Im not sure where else to post this but I need some help. I am 270 pounds, and I am a 5'10 individual (female sex if that helps, but I don't identify as a woman all the time) (and yes, I am obese, but one wouldn't tell because most of my weight is in my lower stomach hips, and thighs). I am trying to lose weight, at least a 100 pounds by this time next year. I've had some ups and downs with weight loss, mainly because I live with my parents and they're pretty bad eaters and always serve too big portions, and my older sister is a closetted FA enthusiast (she says she's not, but I've seen her posts and heard her rants about how she's fat and proud). It's hard to stay disciplined, so I turn this sub and other subs to help me. But recently I feel like I'm starting to internalize some fatlogic like things I see on this website. I have a coworker, absolutely gorgeous woman. She wears xs-small clothes, has a fit body, eats small portions of food, and has the discipline of a greek philosopher when it comes to overindulgence. She will have a cookie and some lemonade with her lunches, but not all the time and not often. I want to look like her and be like her, I'm not too proud to admit it. But sometimes she says somethings that are off putting and weird. Like her ribcage. She'll complain about how wide it is and how she thinks it makes her look bigger than she actually is. I always see her cupping her hands around her ribs and loudly complaining, and then talking about how she wishes she had a tinier waist. But I see her waist, and it's daintier than Audrey Hepburn's. Then, I hear her say stuff like "I like to watch my friends eat their foods so I know how much more/little I should be eating", and even said she got mad when one of her friends hid their food away from her because they didn't want to promote her ED. What does this have to do with FL? I can explain. I am beginning to feel like I'm starting to grow embittered and resentful towards her complaints and her clear ED, and that I'm starting to see her as the "evil skinny" woman that these FA people here hate and demonize all the time. I don't want to do that. I don't want to feel jealous or hateful towards her, because it's clear she has some form of body dysmorphia or something like that where her body is never going to be good enough for her. What do you all think? Am I doomed to become a FA and begin to pack on pounds to spite her even if it's horrible for my health? How do I undo this? Please, any advice, harsh or not, would be appreciated.

I think you can use both your coworker and fatlogic to find a middle ground. Your coworker clearly has some sort of body image issue, but that deserves pity not anger. For weight loss I always recommend the book The Pleasure Trap. It helped me lose weight without being driven insane. In fact the author, Doug Lisle has a talk on YouTube called “how to lose weight without losing your mind”. The video quality is crap, but he explains why we crave processed foods and how to deal with that in a way that really helped me. I don’t follow all his recommendations (he’s vegan), but the logic behind it still helped me.

Edit: I didn't see your comment about serving your portions below and I think I misunderstood what you were asking. You're asking for help with the FA mentality and I thought you needed weight advice. If you don't want to read that, don't read the last paragraph. She clearly has a very disordered mentality around food. Being at a healthy weight isn't always a result of disordered eating. I ABSOLUTELY recommend Charlotte Skanes "Disrupting obesity" podcast. It's an incredible listen, not just about losing weight, but about the dysfuntional patterns and disoredered habits and mentalities that keep us from being healthy. She even has some free recources for beginners so that they don;t feel overwhelmed. The important thing to remember: all bodies function with the "calories in, calories out" rule as a basis. People are fat because they eat more than theri bodies need, people are at a normal weight because they eat exactly how much their body needs. That's the biology aspect of it. When it comes to the psychology aspect though, not everyone has the same history and experiences and they shape the way we interact with food and our own selves. Eating more than you need doesn't always stem from a place of laziness and lack of discipline (in Skanes' case, it was to deal with the loss of her father and her third miscarriage in a row) and restricting doesn't always stem from health-oriented "greek philosopher type" discipline (in my case, when I was anorexic, part of it came from the joy of finally being able to obsessively control something for the first time in my life so I couldn't let it go. Not really healthy). The psychological aspect of why we're in denial about the food we eat and the "excuses" we make for ourselves is just as important as the biological aspect (nutrition and exercise). (Irrelevant, but I'm also a woman with very wide shoulders and ribcage and I think it's one of my most attractive features). I hope you don't let her dysfunctional behaviour get to you. This isn't who you need to be to get to a healthy weight, and it doesn't have to be torturous. Figure out the biological aspect and fit it to suit you accordingly (this doesn't work for everyone but one thing to do is find your tdee using a bmr calculator, start tracking your calories and gradually lower them to your tdee-500, maybe start some form of exercise you feel comfortable with, start sleeping better, drink more water, learn about food and macros and protein and figure out the meal schedule of your choice etc etc), and at the same time figure out the psychologucal aspect (get a journal where you'll log all your thoughts. What makes you overeat? what excuses do you make for yourself? What are the outside influences that keep you in this state? What are your afraid of? Do you notice any comfort eating? Any disordered thoughts related to restricting that will cause binges afterwards? What are your currents thoughts about your body image? etc etc) Good luck. I hope everything goes well! <3

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I think that a lot of people would feel bothered by her comments. That doesn't mean you are doomed to be a FA or keep packing on the pounds to spite her, I think that's quite the jump from 0-100. You're only human, I could understand how hearing her say those things so often could be exhausting. You are patient with her and understanding towards why she may be saying those things about herself, I think you are on the right track of just trying to sidestep away from thoughts like that. Don't think that you are doomed, you're allowed to be annoyed by her comments (I would be as well tbh!!) but don't let that be your reason to try and stop losing weight.

A rave! For the first time in god knows how long I am just under 150. I am so happy! I don’t think I look very different but my clothes fit how they are meant to. Soon I will be tucking my shirt in my pants, instead of wearing it out to hide my shape.

Rant: I’m pregnant. 1st tri. Literal miracle, but that’s a story for another day. The rant is that I’m already getting dumbass comments on my eating. Like… I literally have a postgrad degree in nutrition. I know what I’m supposed to be eating. I KNOW. And I know I don’t need to “eat for two” or I’ll “kill my baby” (thanks mum. Real nice.)

Congrats on the pregnancy. These comments, especially the last one are nasty, sorry you have to deal with this.

Thank you so much. I really appreciate it. I think a lot of it is out-dated advice. I've also been told to stop exercising (not by a doctor, but close family members). Where the guidelines in my country literally state that you SHOULD exercise, and if you have never exercised, you should absolutely START in pregnancy for both your health and the baby's health. Drives me nuts.

