Centurians - people who have lost more than 100 lbs


(Richard Morris) #8

Oh heck if you lost all you intended to lose then I would call that an epic success … we’ll make you an honorary Centurian.


(Richard Morris) #9

11% to 6% is outstanding Heather - well done.


(Heather Miller) #10

Thanks Richard. Yes, still about 20 lbs from goal give or take since I am only 5 ft 4. However I was always fairly muscular in my younger athletic form, so no longer using the scale…just aiming for fit and trim and great health markers!


(Brian) #11

Not there yet, Richard, but I’m workin’ on it! Almost 3/4 of the way there! :smiley:


(Cheryl) #12

I started my journey back in 2014 and weighed over 350. I have not lost all my weight with Keto woe. This morning I weighed in at 189.7. The last 35+ was since September 20 when I had my first Keto day. Even when I reach my goal, I will stay Keto. I feel incredibly healthy with Keto wol!


(Deborah Meghnagi Bailey) #13

I wonder if I count? Between sixteen and thirteen years ago, I lost a total of 105lbs when I went low-carb. I maintained the loss for another four years, until I got pregnant. Despite my total dedication to low-carb, which had turned my life around, and which I was utterly in love with, I was so sick (I had ‘mild’ hyperemesis gravidarum) that no matter what I tried, I could only stomach carbs. And then I threw them up. But despite throwing up four times a day, I gained about 25lbs before I could go back to low-carb - at which point I didn’t gain any more weight. But then I gained a bit more during breastfeeding, and I had gained some pre-pregnancy, during the honeymoon months when I wasn’t as careful as I needed to be. So when my son was a month old, I found myself about forty pounds higher than I had been at my lowest weight. Which was incredibly distressing. But I figured - low carb had finally taught me how to eat, so all I had to do was continue, and I’d lose it again, even if it would take time, as I’ve always been a slow loser. Well, it didn’t happen. For the next eight years, it didn’t happen. I kept eating low-carb, and every so often I’d put in extra effort - I’d do strict keto for a month, or I’d count calories as well as carbs, or I’d quit sweetener… but there would be minimal change, and I would feel like I was on a diet, feel deprived, not feel like I’d felt when I initially low-carbed. I even kept slowly gaining weight over those years. By the time December 2016 rolled along I had managed to go up to 217lbs from my low of 145 (highest weight was 250, in my mid-twenties). I thought it was age - I’m in my forties now. But I was so miserable - there I was, a dedicated low-carber, I owned all the books, I knew all the names - before many of you did, I’d been doing this for sixteen years; even Good Calories, Bad Calories, when it came out, only confirmed what I already knew from my years on low-carb/Atkins etc. But how could I be an ambassador for low-carb when I was gaining weight despite eating low carb 95.5% of the time? I was never diabetic, by the way - just very fat. My bloodwork was all great - because I ate low-carb! One doctor almost laughed at me when I asked about having an insulin test - because why would they give me one, when everything else looks fabulous?

Anyway… in December 2016 I read The Obesity Code. I almost didn’t buy it - just another book telling me things I already know, I thought. Thank goodness I did. Most of it was familiar, true enough - but there were two things that stood out: 1) sweetener raises insulin and 2) even low carb won’t necessarily lower your insulin to the point where you can actually lower your setpoint.

I quit sweetener and started alternate day fasting, in combination with my ever-present low-carb/keto diet (I call it low-carb, but really you could call it lazy keto - I have always been fairly strict, but I also would use sweetener).

I am now, a year later, down fifty pounds. I have no doubt now that, while it may take me a while longer - i’m still a slow loser - i’ll get back to that 100+ lbs lost. I’m now 83lbs down from the highest weight I saw, which was twenty years ago. I have another ten pounds to go to my pre-pregnancy weight, and twenty-two to my lowest weight as an adult (I was obese by the age of 14).

Keto wasn’t enough for me, not once I had had kids. I’m sure my cortisol was raised for years post-birth - my son was a terrible sleeper so I was permanently sleep deprived. Then I went through some years of secondary infertility - more stress. Then another very hard pregnancy - this one even worse, so I actually didn’t gain any weight even though I could only eat carbs - I threw up so much I was losing weight. Then another son who didn’t sleep for years. So it’s possible that even if I’d found Dr Fung’s work earlier, it wouldn’t have helped, because I don’t know how I would have got my insulin lowered when I was being woken up multiple times a night by babies and toddlers.

