Losing weight is easy. It is being willing to make and maintain the changes in behavior to make it happen that it is the hard part. Now that you have fallen for my click-bait worthy headline, let me tell you about my weight loss/behavior change experience. I felt the need to write this post because folks in my life kept asking me what I did to lose my weight. Do not get me wrong, I am very proud of the way I look and feel. I have been talking about getting back under the “Mendoza line” for years. This did not happen by accident, use of some gimmicky product, calorie counting, or by becoming a workout warrior. I simply changed my behavior. In my last blog post I talked about goals and behaviors. In this post I am going to walk you through my change in behavior process that led me to lose 45 pounds during an 8-month span. So, let me tell you my story the best way I know how, from the beginning.
August 2019
Looking back, I had a rough summer in 2019. A couple of folks in my circles left this world in untimely manners. I also turned 40 years old. I started noticing my clothes getting tighter and had to go buy new jeans in a larger size. It was larger than I had ever bought before. My weight was starting to creep up towards the 235 lb. mark. At my height, that is not terrible, but it’s only good if I am about 80% leaner and looking to be the starting linebacker for the hapless Atlanta Falcons. I decided I needed to lose weight and wanted to get back down closer to the 200 lb. mark. August is traditionally the time of year I begin my rigorous training regimen for The Endless Mile in October. That is right folks, I spend less than 3 months “training” for a 48-hour run. I started getting my regular 10 – 15-mile jaunts in and even some 20 milers. Here is the thing, when September rolled around, I was almost 240 lbs. and more than 32% body fat. I had not lost weight but gained weight – and it was not muscle. On a whim I decided I need to try something different: intermittent fasting.
Intermittent Fasting and The Fall of 2019
Intermittent fasting is one of those buzz words you usually hear from dieters. People do fast for many reasons and different lengths of time. I chose to start off with a simple 16/8 schedule (16 hour fast/8 hour eating window). To put it simply, I started skipping breakfast. From 7 p.m. at night until 11 a.m. in the morning, I fasted. No meals, no drinks, only water and sometimes black coffee. I did probably 15 minutes of research before starting this new “diet” after Labor Day weekend. The word diet is a terrible way to describe this approach as it really was just a change in behavior. I did not significantly change what I ate. The drive thru lady at Taco Bell still remembered my name and face, but I did get quick results. I went from 237.5 lbs. to 227 lbs. during the month of September simply by changing behavior. This included a week long trip to Texas and Las Vegas where I ate like a king or at worst a minor noble.
At this point, I started doing a little more research in intermittent fasting and got some quick tips. I still did not take it all that seriously. However, I was committed to the change in behavior. I did not sway much from the 16/8 routine unless it was special events, such as a 48-hour endurance race or my buddy Ash’s Midget Wrestling Birthday party. From September to the end of November, my weight continued to decrease. It finally settled in around 216 lbs./ 25% body fat. by the end of November and pretty much held +/- 2 pounds of that until the end of February. I got frustrated with the lack of progress. But instead of quitting my intermittent fasting I kept doing it. I maintained my changed behavior. My body had a new set weight, but I just did not understand what that meant at the time.
Dr. Jason Fung and the Obesity Code
During Christmas break I made a trip to Atlanta to see my adopted second family. My change in appearance was noticeable and led to a discussion about intermittent fasting. My friend Daniel recommended reading The Obesity Code by Dr. Jason Fung. I immediately read it and found myself with a greater understanding of why I lost my weight and why it plateaued. It is a great deep-dive book into why diets initially work and fail, and it is filled with a plethora of fact-based research to support his assertions. In fact, most people would not enjoy it because of how dry and fact-based it is. However, the last chapter gives a couple of nuggets on how to make almost any diet work. His basic conclusion is this: any diet intended for long term weight loss that does not include some form of intermittent fasting will ultimately fail. The minute you stop dieting or go back to your old behaviors the weight will begin to return. It sounds rather simple, but it is true. Fung’s rather thorough review of the research points to controlling how the body makes and uses glucose as the key to control weight. Fasting gives your body the opportunity to burn glucose, or stored fat. He gives some other basic recommendations such as cutting out snacking and as much sugar as possible. This help keep the body from continually producing glucose stores. But I will not bore you with any more of the details. I will let the book do that for you.
The Season of COVID
The last few months have presented a lot of change for almost everyone I know. I am no different, maybe with the exception that my work routine remained the same. However, my consequences around my life outside of work has changed dramatically. My weight hung around the 214 – 218 range from December through almost April. I started to see some slight weight loss in middle of March as I began to get outside a little bit more and began exercising. I literally did no running or walking from late October through March. The addition of exercise got my weight moving in the right direction. In early April I did several 24-hour fasts that moved me off the set weight range I had been in for several months. Combined with exercise the weight got down to 200 pounds by the end of April.
In May 1st, I dropped down to below 200 pounds/20% body fat for the first time since leaving graduate school over 16 years ago. Over the past two months, I’ve logged over 640 miles of movement to complete a 1000K (621 mile) virtual race. I honestly expected to drop another 15 to 20 lbs. during this period since I’ve averaged burning more than 4800 calories a day for the last two months. However, that has not happened. My weight never dipped below 192 pounds and now sits around the 195 pound/18.5% body fat mark. This seems to be my new set weight. My body continues to redistribute weight around my frame despite not having significant changes in weight or body fat.
The Future
I currently feel like my weight is at a pretty good place and I want to keep it there. It’s been hanging out here for two months now. I continue to do the 16/8 fasting schedule, but I am less of a stickler for it on the weekends. I still enjoy a good hearty breakfast from time to time. The one point I want to get across is that my weight loss was more a result of a change in behavior than anything else. I stopped eating breakfast and snacking. It was not until late Spring that I really began to add the exercise component into this equation. At this point I have lost around 18% of my body weight, but over 42% of my body fat. I want to get that body fat loss to over 50%. Almost all my weight loss has been body fat and not lean mass. I know that if I want to maintain this weight, I must maintain my 16/8 fasting schedule. As I have mentioned throughout this blog post, my weight loss success was not the result of a diet, but a change in behavior.
Final Thoughts on a First Impression 