Llanero's Obese to Normal Thread

[Llanero]

One year ago I quit smoking.

Awesome, right?  No more stinking hair and clothes, stained fingertips, and wasted money (and the whole dying early thing).  Yeah.  But what is not so awesome is my weight gain.  I knew I would probably gain some after losing the cigs, but I figured it was a good trade off since smoking is worse for my health than being overweight is.

So on the 1st anniversary of the day that I quit smoking (July 1st,2010) I started a new weight loss and management program. 

My weight on June 30th was 212 lbs.   Officially obese with a BMI of 30.4. 

Dang, it was worse than I thought. 

My goal is to get to a normal a BMI, so I need to get my weight below 174 lbs.  So I need to lose about 40 lbs. 

Wow, ok, no problem right?  I just need a good plan. 

I will try to lose about 2 lbs. per week.  That means I should reach my goal right around... Thanksgiving, the national holiday dedicated to over-eating.  Nice timing huh? 

I came up with a there part plan:

1.  Intermittent Fasting in 24 hour cycles

I have done IF before and it worked really well to allow me to lose 20 lbs.  the length of the fast really hasn't been a problem for me.  There is hunger involved of course, and some tiredness, but as long as I don't cheat by eating a little snack, the effects are manageable (ignorable).  If I do cheat and eat a small snack during the fast, then the hunger becomes severe and irresistible. So absolutely no cheating!  On fast days, it's water only.  I quit my first IF program when I stopped smoking so I could focus on that goal exclusively.  Now I am excited to get back into it, so I started my first fast on midnight July 1st.

2.  Standing instead of sitting

This is something new I am trying.  I read somewhere that when a person sits, their Lipase levels drop by 90%.  I have no idea if that is true or not, but since I want to lose fat I think it is worth a try.  Besides they say your chair is killing you, which seems unlikely, but I don't see how standing can bad for you except for sore feet.  I been mostly standing for about a week now and my dogs have been barking every night.  Dr Scholl's help but there is still some soreness.

3.  Cold showers every day

This is also something new and is what lead me here to the forum and the Getting Stronger blog.  I am hoping that the cold showers will result in thermogenesis and help me avoid the dreaded weight loss plateau.  So far I have found the showers to be a remarkably unpleasant experience.  At least they are during the shower, afterwards I feel great.  My response to the cold has been the involuntary heaving breathing and flexing.  I haven't tried laughing or singing yet.  I ususally stay in the shower about 8 minutes, but I think I could stay longer if I wanted to.  There is a threshold around 5 minutes or so when the experience changes from "OMG, what level of hell is this?" to "yeah it's cold, but not unbearably so."

Well, there's the plan, and the results so far:

week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI Yehaw!  I not officially obese anymore!

[Todd Becker]

Welcome to the forum, Llanero.  And congratulations for having the courage to make your goals public.  That actually helps with motivation, I think.

Your approach to weight loss looks quite sound to me. And your initial weight loss should make you feel good.  My only caution is not to let fluctuations or stalls in progress affect your determination.  The focus should be on the steps you are taking, not the immediate results. Sometimes you may be doing all the right things and you may not see immediate progress.  And sometimes you have to change or enhance what you are doing to break through plateaus.  I've written about this in my post about plateau busting.

Good luck and I hope you keep us posted with your progress on this journey.

Todd

[Llanero]

Thanks for the welcome and thanks for the advice Todd.  I think you are right on the mark;  I am only weighing once a week for my "official" weight and as of this week my weight is 207.

207?  Wasn't it 206 last week?  Yep.  But I am not worried since that 206 last week was after a day of fasting and the 207 this week was after a day of feeding.  Also even though my official weights are the ones taken on Thursday evenings, I did weigh a couple time unofficially, once on Thursday morning before breaking the fast and once on Friday morning just beginning a new fast today.  On Thursday morning I weighed 204 and this morning 205.  But like I said above, Thursday evenings are the official numbers so here are my results so far:

week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI
week 2 207 lbs. 29.7 BMI

Overall I am happy with the results so far.  I wanted to have lost 4 lbs. by now, and I have lost 5.

[Llanero]

Time for another weekly update.  I am down to 204, so I am 2 lbs lower than my goal for the week.  The numbers are moving in the right direction and the fasting and standing are not really a problem.  The cold showers however are getting harder to do.  I find myself hesitating when it is time to get in the shower and it seems like the cold threshold that I talked about before is happening later now.  I usually don't feel "warm" until about 7 minutes in, up from 5 minutes in when I first started.   I thought it would get easier to do the cold showers but that really hasn't been my experience so far.


week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI
week 2 207 lbs. 29.7 BMI
week 3 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI

[SUGARDUDE]

I haven't played with the thermal loading for awhile but it appears from reading the blog of Ray Cronise that by simply lowering your normal environmental temperature you can substantially increase the pace of your weightloss.  But if you don't have the diet under control it doesn't matter.

