Post your weight gain

[HLSheppard]

I have gained an embarrassing amount... ugh

 

[mattdee1]

You can enjoy plenty of beer without gaining weight but beer does contain calories so you have to look at the big picture of your lifestyle to understand how beer fits in, and to know when enough is enough.

Exercise helps, but the reality is, most of us beer folks are going to have to work really damn hard to offset (or even put a dent in) beer calories with physical activity. Sad but true; just look at how many calories are in your favorite DIPA, and compare that to how many calories you burn by running on a treadmill for 45 minutes (for example).

That’s why, regardless of whether you drink 1 beer per week or 1 case per week, the best way to “make room” for beer without getting fat is to take a good hard look at what you eat.

I’ve no doubt that in many cases, the term “beer belly” is nothing more than a bad diet misidentified; that is, a food diet that contains too much sugar, too much processed junk, too much indiscriminate empty-calorie snacking, and too little attention to portion sizes at meals.

When it comes to weight management, it’s impossible to overstate the importance of having at least a basic understanding of the impacts of your food choices before you make them. That sounds obvious but I can’t believe how few people seem to be able to, for example, tell the difference between a 400 calorie lunch and 1000+ calorie lunch. That 400 calories is not much but it does not require one to eat cabbage water and carrot sticks—it can easily be achieved by filling a Tupperware container with leftovers from a previous night’s healthy home-cooked dinner. The 1000 calorie option is going to get you on the express lane to Fatville and is pretty much what you’re signing up for when you walk into Jimmy John’s and order one of those foot-long tubes of mayonnaise that they call a sub sandwich. Make it a combo with a big cookie or bag of chips, and that’s several hundred more calories. Even without the cookie and chips, this illustrative example shows an additional 600 calories being consumed over and above what would be contained in a smart-but-still-reasonable lunch – a difference which constitutes roughly 25% of a typical 40ish year-old adult male’s caloric budget for the entire day to maintain a healthy weight – and that’s just one of the day’s meals.

If you don’t bother to learn how to read food labels and identify common calorie traps, you’ll be inclined to eat whatever gets thrown in your face or placed conveniently at arm’s length, without having any understanding of how it’s impacting your weight. And that is a bad situation to be in, because most profit-hungry purveyors of foodstuffs do not hold your health as a top priority when marketing and peddling their wares… shocking, I know, and yet another reason why it’s always best to prepare your own meals from whole foods whenever humanly possible so you know exactly what you’re eating.

Oh, and if you are one who assumes that “healthy food” is synonymous with “bland food,” please get that idea out of your head because it’s not true.

 

[PADave]

You can enjoy plenty of beer without gaining weight but beer does contain calories so you have to look at the big picture of your lifestyle to understand how beer fits in, and to know when enough is enough.

Exercise helps, but the reality is, most of us beer folks are going to have to work really damn hard to offset (or even put a dent in) beer calories with physical activity. Sad but true; just look at how many calories are in your favorite DIPA, and compare that to how many calories you burn by running on a treadmill for 45 minutes (for example).

That’s why, regardless of whether you drink 1 beer per week or 1 case per week, the best way to “make room” for beer without getting fat is to take a good hard look at what you eat.

I’ve no doubt that in many cases, the term “beer belly” is nothing more than a bad diet misidentified; that is, a food diet that contains too much sugar, too much processed junk, too much indiscriminate empty-calorie snacking, and too little attention to portion sizes at meals.

When it comes to weight management, it’s impossible to overstate the importance of having at least a basic understanding of the impacts of your food choices before you make them. That sounds obvious but I can’t believe how few people seem to be able to, for example, tell the difference between a 400 calorie lunch and 1000+ calorie lunch. That 400 calories is not much but it does not require one to eat cabbage water and carrot sticks—it can easily be achieved by filling a Tupperware container with leftovers from a previous night’s healthy home-cooked dinner. The 1000 calorie option is going to get you on the express lane to Fatville and is pretty much what you’re signing up for when you walk into Jimmy John’s and order one of those foot-long tubes of mayonnaise that they call a sub sandwich. Make it a combo with a big cookie or bag of chips, and that’s several hundred more calories. Even without the cookie and chips, this illustrative example shows an additional 600 calories being consumed over and above what would be contained in a smart-but-still-reasonable lunch – a difference which constitutes roughly 25% of a typical 40ish year-old adult male’s caloric budget for the entire day to maintain a healthy weight – and that’s just one of the day’s meals.