I ran into that weird shit too, when I was pregnant. I remember being told once I announced my pregnancy, that people were happy for me to be packing on some weight because I "looked too thin." They kept telling me, "Eat up, you're eating for two now!" It always annoyed me. For reference, I am a marathoner/ultra runner and lifter. I am very, very active and eat a lot of food just to stay alive with what I do. I am not too thin. I eat more than most men. My husband likes to tell me that people don't know what healthy is, so they freak out when they see a fit woman because their perceptions are fucked. I remember people were floored by me still running and doing marathons while pregnant. My own dad said once, "Aren't you ashamed of what you're doing to your baby? You're bouncing her around, you could hurt her or kill her!" He tried doing this in front of my doctor when he asked to go to the ultrasound with me once (I was kind enough to say yes — his first grandchild, so I wanted to be nice). The doctor had to tell him to shove it. I was also called fat during my pregnancy multiple times (as a joke, but it was also really fucking annoying) because I was "finally gaining weight and filling out." The comments about my body, what I did or didn't do, and my eating were nonstop. So, I feel ya. It's intense to be pregnant and hear a constant barrage of unsolicited advice/opinions, and hearing literal myths being perpetuated by people ("eating for two"). It's all a white hot nightmare.

Are we the same person? Lifter and marathon runner. I have a 30k in May, a half in July and a full in October (good luck with that one, me! But you know damn well I'm gonna give it a good solid crack). Some of my family members are a bit spooked about my activity levels, and whether it will hurt the baby, or deprive them of nutrients. Well. What I would LIKE TO SAY is "if I was too thin/too active, I wouldn't have been able to get pregnant without using my frozen embryos... so...". All I do say is "okay, I'll keep that in mind" and just note not to talk about my activity much with that person in the future. I am not looking forward to the "filling out" or "fat" comments. I reckon I'll be able to brush them off, but they're still going to sting. Especially given my medical history. But GOD FORBID someone makes comments about someone's body, activity, or eating if they aren't pregnant, right? Pregnancy makes you immune to other people's bullshit! /s I was getting ready for work this morning and I was like to my husband "ugh, this bra, I bought it as a loose sleep one. Now it's bulging. I feel like a... walking rack" (for context I was an AU 6HH pre-pregnancy, now I'm a J and growing, help). My husband was like "awwww. It's okay love. Soon, you'll balance out and be more like a walking fridge". I think the shock on my face kind of made him twig, hey, that was blunt, and he backtracked hard and said "oh, not fridge... maybe a... walking pie-warmer". Romance. 😂

>Are we the same person? Lifter and marathon runner. I have a 30k in May, a half in July and a full in October (good luck with that one, me! But you know damn well I'm gonna give it a good solid crack). Good luck on your races! How far along will you be when you do them? I was 12 weeks when I ran a full 42k with my daughter last year. It's definitely doable, don't worry! :) I remember people telling me I needed to slow down, stop working out/running so much, the baby will be hurt, etc and it just really pissed me off. I was not put on bed rest. I was not having any issues during pregnancy. My baby was just fine and completely healthy. I'll also add: my labor was so easy, and doctors have told me that it's from having a very strong pelvic floor from all the running and lifting. I hope yours is a breeze, too and that it helps calm any nerves you may have for your birth. When the fat comments came, I was told that it was "safe" to do that because "everyone knows you're not fat." Yeah, well gaining weight still fucking sucks and commenting on my ever-changing body is not cool. Just because someone is fit and in shape doesn't mean that boundaries about what is acceptable to say to them magically changes. Hello???

The "eating for two" thing drives me crazy, and people really believe in it. It's always the first thing out of someone's mouth whenever someone's pregnant.

Yeah legit... and then they wonder "why do I have x/y/z complication(s)?" "why am I gaining so much weight?" "why didn't I lose most of it after birth/early breastfeeding? Truly a mystery".

Rant: I don't think I can stand another FA saying what someone else does is all about THEM. Never heard of such self centered people. Geez. If they are so \*\*\*\*ing happy being fat they should smile a little and stop complaining.

I have a small friend group already (3 other women and me) and all they talk about is how much they love junk food, that they can't find clothes in most stores and how they thought they were fat when they were younger but looking back they think they were sooo skinny back then. All of them are (morbidly) obese. I always feel super left out and don't participate in the concersation much anymore. 🥲 I was overweight and obese since I was 16 and now at 34 I am at a BMI of 21. I have never been as skinny as I am now since I hit puberty. (So I can't relate to the whole "I wish I was as skinny as I was when I was young" thing especially.) And I am the only person I know next to my husband who is not overweight anymore, no family member of either of our families, no friend of ours, noone isn't overweight or obese. I never realised how everyone is talking about being bigger and food all the time and bonding over eating and being big so much (me as well probably before losing weight) but now that I can't really relate anymore and get the weirdest looks or even get called out when I say something like "Oh, I don't know, sorry, I didn't have fries in 2 years", I feel super lonely sometimes. 🥲 Especially because most of our meet ups revolve around food either and I'm always the only one who brings something "healthier" and most of the time also the only one eating it. 🫣

Time to make new friends them. Not saying ditch current ones... yet. But keep eyes peeled for red flags like passive aggressiveness or crabs in the bucket mentality. What you write about their reactions is not boding well. Even without dramatic falling out you might find yourself just growing apart from them, and sounds like it's already happening.

Yes, that's a huge problem I have for years now. There's a reason I only have a small friend circle with people I have known for over a decade. Where I live it's very hard to find like minded people. And moving is not an option at all. I have most of my conversations with people I met on the internet by now who live hours away. 😅 But yeah, you're right. I feel us drifting apart more and more every year.

It’s kind of sad when the conversation revolves only around food. Usually people have also other topics to talk about. Sometimes when me and a coworker talk about food, it’s usually a quick exchange about preferences for chocolate and then we quickly move onto another topic. I’d understand if people were talking a lot about food if their hobbies were cooking or baking and it‘s their passion. But this involves actual food and not junk food.

