[samsamsam]

This isn't me. Just a random thread on Redddit. But I was impressed by his dedication and commitmrnt. As the New Year is around the corner, I post this as encouragement with those who are struggling with weight. Happy holidays and to a great 2015.

Edit: on my crappy tablet. Can't shrink the pic.

Quote:

Alright, /r/fitness, it's my time to do my part in what I see as "giving back" in this community which is to post my transformation. I know a lot of people don't like these posts and want them relegated to other subreddits, but I got my motivation from /r/fitness and transformation posts were huge for me so if this can motivate one guy/girl like me, then I'll have done my part. I saved this for this time of year, hoping it may motivate some people who are considering a change in 2015.

Quick Bio
TLR: Fatty tries and tries again, finally gets the prize.
I've been overweight since the middle of high school and really ballooned during college. I've been firmly in the obese category for 5-6 years. I doubt anyone has tried and failed as many diets as I have in that time span. I have archives upon archives of "before" pictures. But my struggle can be summed up with the Thomas Edison quote (I know all the Tesla/Edison stuff-I'm only supporting a theory behind a quote, not a man): when asked how he felt about his 1,000 failed attempts to create the light bulb, Edison reportedly replied "I haven't failed 1,000 times, I've found 1,000 ways NOT to make a light bulb". Whether this is a true story or not, the mentality behind it is true. If you've tried time and time again, you have not failed-you have learned ways that don't work for you. Change something, anything, and try again. You only have to get it right once to change your life. I'd like to say I saw what I had become, had a moment of clarity where the sun shined down on me and I changed then and there, but the truth is, that had happened many times and it always wore off. It is the continued daily effort that gets the job done-not the sudden surge of inspiration or motivation.

Quick Breakdown of My Transformation
TLR: Caloric deficit every single day for 5 months straight, typical day < 1,500 calories + 1 hour exercise. 103.8 pounds in 5 months.
For the past 5-6 years, my goal has been to get under 200 pounds. On 06/01/2014, I stepped on the scale right at midnight and looked down to see that I weighed the most I've ever weighed in my life: 295.6 pounds. For 5 months, I focused on being as healthy as I could while taking in less than 1,500 calories per day, and exercising for 1 hour each day. On the morning of 11/01/2014 I stepped back on the same scale and looked down to see that I weighed the least I've ever weighed while 6 feet tall: 191.8 pounds.

The TLR of my advice
Study and research as much as you can about your goal and how to achieve it. Learn the nutrition, the exercises, the pros and cons of everything. Knowing your stuff is how you avoid putting tons of effort into activities that won't give the results that you're looking for.

Study and research yourself. Nutrition and fitness are evolving sciences-we don't know everything about how our bodies work yet (but we know a heck of a lot-see # 1). On top of that, everyone is different to some degree. It may be easier for you to have a cheat day to keep you from breaking down or you may be like me and a cheat day may be counterproductive because it opens you to temptations that are hard to pull back from at the end of it.
The ONLY correct diet for weight loss is the one that you stick to. I've lost 15 pounds in 2 weeks, before going back to my old ways more times than I can count. It doesn't matter how great a diet works if you can't stick to it for long enough to reach your goal.

I'm embarrassed to admit I used to see these posts and I was too lazy to read some giant explanation of all kinds of stuff about the lifestyle, life, etc. so I'm intentionally going to break this up into parts. I hope this isn't seen as karma whoring. I obviously couldn't care less about internet points on an alternate account I made specifically for this post. For /r/fitness, I'll obviously break down my workout. I've posted my diet and nutritional goals and mission in my /r/loseit post (link here) and I encourage you to check that out because it is very detailed and took a long time to come up with the diet to meet the needs I wanted to meet.

Since my goal was burning fat, I did not get super detailed into specific workouts and exercises. My goal in my workouts for the majority of the transformation was simply to burn calories. For the first month or so I walked. If that's all you can do-don't be ashamed! Go Walk! Walking, and especially power walking, is in my opinion one of the most undervalued things by obese people. They feel like they can't exercise (which is often true in terms of intense workouts) so they don't. You'd be surprised how many calories walking/power walking can burn! Start by walking for your hour of exercise. Then find a way to run for 5 minutes in that hour, then 10 minutes, then 15. I literally started by strolling on a treadmill for an hour and by the end of the 5 months, I was running 5 miles during my hour of exercise.