Sorry for this very very long post!! But I love to talk about my experience - because I have been doing this for so long, and because my long-term success with low-carb/keto was negatively affected by the upheavals of pregnancy (and some other stresses like job losses) despite my continuing to eat right, and it took eight years of struggling and only then, with Dr Fung’s book, a combination of keto and fasting and quitting sweetener for things to work again. But now I’m on fire! I love fasting and my love of keto and low-carb has been renewed. My appetite is back where it should be; I’m in charge, not my body, and I finally feel like my appearance has begun to reflect my commitment to the healthiest way of eating there is!! before_after|690x344


Studies showing Sweeteners that Raise Insulin Levels?
(Deborah Meghnagi Bailey) #15


(Liz ) #16

I really appreciate you telling your story! I, too, have been low carb for a really long time. I initially lost 60 lbs on Atkins in 2003 from 260 to 200, but never got to goal (somewhere around 140-150 I’m guessing) and started to slowly regain despite staying low carb all that time. I don’t have kids, but I did add in too many carbs when I tried Paleo for about 5 years there, so when I went Keto in March of last year some weight did start to drop off, I have now dropped 40 lbs, I’m a slow loser too. But now I’ve been stalled 20 or 30 pounds from goal for a few months and I am relying on fasting to get me there, eventually, at which point I will have lost 100+ from my highest 15 years ago. So cheers to you and your persistence! Very inspiring.


(Liz Myers) #17

Not all my weight loss was from keto, but the easiest weight loss has been!

I have always been morbidly obese - right from infancy.

In the spring of 2003, at age 29, I was diagnosed as being prediabetic. That fall I had RNY weight loss surgery - I weighed 343# the morning of my surgery.
I lost 140# by spring of 2005, and hovered around there a few years before my weight started slowly creeping up.

In March of 2015 I weighed 235 - my husband and I were planning a cross country motorcycle trip for 2016, and I knew I needed to increase my fitness level for it.
Over the next (nightmarish) 15 months, I worked with a trainer and saw 2 nutritionists - and lost 35#. I followed all the crappy standard diet advice, was obsessing over food because I was constantly hungry and had zero energy.
It’s bad when your trainer sends you home because you are dragging so badly. It got to the point that I felt I was unsafe to ride my motorcycle, so I stopped monitoring my food intake a few weeks before we left.
I vowed I would dig into the science behind hunger and energy when I got back.

I had an accident during the trip, and during my recovery I saw a post about keto from @Brenda (we were motorcycle FB friends). I was bored and cranky, and diet posts annoyed me, so I was determined to research and disprove the wacky diet she kept posting about…only I couldn’t…

I read the Obesity Code, and had a light bulb moment when Dr. Fung talked about high insulin levels making you unable to access energy. That is why I was always so darn tired.
That was January 2017, and I weighed 230. I was full keto by mid March, and have lost 47 pounds on keto so far.

It blows my mind that every few days I wake up and am a new lowest weight (183 this AM) since I was a kid. I’ve started running (no, I’m not being chased) - something I never thought I’d ever be able to do.
I’m never hungry. I never have low energy. Keto is responsible for my meeting incredible people.

Can life get any better?


(Richard Morris) #18

Awesome … Imma KC&KO too :slight_smile:


(Richard Morris) #19

Absolutely. I am always interested in people who lost large amounts and then kept it off for more than 6 months. This is traditionally considered so unlikely to be virtually almost impossible - and yet for those of us on the diabetic continuum who go low carb it seems to be common. It’s still not easy, but it’s not impossible.

Diabetes is a diagnosis of failing glucose control - but we can keep our glucose in control with a little insulin or a lot. The latter group I would put on the diabetic continuum at one end of which is carrying too much body fat around the viscera and the other is diabetes.

:frowning: I’m sorry that must have been frustrating

Yeah you will :slight_smile:

When it comes to lowering insulin

Fasting > Keto > Low Carb > Vegan > SAD

Woot :slight_smile:


(Richard Morris) #20

:frowning:

yes that is sadly the necessary biochemical outcome of the crappy standard diet advice - hunger and lethargy.

The crappy standard moral advice is man up and stop being so greedy and slothful.

LOL. yeah I got started trying to disprove it too, so did Tim Noakes … we’re in good company.


(Justin Hamilton (Hamenopi)) #21

Proud to say I’ve dropped 120 lbs with the help of keto.
2 years ago I was over 300 lbs. Last summer I got down to low 180s. Still below 200 after holidays.
Decided to do an obstacle 5k as a reward.
Bulking up and trimming down for my first Savage Race in April


(Will Madams) #22

image

Started Keto 1 January 2017

start weight: 172kg at 186cm
Current weight: 115kg at 188cm

Since going Keto I have completed:

2 Half Marathons
1 Full Marathon
3 Triathlons (2 Sprint and 1 Olypmic)
Ridden Around the Bay Charity Ride (280Km ride around Port Phillip Bay Melbourne, Australia)

Started my own Keto group at work and helped two colleges reverse their type 2 diabetes.

Next goal is to get to 100kgs and Join the Royal Australian Navy (now i fit the fittest requirements)

2 Keto Dudes Podcast got me through it and continue to!

Thanks Lads


(8 year Ketogenic Veteran) #23

Awwe Liz. @WrenchWench. I love ya man.


(8 year Ketogenic Veteran) #24

I lost 100 total. Ketogenic since February 2014.
A1c 12 to 5

I’ll write up a post with pics tomorry.