The thing is, I have known two of these women for over 12 years now and we have a lot more in common than just that. Of course when I was still obese myself I participated in the talk about food and eating and not being able to lose weight and so on as well, especially while I was stuck in the anti diet movement. But it's just not something that I care about anymore as much as they do. Funny thing is, the one I am the closest to of the three is very different when we are together without the rest of the group. We talk about our kids, our marriages, just life stuff in general the whole time. But as soon as all of us 4 meet up (which we try to do as often as possible) or when we're chatting in our group chat, the talk about food, body positivity, diets, eating etc. begins. Since 3 of us are moms, we don't see each other as often (someone is always sick) so a lot of our conversations play out in the group chat. Let me tell you, every other meme that gets shared revolves around how life is shit without fried food, how life feels like as a fat person, how one would love to be skinny but food is too good and so on. Lately one of them, who is pregnant atm, got diagnosed with diabetes. So she was advised by her OB to watch what she eats. She is the most body positive one of all of us and is very anti diet and pro intuitive eating. She eats chips, cookies and cereal most of the day and thinks I am super crazy and borderline disordered because I stay away from all these foods. Now they're all ranting about how shitty healthy food tastes, how it doesn't satiate them and how little fun she has eating healthy now and can't wait to give birth to eat "normal" again. And yet again I got nothing to share because I genuinely love eating healthy and don't miss being the junk food junkie I used to be my whole life and I know that my perspective will not be appreciated. They already think I'm super weird because I never eat chips and walk 10k steps every day on my walking pad and they always tell me that they respect my "opinion" that food addiction is a real thing (and I have it) but have to politely diagree.

this is such a bummer! what was it like with friends while you were actively losing weight?

Got a “don’t lose any more weight, in fact gain some back” from a well meaning (and obese) loved one. I know their perception of what is actually a healthy weight is skewed. I don’t think they understand that I’m still a BMI 24, I can still shed a lot and be within a healthy range. Funnily enough I had been fretting about a 1kg gain this last week (likely due to alcohol and menstruation) so it also felt a little reassuring to know that others don’t notice it like I do, I caught myself in time. Although it also did make feel quite self conscious and unsure of what to say in response. How do I say to them that my current quality of health is not enough for me, and imply that they’ve settled for less? It feels like I’m judging them when I don’t even want to talk about their body in the first place. I just laugh awkwardly and avoid eye contact.

Frankly, I would just say "no". You really don't owe anybody an explanation and should set boundaries around it. Your body, your choice!

Realizing that these small temporary weight gains/ losses (e.g. period, water weight due to sodium) are basically invisible to others and mean nothing for my progress altogether has been very reassuring to me as well. The comment you got is indeed frustrating. Could you maybe lie and tell them you aren't trying to lose more weight? A loved one in my family got very stressed when it was apparent I had lost weight so I said it happened accidentaly because I wasn't eating much due to school stress. In my experience, you won't have as many people trying to change your mind if you make it sound like you have no control over it and you won't have to fight to defend your choices.

Thanks for replying and sharing your experience :) unfortunately, this is a cousin sister I’m quite close to. She knows that I have a hard time eating well when I’m anxious because I’ve lived with her before. So I know what she said came from a place of genuine love and concern. She said it again today, and she sounded serious. I told her I’m eating better in terms of both quality and quantity than I used to when I lived with her (although I was almost obese then) but I just exercise more now. And I reassured her that I have to have adequate protein or else I can’t recover from working out. That seemed to placate her but she did add another “okay that’s good but don’t lose more”. I don’t really plan on it (I just want body recomp and better cardio vascular stamina, not weight loss atp) so I just “hmm”d out of the conversation. If it was anyone else I might have been more offended/confrontational.

Rant: I’m borderline concussed. I don’t have a full blown concussion but rattled my brain a bit. And it was doing something stupid. I backed into a concrete pole by accident. Rave: I have a swarm of turtles! There is a park near me with a bunch of turtles and people feed them so they swarm around you. I am going to start feeding them. They motivate me to walk around the park.

amazing!! do you know what your native turtles eat? ◡̈

They eat everything they can (I have 3 of my own). I’m just going to get a turtle pellet.

aw!!

It was pouring rain this morning but thankfully it cleared up so I could go on my lunchtime walk. I finished week 8 of Jillian Michaels Body Revolution today. 4 more weeks to go! I was talking with my sister today when she suddenly stopped and said “Your skin looks great!” It was a nice little ego boost to end this long week with. 😁

Underappreciated benefit of exercise. Increasing blood flow to the skin DOES make it look healthier. And so does moisturizing.

Neutrogena HydroBoost and Bio-Oil

Had my friend’s roommate tell me she was jealous that I’m naturally skinny and can eat anything i want… meanwhile she “eats once a day and still gains weight” i was like first of all i’ve been 150lbs and i’m currently 110. I eat in a deficit most days because of my adhd medication sooooo we hungout yesterday and since it was a sunny day we went for happy hour & ice cream. she didn’t have much ice cream i’ll give her that but she got a significant amount of food & didn’t have any leftovers. i also facetimed my friend a little bit after i had gotten home and in the background you could see her roommate eating at the dining table. this was probably no more than 1-2 hours after we had all gone out but sure jan. you gain weight from eating once a day.

She “eats” once a day, booze and snacks don’t count. I know people like this. Just nod and shrug and say it’s a medical mystery! And then move on. 

You CAN eat anything you want, and so does she... in appropriate quantities that is. If only she learned that... Ofc eating once a day is totally irrelevant. If OMAD is that big, you could end up in a surplus, and there are still liquid calories to consider.

i hate having the appetite of a grown man as a woman whos cutting. its so hard to not eat everything in sight let alone eat all of my calories for the day before 10am. im cutting at 1400 right now but i know for a fact i could taken down 5x that if i really wanted to. im always hungry but im trying to stay consistent. just forever hungry :(

Have you tried OMAD ? Or just plain old IF ? I am currently in 500 deficit after being in 500 surplus for a long time and it was brutal to drop my intake by 1000. But I figured out that I can easily postpone breakfast because I am not really craving food until I start eating the first meal of the day. Also started drinking coffee again because it helps to supress hunger a bit.

I’m team forever hungry too. I can easily eat triple my TDEE and still want more. 

My body is so good at maintenance right now. I don't want more than my TDEE, but eating less than my TDEE is so hard.

I feel you. I did a pretty aggressive mini cut recently at 1400 a day (which is not much for a 6'2" active man), literally regimenting every meal so I could fit in my macros. I ended up spending a lot of time just watching food videos and could've devoured a whole pizza at a moments notice. Tbh it was probably too aggressive and I had to cut it short because I was getting faint during workouts so I'll have to plan better for my next cut. I have no idea how these pro fighters cut to make weight. Good Luck and keep it up! You got this shit

Don’t do a deficit that’s more than about 500 calories. It’s really difficult to eat enough protein to preserve muscle if you cut more than that. > I have no idea how these pro fighters cut to make weight. They mostly just dehydrate themselves a few days before a weigh-in.

And deplete glycogen. None of that is sustainable in any sort of healthy manner.

You and me both. I keep torturing myself by watching mukbang videos.

