I’m writing this as a resource and guide to answer questions I am frequently asked about my weight Loss. You can share (or come back to) this post with this friendly, easy to remember URL:

http://bit.ly/JoshWeightLoss

The Story So Far

At the first of this year, 2011, I decided I was done being the fat guy. I have been overweight practically my whole life, and had gotten so fat (350 pounds) that I felt like a handicapped person. I’ve written a few times in depth about my experiences trying to lose weight so far (these are long, but have all the details):

• I’m Done Being the Fat Guy
• Weight Loss Plateaus – I’m Stuck
• Six Months, Fifty Pounds

Now, in September 2011, I’ve lost almost 70 pounds. I’ve still got a long way to go. My goal weight is 175 pounds, which I should hit next fall if all goes well. I will have lost half of my peak body weight. An entire person. I can’t wait.

Principles I’ve Learned

It’s Just Math

Weight loss (and gain) is simple math. One pound is approximately 3500 calories. If you want to lose weight, you burn more calories than you eat. For example, if you want to lose two pounds a week, you need a 7000 calorie deficit (or 1000 calories per day). Now, measuring what you burn and what you take in is where the effort lies, but in the end, it all comes down to this principle.

You Know How to Play This Videogame

I’m a geeky, nerdy type. Nerds like to treat things like a system – once you figure out the inputs, outputs, and rules of the systems, you can make it do what you want. You know how to play that game. Weight loss and taking care of your body is the same way. There are inputs, outputs, and rules. It’s not magic. Hack the system. Make it do your bidding.

You Can’t Change What You Don’t Measure

For me, it’s super important to stick to the numbers, and not just guess. I can’t rely on my own mind to keep track of things, because apparently, I lie to myself. And for me, all the numbers, charts, and graphs push the happy buttons in my nerd brain. I’m all about the data.

It Takes Time

Last year, I had sort of fit about my weight. I felt like in this day and age, with all the technology and modern medicine we enjoy, I was owed some kind of easy solution. I even went to my doctor, determined to get some kind of “fix”. Pills, surgery, magic, I didn’t care. She very patiently defused me, explaining why none of those things work. It still took a while until I was ready to actually start changing my life, but that was a lesson I had to learn. The change I wanted would take years of day to day effort and mindfulness. I had to accept that before I could begin.

Protein is Your Friend

I know very little about nutrition. I am not an expert. This is only what I’ve learned through my own experience the last several months. Foods that are high in protein – meat, nuts, eggs, etc. – help you feel full longer. It breaks down into fuel for your brain, and you can leave your muscles and the rest of your body to raid your fat reserves for the fuel they need. I’ve become a junky for beef jerky and nuts. I usually have a two ounces of jerky or nuts for breakfast, and I don’t feel hungry until lunch time. It’s very sustaining, and I’m sure it’s good for you in a whole bunch of other ways (like I said, I am not a nutritionist).

Diet Matters More Than Exercise

Exercise is important for health, but for weight loss, you’ll get MUCH more bang for your buck reducing your calorie intake. They say that a good rule of thumb for walking/running is that you burn about 100 calories per mile (this varies with your weight, of course). So if your strategy is to eat extra calories and then burn them off with exercise, keep in mind that you’re going to have to walk or run a mile to burn off every 100 calories over your budget you are. For me, at least until I get stronger (and smaller), I’m not focusing on exercise for weight loss. (I am exercising more for the other health benefits – mostly walking and soon, cycling).

Have A Support Team

You’ve got a group of people in your life that love you, and want to cheer you on. Whether it’s family, Facebook friends, or strangers on an internet community, it helps a lot to have people with whom you can share your victories (on and off the scale), and who will cheer you on when you’re stuck (because that will happen).

Tools I Use and Recommend

LoseIt

This one is the heart and soul of my weight loss efforts – it’s where I log every single thing I eat (and my exercise, in a round about way – see FitBit below). Available on iPhone or Android, or on the web. It’s free. Has a HUGE database of foods, and it’s easy to enter new ones. But it’s way more than a food journal. It will estimate your daily calorie burn based on your age, sex, and weight, and from there, depending on how much weight you want to lose per week (up to 2 pounds), give you your daily calorie budget. Stick to that, and you’ll lose weight. Period. When you exercise, log that, too, and you’ll get those calories added to your daily budget. It’s got a lot of other great features – syncs automatically with the LoseIt website and multiple devices, great social options for finding friends to cheer you on and encourage you, configurable reminders so you don’t forget to log, etc. There are other trackers out there (MyFitnessPal, FitDay, etc.), but this is the one I use and love.

FitBit

A FitBit is a magical little $99 device – a 3-D accelerometer (like in a Wii remote) that measures your steps, and communicates wirelessly (via your computer) to a website to tell you exactly how many steps you’ve taken (and from there, it can extrapolate how many calories you’ve burned). It can also track things like how well you’re sleeping. And the coolest thing is that it integrates with LoseIt to automatically log your exercise. Let me say that again. My FitBit automatically logs any walking, running, or other activity to LoseIt. It also tells you how many calories you burn per day (rather than making a blanket estimate, like LoseIt et al). Using my FitBit, I was able to fine tune my LoseIt calorie budget (it was being too generous) to a “no real physical activity” day. Now, anything I do above and beyond that baseline gets automatically added to LoseIt as tasty calories, so I can have a bigger meal or extra snack, and still know exactly where I am.

RunKeeper

If you have an iPhone or Android phone, RunKeeper (free) can use the GPS in it to log any walking, running, or cycling activity you do. It works best outdoors, where you can get good GPS reception. You can program specific playlists (I love to listen to podcasts while I’m walking), and you get a really cool map of your activity, and all kinds of other details. It’s very cool, and lots of runners I know use it. When I start cycling (soon), I intend to use it to log and measure my rides.

Daytum

Daytum is a general purpose data logging and display app and web service. You can track anything, fitness related or not. I’m using it to track things like body measurements, blood pressure, etc. It takes a little bit of configuring, but the result graphs are beautiful, and the app is free (there are paid tiers if you want to track ALL the things).

The Saga Continues

I feel like I’m merely at the beginning of this change. I’ve got a long way to go before I reach my goal, and what then? The best part about all of this is the worlds that are opening up to me that always seemed out of reach before. I could take up a sport. I could learn how to really enjoy cooking, and making good, healthy meals. Who knows?

I feel better than I have in a decade, or more. I have energy to play with my kids. I’m more optimistic about the future than I’ve ever been. I’m not saying all of that to brag, or to proclaim that “these miraculous changes can be yours if you do exactly what I do!” This is my journey, my life. You have yours. I simply want to share what I’ve learned. Even though I write this stuff mostly for myself, I keep hearing from friends (and strangers!) that something I’ve written about what I’m doing has helped or inspired them. In fact, someone stopped by while I was writing this to tell me exactly that. So I feel doubly blessed – first, with all the benefits of better health and a better life, and second with the possibility that I’ve not only helped myself, but others, too. And that’s pretty cool.