The Project Nemesis Weight Loss Plan

Introduction

About 10 years ago, I was discussing the possibility of bariatric surgery with Paul, a coworker who had been an Army medic. He pointed out that the body is a “sealed system” and any surgery, necessary or cosmetic, breaks the seal. He also reported that some insurance companies won’t cover bariatric surgery unless you can demonstrate some weight loss on your own. “It doesn’t have to be much,” Paul insisted. “Just one to two pounds a week. Lose 50 pounds on your own, and they’ll be more likely to consider it.” Whether Paul was right or wrong, that’s when I realized how little thinking, research, and planning I’d ever done on any previous diet.

Yes, I need to lose weight … but just how fast do I really need to lose that weight?

Diets fail for many reasons. The reasons of most interest to me concern self-sabotage, the things dieters think and do to undermine their own efforts. In my own case, I think I have enough of an addictive personality that, after meeting a certain level of success for a given length of time, I grow over-confident and expect the successes to keep going. So I grow lax in my dieting approach and gradually re-assume the bad eating patterns that led me to obesity in the first place.

But another thing I believe leads to self-sabotage is the tendency many people have to set unrealistic goals and expectations. They starve themselves and exercise frantically until reality kicks in and they collapse. They cut out whole food groups and find themselves craving those food groups more and more. They expect dramatic results and despair when the actual results are more modest, growing upset over plateaus and short-term upticks. Those of us who are morbidly obese didn’t grow fat overnight; we’re fighting patterns of behavior and thinking developed over many years. Why should we expect to get a “beach body” in just a few weeks?

The truth is, there will be fluctuations, often due to factors beyond your control. Almost every number you’re ever given for diet and exercise purposes is an average derived over time from multiple sources, whether it’s the number of calories in a particular sandwich or the number of calories you burn by walking. One week, you’ll do everything right and gain 1.5 pounds. The next week, you’ll blow your diet big time one day and your weight at the end of the week is down 1.5 pounds. Nevertheless, as long as you stick with the plan, your weight will go down over time. So you have to get comfortable with averages, guessing, and trends.

So … how much time are you willing to invest in losing weight? Your answer should be, “As much time as it takes.” Although I’ve called it the “Lazy Man’s Diet”, it actually takes work and will require more effort as you progress in order to stay on target. So take it one day at a time. Give yourself plenty of small and intermediate goals to achieve and reward yourself for achieving them. Surround yourself with people who will support your efforts rather than enable your self-sabotage. Constantly remind yourself that many great changes take place slowly, almost imperceptibly, until one day the difference is too much to miss.

The Theory

The diet itself is based on a fairly simple theory: Your body requires an intake of a certain number of calories (technically, kilocalories, abbreviated kcal) to maintain a particular weight. This intake is determined by your basal (or resting) metabolic rate, a rate affected by sex, age, and current weight, and by your activity level. If you eat much less than that basic number of calories, your body will eventually supply the deficiency by burning the stored energy in fat cells. One pound of fat cells equals about 3,500 kcal; in theory, a calorie deficiency of 500 kcal/day should lead to one pound of weight loss per week (500 × 7 = 3,500).

There are a couple of considerations:

1. A properly hydrated body has plenty of water-soaked tissue. You can lose this so-called “water weight” for rapid results, but only at the cost of dehydration. So a good diet plan includes drinking more water.
2. As you lose weight, you need fewer calories to maintain. So you need to adjust your calorie budget downward in order to maintain your ideal weight-loss rate. However, there is a “floor level” below which you start to risk malnutrition, dehydration, constipation, and potentially fatal imbalances in your electrolytes. For men, the recommended minimum intake is 1,500 kcal/day; for women, 1,200 kcal/day. That’s the other reason you eventually have to start exercising — that’ll be the only way you can keep up the weight-loss rate.
3. As you lose weight, your body burns calories more efficiently so it will take longer and more difficult activity to burn the same number of calories per day than it did when you were heavier. On the plus side, you’ll feel more energetic as you lose weight, so increasing your activity won’t be as much of a physical burden as you might think.
4. When you’re at your goal weight, you’ll need calories not only to maintain the weight but also to maintain your activity level. The right fitness program will help you find the balance between intake and activity to maintain your weight.