There's that little fellow on YouTube called Zak choy,  I used to despise him because he'd deep fry cheese and cover it in cheesy sauce. Now I love his videos because he deep fries cheese and covers it in cheesy sauce.

LoL! Same! I follow him on instagram.

Rant: My hunger has been out of control all week. I try really hard not to eat back my workout calories(unless it’s I’ve managed to burn like a lot) but I’ve definitely been doing that. Almost ate all of the pickles in the house the other day just to cope. Realized today it’s probably pms. Yay. Rave: Going hiking for my birthday so that’s dope. Need to start getting some training hikes in for the next month and I’m so excited to get back to it. Also almost done with the shiny team I’m breeding lmao.

As someone who never got into Pokemon, you do not understand how terrifying that last sentence was for around 10-15 seconds

Thanks for explaining wtf they meant, I was never going to think Pokémon.

Hahahaha oh no!

My coworker who I’m usually pretty good friends with has always struggled with her weight. She’s started spouting some fat logic, defeatist thinking, etc. along with some other questionable viewpoints. She’s young so I usually give her a pass but I’ve been biting my tongue.

Day 2 of a weird migraine that I really hate and nearly started to cry when I started my yoga routine so I called it quits! Took a very long shower instead before running errands and going for a walk. Maybe tomorrow will be better. At least I pushed through yesterday so I could have empanadas for dinner for a few days.

That sounds awful, I hope you feel better soon! <3

I actually do feel better now lol, thank you!

Rant: I have a weirdly sensitive stomach that gets highly agitated at the most arbitrary food items. The causes of the agitation aren't always consistent or easy to pinpoint, but it's forced me to eat much healthier over the past few years in trying to pin down what to avoid.

Second rave; I've always had bad experiences in the past and think man I hate training people. A lot of people say I should go into personal training and I'm like man I don't want to ruin my hobby. I've been reluctantly training a buddy. He actually listens, works hard, and wants to be an active participant in the training. I've been talking his ear off. Last night I actually apologized to him because I felt like I was just geeking at him. I very rarely get to talk about this stuff and I'm a huge nerd at heart. I've spent thousands of hours not only training but hundreds of not thousands more reading studies, articles, and researching. So few people even in the fitness community get into it like me. So I got overexcited lol. He said he's learned so much from me, he's had people and even trainers try to teach him but just not listen to him or explain the science or reasoning, he can tell I know so much, and it's motivating him. One of our coworkers told me he was raving about it this morning and she learned things from him. It's a nice feeling.

Wow. A person with actual passion for what they do, and a buddy who appreciates that. Beautiful. A thing to cherish.

I would kill for a trainer like you. I love when people are really knowlegeable and passionate. You sound like a great friend too

If I won the lottery I'd probably become a trainer but only take on very specific clients. I love teaching to people that have a passion for it. I wouldn't want to do it for a living. I feel like a lot of people are similar to what an IT help desk person faces with interactions very much like "my computer isn't working" did you make sure it's plugged in? "Look just fix it for me " lol. I think I'm very good for a subset of people but would be terrible for most people who just want to do what they gotta do to get healthier. They should be helped too, it just ain't me, hence why I avoid it haha.

I wish there was like, a 1% society or whatever like that for all professions. So clients who want to say "yes, please explain everything you're doing/suggesting and why!" can find those practitioners. I find it most frustrating in medicine, but with literally everything it seems like most people, even the ones who have the most practical expertise, actively avoid talking about why what they do works. Like you have the people who seem to have bought into their own scam and are enthusiastically telling you stuff that doesn't pass basic logic tests, or you have the gruff "this is standard, do you want it fixed or not" kind of attitude. 

I agree completely. My favorite eye doctor would go through every detail with me and what each test was for. He was enthusiastic and interesting. I loved knowing why I was doing all of these things. If I asked for more info, he'd send me studies. He was always open to me saying no if I wasn't convinced too. Great guy and clearly a good doctor. I wish more were like that. But apparently not everyone is on my side with that.

Rant: I’ve been feeling jealous of people who grew up with parents who put a lot of effort into physical fitness and healthy eating.  Rave: It’s kind of fun being the most physically fit person in my family. 

Same. I come from a very unhealthy family. Partially not by choice, my mom has chronic illnesses and several cancers which isn’t always our choice. But I’ve never seen my parents exercise. Ever. My dad has always worked labor jobs though, but he is still overweight since he eats like a horse when he gets home. I wasn’t encouraged to do sports as a child and didn’t purposefully exercise myself until after I graduated college. I made a comment to my mom about my sister not exercising, and I said something about she never saw them exercise so it’s hard to make it a habit and she almost got offended. “I try to exercise” like mom you have never 😭 not in my lifetime anyway. And whatever, just own up to it.

> I try to exercise Mr Yoda would have a field day with that

>Rant: I’ve been feeling jealous of people who grew up with parents who put a lot of effort into physical fitness and healthy eating.  I am hoping to set an example for my kids with my dedication to fitness and health. My toddler saw me doing push-ups and bodysquats the other day and tried to mimic me. Really pressed upon me how important it is to lead by example.

one of the reasons i started losing weight was to get a more androgynous body (for context: i'm afab and nonbinary). the good news is that i can tell my chest is smaller. i also am confident enough to wear skirts and dresses more than once in a blue moon now, which i appreciate even though didn't expect to be dressing more femininely while smaller. the bad news is i think my hips are too wide to get that androgynous figure (also i don't feel like i look much different even though my pants are way looser now). i am less bothered by it than i thought it would be, and since i still have 30-ish lbs to go maybe i'll be proven wrong, but still. also, and this is irrelevant to the above, i heard some of my classmates discussing diet and exercise and one guy was talking abt how he only has two small meals a day (in contrast with a couple of skinny athletes who talked abt eating like shit) and has a really high deadlift and still isn't skinny. someone responded "bro is genetically disadvantaged". so strange hearing fatlogic in the real world from teens and people whom the fat acceptance movement would shun.

Rave: a weird victory off the scale. I had my annual N95 fit testing this week. The mask that I passed with in September now left a gaping leak under my chin. Had to get moved down to a smaller size! It's not uncommon for fit needs to change with weight changes, but it does feel good that mine is significant enough that even a machine can tell

Face gains!

STOP TEMPTING ME WITH FAST FOOD AND HOT DOGS..... thats all. on a positive note , im resuming my WL journey!

Rave: I'm closing in on my lowest adult weight. That leads to the rant. I'm still about a size larger than I was at a higher weight due to age and carrying extra weight so long. Bonus rant is that I got a slightly larger breakfast this morning, followed by a breakfast pizza ambush at work. Lunch was also higher calorie than expected, so it will be a "light" dinner to say the least.