Cold showers are definitely an experience but for purposes of weight loss you probably want to find other ways to add to the effect like sleeping without blankets, walking outside with less clothes, and lots of swimming (but this increases hunger so be careful).

You can check out Ray's blog here: http://hypothermics.com/home/

[Llanero]

I haven't played with the thermal loading for awhile but it appears from reading the blog of Ray Cronise that by simply lowering your normal environmental temperature you can substantially increase the pace of your weightloss.  But if you don't have the diet under control it doesn't matter.

Cold showers are definitely an experience but for purposes of weight loss you probably want to find other ways to add to the effect like sleeping without blankets, walking outside with less clothes, and lots of swimming (but this increases hunger so be careful).

You can check out Ray's blog here: http://hypothermics.com/home/

Thanks for the link, I would like to check it out but it looks like registration is required.

[SUGARDUDE]

Yeah but it's free and yoy only get e-mailed when he puts up a new blog....which isn't that often.

[Llanero]

Yeah but it's free and yoy only get e-mailed when he puts up a new blog....which isn't that often.

I did go ahead and register and I am reading through the blog.  There is some very interesting material there.  Thanks again.

[Llanero]

Ok time for another update:

week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI
week 2 207 lbs. 29.7 BMI
week 3 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 4 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI

Yep, 204 same as last week, but remember that because of my alternate day fasting and feeding, some weights are taken on fast days and some on feeding days.  Yesterday was a feeding day.  My weight was as low as 202 on one of my unofficial weigh ins.

I am still doing well with the fasting and avoiding "cheating".  I have had some soreness in my lower back.  I have been standing most of the time, but I will sit on a medicine ball to rest sometimes.  I think that is what is making my back sore.

I think I have figured out way the cold showers seem to be more difficult now than when I started.  Less insulation, DUH!  I should have realized that right away.    Humm.  When I get down to my target weight, the showers will be even more uncomfortable than they are now. Oh joy. 

Anyway, I have started to take a stopwatch into the shower with me and I make sure to stay in for at least 10 minutes.

Also, I have noticed that I seem to be getting more acne.  Not a lot more, just a few whiteheads here and there.  I am wondering if the cold water could be causing that by making my pores close or at least get smaller to prevent heat loss.

[Todd Becker]

Llanero,

Nice, continued progress on your weight loss.  It's good that you recognize the fluctuations for what they are.

Regarding your back pain, what about some strengthening exercises?  I've found that gradual strengthening using a weight machine has been helpful in preventing and reversing back pain.  The key is to build up very gradually over a period of several weeks, and to combine this with stretching exercises such as yoga.

Many people taking cold showers and baths report a benefit to their skin and hair, and I've found this in my own case.  So I'm a bit puzzled by the acne breakout, but sometimes "detoxification" can lead to a temporary outbreak. In my own case, and that of my teenagers, a generally low carb or low glycemic diet has eliminated acne.  Some have postulated acne as a form of insulin resistance or diabetes of the skin, whereby the skin as an organ is unable to adequately handle sugar.  The initial effects of eliminating sugars can be a temporary reactive acne, but eventually the skin becomes much healthier.

http://insulin-resistance-acne.wetpaint.com/
http://www.dermaharmony.com/adultacne/dietinsulinandyourskin.aspx
http://www.spatrade.com/spa-blog/acne-vulgaris-diabetes-skin
http://thepaleodiet.com/dietary-cure-for-acne-book/

I would be surprised if losing a little fat really reduces your "insulation" by enough to make the showers more uncomfortable than they were when you started losing weight.  I weigh 50 pounds less than you and I don't mind cold showers after the first 15-30 seconds.  My water temperature is about 60 F (15 C).  I know a number of people thinner than me who take showers colder than I do and they aren't uncomfortable.  So the comfort factor must have to do with more than fat around the belly or water temperature.  I think it comes down to habituation and to some extent mental attitude. If you do something uncomfortable willingly and with the anticipation of a beneficial after-effect, you can tolerate it much better than if it is forced upon you unwillingly.)

Looking at this even more generally, pain and pleasure are conditioned by culture, experience and attitude. 

One suggestion to improve your experience, which may seem counterintuive, but is supported by the opponent-process theory of emotion:  Try to get the water even colder at first (no higher than 60F/15C), and shorten the shower if necessary.  Colder water will lead to stronger thermogenic warming. It is this warming effect, which persists for at least an hour after you get out of the shower, which is the real sign of whether the cold showers are working.

[Llanero]

Another week.

The back pain is completely gone, so no further action is necessary there.  I think that pain was just my body adapting to the loss of my office chair.