If you don’t bother to learn how to read food labels and identify common calorie traps, you’ll be inclined to eat whatever gets thrown in your face or placed conveniently at arm’s length, without having any understanding of how it’s impacting your weight. And that is a bad situation to be in, because most profit-hungry purveyors of foodstuffs do not hold your health as a top priority when marketing and peddling their wares… shocking, I know, and yet another reason why it’s always best to prepare your own meals from whole foods whenever humanly possible so you know exactly what you’re eating.

Oh, and if you are one who assumes that “healthy food” is synonymous with “bland food,” please get that idea out of your head because it’s not true.

I couldn't agree more with this post. Amazes me how many people don't know how to read a nutrition label and find out when they are putting into their bodies.

 

[JonM]

Oh, the leftovers from last night's healthy meal are my go-to work lunch. The best is on a Monday where I throw together a container of leftovers from several weekend dinners - little couscous, some grilled pattypans and beets and carrots, couple shrimp, couple chunks of pork tenderloin, little rice, etc.

 

[mattdee1]

I couldn't agree more with this post. Amazes me how many people don't know how to read a nutrition label and find out when they are putting into their bodies.

What sucks about that problem is how it ends up discouraging people who might genuinely have an interest in making better choices. A classic example in my experience with some of my close friends would be the guy who desperately wants to get his belly back to the size it was in his 20s, so he makes a promise to himself to overhaul his diet and do things like eat side salads instead of fries, other carbs, and deep fried stuff. He feels this is a big step that takes significant willpower, so it is with great disappointment that after several months of strict adherence to this new policy, he hasn’t lost a single pound, and may have actually put on additional pounds.

“Damn beer is making me fat,” he declares with cold certainty to all who will listen.

But it probably has little to do with beer. Those supposedly “healthy and light” side salads are slathered with a few hundred calories worth of cheese and ranch dressing and are eaten alongside, for example, a big reuben sandwich at Applebees that is covered with butter, “special sauce”, cheese, and Lord knows what else. Or maybe it’s chicken wings at the pub with the boys (chicken is healthy, right? Right… ?) for a cool 1500 or so calories per basket. The net result is that every one of those meals is still well in excess of 1000 calories – maybe in excess of 2000 calories -- salad or not. So the poor guy, no matter how well-intentioned, is habitually killing close to his entire daily calorie budget in a single meal, while having absolutely no idea what, how, or why.

 

[Homercidal]

I've been on a lower fat, more veggie diet for a bit to appease my doctor. I've been losing a small amount of weight, mostly due to salads (low less dressing than normal) and simply eating less.

But I bet I can lose even more by kicking beer.

But that's only if I don't substitute something else in place of it, like soda. Yes, zero fat, but plenty of sugars. I'd rather get my carbs in liquid malt barley, thank you very much!

I have found that diet soda does make me hungry, like the recent studies have insinuated. Anything sweet tends to make me hungry. Coffee with cream and sugar in the morning, diet soda, even sweet fruits. I can be hungry, eat an apple, and then be MORE hungry right after!

One thing I've learned is to eat a reasonable amount of food for a meal, then put the damn plate away. Give yourself 20 minutes, doing something to take your mind off of food, and afterward you will likely not even be hungry anymore.

And don't forget the big one in health: Exercise! I find that exercising reduces my desire to eat more. I'm not usually hungry while I'm exercising, and after a good workout I'm more thirsty than hungry. The hardest things are finding time for a good workout, and actually wanting to exercise! Exercise isn't so much to lose weight, but to just generally feel better with more strength and stamina and improved cardiovascular health.

 

[danimal45]

What sucks about that problem is how it ends up discouraging people who might genuinely have an interest in making better choices. A classic example in my experience with some of my close friends would be the guy who desperately wants to get his belly back to the size it was in his 20s, so he makes a promise to himself to overhaul his diet and do things like eat side salads instead of fries, other carbs, and deep fried stuff. He feels this is a big step that takes significant willpower, so it is with great disappointment that after several months of strict adherence to this new policy, he hasn’t lost a single pound, and may have actually put on additional pounds.

“Damn beer is making me fat,” he declares with cold certainty to all who will listen.