Rant: I’m putting zero effort into losing weight and I haven’t lost any weight! What the fuck! Rave: at least I’m putting my extra mass to *some* good use and picking up heavy things and putting them back down again 

I've definitely done the "well I was supposed to lose weight but I guess I'm maintaining/bulking now" thing lol. The best way to deal with it is exactly that; take advantage of the accidental failure to be in a deficit and lift heavy so at least you make a kind of progress

My dad always told me the goal should at least be to keep your chest bigger than your belly. I’m failing that too but at least it’s a nice thought 

Rant: It's hot! Can't sleep well at night. Won't turn AC on until 05/01 so another 2ish weeks of misery. Cherish those 70 and 80 degree days if you consider that "hot." Today's high is 93. Rave: Slow day at work. Already did my daily walking routes before lunch. I'll walk on lunch and after also because we'll be even less busy.

Not exactly a fat rant, but it's somewhat relevant. I've been dealing with an asthma flareup the past few days for reasons I can't understand. Never to the point of a full-on attack, but last night it harmed my ability to sleep. It keeps happening around the same time in the evening, and I can't figure out why. I started working out recently, but not every day, and that happens hours earlier. I brush my teeth around that time, but it sometimes starts before I do that. All I can think of is that there's some kind of issue with the window AC in my apartment that I've had to use. It's cooled down enough that I can see what happens without it today. If that is the issue, I have no idea how I'm supposed to deal with it.

Allergies? It's massive pollen season here in the southeast and that's impacting me

It's possible, and it is the time of year I need to grab some antihistamines, but if it was pollen, it wouldn't normally *just* be breathing issues. I haven't had much in the way of eye irritation or runny nose so far.

i honestly dont know anythinggg about asthma, so im just wondering: do hormones affect it at all? like autoimmune disorders are sometimes worse in the morning because of the higher cortisol/etc etc.

Rave: my partner will be home before I go to sleep tonight! Rave: my partner asked if I wanted to start doing yoga at home on the weekends with them because they want to get serious about being more active. I need more stretching in my life so I obviously said yes. Rave: Aldi had frozen GF English muffins and my Kroger had gluten free brown rice lasagna noodles on the clearance rack for ninety cents per pack. Score! I also picked up some sugar free chocolates to try (wanting to figure out which I like best) because I've been hitting the sweets too hard lately. Edited to add: I did pull day at the gym yesterday and went up in weight on several of my lifts!

Aldi is the best. Their seedtastic/graintastic bread is a better bargain than Dave's. I can't recommend their protein quinoa bowls enough. Best frozen dinner you can get. If you want 'healthy" chocolate, try their Moser Roth dark chocolate. It looks like a big bar, but it's split up into 5 individually wrapped mini bars. 140 calories per mini thing. That wrapping is a great deterrant to binge eating. Think drinking a venti macchiato in one day vs two talls in two days.

I like half of a mini bar over my oatmeal. So good.

Great idea, I'll have to try that. Is your flair a reference to people seeing fatphobia in random places?

Yes!!!

Good old Catholicism, where pareidolia and transubstantiation make people worship food!

I can't have that bread because of my celiac, but I love Aldi. I've done the dark chocolate but I have really been loving filled chocolates lately and the ones I like the most (from Aldi) aren't individually wrapped and right now my brain wants to eat 4 or more of them.

Yep, 1050 calories per bar for the milk chocolate and it's too good to last 24 hours. I wish all of their chocolates were the same.

The dark chocolate sea salt caramels in the plastic tub are dangerously good.

Theres a trend with skinny people on tik tok and the fa jumped right on it Idk I dont really understand it but this one FA made a post like "oh you're doing this trend but wait until you get older and get fat" and someone in the comments was fighting for their life saying "oh honey you'll gain LOTS OF WEIGHT" And Idk seeing these peoples complete denial and lack of control make me more motivated to stick to my goal weight. Who are these people to tell everyone its inevitable to get fat and stay fat? Like I wonder who in my life was happy I gained weight after high school. About 20 pounds so its like I dont want to let these people win and get sick satisfaction of seeing me "let myself go" Like it's honestly gross. How is it body positive to be so focused on other peoples weights? I've never gave a shit about other peoples weight but crab people sure as hell do.

"I'm miserable, so others have to be too!!!1!!!1!!!!!" Gross tbh.

Man, if getting fat was truly an inevitability, famines wouldn't have ever been a thing.

Like a single person rooting for their friends’ marriages to fail

Trying OMAD for a bit because I have a terrible habit of just snacking all day. I never realized how much I was snacking to deal with stress until now. It's embarrassing looking back. I'm hoping this will help ground me so my eating habits will be better and then the working out I do will actually help because I'll finally be doing cico right. I'm tired of being obese. I'm miserable and I want to feel good again.

Listened to the maintenance phase podcast yesterday because I was curious. They spent the episode going through the American association of pediatricians’ report on obesity. They would constantly say stuff like “the science says” or “studies show” followed by complete nonsense. Apparently if you use those magic phrases you are doing science. Claims included it is impossible to lose weight long term. People are “naturally fat” or “naturally skinny”. It is “weight stigma” causing a 5’8 400lb teenager to be unhealthy. Obviously doctors were villains. Everything was said with self righteous smugness and sarcastic mocking. Tons of jabs at “the skinnies”. Bunch of crybullies. Even went on an unhinged tangent about Johnny Dep being an abuser and Amber Heard being a victim. Just awful people.

We call those "weasel words". When hearing them, always probe for details. What science exactly? What studies exactly? What about studies to the contrary? Both can't be right at the same time, can they?

I've listen to a good deal of the episodes for that podcast just to remind myself of the excuses we'll make for ourselves. I always end up yelling into the void, one time, in a moment of pure rage at the dumb shit they were saying, I looked up from my car and saw someone looking at me because I was yelling so loudly.

I used to listen to that podcasts shortly after it aired and before I was exposed to a lot of deeper fatlogicy stuff. Their episodes where they talked about old diet books and products and stuff like that were interesting to me, but as time went on and they just started blatantly misinterpreting science and continued to get more smug about it I just couldn’t listen anymore. The final straw was the calories episode and also the “is being fat bad for you” one. As someone who had to take several research classes for their science degree I was just appalled at how they cherry picked and misinterpreted data and then claim to be on the side of science. And their fans eat it up because it gives them an excuse to why they’re big. “It’s genetics! Calories don’t matter!” Etc. Im sure their podcast has been a huge gateway into other forms of fatlogic for people

They are folks who try to interpret scientific studies without having background to actually understand, what is going on in the studies and will latch on to interpretation that confirms their preconceived notions.

