My monthly fatloss report....

Today's Post:  Monday, 2-22-2016

A.  Here's the key news. 

1.  I lost almost FIVE pounds from about 167 pounds to 162!

The new method I tried worked!

After the next section, ALL this post will cover that method for what are understandable reasons!  (I’ll resume the other sections next time, AFTER I to the key news and how the new method worked the previous month.)

2.  I lost a quarter inch off my chest; and a half inch off my waist; and a half inch off my hip measurement.

Most of my fat is on my belly and visceral fat inside it and on my hips. So that makes sense.

Because I want to gain more muscle in my upper back and chest than I lose in fat and want to add more muscle in my buttocks and lower back AND show all my fat gain on my waist, THAT is a reasonably good sign.

B.  The new method adds something I learned from Vince Del Monte who teaches a special 4 week sequence that enables you to both lose fat AND gain muscle to new research that fits his protocol.

1.  In simple form, Vince Del Monte teaches a four week sequence:

In each week, include a lot of vegetables and a high protein intake.

(I already know that for muscle gain, extra whey protein works best -- in addition to wild caught fish, and dairy from grass fed cows, and eggs from chickens fed on pasture, and from beans and lentils and non-starchy vegetables.)

in week one to cut down on the carbs and calories somewhat; and do effective strength training;

in week two to eat a somewhat more liberal diet with more carbs and calories; and do effective strength training;

in week three to cut back a LOT on carbs and calories; and do effective strength training but take it just  a bit easier;

THEN in week four to eat a bit of an extra liberal diet with more health OK carbs and calories AND to make a strong effort to add more weight or repetitions to each exercise.

This has two benefits:

Since you only cut back a LOT on calories one week out of four and don’t overdo them in the other 3 weeks, this keeps you lean and relatively free of excess fat or losing a bit each month.

And, it keeps up your energy and mood all four weeks; and avoids the failsafe famine response.

Then in week four, when you eat the most, you add some weight on the scale.

Here’s the huge benefit Vince found and that his students got as well:

He finds this protocol tends to only add that week’s added weight as muscle!

AND, you DO tend to get stronger and do more!

I’ve followed his week one and two plan; I eat a high protein diet and followed his other guidelines.  But I’d never tried the week 3 with a BIG calorie cut back.

2. The other inspiration for my new methods was widely reported research and was also on Medical News Today.

I saved it both in the original form and with my ideas for using it.  But I can’t currently find it in my saved info!

(I badly need a knowledge base manager and a multiple subject filing system which that person maintains to prevent such things. I’m working on getting a good knowledge base manager to do just that!)

A group of men ate a high protein diet that was a 40% calorie cut back from what they ate before.  And, they did regular strength training.

They lost weight on the scale as people tend to do when they cut back calories that much.

AND, it was all fat!  No muscle was lost!

But because that much calorie cut back every week for years with no breaks even maintaining a high protein intake does tend to cause problems with low energy, low mood, excess hunger, and does tend to trigger the failsafe famine response, the fat lost may or WILL return!

In addition, while no muscle was lost, none was gained either!

C.  My inspiration was to add the two methods together!

What I realized it is that, if I didn’t do the 40% cut back any weeks, I’d continue to have about as much fat as I do now.

(Certainly my lack of progress over the last few years bears this out.)

BUT, if I cut back 40% EVERY four weeks from now on, each year I’d eat 40% fewer calories less one fourth of the time.

AND, that means that over each year, I’ll eat 10% fewer calories.

Since I began at 167 pounds, that suggests that over a year I’d lose 16.7 pounds of fat.

And that it would never come back!

AND if I also gained muscle as Vince’s students did, I might lose more fat than that over the year.

D.  So I looked at everything I regularly have been eating:

If it was high carb and zero or low protein as my no sugar applesauce and occasional organic prunes and raisins have been, I deleted it entirely last week; or I cut back by 70%.

If it was moderately high protein but somewhat high in carbs as the pinto beans I was eating, on those occasions I was eating 3 tablespoons a day in my dinner, I ate one tablespoon of lentils, a higher protein and lower carb bean and one tablespoon of pinto beans – or even just two tablespoons of lentil.

That step cut carbs and calories quite a bit and only cut protein about 30%.

To combat that, I doubled the amount of whey I ate each day.

I also deleted my four servings of 4 ounces of rolled oats that week AND the 12 ounces a day of grass fed milk I was having with it.

That cut my calories and lactose quite a bit. I think it added up to over a quart less milk!

Again, to keep the protein I doubled the amount of whey I ate on those days.

And, I ate five tablespoons of lentils on those days which replaced some of the protein but had way fewer calories.

I also ate one tablespoon of nonfat cottage cheese instead of a slice of grass fed cheddar cheese for the two or three times a day I’d eat that as a snack.

This kept most of the protein; but slashed the calories that week.

For my two times a week I had dark chocolate, I had half as much each time.

And, I kept all of the vegetables and main servings of fruit for the week.

I cut back from 10 tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil to 7.

But I kept the two tablespoons a day of avocado paste.

Because I kept the things I kept that were high protein, or high nutrition, or high fiber and mostly cut extra fat or carbs, I wasn’t even hungrier than usual much to my great surprise!

And, since it is only every four weeks, I won’t get a cumulative effect of extra hunger because of the failsafe famine response either.

So losing over 11 pounds more fat for a total of 16 or more, looks like a lock!

The math says it is!

Since it has that likely potential and is that easily doable, I certainly will do it!

But there is more, the other lower carb week and every week, I’ll keep up some of what clearly works to reduce my carb intake a bit but not my protein intake.

For, example, I have been eating the double dose of whey every other day otherwise.

Now, I’ll do it every day.  And, I’ll eat a bit less no sugar apple sauce every week and more lentils than pinto beans every week.

And, I’ll eat barley instead of oatmeal once every week too!

E.  What if I also get the muscle gain effect of Vince Del Monte’s students and gain five or six pounds of muscle over the upcoming year too!

If that happens my waist will finally shrink and I’ll lose visceral fat with the extra health benefits that produces!

So I am working to make that happen too!

Could you do the same thing?

You can if you eat a regular style of eating almost every day that you tweak in similar way; you eat a double serving of whey each day; eat or drink nothing that is harmful or super fattening such as soft drinks or wheat foods; and you do some form of power lifting or superslow strength training each week.