The acne break out is gone too.  It could have just been a coincidence, for now I am not going to worry about it.

This week I did get a painful gout attack.  I am not surprised really, the last time I was doing IF I would occasionally get attacks.  I am pretty sure it is because I am losing fat and producing more ketones.  For now I am controlling it by just drinking a lot of water and some lemon juice.

I am not sure how cold the water in my shower is.  I want to measure it but I keep forgetting the thermometer.  My guess is that it is about 63F since that is the average temperature where I live.  It is as cold as it can get, I just turn on the cold water only and get in.  Does your shower run colder than 60F?  What is the average temperature where you live?  Can the shower run colder than the average ground temperature?  I need to remember that thermometer so I can post some temperatures next week.

The showers are still very uncomfortable.  The first 2 to 3 minutes are the worst for me.  At around 7 minutes it gets much better.

The fasting is still going well, my hunger has not been severe on fasting days.

For the weekly update: 

week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI
week 2 207 lbs. 29.7 BMI
week 3 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 4 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 5 201 lbs. 28.8 BMI

[Llanero]

some interesting things since last update:

I measured the temperature of the water in my shower.  I was surprised to see how warm it really is, 78F!  That is almost 80F, I can't even call that cold in good conscience.  Now I feel like a total wimp for acting like that water was really really cold.  But now the showers are much easier since I know they are not really cold.

The gout hasn't been a problem this week but I did notice that I have a bruise on the back of my knee.  One day last week when I had a gout attack, I notice a pain that seem to run up my leg from my gouty toe.  I am pretty sure that the bruise is related.  Gouty phlebitis? Anyway since the pain is gone, I am not going to worry about the gout either.

week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI
week 2 207 lbs. 29.7 BMI
week 3 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 4 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 5 201 lbs. 28.8 BMI
week 6 202 lbs. 29.0 BMI

Uh oh, I am of track for my weight now.  I should have only weighed 200 this Thursday to be on track. I am not going to worry yet, but it is a little disappointing.

[Todd Becker]

Llanero,

It's good that you checked the water temperature.  You are right -- 78 F is definitely not cold!  My showers typically run 60-65F in the summer, below 60F in the winter.  If that's too cold for you, see if you can get there in increments of 5 degrees.  The thermogenesis will really kick in once you start to get cooler.

Your weight loss trend doesn't look bad to me.  You have to expect up and down fluctuations week to week.  Overall, you are still in a down trend.  That might be easier to see if you try graphing your weight as a function of time.  I think you can still fit a line to it.  Over the 6 weeks, you've lost 10 pounds, so you are averaging more than 1.5 pounds weight loss per week.  If you keep it up, you should be at 192 pounds by the end of September.  Slow and steady wins the race.

Gary Taubes has written about the possible connection between gout and and insulin resistance linked to carbohydrates in the diet, so you might consider cutting back on insulinogens like carbohydrates as well as fructose-containing foods, for both the weight loss and to avoid gout:

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/blog/2009/10/05/gout/

[Llanero]

Thanks for the link about gout Todd.  Fortunately, the gout wasn't a problem last week.

60F to 65F is the temperature that I would expect unheated tap water to be.  Mine is much warmer than that for some reason.  My guess is that it is because it has been hot here this summer with day time highs usually over 100F. Just about all of our water here comes from surface reservoirs so they are probably heating up and the water is probably not spending much time in the pipes underground.  As autumn approaches the tap water should get colder and I can take an actual cold shower.

Program updates:

Intermittent Fasting - Very good, I have been sticking to the schedule very well and only had one "cheat day" in which I broke the fast early. Only one cheat day out of 25 fast days is in my opinion very good discipline.

Cold Showers - Not so cold.  I thought about just going back to regular showers but decided against that since as winter approaches my showers should become colder and more effective right around the time I that I will probably be reaching a weight loss plateau.

Standing - Poor.  I have almost completely abandoned this part of the program. I still stand more than used to but I am sitting most of the day again.  

week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI
week 2 207 lbs. 29.7 BMI
week 3 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 4 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 5 201 lbs. 28.8 BMI
week 6 202 lbs. 29.0 BMI
week 7 199 lbs. 28.6 BMI

Yay, an official weight that doesn't start with a 2.

I am pretty satisfied with my results so far.  I am only one pound over goal for this week.

Also, I am working on a chart with a trendline to include in future updates.  

[Llanero]

Quick update for the week:

week 0 212 lbs. 30.4 BMI
week 1 206 lbs. 29.6 BMI
week 2 207 lbs. 29.7 BMI
week 3 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 4 204 lbs. 29.3 BMI
week 5 201 lbs. 28.8 BMI
week 6 202 lbs. 29.0 BMI
week 7 199 lbs. 28.6 BMI
week 8 198 lbs. 28.4 BMI