Before you start, find a weight-loss utility that offers not only weight, calorie, and activity tracking but also calculates your calorie budget and adjusts it as you progress. Ideally, the utility will also have an online community of members and fitness coaches to help support your efforts. My main utility is the website Lose It!, which is an app on my Android phone as well as bookmarked on my PC; however, they don’t have many tools or resources except as part of their premium program. So if you want a free utility, you may be better off considering MyFitnessPal (by Under Armour) or SparkPeople. If you want to go with a paid site, the gold standard is Weight Watchers. I also use the Samsung Health app, which tracks my activity and sleep. If you have a FitBit, you’ll want a weight-loss utility with which your FitBit will talk. If you don’t have a FitBit or similar gadget, there are a few apps out there that will work using your smartphone.

The Rules

So here are the rules:

1. Set a reasonable weekly goal. You want to eat less, but you don’t want to feel like you’re starving yourself — that’ll defeat your purpose. Two pounds per week is on the aggressive side of safe, and to achieve it you have to eat 1,000 calories less than you need. That may leave you hungrier than you can tolerate for long. Try to find a balance between seeing results and being comfortable with your diet.
2. Record everything. Be honest with yourself and your dieting utilities. Find people who will not only support you but also hold you accountable, and be accountable to them for what you do. The apps and programs you use will only be helpful so far as you use them properly, which means putting in all your food and activities, not just those that make you look virtuous.
3. Record daily, check weekly. Remember what I said about fluctuations? Your dieting utilities will capture the fluctuations, but you want to focus more on the general trend. So create a separate record (a spreadsheet, a sheet of graph paper, a diary, a poster card, etc.), pick a day of the week, and record your weigh-ins on that day of the week. Ideally, your weekly record will include the goal weight for that week according to your expected pounds/week goal.
4. No second helpings. Take what you want on your first and only plate. Avoid buffets as much as possible. (But see Rule 11.)
5. Use the “quarter method”: Mentally divide your plate into four quarters. One quarter is for your meat/protein dish; another is for your starch dish; the remaining half is for vegetables.
6. Spread out your calorie intake throughout the day. My current budget is 20% of my calories for breakfast, 25% for lunch, 30% for dinner, and 25% for light snacks throughout the day. The snacks help keep hunger pangs to a manageable level.
7. Fast food is not your friend. Depending on your life demands, it may be impractical to avoid fast food altogether. So plan ahead — go to vendors who publish nutrition information; stick to the lowest calorie options; avoid fried potatoes as much as possible; prefer grilled or roasted chicken to fried chicken.
8. Drink more water. Most canned and bottled beverages don’t properly hydrate your body. I make no claims one way or another concerning sports drinks like Gatorade, except that they have calories you won’t need unless you’re exercising or playing intensely. Drinking when you think you’re hungry may also settle hunger pangs.
9. Gradually introduce exercise. Don’t start thinking about gym memberships until you’re down at your floor-level calorie intake and can’t eat any less without wrecking yourself. Start by going to a park and marching — 120 steps per minute — for 30 minutes every other day. When you’re ready for gym exercises or running, find a fitness coach. Start reading fitness magazines and websites so that, when you’re ready to start exercising, you’re already acculturated in the fitness mindset.
10. Don’t rationalize splurges. If you’re going to blow the diet, blow the diet. The next day, get right back on your horse. Don’t punish yourself or try to compensate for the excess calories. Just go on as if it didn’t happen.
11. Allow yourself an occasional “diet holiday.” Some events, like major holidays and family get-togethers, involve lots of food. So far as possible, eat as you normally do earlier in the day so that, when the event meal occurs, you won’t eat as excessively as you would if you’d starved yourself earlier. Otherwise, ignore Rule 4 and let yourself off the hook for that one day so you can enjoy it.
12. Trust the process. There will be upticks. There will be plateaus. But as long as you’re eating less than you need and exercising more, you will lose weight over time. Don’t despair and don’t take drastic measures to “correct” the situation.