About halfway through my transformation I realized I'd want some sort of body once all this fat fell off, plus I wanted to get my body conditioned for working out so I could make the body I wanted after getting rid of what I didn't want, so I added basic, general workouts. By the end, my routine consisted of 30 minutes of workout including pull ups, pushups, situps, dumbbell flyes and curls, then 30 minutes of running. My routine was 30 mins workout, 30 mins run one day, then run the full hour the next day. And repeat. Again-it is important to clearly identify your goal and the best way to achieve it and my goal was fat burning.

I just want to urge you, if you are not who you want to be-it is time, right now to go do it! I intentionally made this post a week before the 1st of the year so you have no excuse-go shopping today, go shopping this weekend, get your routine together-you have 7 days and then you begin, no matter what! People don't plan to fail-they fail to plan!

If you ARE who you want to be, if you're knowledgeable about fitness and what it takes, especially if you got that way in part from /r/fitness, stick around the community, help the new guys/girls-explain things, be kind and welcoming. This community was so instrumental in educating and motivating me to become this new person-please keep that up.

In closing, thank you /r/fitness for the new me. Please continue to be the community you were for me for others down the road.
Questions HIGHLY encouraged

http://www.reddit.com/r/Fitness/comments..._5_months/

[bacan]

Thanks for the post. Under 1500 calories seems like a very strict diet. Good for him. I'm going to follow up and check out his diet plan too.

[bacan]

Looks like he ate the same three small meals every day:
http://www.reddit.com/r/loseit/comments/..._5_months/

I am thinking of doing something similar, like just picking 2-3 daily meal plans that will meet my macros and rotating through them over a couple weeks. Then making a few new meal plans and doing it again.

[RexImperator]

-100 lbs. in 5 months is impressive.

[vinman]

I'm skeptical. I've known people to drop 100 pounds quickly with lap band surgery, and exercise, but they looked like they like they were wearing a skin suit. Almost like a deflated balloon. I find it hard to believe that this guy looks that good shirtless in only 6 months. Maybe he's using these pics to show the contrast in sizes. If true, I applaud his dedication, and determination.

[Onto]

(12-24-2014 12:45 PM)vinman Wrote:  

I'm skeptical. I've known people to drop 100 pounds quickly with lap band surgery, and exercise, but they looked like they like they were wearing a skin suit. Almost like a deflated balloon. I find it hard to believe that this guy looks that good shirtless in only 6 months. Maybe he's using these pics to show the contrast in sizes. If true, I applaud his dedication, and determination.

I think it's very possible. I lost almost 50 lbs in 6 months and I had a lot of relapses during that time. I was also in my early 40s, but not as fat as that guy. The fatter you are the more "amount" of weight you can lose quickly. His new muscle tone is remarkable though, and I attribute that to him probably being under 35 years old and quite possibly in his 20s

[britchard]

Your messed up American date format had me thinking he did this in 5 days!!

[samsamsam]

(12-24-2014 01:13 PM)britchard Wrote:  

Your messed up American date format had me thinking he did this in 5 days!!

You guys are the ones that are messed up! Just kidding.

Happy Holidays!

[roberto]

He looks way skinnier than 191lbs at 6'

I'm 175lbs at 6' and I look bigger than him.

Edit- just found motivation to lift tonight. Thanks OP!

[vinman]

(12-24-2014 01:07 PM)Onto Wrote:  

(12-24-2014 12:45 PM)vinman Wrote:  

I'm skeptical. I've known people to drop 100 pounds quickly with lap band surgery, and exercise, but they looked like they like they were wearing a skin suit. Almost like a deflated balloon. I find it hard to believe that this guy looks that good shirtless in only 6 months. Maybe he's using these pics to show the contrast in sizes. If true, I applaud his dedication, and determination.

I think it's very possible. I lost almost 50 lbs in 6 months and I had a lot of relapses during that time. I was also in my early 40s, but not as fat as that guy. The fatter you are the more "amount" of weight you can lose quickly. His new muscle tone is remarkable though, and I attribute that to him probably being under 35 years old and quite possibly in his 20s

I'm not saying it's impossible. But his skin looks a little too good to me for a guy that dropped 100 pounds that fast. Even for a young guy it's truly remarkable for all of that skin to tighten up.