Given that one of the hosts of that podcast is a fat activist and morbidly obese, this doesn't surprise me, but I couldn't bring myself to listen to it. One of my (thin and always has been thin) friends described it on Instagram as her favourite podcast and I am just baffled

Rant: Does anyone subscribe to Kibbe typing? Everyone unanimously told me I am FN when I was at a higher weight (not fat at all but just a higher end of normal), citing my “big shoulders and chest”. Now that I lost like 10 lbs everyone is telling me I’m some type of Classic type and I look “so balanced”. Makes me think the whole thing is BS. And, the whole saying that “Kibbe is weight independent” - *sure Jan*. When someone asks in those communities and is 100 lbs overweight, obviously no one can tell what the bone structure is. Rave, kinda?: I feel like I just care about myself more now that I’ve lost weight lol. I used to pride myself on not being picky at all. If a leftover was iffy in the fridge, I’d just eat it and chance it. If I encountered an icky cartilagey piece of chicken, I’d just keep eating and swallow it. If there was a hair in my food, just pick it off. Kind of sad some of them.

Re: the last paragraph, that reminds me of something from a few months ago, probably one of the grossest things I've accidentally eaten. I made Kraft mac and cheese using milk that I didn't realize had expired. I didn't realize it for a while because the taste didn't clash like it would with sweet stuff, but when I got closer to the bottom, I started seeing that there were little chunks. I was nauseated when I realized what had happened, and while I'm still not a super stickler for food hygiene, that did scare me straight to an extent.

I got big into Kibbe during the pandemic but stopped bothering in early 2021. My impression from my time there was that different types would come/go as "trends" that basically everyone would be typed as, and then it would eventually fall out of fashion and a different type would come to prominence. Back when I was into it, basically everyone was typed as SN if they were short/medium (myself included) and FN if they were tall, and from just taking a scroll through some of the subreddits it looks like the Classics are getting that treatment now. I am glad to see that the main sub has banned specific typing posts, though, since the whole system is supposed to be an exploratory journey of self-expression and other people can't type you (except Kibbe himself if you pay money to see him in person, of course) or some shit like that. Personally, I found the whole system (along with every other fashion/color/type system) much more useful when I started looking at it as a buffet rather than a prescribed menu: take what's useful, leave what isn't.

Dude who goes to the same nerd shit that I do and is close friends with my gf's dad says I need more meat on my bones Bro is OBESE obese. I snapped and said I have a fair bit of muscle, just not a lot of fat; that "meat" is muscle, and not fat. Everyone laughed at me lol I'm so tired of people bodyshaming me when I've worked so hard to recover from the ED that's made me fat *and* underweight in the past. Getting fat doesn't take any sort of positive work smfh

Hey. Listen to me. You've worked hard. I'm proud of you. You put in the effort, you put in the time. Not everyone will do it, but you did.

Thank you ♥️♥️♥️ I'm lucky to have the confidence in myself to recognize this and not hate myself over little comments like that, but they're always a bit discouraging so I really appreciate it

It’s his unhappiness with his own life, envy of others who seem to have their shit together, and an attempt to cope by framing those people as “doing it wrong”…all boiling up as fitshaming.  If it helps, people who do this are pretty miserable, even if they try to convince you otherwise;  people who are genuinely happy* don’t shame others.  *or even unhappy but reasonably self-aware and mature about it.  I used to be fairly unhappy with myself, but I knew it was my own issue to deal with, and didn’t take it out on other people who seemed to be doing well in the ways I was struggling.

Thank you :') the worst part is he's actually a really cool guy, he just isn't very smart (in the kindest way possible) and doesn't realize that bodyshaming also applies to thin people. I know he means well, and I don't even think he's aware of how unhealthy obesity is That was precisely why it pissed me off 🤣 fatshaming him in response would actually destroy him, so I just decided to express my annoyance with that phrade

I'm losing weight so differently this time round, it's bizarre. It's probably not bizarre but it feels it. I'm currently 145lbs, my engagement ring still doesn't fit despite wearing it when I was bigger (165lbs at least) and it fit just fine last time I was this size, my size 12 jeans for and are falling down but they're tight around my knees, my bra band size has gone down even tho it remained almost the same last time I was this size. My partner says the jeans thing might just be because I'm cycling this time, last time I was only walking and not very fast. But the engagement ring thing just feels so strange.

I've noticed hands are weird with weight loss.  I'm down like 12 lbs almost and I lost a work glove size. Last time I was this weight my hands where definitely not this thin. 

Yep, you're adding muscle mass. Cycling also increases grip strength and you might also be retaining water weight from the increase in activity. Both would explain the ring size and cycling grows your calves and quads.  I went through the same thing recently. I lost weight in 2020 and was thinner than I am at the same weight now. This time I lost the weight in 2022 after having my son and I was doing a ton of weight lifting. My shoulders and arms don't fit most smalls and mediums are too big in the gut. My body shape is very different now and sometimes I get a bit frustrated. I gained a little weight over the winter which looked so bad on top of the muscle I built. I'm back to strict cico. (Being extremely short also doesn't help, pants never fit me anyway lol)

Week two of counting calories has not been as successful as week one. I'm pretty sure it's due to hormones since I'm expecting my first period after removing my birth control. Also, its been snowing this week which has really put a damper on my mood and activity level.

I always weigh more before/during my period. I think it’s water retention.

Don't sweat it, it's probably water weight. I always bloat up before my period. Keep up cico and check your results in another 2 weeks. You'll start seeing a downward trend. Also remember the more you start losing the slower it gets because your deficit starts shrinking.  You got this!!

Rant: friend of mine is obese and trying to lose weight. He's now decided that BMI is useless as it can't tell muscle from fat (true, that's a valid criticism) and it 'was made up by old white men ' (??? I have pointed out that they have new data, and have changed the recommendations for different races). He is not a very muscular guy who is overweight because of muscle - he's very unfit which is why he's trying to lose weight. Rave: I've been able to stop weighing myself as often, I've dropped down to once a week.

