Advanced fat loss discoveries

My monthly fatloss progress report....

Today's Post: Monday, 5-21-2012  

Since last month, there’s several kinds of good news!

1.  First, the month was a bit of a mixed review in many ways; but I LOST 3 & a half pounds on the scale and lost back the 3 quarters of an inch on my waist I’d recently gained.

The majority of that was because of a rare negative event.  I got a severe cold that created a significant secondary chest infection with lots of congestion.  That was about 3 weeks before my monthly Saturday measurement on 5-19.  I had to do less exercise and only gradually build back to avoid delaying my recovery.  And, for the week before I got sick plus two of the 3 weeks it took to recover, I ate 2700 calories of almond butter.  So, I expected to gain this month.

So, what happened to cause me to lose and by that much instead?!   My appetite dropped off just a bit, but the almond butter easily equaled or overcame that.  I exercised a lot MORE during those three weeks by coughing so horribly much.  I must have burned an extra 13,200 calories in those 3 weeks from coughing based on the math I know.  Even better, it was vigorous enough, I may have added some muscle in my core muscles that contracted when I cough.

2. In addition, I already added a way that looks likely to help me lose back the other weight I’ve regained over the last six or seven months. 

When I lost the original 20 pounds I was eating no almond butter.  Since then I’ve gained a pound or so on many months over several months. In fact, before my weight loss this last month I had regained a bit over half of it. 

When I did the math on the almond butter I was eating and found that even when trying to cut back, my records show that, virtually all that fat regain was from the almond butter I was eating, I decided that I’d better stop buying and eating ANY almond butter.

If I’m correct, and my recent good results that included my first week without it suggest I am, that means that just from tossing this one food that was reversing my resulting fat loss will enable me to re-lose that 10 pounds.

I’ve now successfully had NO almond butter for almost two weeks and it’s even easier than I expected it to be.

3.  The first piece of even better news is that, I’ve read that boosting my level of growth hormone to what it was when I was in my teens or early twenties or early thirties with shots of HGH, has a proven track record of taking fat off the abdominal area enough to restore the waistline I had at that time.  

(That would be 34 inches – the six inches off my waist I have wanted so much to lose!  I also found out just recently that for health reasons everyone should have a waist measure no greater than half their height.  My natural height in those years was 68 inches.  So dropping those 6 inches would be health protecting too!)

I’ve not done anything with that information because of three factors.  It’s WAY too expensive for me to consider; it may have side effects if you do it that way; and it’s likely to actually turn down the normal growth hormone release my body does by itself.

What I have needed was a doable and affordable way to cause my own body to boost my growth hormone that much.

I just found out that I’ve already been using the two proven methods to do that!  The great good news is that means by using those two methods more than I have, I actually have a shot at losing a good bit of the fat on my waist!

a) One way to do that is with strength training of your muscles to the point they almost get completely overloaded.  The other way is with quite vigorous interval cardio that you build up to gradually and include some rest breaks each time as a second way to make it safer.  I’ve gotten some positive results on the few exercises I done this on.  So, by adding doing this at least once a week on more of my exercises and working a bit harder on the ones I’ve been doing it on, I’ll release more growth hormone.  I certainly will begin to systematically add more exercises where I do that.

b)  Obviously a fast or partial fast every other day for 3 days out of 6 every week or even two nonconsecutive days each week, will cut calories.  Studies found this a superior way to cut calories once you make the needed upgrades in the quality of what you eat and drink.  One study even found that doing this just two nonconsecutive days each week lost MORE weight and fat than trying to cut back every day when it was actually tested recently. 

One reason for this is that it’s much easier to do than cutting back every day psychologically. 

But there are two even more powerful reasons!

Research found this kind of calorie cut back is similar enough to the way humans ate before 10,000 years ago that it does NOT trigger your famine response or does so far less than every day calorie cut backs.  Jon Benson is the fitness expert I learned this from.  (It’s pretty simple when you think about it. Back then, lean rations every day meant famine while lean rations a few days a week but quite decent the rest of the time was actually relatively good times.)

But the third reason is more powerful yet!  It seems that to ensure good repair on the short ration days, I just found out that when it isn’t a famine, your body boosts the heck out of your growth hormone release so your body can repair itself more efficiently.

Between those two factors, it strongly suggests that if I do more growth hormone releasing intense strength training and do two partial fast days a week instead of just the one I already found doable and have been doing, I not only will lose fat, I’ll begin to lose it from my fat tummy most of all!

To me, that is fantastically good news!

It makes me more hopeful about my own fat loss than I’ve been in many months.

4.  But there is even more good news yet this time!

For months I’ve known that I have a shot at better future results from a strategy I’ve ended this post with for those several months. 

Besides the short sessions of very intense exercise, the other proven fat reducer is just lots of moderate exercise each week.

Tons of more than moderate exercise tends to boost your appetite that much or more.  But intense exercise for short periods boosts your metabolism for hours after you do it.  Similarly, a moderately high amount of moderate exercise simply duplicates the normal conditions of humans before 10,000 years ago and your body tends to not boost your appetite more than the calories you burn.

One woman I read about had lost 20 pounds by food upgrades and not pigging out as much.  When she lost another 30 pounds on the same food, her doctor was amazed and asked her what had changed.  It was quite simple.  She had decided to take transit and was walking two miles as part of it each morning and another two miles back each evening.  Four miles total each day times five weekdays each week meant she was burning close to an extra 2,000 calories a week.

Since she didn’t get too much hungrier because that used to be an average day for humans activity wise, she lost the extra 30 pounds.

The problem with that of course is that she spent over an hour each day and about 6 hours a week walking.

Some young people have that much extra time and so do many retired people.  The rest of us not only don’t have that extra 6 hours, we need that much more to do well in the rest of our lives.

The solution exists however.

Do that moderate exercise while you watch TV or read at home and during much of the time you are at your desk at work.  You get the extra fat loss and health benefits without using hours of time you can’t spare!

I’d posted before that too much sitting is a health risk factor even for people who do vigorous exercises several times each week in shorter sessions.

And I’d posted before on some under the desk exercisers that cost about $150 but you had to order them online & might not be able to return them if they turned out not to be usable at your desk.

But three things happened since last month. 

I found out that having such an exerciser at work would improve my memory and mental sharpness on the days I used it.  I posted that news last week!

At my new job I do have enough more knee room under my desk, I’d known I might be able to get one of the tiny bicycle style exercisers and begin using that a few hours a day.  (They are just pedals and a support stand available online for about $150.  Not fancy; but an extra 200 calories a day on it will trim off some fat.)

And, it seemed silly not to try it already for that extra fat loss. But when I got the news it would improve me mentally too, I decided to try to implement it soon.

Then I realized I could go to the local sporting goods store to see if they had such an exerciser.  That way if I tried it and it didn’t work out right away, I could return it.  The news then got better.  I asked and they would refund my money if the exerciser turned out right away not to be usable.  But even better, instead of $150, it only cost $50!

So, tomorrow, I’ll set that up and begin using it on Wednesday this week.

I’d be somewhat happy with just losing a pound a month overall by stopping the almond butter along with some better progress on shrinking my fat tummy and waist measurement from adding the exercise upgrades, the second partial fast day each week, and the under desk exerciser.

But the potential exists to lose closer to 4 pounds of fat a month mostly from my waist.  If that happens, that would please me tremendously!

I might actually lose the six inches from my waist eventually if that is the case!

I’ll let you know how I do.