[Hades]

(12-24-2014 12:45 PM)vinman Wrote:  

I'm skeptical. I've known people to drop 100 pounds quickly with lap band surgery, and exercise, but they looked like they like they were wearing a skin suit. Almost like a deflated balloon. I find it hard to believe that this guy looks that good shirtless in only 6 months. Maybe he's using these pics to show the contrast in sizes. If true, I applaud his dedication, and determination.

It looks sort of fishy, but he might have his hand right over that slack bit of skin where you would expect it to be. Either that or somehow he doesn't have stretch marks from being fat in the front.

I know one guy who did something similar, went from 330 to 165# in a year and a half, his skin shrunk back but it took a while.

[AntiTrace]

somethings fishy.

he's wearing the same pair of boxer briefs in both pics. Maybe he just likes that style or its a coincidence. Slightly odd.

His right nipple, or lack thereof in the first pic, changes significantly in the after pic while his left nipples appears to stay the same. This bro get some regenerative nipple surgery while he was at it?

Regardless, I like his walking point. Too many times I see disgusting fat bodies trying to get in shape, and they are out there running. Good for them for trying, but running at such a heavy weight is horrible for your body. A mile of running and a mile of walking burning roughly the same calories. The only real difference is time.

[redbeard]

+1 for the walking plug, but this is still very fishy.

He also started tanning this year? Dude is brown in the right picture and "World of Warcraft" white on the left.

[Brian Shima]

Fake. He had "man boob" surgery on his right nipple in the fat picture. I know this because I had the same thing done in high school and it's scarred for life, it wont suddenly go away when you get in shape LOL

[RexImperator]

Yeah I was thinking about this in the gym and 100lbs in 5 months (20 weeks) is losing 5 lbs. per week. That's insanely fast. If he's eating 1,500 calories per day, 1lb = 3500 calories, so 5 pounds over a week requires a deficit of 2,500 calories per day. His TDEE would have to be jacked up to 1,500 + 2,500 = 4,000 kcal/day.

I would also expect lots of loose skin afterwards.

[Sonoma]

I've had multiple friends do this kind of weightloss and all had different results in regards to skin and appearance.


That being said the pelvic area of the guy on the right looks like he's never been fat in his life.

[Parlay44]

(12-24-2014 12:37 PM)RexImperator Wrote:  

-100 lbs. in 5 months is impressive.

That's 20 pounds a month or 5 pounds a week. 3 pounds per week drop is normal if working out hard. To drop 5 a week he's supplementing somehow. Either doing some kind of upper or steroid to burn fat like that.

[Enigma]

(12-24-2014 03:30 PM)AntiTrace Wrote:  

somethings fishy.

he's wearing the same pair of boxer briefs in both pics. Maybe he just likes that style or its a coincidence. Slightly odd.

His right nipple, or lack thereof in the first pic, changes significantly in the after pic while his left nipples appears to stay the same. This bro get some regenerative nipple surgery while he was at it?

Regardless, I like his walking point. Too many times I see disgusting fat bodies trying to get in shape, and they are out there running. Good for them for trying, but running at such a heavy weight is horrible for your body. A mile of running and a mile of walking burning roughly the same calories. The only real difference is time.

I agree with your point about fat people running, but the bolded part is not true at all. Not only will you burn more calories during the run, your body will continue to burn calories at a higher rate after the run.

[civpro]

5 lbs a week and zero loose skin? Is this real life?

[Switch]

I think 100 lbs in 5 months is possible, but his nipples changed way too much for me to believe this specific case is real.

[monster]

(12-24-2014 03:30 PM)AntiTrace Wrote:  

somethings fishy.

he's wearing the same pair of boxer briefs in both pics. Maybe he just likes that style or its a coincidence. Slightly odd.

His right nipple, or lack thereof in the first pic, changes significantly in the after pic while his left nipples appears to stay the same. This bro get some regenerative nipple surgery while he was at it?

IDK. On the pic of the right you can still see the pear-shaped flab around the torso and the huge bellybutton, which is THE sure sign of a guy who went from fat to normal.

Also same hairy-ass forearms and hairless everything else.

I'm a believer.