Oh hell, y’all know my story. Lol

BUT

I’ll still write one up…
with pics.


(Jennifer Kleiman) #25

Hi! Just joined the forums here but I’ve lurked for awhile. Love the podcast! I’m on facebook & have been helping Karen Ogilvie run the Impulsive Keto groups, recently started podcasting with her on the Impulsive Ketocast which is a ton of fun and hugely educational for me.

Storytime- my whole life I was obese, my mom’s obese, my dad’s obese, my brother’s obese, my aunts & uncles are not all obese but some of them, yeah. I figure my ancestors survived regular starvation in the shtetl on 2 beets and a potato, so if we lived in a situation of food scarcity I would totally be in great shape whereas my sister-in-law who devours cases of twinkies daily and remains 105 lbs would die right off. But alas we are surrounded by abundance and my genes are not ideal.

I was a happy 245-lb fat chick until early 2014 when I got my diabetes diagnosis – 12.1 a1c. My doctor gave me metformin and told me to eat better and check back in a few months. Well, I lost some weight and between that and the metformin I got my a1c down in the 6s. Great job said my doctor, but my a1c numbers started creeping back up and the doc prescribed more metformin, then glipizide, then my kidneys started having issues and the cholesterol numbers were bad. That’s ok said my doctor, diabetes is a progressive disease and that’s how it goes sometimes, as he calmly prescribed more drugs.

It was mid-summer 2015 when that happened. A few days later i was at Six Flags with my family, most of whom didn’t even try to fit into the rides that required tight safety harnesses. I love rollercoasters though. Well, the safety harness closed over my gut but it took two of the ride operators to slam it into place. I could feel their contempt. Later that day, I heard one of my diabetic, morbidly obese aunts had to call 911 because she’d fallen and couldn’t get up on her own. Wake-up call finally hit me – I could not keep going down this road.

I did research and found keto on reddit, then nearly killed myself with severe hypoglycemia… ugh glipizide, such a horrible drug. My doctor said yeah that was a common side effect, just keep orange juice on hand. Well I fired that guy and got a keto-savvy doctor. In short order I was able to discontinue the glipizide, metformin and although it took a year for my kidney numbers to normalize, they healed too.

With 100 lbs of weight lost I had a bunch of loose skin that kept getting infected. In June 2017 I got it cut off! My weight’s been stable at 145ish for the past 1.5 years now. I follow the Impulsive Keto method of intermittent fasting and meals of meat + two veg, more or less. My HOMA-IR’s been tested at 0.5 which is as good as it gets, my cholesterol’s great, my bp’s great, everything’s great (er except for some thyroid and anemia issues). Currently trying an experiment with alternate-day fasting, no food Monday/Wednesday/Friday, so basically 3 44-hr fasts during the week, to see if I can shake my body off this 145 set-point and lose anothr 10 pounds or so just out of vanity really. We’ll see!

I also saw a therapist to delve into my psyche and figure out long-term weight/health maintenance strategies. The key for me is to always have new goals, to monitor myself, and to participate in communities where I make friends that understand and share the same health goals :slight_smile: Nice to meet y’all.


(Deborah Meghnagi Bailey) #26

Yeah, when I say I was never diabetic, I mean my blood glucose was never high. I’m sure my insulin was off the charts, but nobody tests for that! Obesity does run in the family on my mother’s side, but not in my nuclear family, I was the only one who was obese as a teen. My weight gain started with puberty. I’m pretty sure I had pcos, which also runs in the family. I are a ton of junk food, I was totally addicted to carbs. Part of it was probably pcos, and I’m wondering now if part of the insulin problem was caused by stress, because I was bullied fairly badly just around the first couple of years of puberty. And then of course there was the recommended diet… Low fat, high carb… So my parents dutifully followed that, and we ate a lot of soy, too… I was never full. But I only got up to 250 in the first place by dieting. I was around 185 by 14/15 years old, and that was my setpoint until I tried to lose weight with weightwatchers… Anyway, I would love to talk to you about my experiences. I love your podcast!!


(Deborah Meghnagi Bailey) #27

Jennifer, I reckon my mum’s side survived the shtetl in much the same way :slight_smile: and the obesity in our family is definitely from my mum’s side. I guess the Jewish community in Libya had better food, because everyone on my dad’s side is slim. Facially, I look like my dad but my metabolism is definitely ashkenazi!


(Deborah Meghnagi Bailey) #28

Thanks, Liz! It’s always comforting to ‘meet’ others with similar experiences! My maintenance range was 145-154. I’m not tall, but I’m an extreme hourglass, so that was a good weight for me. I had some excess skin, but not a lot, nothing that would have required surgery. Also, I only got down from 154 to 145 by eating 1200 calories a day as well as low carbing. So it could be my body prefers to be 154. I’ll wait and see what happens now with fasting and keto. I’m at 167 now…