Dieting

Question
Hi,

I抦 a 55 year old white man weighing 270 pounds and I抦 100 pounds over weight. I抦 very depressed because most of my weight has gone to my waist and I have a 48 inch waist. I can hardly tie my shoes. Yet I抦 strong and healthy in all other respects. I walk an hour every day and do exercises, but no matter what I do I can抰 lose so much as a pound!  In my younger days I could drop weight, but now that I抦 55 I can抰 lose any weight at all.

I抳e heard it isn抰 a good idea to skip meals or fast. However, in my current obese condition wouldn抰 it help if I skipped meals and even fasted one or two days a week to lose weight?

I love to eat meat and poultry which is the reason I once went on the Atkins diet 5 years ago. With Atkins I lost 30 pounds but gained 60 pounds back when I got off of Atkins. So my normal weight increased by 30 pounds! I wish I had never heard of the Atkins diet as I抎 be 30 pounds lighter if I had never tried Atkins.

If you don抰 recommend I skip meals or fast, what if I ate Caesar Salads? I love Caesar Salads almost as much as I love eating meat.

Now that you know my situation, what are your recommendations for me losing weight?  

Answer
Brison,
Caesar salads are nothing but empty calories. (Sorry). If you eat them WITHOUT dressing, cheese, or croutons, then go right ahead, but that only leaves you lettuce and chicken.
Skipping meals and fasting are definitely out, because that'll slow your metabolism down and cause you to gain weight.
Since you're already on an exercise program, what needs to be fixed is DIET. You're 100 pounds overweight, so a quick rule of thumb is that you've been eating an extra 1,000 calories every single day over and above what your body actually needs. The best way to attack this is to start keeping a food diary. Online ones are easiest (try www.sparkpeople.com or www.fitday.com). Log everything you eat, including condiments, beverages, etc, for at least ten days (include two weekends). Then you can see how many calories you're eating on average. From there, it'll be simple-use the food tracker to ensure that you eat on average 1,000 calories less than you have been. Without knowing your height I can't tell you exactly how many calories you should be eating. But fixing your diet is the only way you can lose weight. In order to exercise enough to account for your current calorie intake, you'd need to walk briskly for over four hours every single day of the week.
It's difficult, but it has to be done. You've told me that your weight is interfering with your life, it's interfering with how you see yourself, and at some point in the near future, you're going to be facing high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes, and heart diseases unless you fix this now.
Good luck!
Melissa

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