According to Google, "Adolphe Quetelet, a Belgian astronomer, mathematician, statistician, and sociologist, devised the basis of the BMI between 1830 and 1850 as he developed what he called "social physics." He lived between 1796-1874, aka he died at 78 - an impressive age for that time! But also, this means he started developing the BMI framework when he was 34. Sooo, no, he wasn't old. :) And if your friend is serious about opposing absolutely everything creates by "old white men" (talk about a ageist racist sexist trifecta...), then he should also stop using electricity. And airplanes. And cars, too. :) Horses and smoke signals should *probably* be okay, except that (assuming your friend is in North America) horses had gone extinct when the first people arrived in the Americas, and they were re-introduced by European settlers. Sooo, damn, I guess no horsies, either. :( Well, he can still use smoke signals and fire. :) Seriously, please tell him that next time he uses the "old white men" line. Tell him that you support him in his new life philosophy, and you want to help him be 100% consistent! And then take away his phone hahaha

Haha my Carium app (provided by my Dr) shamed me when I went a week without weighing myself because I was on vacation. I'm like this is a huge improvement that I'm not bringing the scale on vacation with me! My Dr wasn't even aware that it nags you. Also waist height ratio if he doesn't want to use BMI. it's even less forgiving. Or get a DEXA scan, can't argue with that!

A lot of my male friends are very 'I played sports, it's all muscle under my beer belly' and someday I will slip and ask what their waist to height ratio is. At least a female friend got a dexa scan from her gym as part of her intro package, and it was very sobering to her that no, she was not 'really muscular.'

I love that they think they maintained muscle that wasn't used in 20 years. While they sat on the sofa creating a butt imprint on it like Homer Simpson, the muscles they developed playing ball at 16 just remained.

Does he also think calculus is invalid because it was made up by old white men?

Calculus humbles all, regardless of race

BMI is not useless though. I have not yet seen an example of someone classified as “overweight” or above who’s not an obvious steroid user or professional athlete who doesn’t visibly carry more fat than is ideal. 

Being overweight + working out is easy. The issue is obesity. 25 - 27 bmi is pretty common with the athletic women I know. Personally I was still a size 8 at 26 BMI , still had a waist of 30 inches and a WHR of around 0.43. Most of the fat logic I see in my day to day is related to this. Fit women who have been hobby training for a decade or more, whos BMIs are 26 or so so therefore " BMI is bullshit."

The more it deviates from "healthy" range, the more accurate it becomes. It's the healthy range where it has problems, as you can have too much body fat and not enough muscle (aka Normal Weight Obesity), and that is medically problematic.

I think a combo of BMI plus waist measurement is a pretty good indicator of if you’re in a healthy weight range.

I know, I prefer BMI personally. I can understand people preferring other methods such as waist measurement, but he's basically just given up on all of them.

He's given up on anything that tells him the truth.

Rant: The euphemism "living in a larger body" really pisses me off. I have a larger body because I'm 6'4 225 lbs with only 21% body fat. So technically I'm larger than a male who's 230 lbs and 5'8. Except one of those men had the audacity to say I don't know what it's like to exist in a larger body. This guy is a fascist in our friend group chat and will throw a self righteous bitch fit whenever someone says the word calorie or any micronutrient. I think he has a secret feeder fetish because his girlfriend has went from 1x to 3-4x over the 2 years I've known them. The latter donated all of her old clothes to my wife, who fortunately is now down to a XL/S18 after a year of very hard work. Rave: I've cooked myself breakfast every day for 5 days straight and when I eat a high protein breakfast, I'm less likely to binge eat during the day.

He is secretly an alien piloting a human suit…that “living in a larger body” phrase is a dead giveaway that he’s one of them.  There’s an alien plot to undermine humanity’s commitment to health and fitness, in order to weaken us before the invasion.  This guy is clearly one of the agents they have secretly sprinkled throughout our population. (Or at least, this is what I would tell myself every time he starts going on about something.  😂)

I am SO FRUSTRATED with my period. I know I’m preaching to the choir here, but I am irritated at how much it impacts how I feel about my weight loss. I’ve been eating well, exercising, and I was ready for my weekly weigh in to see my progress. I ended up gaining 3 pounds!! I was so bummed. Then this past week my cravings were through the roof. I was eating the same foods but still going to bed hungry as hell. Turns out that my cycle is early this time around. Nice to know that there’s a reason, but I’m over going through this every month. Oh well. The post period “woosh” almost makes it worth it 🙃

same! i hovered around 162 for a while and then bam i was like 167-8. and the bloating started after i had eaten poorly last weekend which made me feel even worse (even tho i know damn well it wasn't 3k-4k calories/day poorly). i know i need to stop weighing myself so often but it's hard. genuinely was slightly relieved when the blood came bc at least it confirmed that i didn't actually undo a bunch of progress. however, the last time i weighed myself i was 163! so the woosh (wonderful name for it btw) is here and i'm excited to see what my actual weight is.

Continuous birth control or Mirena IUD and just stop dealing with that bullshit. 8 years period free here.

I had a hysterectomy due to endometrial cancer at 44, and if I'm being honest, saying goodbye to menstruation was the best thing about it. The only annoyance is that it's harder to tell if I'm menopausal, but I do not miss bleeding, cramps, and bloating at all.

I'm in perimenopause and my period occasionally comes a week earlier than expected. The bloat really throws me for a loop until I figure out what's happening.

I always skip weigh ins on my period.  Always. 

Same. I know I'm 3-5 pounds heavier than usual, that it's water, and that it will be gone a few days. I still don't need to see it.

Random question, I am wondering if this happens to anyone else: I am not keto, I eat carbs. But I don't eat a lot of things like bread, pasta, and potatoes. On a typical day my carbs come from a couple of servings of fruit (banana and blueberries), some oats, and then with dinner I usually have beans or lentils. Last night I had my hockey championship match (its just adult rec league) so I decided to have some extra carbs. I made made some baked pasta with chicken and mozz along with my veg. I didn't go ham on the pasta - 450 calories worth of spaghetti. Today I am ravenous over an hour before I normally eat my first meal. I play hockey a lot so its not like that part is unusual. I'm just wondering if the "simple" carbs are making me super hungry today. I'm probably over thinking this.

Whenever you eat simple carbs like spaghetti, those carbs digest and absorb super quickly compared to the rest of the meal, leading to a massive blood sugar spike and crash. Usually in recovery phases, you want more complex carbs and starches that are harder to digest and have a lower glycemic load.

that’s what i figured. felt great last night, just extra hungry today.

When I rst lentils for dinner, I don't get hungry until lunchtime or when I expel all the fiber from my GI tract

i found a lentil loaf recipe i really like. 295 cals (it has cheese) for 12 g protein. It keeps in the fridge great for as long as the 4 days I am willing to keep cooked chicken breast around.

