losing 15 pounds in 3 months? is it possible? how? page

[spakesneaker]

I know, I know, it's not about quick weight loss, it's about long-term health. But my brother's wedding is in October and I gotta rock that sari.

I'm guessing that I'm around ~149 lbs. right now, at 5'1.5" (23yo Female). I've been staying with relatives for the past few weeks so I haven't had much control over what I've been eating, and have ended up eating pretty carby (e.g. cereal for breakfast), but I've lost weight just by eating pretty low-calorie. But I'm going to cook myself an omelet tomorrow morning.

Before this, I think my weight loss was stalled because I wasn't really sticking to the plan. Something always seemed to pop up.

I don't have the patience to count calories anymore, but being a short female with a pretty small frame, I recognize that I probably don't need to eat that much. How does this look for a sample meal plan:

midmorning/noon: shake w/ ~48g whey protein, coconut or almond milk, frozen berries, some wheatgrass powder OR an omelet cooked w/ onions, chili peppers, and capscium, and avocado on the side
evening meal: ground beef/lamb w/ sauteed greens; or salad with spring mix, canned salmon, and olive oil

If you think it would be wise to throw in some more carb sources, I love sweet potatoes. I also really don't want to shed more hair again.

But I think I want to focus on this mostly through exercise. Namely, 4-minute (non-sprint) tabata routines every other day or even every day. Especially because I want to lose mostly my belly fat. Has anyone ever done that before? Is it going to exhaust me?

[trapperjohnme]

15 lbs in 3 months shouldnt be that difficult. and it is much more about the diet than the exercise. You cant exercise away bad eating.
if yrou goal is fat loss i suggest you ditch the berries in the shake for most days. As fair as hair loss, its not about the carbs as much as micro nutrients in my experience. take a good multi vitamin/mineral. I would nto suggest counting calories either. If you read Robb wolfs book he mentioned our bodies were designed to run on a calorie surplus.

[Sue]

if you want to lose 15 lbs in 3 months keep an eye on the calories if weight doesn't seem to be budging. Also add in some daily walks.

[spakesneaker]

if you want to lose 15 lbs in 3 months keep an eye on the calories if weight doesn't seem to be budging. Also add in some daily walks.

Yeah diet really is key. I already have a (fairly) regular exercise schedule of sprint 1x/week, p90x 2x/week, PBF 1x/week, and walking/yoga/dance whenever I can. I'm just wondering if I can speed it all up by doing brief high-intensity exercise (in addition to sprints) a few times a week.

I'm also just concerned because I've already lost about 50 lbs over the past few years, so it's been a really slow and gradual process for me, and everyone says that weight loss slows down as you get to your goal..... but it's not like I've been doing the same things all along to get to this point.

re: the frozen berries..... I just don't see how 12g of fruit carbohydrates daily, in the absence of grains or starchy vegetables (except for the occasional bite of sweet potato) will make or break my fat loss.

[ChocoTaco369]

Look at the link in my signature. As long as you're careful to maintain a mild energy deficit - without going overboard - 15 pounds in 3 months should be easy. You're probably going to have to incorporate carbs, and copious amounts of them. I lost 2.5 pounds of pure fat over 2 weeks. I have another weigh-in tonight I think, so I'll see how I did this past week.

[davem]

Let's see, I've lost 6.5#+ in a week focusing explicitly on diet, and based on my workout last night, no lost strength.

Trying to lose weight purely from working out will disappoint you, I've done that for two years. I finally started paying attention to what I eat, modified a little bit of it, and the inches are coming off. So, it's your choice, but diet>working out.

I think the average rule of thumb for running is very apparent: 1 mile of running = 100 calories. That means 35 miles = 1# worth of calories. 15# = 52,500 calories, or 525 miles run.

Now, we're midmonth July, let's assume that the wedding is mid Oct., or 13 weeks from now. You'll need to clock 40.3 miles per week in order to lose 15 pounds by running. Or average 5.75 miles ran per day without increasing your current food intake. However, my ortho claims that you can lose 1400 calories per hour from "properly" using an elliptical - so 15 pounds is just 37.5 hours on that elliptical. Sadly, he didn't delve too deep into what "properly" meant, but I know he was describing a blistering pace as they determined that by experimenting on airborne qualified soldiers.

ETA - read a little further down, looks like you have a good eating habit, sounds like you need to get a little more serious with it, that's all, I wouldn't change your workout by much, except just up the intensity in all of it.

[spakesneaker]

Look at the link in my signature. As long as you're careful to maintain a mild energy deficit - without going overboard - 15 pounds in 3 months should be easy. You're probably going to have to incorporate carbs, and copious amounts of them. I lost 2.5 pounds of pure fat over 2 weeks. I have another weigh-in tonight I think, so I'll see how I did this past week.

It looks interesting but I don't think I'm at that point yet. Once I get to 135 I will want to get down to 120, i.e. I'm still at pretty high bodyfat percentage levels. And I used to be insulin resistant with PCOS and while all that's calmed down a lot I don't think it has been fully reversed yet either.

[spakesneaker]

Let's see, I've lost 6.5#+ in a week focusing explicitly on diet, and based on my workout last night, no lost strength.

Trying to lose weight purely from working out will disappoint you, I've done that for two years. I finally started paying attention to what I eat, modified a little bit of it, and the inches are coming off. So, it's your choice, but diet>working out.

I think the average rule of thumb for running is very apparent: 1 mile of running = 100 calories. That means 35 miles = 1# worth of calories. 15# = 52,500 calories, or 525 miles run.

Now, we're midmonth July, let's assume that the wedding is mid Oct., or 13 weeks from now. You'll need to clock 40.3 miles per week in order to lose 15 pounds by running. Or average 5.75 miles ran per day without increasing your current food intake. However, my ortho claims that you can lose 1400 calories per hour from "properly" using an elliptical - so 15 pounds is just 37.5 hours on that elliptical. Sadly, he didn't delve too deep into what "properly" meant, but I know he was describing a blistering pace as they determined that by experimenting on airborne qualified soldiers.

ETA - read a little further down, looks like you have a good eating habit, sounds like you need to get a little more serious with it, that's all, I wouldn't change your workout by much, except just up the intensity in all of it.

Yeah I know that diet > exercise, but I just want to speed fat burn up by doing brief conditioning high-intensity exercise more often, and am wondering if that's possible. I HATE running so there's no way I would try to clock 40 miles a week, haha. I know I could be better with diet (sticking to primal, saying no to fruit even though it's summer, and eating less when I am doing primal, not eating chocolate) so I will definitely work on that.

You say you lost 6lbs in a week, but did you just start Primal? how much more weight do you want to lose?

[Ummmmya]

re: the frozen berries..... I just don't see how 12g of fruit carbohydrates daily, in the absence of grains or starchy vegetables (except for the occasional bite of sweet potato) will make or break my fat loss.

Maybe it will, maybe it won't. I don't lose weight if I eat any fruit (or nuts) at all.

[Mike Gager]

i lost 15lbs in 1 week