Weight loss…which method??

[Kirstineridesagain]

Considering PCOS can affect your fertility it is remarkable that the PCOS gene didn’t die out. However there is a train of thought that the struggle to lose weight helped women with PCOS during times of famine and the gene was able to be passed on when women who didn’t have a PCOS either died or lost so much weight they couldn’t have babies.

Interesting. I was diagnosed with it in my 20s but then had four children (first one after a course of treatment, can’t remember what it’s called but it helped me to ovulate). I have had regular periods since my first pregnancy. My mother tried to get pregnant for three years before I was born, and then had twins a few years after that. She was never diagnosed but I suspect I inherited it from her. I think there are degrees of severity with pcos - my only symptom was irregular periods (and some painful cysts). But I think I have an issue with regulating blood sugar and have fainted (very rarely though) from and early age.

 

[Aperchristmas]

But put thirty people on bread and water for two months and some will lose 30lbs, some will lose 7. Etc.

I think this point is often overlooked when people get a bit moralistic about weight loss. When studies have been done, what they find is that some people lose lots of weight quickly, some people lose very little weight in the same period, and obviously there's everyone in the middle of the extremes. But imagine you are someone who, after being in a calorie deficit for 3 months, only loses 1-2kg. All that work, all that hunger, impact on your hormones etc for negligible weight loss. Can people not understand why that would be so hard to maintain? Also it's not good for you to be in a calorie deficit for long periods, but if you're one of the people on the unlucky side of the bell curve that's what you have to do.

I will try to find a nice graph to illustrate my point.

Anyway for myself, I have to really restrict my calories to lose weight and it's miserable, but I will have to do it as I am now overweight again but not heavy enough for e.g. Mounjaro. Here we go

 

[Lois Lame]

When I started calorie counting and trying to meet the recommended daily allowances of healthy things I put ON weight

I just realised my reaction might have seemed odd.

What I meant was, cutting down too much can slow our metabolism. If we feel and look terrible, that would be an indication that that was happening.

 

[Kirstineridesagain]

Lost a kilo. At least that’s one down, not another one up! So feeling a bit more encouraged now.

 

[palo1]

I have struggled to lose weight over the last 5 years; I have been slightly overweight using a BMI measurement though fine acc to the waist/height ratio. I believe fundamentally in eating healthily and I really want to be within a healthy BMI - for health and vanity! I am very nearly there thankfully but so many strategies and approaches have been useless to me!

The ONLY way for me to lose weight without feeling awful is to have ridiculously low calorie meals consisting mainly of protein and fibre. With this approach I have plenty of energy, am not hungry, don't crave things and lose weight consistently but not especially fast. Many, many people would say that I am absolutely not eating enough calories tbh but I have friends who have reported the same. For me, the calorie deficit must include particular foods but I don't really understand why and I'm reticent to discuss how few calories I'm eating. I don't think it's just me; I think the nutritional advice we have been having for the last 50 years is dire. Everyone needs something different and I suspect many people don't need the calorie intake that is widely suggested as healthy but I am not a nutritionist so I do sometimes wonder about it all!