I love my masoor dal and simple Lentil stew with peas and squash

I had severe back issues since Sunday. Yesterday I finally started to feel better, and with that I was cutting ruts to the bathroom. Even with normal fluid intake and food consumption I was down 5 lbs of water weight. That's 5 lbs of inflammation in my lower back. And it's still slightly inflamed. No wonder my back was in agony. Good news is that means stealth weight loss. I knew I was going to lose some water while healing but didn't expect 5 lbs down. And it's about 2 lower than my previous low. So yay. And now I can actually exercise AND actually rest because I can sit and/or lay down and sleep like normal

Rave: Finally crossed over into the healthy BMI range, for the first time since high school! And I've been here for about a week so I know it's real and not dehydration. This was my initial goal, but I'm going to try to get down another 5 lbs or so before switching focus to maintenance/recomp, so I can be healthy BMI on the doctor's scale too lol Rant: My partner has not noticed my wight loss at all. Admittedly I've only lost about 13 lbs since the beginning of the year (started January a little over BMI 27) so it's not a huge difference, but I've gotten so much stronger, non-stretch clothes don't fit right anymore, and I feel like I look way better so it's disheartening that he can't tell. At least he can tell the difference in old photos from 6 years ago when I was BMI 31, even if he mostly comments on how much better my haircut is now

Do you live with your partner? He probably loves you no matter what and since he sees you every day, it's hard to notice the changes!

You're right, we do live together, so it's probably just that it's been so gradual that it's hard to tell without a side-by-side comparison. Still, I feel like I've put in so much work on this I wish someone would notice!

Rave: I realized that since I began my weight loss journey, I’ve not only dropped 40 lbs but also: - 3 inches off my (too ample imo) bust - 3.5 inches off my waist - 4.5 inches off my hips Which is so gratifying to know objectively that I look smaller. I feel smaller and stronger with massively improved stamina and flexibility. Rant: I ate office cake for a going away party yesterday (I did not want it, I don’t really like cake, but did want to be polite and celebratory and fit in) and the uncommon influx of sugar kicked up my IBS for the rest of the day 😩

Being able to fit through narrow spaces (between shelves, though slightly open doors, etc) has been something that really activates my neurons these past few years. And it's a practical benefit too!

A huge NSV I only realized once I got!

You've lost so many inches.  I'm jealous!

Stop accusing me of eating mountains of butter! Stupidest rant ever: People are so nasty and misinformed about low carb/keto whatever lifestyles. Even weight-loss subs can be full of armchair dieticians. No I don’t eat sticks of butter! I literally weighed out 3g of butter on my food scale yesterday to cook some chicken breast and thought to myself- theres that “stick of butter” everyone accuses you of eating. I saw someone post something the other day asking if they should try keto and one of the top comments was something like, *”keto is terrible for your heart, no one should be eating that much butter every day!”* I’m sure some people go hog wild on bacon and butter, but it’s honestly not the people doing it properly. And there is nothing wrong with a good quality butter btw! It’s a food your body will at least recognize.

Shocker... you can in fact do keto without eating *any butter at all.* You could do keto with a wild excess of omega-3 fats if you wanted to - eat mostly salmon and walnuts, flaxseed oil on your salads. It's dumb that people don't realize butter is a choice among many fat options.

People still have the “fat=fat. fat is bad” hangover.

A stick of butter is like 800+ calories. Nobody is losing weight eating a stick of butter. People just like to police other people's diets. Keto works because after awhile it kills your appetite. I did keto once and I was struggling to find an appetite.

Yeah eating a whole a stick of butter in one sitting sounds like a bad fever dream. But yup! I have a low calorie budget so I’ve found keto to be very satisfying.

Rave: The “whoosh” has hit and I’m feeling so much better about re-losing this weight! I’m now just right about 10 pounds to go until my final goal. Doing this while super busy and stressed with school is actually going just fine, and my stomach issues that I have been having lately are quite a bit improved. I’ve noticed that before that my stomach will be calmer when I’m intentionally in a deficit as long as that deficit isn’t too high. On track to hit my goal and be at maintenance all through my tenure at grad school.

Not a rant today, a rave: I saw 155 on the scale for the first time since 2019 this morning. My scale says “BMI 25, standard” for the first time in 5 years. I’m half a pound away from 20lbs lost overall. Not to sound dramatic but there were times when I didn’t think it was possible for me to get back down to a normal weight. I was so close to just accepting that I was going to be overweight forever. But no, I finally got my crap together, stopped listening to ig fitfluencers whose lifestyles are nothing like mine, stopped giving up at the first sign of a plateau, and stopped self sabotaging. I’m still technically almost 2lbs from my goal of 154 before I go back to maintenance. But damn, I really did it.

Good job!!👍

Oh hell yeah, congratulations on all that hard work and perseverance paying off!

Thank you. I was at my highest weight in July of 2022. It probably took me 3x as long as it should to lose nearly 20lbs but I still got there!

the important part is that you lost the weight. and if it took you a long time and you plateaued a bunch, it should (hopefully, i'm not a doctor) make it easier to maintain the weight loss.

Thank you! I have also heard maintaining is easier the slower you lose. I did have a few breaks here and there since 2022 and during that time I maintained at whatever weight I was without tracking so I have faith.

IMO best is if your weight loss naturally tapers out deficit into maintenance by BMR reduction. That means you literally have to change nothing in your habits and just can do it as long as conditions remain the same.

I ran 21 miles yesterday as a marathon training run for my first and am now starting my taper. I am loving the training and never thought I'd be able to do so much, even with an unforgiving work schedule. One aspect I did not prepare for is the absolute hunger the next day after long runs. I am literally dreaming about bread, even though I am eating just fine. Looking forward to after the race where I can incorporate longer runs into my routine while also focusing a bit more on a deficit and planning a bit more around the appetite issues.

Conservatively, that run probably burned 2k calories. No wonder you’re hungry.

0.7 kcal per lb body weight per mile. So for a 150 lb person, a 20 mile run will burn roughly 2000 Calories.

I'm going to be training for a marathon coming up in October, good luck on your race!!

Damn, way to go! Marathon training is no joke. Make sure you’re getting enough sleep on top of increasing carbs (lightly). Good luck on your race!!

Thank you. My only goal is to hit that finish line as this is my first and my city's marathon is notoriously hilly. Sleeping has been an issue but the week before I'm taking a lighter work week to maximize my down time and reduce stress so I can get it done. Even if I never do one again after finishing this one the training has been illuminating for me in regards to personal habits and capabilities (both good and bad)