But it probably has little to do with beer. Those supposedly “healthy and light” side salads are slathered with a few hundred calories worth of cheese and ranch dressing and are eaten alongside, for example, a big reuben sandwich at Applebees that is covered with butter, “special sauce”, cheese, and Lord knows what else. Or maybe it’s chicken wings at the pub with the boys (chicken is healthy, right? Right… ?) for a cool 1500 or so calories per basket. The net result is that every one of those meals is still well in excess of 1000 calories – maybe in excess of 2000 calories -- salad or not. So the poor guy, no matter how well-intentioned, is habitually killing close to his entire daily calorie budget in a single meal, while having absolutely no idea what, how, or why.

That is the classic approach that leads to failure. Counting calories and going on diets is a great way to understand the big picture but it does little to actually implement the changes needed to stay thin. Then people fall into the "health food" trap and as you describe, they pick an item that is considered or labeled as healthy, and either eat so much that it is just as bad or cover it in fats to make it taste good.

The best way to overhaul your diet is one item at a time and one meal at a time. Start by replacing sweets with fruit. Get used to having fruit around all the time, and eating it for snacks. Do that for a month or two until it is a habit. Then look at entrees and sides. Replace a side with a vegetable. Get used to having vegetables as a portion of every single meal. Now start just picking healthier options for entrees and change what you order at restaurants. Finally start making physical changes. Take the stairs, every time. Park in the back of a parking lot. Ride a bike to work.

I gained a lot of weight because I changed jobs, moved, had our first child and was going to college all at the same time over the course of 18 months. The stress and the sedentary lifestyle my job and school placed me under, and the fact that we were eating fast food all the time without time to cook dinner I gained 30 lbs over that 18 months. But in less than a year, I am back down to my previous weight and have been getting into better shape even though my brewing has increased above what it probably should be. I am not on some rediculuous diet, I just bike to work 3-5 days a week and I eat fruit all the time and cannot remember the last time I had a soda or ate fast food.

 

[danimal45]

You know, one other thing that I found that really helped are almonds. I buy the big bags of raw almonds from costco. Every so often throughout the day I take a handful. Not much, just a couple bites. A couple bites of almonds almost completely satisfies even my greatest hunger pains. It is strange. I can be absolutely starving at 10am, I eat a handful of almonds and most of the time I am not really that hungry when lunch time rolls around at noon. So I eat a smaller meal at noon. I do the same thing around 2pm.

 

[JonM]

Know what's surprisingly satisfying for dinner? 6-8 oz of a meat/protein and two different kinds of veggie - even better on the grill. 6 oz of salmon and a heap of grilled carrots and another heap of grilled broccoli (it can be done). An 8 oz fillet mignon and a pile of grilled sliced beets and some sweet corn or potatoes steamed with just a little butter. Too bland? Add a crap ton of garlic.

And FWIW, I know some folks (especially dudes) pooh-pooh it, but Weight Watchers does a fantastic job of getting members to redefine their relationship with and understanding of food, and they do a great job of helping members to unlearn bad things they learned before.

 

[FloppyKnockers]

 

[mattdee1]

Know what's surprisingly satisfying for dinner? 6-8 oz of a meat/protein and two different kinds of veggie - even better on the grill. 6 oz of salmon and a heap of grilled carrots and another heap of grilled broccoli (it can be done). An 8 oz fillet mignon and a pile of grilled sliced beets and some sweet corn or potatoes steamed with just a little butter. Too bland? Add a crap ton of garlic.

^^ exactly

Garlic, herbs, and spices are your friend when it comes to meals that are both healthy and satisfying. Cumin, fennel, cardamom, cayenne, coriander, rosemary, sage, basil... the list goes on and on, and the possibilities are endless.

And FWIW, I know some folks (especially dudes) pooh-pooh it, but Weight Watchers does a fantastic job of getting members to redefine their relationship with and understanding of food, and they do a great job of helping members to unlearn bad things they learned before.

I don't know anything about WW, but I am very familiar with the general tendency for dude-bros to pooh-pooh things that are healthy. I can't count the number of times I've had dudes -- many of them with big bellies -- snicker and make fun of me for some of the things I eat. It's like, you know what, you're right dude... everybody knows that nothing is more manly than a big fat spare-tire gut, I think I'll stop eating this and go grab something you think makes me look tougher. It's ridiculous.