How I Lost 50lbs (22kg) in 6 Months
June 4th, 2011, 8AM : After seeing a rather disgustingly thick layer of dust settled on my scale, I stepped onto it. I held my breath, waited a few seconds and looked down. It read, 302 pounds (137kg).
The *bleep*? I stepped off. I stepped on again. It read, 304 pounds (138kg). I jumped off the scale and decided to quit while I was ahead. I turned to the bathroom mirror for affirmation. Having always had a poor sense of self image, the thought ran through my mind, ‘I don’t necessarily want to vomit any more than I typically would otherwise.’ How could this have happened? How could I be 28 years old and weigh over 300 pounds?
You don’t need a medical degree or a best-selling trilogy to tell you that your body requires food to live. As with most necessities, one can assume that when food is scarce, humans will go to extremes to secure it. This can be observed in both riots throughout history and a Friday night meal where Mom didn’t prepare enough Stove Top stuffing. Have you ever gone to the grocery store, shopped, brought your haul home and then thought, 'I need to eat x and y because if I don’t then he/she will eat it?’ Competing for food with a modern twist wouldn’t you say?
It is my belief that if you have gone even a single day where you have not had the means or access to food, you will retain a type of scar from that experience. Not knowing when or where your next meal will come from will result in overeating for obvious reasons. During my pregnancy with my son, I was in a rather bad situation. I was 20 years old and lived on my own in an area where I knew no one. I had lost my job and due to a lack of funds, I had no hot water, no electricity and a limited supply of food. While I was overweight before I ever became pregnant, I strongly believe that this experience has made losing weight a greater challenge.
With the back story and the science lesson out of the way, let’s talk about diets. Well before I hit the 300 pound mark, I had already tried several methods to lose weight. So many diets are marketed these days : Weight Watchers, Atkins, Zone, Master Cleanse, South Beach, etc., none of which ever worked for me. So why did these diets fail for me? I like bullet points. Do you like bullet points?
- I had no support system
- I couldn’t afford the food
- The diet was hard to stick to
- Disappointing weight loss results
- I was making temporary changes
So let’s go back to June 2011. What did I do about my weight? I read. A lot. I took notes. I feel like I should receive some sort of honorary nutrition certificate for having put so many hours into researching what foods do to your body. I compiled a list of “symptoms” that I wanted to see resolved and some of the symptoms I identified I knew were the ones I needed to take care of first. At the top of my list was fatigue. Logic told me that taking midday naps did very little for my weight loss. So why was I always so tired? I wasn’t eating enough, of course. Yes, that’s right. Miss Piggy McFatFat had been eating only one meal a day and it was junk with little protein and lots of carbs. Sleep, game, spaghetti = fat. Negotiating with your body’s metabolism is tricky. You have to have enough of the right fuel in the tank to burn fat. A large part of my weight loss was attributed solely to creating a 3x3x3 build for my daily eating routine. I ate every 3 hours, had 3 full meals and 3 snacks throughout the day. (Ex : 6am breakfast, 9am snack, 12pm lunch, 3pm snack, 6pm dinner, 9pm snack)
But Genna, you can’t expect us to believe you lost 50 pounds in 6 months without exercising. Believe it. You can always “out-eat” your exercise. I have a recumbent exercise bike that I absolutely love. I do about 6 miles in about 30 minutes when I feel like working out. Did I bike while dieting before? No. Why would I stress about working out when biking for 6 miles wouldn’t even burn enough calories to combat a Big Mac? Exercise is great for maintaining your weight or getting your heart rate up (which is what I was using it for), but it is not going to be the bulk of the reason for losing weight when you are clinically obese.
Right now you are thinking, “I bet she ate overpriced organic produce and all of these bland pieces of cardboard”. During the 6 months I dieted, I didn’t even eat the healthiest foods I could be eating. I ate dairy, carbs, meat, fast food and drank soda. I simply found my basal metabolic rate aka BMR (the minimal number of calories your body needs daily to sustain life in a resting state ie : not exercising) and limited my calories based upon how much weight I wanted to lose. A female (that’s me) who is 5 feet and 7 inches tall, weighing 300 pounds and is 28 years of age burns appx. 2136 calories per day just by resting. A pound of body fat equates to approximately 3500 calories. So if you have a calorie deficit of 500 calories (meaning that you burn 500 calories more than you eat each day) you would lose approximately one pound per week: (500 x 7 = 3,500) So I came up with a figure I could live with : 1700 calories per day and I went with it for 6 months.
Well, if you were to look at a picture of me today, you’d say, “she’s fat” and you’d be right. I am fat. I am still fat, but I’ve lost 50 pounds. I have also cured my high blood pressure, increased my mobility, fit in an airplane seat and can shop at two stores in the mall where before I could shop at none. You would be surprised at the side effects from being able to wear more than just black drapery from head to toe. Stop staring daggers at the thin girls who get to wear the cute stuff and make a life change.
I am continuing to lose weight and am now working on integrating healthier choices into my routine. This is merely a “Part I” of my weight loss journey. I spent some time to write this little blurb because I’ve gotten a lot of questions on my Twitter and Facebook whenever I mention how much weight I’ve lost. This seemed to be the easiest way to get it all out there. I am not a “blogger” per se and I’m quite certain I have not made this reading experience pleasant, but thank you all for reading nonetheless. Hopefully, in another 6-12 months I’ll have reached my goal of weighing under 200 pounds. That should be something worth writing about.
Please feel free to comment below or ask questions and I will do my best to answer them.
Note that I am not a doctor and you should always consult your physician before embarking on a change in your diet. What works for one person may not work for everyone, but this is what worked for me when nothing else would.
