with the program and really start eating more regularly. It still was imperfect, my calories still low, but I made more of an effort to eat more often and/or to eat more food each day. The next day I began that time of month, so my weight went up 10 lbs which is normal for that. I kept on working on eating more regularly. Even if that meant having a couple tablespoons of peanut butter, I tried to eat SOMETHING every few hours.

As of today, five days later after I began eating halfway decently again, my weight 'whooshed' from 388 (well, 378 if you remove the TOM water gain) to 370 -- finally for the first time breaking that seeming roadblock range. The only difference is that I finally started eating more calories, and more often.

I have seen this repeatedly over my several cycles of lowcarbing. If I don't eat enough, I don't lose weight, even though my BMR is allegedly over 4000 calories (hahahaha). When I make a POINT to eat many times through the day, and at least a couple thousand calories, the weight begins coming off.

Since this contradicts the idea that if we just eat fewer and fewer calories we'll get skinnier in no time, I thought I'd make a point to post about it.

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Click on the pic for Pink's Video. It's a spoof of modern females in the media and the body obsession.

What do you guys think about the blog in blue and green? I'll probably change it back eventually to the red/white/orange/yellow it used to be.

370 is a new record for me. The last month, with my weight seeming to go up more often than down, and me having the worst reaction of not-eating partly in response to that, I was getting SO demoralized about it all.

I'm excited for my progress again. Finally!!

PJ

Faint-by-Number

Many of the people I read online (such as in forums) are really, really concerned about what their scale says each day. More than concerned. Some folks if not actually bound and gagged would be weighing themselves by the hour. Hoping for a better number. Despairing if it doesn't show up. The more someone weighs themselves, the more they seem to be psychologically affected by it (which is logical, as the degree of their psychological stress about the subject is probably what determines how often they weigh themselves).

Now if we were talking about what the scale said in general, like for a few days running, this would make sense to me. They are working toward better health and fitness, so obviously, being able to see they lost or gained weight matters.

But every day? Twice a day? More??

The body is a great part fluid, which is pretty heavy. And the exact percentage and quantity of that fluid varies, with many factors involved. Some of these factors are well known: The fewer carbohydrates you eat, the less your body will retain water. The more sodium you ingest, the more your body will retain water. The more water you drink, the less your body will retain water. When my Monthly Mess is about to arrive, the body in its need to dilute and rinse out the womb, collects massive water in the tissues to be sure it has it available.

There are 4,982 other reasons for "fluctuation of fluidic levels in the body," of course. They are all secret. Only 3 people know them, and they would have to shoot you if they told you.

Now given this situation, and given that our food and liquid intake varies a little, the body and external temperature varies, the precise amount of exercise varies, the hormonal levels (of both men and women) vary, and with most scales, even the way you stand on it might make it vary, it seems to me the general lesson here is something like:

It varies.

I understand the need for feedback. If one isn't observing results, re-evaluating strategy, and implementing change when needed, then it isn't much of a plan.

But at some point you gotta ask yourself, is my monitoring serving a purpose of correction and/or inspiration? Or is it causing me more angst in the long run, with the constant variations?

I think psychology plays a great role in weight loss and change of fitness level. Weighing is supposed to be a realistic feedback and, hopefully, at least occasional inspiration. I have seen people who are actually losing weight, consistently week by week, who literally spend at least half of their days per week stressed and worried and guilty because so often the number had gone up slightly instead of down. Well when the overall trend is good, but a good number of daily weighings make ya feel bad, then the psychology is now more harm than help. I call the scale obsession the "Faint-by-Number" plan.

I see people in the forums saying things like, I ate this and that and today I'm two pounds heavier! So I guess food X is bad for me! -- er, well you know, maybe, maybe not. Might have had more sodium. Might be an intolerance issue. Might be one of a zillion other even unrelated factors. If it was 7500 calories in the middle of the night then ok, it might have made you fatter. But otherwise, small weight fluctuations are going to happen just like mood fluctuations do: they are both about the balance of the body, which is not a static thing in one place, but a dynamic process constantly re-re-adjusting to homeostasis. I also see the opposite effect: Well I ate birthday cake last night and I'm down half a pound this morning so it's fine! Heh. Well, you know... the longer-term numbers, and whether carb cravings knock someone off plan, will tell.

I'm not saying the Faint-by-Number approach is inherently wrong; some people really need that constant feedback. I'm just saying that I observe it is demoralizing when weight loss that is not rapid is approached that way, as their comments indicate.

o0o

For those who would really like to weigh EVERY SINGLE DAY I thought this might help. You can download free here in Excel format a simple spreadsheet that will not only let you track your weight, but will give you a 3-day, 7-day and 10-day "average" of your weighings. This is an idea I got from someone else I cannot recall the name of now (sorry). It allows you to see the "trend" of the weight change, not just the daily numbers. Also there is a page that automatically gives you a little graph of your weight as well. There are only a few tiny instructions, to set the date and graph for your unique numbers, they're on the sheets and easy.

Folks who already have spreadsheets, or are tracking their weight in a free online place like fitday.com won't need this, but for those to whom spreadsheets are greek, it might be helpful. Click on the pic below to download the spreadsheet file, save it to your hard drive, and then open it in Excel. If you don't have that program, try Open Office, an awesome office product that has the equivalent of all MS's stuff, FREE, and will open Excel (as well as Word docs, Powerpoints, etc.) just fine.

Click on the pic below to download the xls file. Save it to your disk (remember where!) and open it in a spreadsheet program.

Now look at the averaged columns. Note that on the (fake) date 6/3 our (fake) person gained half a pound. But the 3 day average shows 0.1 lb lost since the last measure; the 7 day average shows .3 lbs lost since then; and the 10 day average shows 0.6 lbs lost.

So on days when you feel like freaking out because your weight is higher, consider the larger "trend." Look at how the numbers move in the averaged columns. Much less "wiggle factor" than the day to day weights. When the 3 day, 7 day, especially 10 day, averages are moving, then you really know that it's more than a variation or fluke, you're not just guessing. If the larger averages aren't growing much, relax a little. It MIGHT just be the normal variations of the body. :-)
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