Experimenting
and
N of 1

This is just another random musing....

I spent an hour today watching the presentation by Dr. Eric Westman - 'Keto Medicine - The Practice Of Carbohydrate Restriction' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xMVI_t6Vfqo on youtube. This is an excellent talk where a long practicing medical doctor (someone legally responsible for the direction that they give their patients) talks about his work for the past 20 years. I would recommend you go watch that then come back and finish reading...

If you watched it AND came back, I thought I would share a few things I thought about after watching the video. So, as of today, I have lost about 20 pounds (9 Kilo or 1.5 Stone) in about 10 months trying a few different things (in three different major time windows). The weight loss has not been continuous since I have started and stopped trying different things. As I mentioned in my article "Make 1 change", I view losing fat mass as a journey where each stage of the journey can be different than the one before, where you learn through each experience how your body (and mind) will respond to the changes you are asking of them.

So, I thought I would share what I tried (my experiments on myself, my n-of-1) but didn't work for me (but they are good ideas and could work for you, go read about them and give them a try).

I have tried alternate day fasting (eat for a day, don't eat, repeat), but I could not get it it stick. When I wasn't eating, I found that was thinking about eating (craving to eat) and thinking about when I would eat next. Even though I couldn't do it, I believe that this would work for weight loss and could be reasonably healthy given how long the fasts last (generally 24-36 hours). What I found for me was that without changing the kinds of food that I ate, it was hard not to do binge-style eating or to manage the strong cravings for my previous foods. Have you ever made a peanut-butter sandwich two hours after you had dinner? I have and still have no idea why :) That is what cravings are...

I stopped drinking alcohol (calories) 100% and it worked to reduce my overall calorie count and some food cravings, but for most people who like to drink socially, it is not sustainable. As I mentioned in another post though, doing an alcohol-detox (30 days) dramatically reduced my desire to drink and thus the extra calories I was consuming, so I recommend the experiment even if it isn't part of a long-term solution. This experiment had more benefits than just a reduction in calories and weight loss, but that can be discussed somewhere else.

I tried time-restricted eating while including carbohydrates (this is often called 16-8 or 20-4 or Two meals a day). I think that this style of eating (this diet) can work for people to lose weight and has many health benefits but the challenge that I had when I was doing it was that I could jam a lot of calories into 16-8 and I saw my weight loss stall (stop) when I was doing this. Looking back, I lost the first 5-6 pounds quickly, then I hit a huge stall-plateau. My weight on the scale didn't change for a month and it came down to how much I was eating and drinking.

I did a low-carb eating experiment but found that I completely sabotaged it by eating too many nutrient (calorie) dense nuts. Again, I had no idea how many calories were in nuts until I stalled (and I never ate 1 handful of nuts, it was always two). Ah well, live and learn.

I like experimenting and seeing what works and doesn't work and I try (I really do try) to see an experiment through. Since for me the goal of these experiments are to find a way to both lose the excess fat that I have stored and to find a way that will allow me to eat a diet that will keep me healthy over the longer term.

So, currently, I found what has worked to lose another 15 pounds after that first major stall. For me, I needed to stop eating simple carbohydrates that were highly addictive to me and I needed to stop drinking my calories (which are usually carbs). This meant no double-double coffee (two cream, two sugar for the non-canadian readers), just black coffee during the day and no lattes. I also am currently doing a low-carb time-restricted eating window. I eat 2 meals during 10 hours a day - lunch, dinner and the occasional snack either before dinner or after (nuts or cheese). This seems both sustainable (I like food I am eating) and it allows me to socialize with my family by eating a primary meal (evening dinner) with them.

So, that is the end of this ramble. The question should always be for you, what could that random persons experience mean to me? What will you try next? What might work for you?