I used to be overweight because of depression. Depression was caused by gender dysphoria that I no longer have thanks to having an accepting family + transitioning :)

I don’t recommend losing weight the way I did to anyone, it wasn’t intentional and I definitely suffered more than someone has to in order to lose weight, but it did work.

For reasons unrelated to my weight, I was stuck in a tiny mountain town where I had very little food and had to hike 3 miles down a mountain every day for water and food, and would obviously have to hike back up the three miles, while carrying food and water. I also had to chop wood the first 3 or 4 months I was there, because winter was coming.

That was my life for about 5-6 months, when I came back, I was 70lbs lighter, and my cardiovascular was and has never been better than right when I came back. After the year or two I was back, I did slowly start to gain weight again, but keeping weight off is WAY easier than losing it, so I’ve just been conscious about not gaining it back by working out and eating less food when I notice I’m getting a little squishy.

A dedicated conviction and multi year effort to improve myself. There is no dirt secret. You either cut calories or exercise to make up a deficit.

Metabolism and nutrients and all that help. I think it mainly boils down to learning how to be more active and live with being hungry for a while sometimes.

When you drastically cut out sugar, your body burns fat to fuel your cells.

I started with a week or two of counting calories. Then a week or two of eating maintenance calories. Then I jumped off the deep end, got into biking and ate a 1000kcal deficit until I was 30 pounds lighter and obsessed over my weight to the point it probably counts as an eating disorder (they run in the family).

But on the other end of it it was really about readjusting my understanding of portions and my body’s signals and developing the ability to resist hunger when I knew I’d had enough.

Simply stop eating garbage. I cut out processed foods, bread, soda’s and candy. I’ve lost a whole human over the last 10 years and never felt better. I still have chips and dip occasionally but I’m loosing interest. Mixed nuts have pretty much taken their place. We have sweets that are homemade with local honey, and real fruits etc. I’m a lazy sumbitch so no added exercise. If I can do this anybody can. Good luck on your journey.

honestly as someone who was a fat kid and has been fat a few times as an adult i would advise steering clear of all these supplements and drugs that are popular for weight loss nowadays.

not really in an alarmist sense but i feel most of the studies and data i see about the safety of these products is kind of copium. i’m not saying they’re dangerous, im just doubting the certainty that they’re safe in the long term. i would personally rather not take the risk.

for me, honestly, weight was heavily tied to my ego or self. when times were bad my weight was “bad.” breaking out of that involved a lot of personal growth and understanding how people and the world work to better understand how i work.

i recommend two books.

first, the bhagavad gita. it’s cringe ik but hear me out. i’m agnostic/atheistic, i didn’t take it explicitly as a religious text. it taught me a lot about life. i specifically recommend the annotated edition by eknath eswarn as he is a religious scholar who grew up in colonial india and later received an extensive western education. he was uniquely position to reach me personally with these ideas.

second, willpower doesn’t work by benjamin hardy. it’s a bit popsci but i think it’s well informed and makes decent points. it helped me analyze myself more objectively.

When I moved to a vegetarian diet my health improved significantly. But when I skipped cheese from my diet I was finally able to lose weight.

As soon as I eat diary fats like ice cream or cheese my weight tends to explode.

But creamy vegan ice cream is a killer for me too.

During the pan, I lived alone and was single and didn’t have a car. I was stuck at home with tons of free time to fill. I listened to podcasts while walking endlessly around my neighborhood and surrounding area. Over the xmas break, I walked 16 miles in a weekend (my furthest by a good amount). I lost a lot of weight and lost a large belly. It’s back since moving to a different area (not as pretty or safe) and living with a partner who loves to cook large meals. I’m not getting real exercise anymore.

Weight loss is all about “calories burned > calories in”; so in the simplest terms, you need to find a Way of Eating (WOE) that makes a caloric deficit bearable.

For me, that was keto. I managed to drop from 120kg to 78kg over the course of a year and a half.

My suggestion is to try a bunch of different diets/ways of eating (keto, paleo, vegetarian, pescitarian, vegan, Mediterranean, carnivore, Atkins and/or intermittent fasting) and see which one clicks.

Another really important point is to track your caloric intake, at least at the start - to build up the knowledge required to make better food choices.

The last bit of advice is probably toxic, but it did work for me - so you can consider whether it’s suitable for you too: “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.”

P.S. r/FatPeopleHate was one of my sources of (albeit negative) motivation; so I guess self-loathing helps too! 😅

I’m not a part of the group you’re addressing, but I guess a heads-up for anyone taking notes:

My wife and I tried a number of different eating styles for a while, and discovered maybe 2 years ago that we were becoming malnourished in a couple of key micronutrients and doing a bit of damage to our metabolisms.

Whatever you decide to eat for your new lifestyle, make sure you listen to your body and try at least getting your metabolic support nutrients in spades.

Long story short for us: we were becoming really deficient in our minerals, to the point of suppressing our metabolism. We were consistently running 30% deficits and had to keep reducing our intake because we weren’t losing anymore. The last two years have been good, refocusing on hormone support and we’re feeling really great now, despite not being any smaller.

I think people forget that there’s more to being healthy than just losing weight.

Tracking calories, weighing and measuring my food, and moving more. Tracking taught me about what I eat, and what contributes to weight changes. I use MacroFactor. It’s really good.

Greatly reducing sugar intake goes a long way.

I just started moving more and eating less garbage

GLP-1, and Mounjaro is much better than Ozempic. Follow up with SARMs and heavy weights lifting to regain muscle. Yoga and farmer carries for core. It’s been 2 years since I stopped the shots and am exactly the same weight.