I lost 30 pounds in three months using the Lose It! app

I know, I know — you’re reading CliqueClack Food to read about eating food, not avoiding it. If you’ve got no interest in losing weight or dieting, you can move along. However, I’m here to tell you that, at least in my case, I’ve found that losing weight isn’t all that tough and you can still eat what you want … just less of it.

At my age and height, most online calculators told me that, at 225 pounds, I was “obese.” I knew I was overweight, but I didn’t think I was in obese territory yet. In fact, the lowest weight I can recall being in the past 15 years or so was 205, and even that was considered to be overweight by these online calculators. How much should I weigh, according to these sites? About 185. The last time I can recall weighing 185 was in Jr. High School!

These calculators are insane when they’re not taking other factors into account. So, I decided that I had a goal weight in mind that I was happy with: 205. It’s a weight I can recall feeling relatively fit and feeling good. I was riding a bicycle about ten miles every weekday and routinely lifting weights, so that felt like a good place to be.

Rather than hop on some trendy diet or try to fit in bicycling again, I decided I’d combine simple calorie counting with regular treadmill exercises. The treadmill allowed me to work and walk, since I simply placed a board across the handles and put my laptop there. Now there would be no excuses for not getting off my ass, as the company wireless network reaches the gym and there’s barely anyone ever using the treadmill. It was like an office away from my office.

To do calorie counting, I found the free iPhone/iPod Touch application called Lose It! (emphasis theirs). Right away I was impressed by how extensive the database was on this app, making regular entry a snap. For anything not in the database, I could easily add my own items by either looking online or simply reading package labels. The tedious part came when I had to enter a recipe, but once it’s entered, you can just refer back to that recipe again later very easily.

For people who tend to not eat very many different things throughout the week, the app keeps track of what you’ve already used in the past and keeps a “My Foods” list for quick retrieval. You can also very quickly add a previous meal to what you’re eating on a given day. So, if you’re having another bowl of cereal, milk, eggs and juice, just pick the day you had that same breakfast and add it to the current day and you’re done.

There were times, though, where I was at a party and simply didn’t have time to keep track of everything I was picking from all day. For this I added a custom “food” simply called “100 Calories” and guestimated what everything added up to. Guessing gets a lot easier when you’ve been using the app for a month. I found that I’d usually add a bit more calories to my guesses, just in case I was really wrong on something.

I’m a gamer at heart, and I sort of found using the Lose It! app like playing a game. If I could anticipate my future moves, I’d know what I needed to do earlier to “win” at losing weight. Going to have a beer with dinner? Shit, I’d better get on the treadmill now for an hour to make up for it.

The results, after three months of using Lose It!: I’m hovering around 194-195 pounds. There’s a very noticeable difference in my appearance, and I’ve had to get all new pants and belts to fit me. I haven’t been this weight in probably 20 years, and I feel fantastic. I still don’t feel the need to go down to the “recommended” 185 pounds — in fact, I think that might be downright unhealthy for me.

Some tricks I’ve found to get the most out of using Lose It!:

– As I said above, to keep yourself sane in times of a busy party or whatnot, create a “100 Calories” custom food and simply use that when there’s a convenient time to add it. You can use fractions of that 100 calories or simply specify more “servings” of it if you’ve taken in 200 calories, etc. I didn’t use it often, but it helped on a few occasions.

– Make sure you stick to the calories you’re allotted and don’t think eating far less is a good thing. The app purposely adjusts for your current weight and will gradually bring your allotted calories down as you lose weight. If you drop your calorie count too quickly or too soon, your body will start to store fat to make up for what you’re not eating.

– Try to anticipate what your dinner will be before you eat lunch or even breakfast. This way you can indulge a little or have that one extra slice of pizza at lunch or a beer after work with friends when you know you’re having a salad for dinner. It would totally suck that you passed on eating a cookie after lunch because you thought you’d be eating a pasta dinner, yet it turned out you were having something far less caloric. Knowing ahead of time that you’ll have wine or dessert later that night also helps you know how much exercise you should try to do that day to make up for it.

– I love pasta, but anytime that appeared on the menu, I knew I’d likely be going a little over that day. Try to limit your pasta intake.

– The app already takes into account an average person’s daily movement for what calories you lose there, but make sure you add in any other exercise you do throughout the day, including yardwork and vacuuming! Yes, those are “exercises” included in the database that will subtract calories from your daily intake.

– Start with a low per-week weight loss plan. The app asks you your goal weight and how much you want to try to lose per week, which it will use to tell you the date when you should reach your goal. I tried a goal of losing 20 pounds, two pounds per week, and that was too difficult at first. I dropped down to one pound per week and that was much more reasonable for me. Eventually I got so used to it that I was able to jump to 1.5 pounds per week, then two. Your mileage may vary, but don’t give up if you can’t handle a faster pace.

– Take your weight measurements at the same time every day, without clothes on and preferably in the morning. Oh, and preferably at home, unless you like stripping down in public. If that’s the case, then good for you … I guess.

– Need something that does the same thing, is free and is on the web? The best I’ve found is About.com’s Calorie Count. It’s also a great place to search for calorie information on foods that Lose It! doesn’t have in its database.

– Keep at it! Don’t forget to record everything you eat and learn what healthy snacks fill you up without adding too many calories. Calorie counting is all about being aware of what you’re eating. After three months of using the app, I’ve gotten so used to knowing what things have a high calorie count that I don’t need to use the app anymore.

If you decide to give the Lose It! app a try, let me know how it works out!

Clacked by Keith McDuffee
on May 29, 2009 @ 10:00 EST5EDT