Marion Nestle!
I’ve had a ton of success with intermittent fasting and low-ish carb over the last year. For me it’s vastly easier to eat nothing at all than to have a small snack or taste, so I do all my eating in a 6 to 8 hour window. Once in awhile I get hungry and totally break that rule but overall it’s been extremely helpful in managing hunger.
If you can keep your LDL levels in check (or really, your LDL to HDL ratio.)
I just had my physical this week, and while my LDL levels are higher than I’d like (~140), my HDL levels are booming and according to the risk calculator my doctor used to talk me through my bloodwork results, that makes up for it [1]. We’re switching to yearly monitoring to make sure the ratio stays in check (or I get my LDL levels down further, which I’m working on with some soluble fiber supplements.)
[1] It also helps that my BMI is under 25, and I’m pretty physically active.
@John_Reynolds Man, I’m really sorry to hear about your results, and the stress and anxiety they cause. I hope they provide you with that extra motivation to modify your diet and exercise regimes to get you closer to where you want to be. While it feels impossibly far away now, small changes can have a big impact on your results. We’ve got some great threads on the forum with lots of helpful advice, so I hope those give you some good material to work with. A few people like @inactive_user have had a lot of success lately with weight loss, I hope you can find the same!
I’m so so sorry to hear this. It must have been a shock to hear from one source that your heart was in great shape and then swing so wildly to the other side.
There’s a lot of great advice in this thread already, and it sounds like you have a good handle on what’s realistic. The biggest key is to do what works for you. There are a ton of effective diet and exercise plans, but the best one for you is the one that you can sustain.
I have a background in physiology and a lot of exercise/diet experience. Feel free to reach out if you want any input, or even just need someone to help you feel accountable.
We’re all here for you.
This is me as well.
I sort of naturally fell into intermittent fasting once I went low-carb and my hunger response chilled the hell out. Now I generally eat something like 11-7 (when I’m being good and not munching late-night, which I need to get back to being good about, heh) because that’s when I’m hungry.
@John_Reynolds man, Internet hug! I also have a family history of heart disease and a father who ate/drank himself into an early grave, I’m just a little younger than you and ahead of your schedule. I think everyone here has the advice front pretty well covered, but on a personal level I completely changed my whole situation by going keto (which some wankers will call a fad diet, but they’re wrong and they should feel bad) and am happy to chat about my personal experiences any time.
Keto certainly has demonstrable effects (and I drink Atkins shakes myself occasionally) but every person I’ve ever known who went keto eventually quit and immediately gained all the weight back.
just wanted to hop in and say, that sucks man! We are all pulling for you though. I think the important things to look at here, are that it isn’t a death sentence, as much as a scare tactic. We are all going to die someday, and your doctor is giving you some good plans and ways to extend that as much as possible. You definitely can do it, lifestyle changes suck, but it seems like that is what it has to be at this point. Like someone else said, healthcare continues to evolve year after year, who knows what CHF treatment will be like in 10 years? You just have to keep yourself healthy enough to let medical science catch up!
It does sound like you have a good plan going, and it is nice that your doctor is being so frank with you, it really does help sometimes to hear the bad news without any sugarcoating, so that you can make a decisive plan for change.
Good luck, and you better stick around for at least 30 more years.
If I qualify as someone you “know”, then that is no longer true. For me, it is a lifestyle, not a diet. Been over twenty years now.
But you are Misguided! :)
To expand on my earlier comment: the nutritionist divided the plate in 3 parts: 1/4 protein, 1/4 carbs (rice, etc.), and 1/2 plants, but not a lot of fruits or berries, because those are carbs. The basics for me, as a large male, was 30-50 carbs per meal, with the caveat that you don’t drink your carbs. That is the hard part for me, I really like Coke.
This isn’t a great thread for this discussion, but if you exercise you can eat/drink all the carbs you want. People should pick whatever works for them of course, but I eat a lot of carbs and have no issues there.
350lbs and congestive heart failure, I assume your doctor mentioned surgery. Endoscopic sleeve surgery is minimally invasive, they basically go in down your throat and sew up your stomach from the inside so it’s smaller, and works extremely well longterm unlike dieting.
You could also look into semaglutide for weight loss, it seems to be pretty effective at controlling appetite, but nothing matches the surgical option. Patients lost around 15% of their body weight on semaglutide but that wouldn’t be sufficient to get you anywhere near a healthy weight. It’s an injection which sounds scary, but it’s a very short tiny needle and comes with an injection pen so there’s really nothing to worry about. If you’re unwilling to consider surgery, dropping 50lbs is a hell of a lot better than nothing.
Best wishes, @John_Reynolds. I would just like to add that keto has worked wonders for both me and my wife. I lost 60 lbs. and she lost 40. I don’t foresee any issues staying on it for the rest of my life.
r/keto is filled with posts of people dropping 100 lbs. or more all the time.
Is there any dieting subreddit that isn’t?
Diet and exercise doesn’t work for most people. Not because diet and exercise doesn’t itself work, of course it does, but most people can’t make the lifestyle changes to actually do it longterm. That’s really fucking hard. What actually works is surgery. It always works, and it’s minimally invasive these days.
If you’re, like, 250 pounds and 5’11", maybe you try to diet and work out more, or go on semaglutide. But 350 lbs and heart issues, it’s time to stop fucking around. Talk to your doctor about surgery.
The doctor did not mention surgery, and to be honest I balk at the thought of it (not out of fear of needles or surgery, I’ve been under the knife a few times), but I’ll research it, stusser.
Been using myfitnesspal.com to track intake since Mon night, been averaging 1,800 calories via a fairly good balance of protein and various carb sources. Sodium has been decent too, we put up the salt shaker and my wife has been researching stuff she can cook for me.
I’m kinda shocked he didn’t bring it up! But yes check it out. They don’t flay you open like a christmas goose, it’s down your throat like Asa Akira and you’re done.
I would ask about semaglutide also, it seem to be pretty dang close to magical. But 15% body mass wouldn’t get you down to healthy.
IMO there are better threads for arguing that keto will turn your face into a butt or whatever ;)
Not to make this about me but I’ve been on keto for over 2 years and have lost (and kept off) 85 pounds. I am 6’4" and weigh 200 lbs. Not planning on stopping anytime soon. And that’s with minimal exercise. I’ve found it to be very effective.
Says the guy who bought a bicycle this summer.