Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[TalkingRat]

...I am beginning to think many people don't take quite enough to get the weight lose going.  I had to take double what the book recommended (2T versus 1T).

There's big resistance to doing certain amounts of oil & SW, even among those of us who stick with it.  We do our best not to increase our dose of either and worry it's bad for us.  When in reality getting the weight off is the best health present we can give ourselves!

We forget that the dose you need to lose weight is not likely to be the dose you'd take to maintain that weight.  Viewing 4T of oil as a short-term action (say 1 year versus the rest of your life)  might be easier to handle in that context.

I think you are right go2grl.  We all seem to have skipped over this statement on Page 55:  "After a few weeks or a month you will probably adjust the values up or down to lose weight faster or slower.  Don't try to lose more than two pounds per week."  But who among us is losing more than 2 pounds a week after the first month?  It seems like all of us would have to adjust up to lose at that rate.  Either we have less hunger but not the satiety, or we have bouncing AS.  We are losing an average of 0.6 lb, not 2.  Since it's taking 420 calories out of a typical daily 1200 calories to lose 0.6 lb a week, how much would I need to lose 2 lbs?  I am assuming an ungodly amount, so it's easier to settle for 0.6.   

I think what also slowed me down on tweaking is that I thought I read a comment from Seth that whatever it took to lose the weight, that's the level it will take to maintain.  I would be happy using 2T forever, but I don't like the idea of staying at 4T or more.  Since then, I've read about some who have been able to skip; Spacehoppa for awhile was taking oil only every 4 days, or I think it was MEM (?) who skipped for months without losing AS.  And now that we have more reporting their maintenance experiences, there seems to be some play in the steering wheel, as Frenata puts it.  But I'm still confused about the long term implications of upping the oil now.

[go2grl]

Hi TR,

Thanks for the reply. I find this all so fascinating!

Re: adjusting the dose. Thanks for that quote - very helpful.   I think we've seen on the forum that Seth's original chart gave oil doses that were low for what most people really need.  I do wonder if one would have to ramp up the oil dose a huge amount or if it could be non-linear in nature.  Meaning someone using 3Ts might have AS, but really need 3.5Ts to reach some body signal to give up those fat stores.  A different body might require 4Ts.

I have the same worry about the amount of fat calories...BUT these oil calories are recognized differently by our bodies. That makes me less afraid.  They act as a way to trick our bodies into giving up the fat.  As counter-intuitive as it is - they are helping us and more oil equals more help.  (Or noseclipping or SW if you can't stand taking any more oil)

Re maintenance levels:  Stephen is taking half his usual dose I think.  I'm getting close to trying maintenance (maybe I'm there and just fooling myself!) but I'm not convinced I'll be able to cut back to 1T vs 2T.  The time I tried it my appetite certainly was making it's way back to old levels.  So again, I'm tempted to guess that the doseage is not an exactly linear process. 

Question for you - what do you fear would be the longterm effects of more oil?  It would be interesting to figure out how much  oil one would ingest OVERALL doing a high dose for a shorter period of time + maintenance, versus doing a moderate dose for a long time + maintenance.

[TalkingRat]

Question for you - what do you fear would be the longterm effects of more oil?  It would be interesting to figure out how much overall oil one would ingest OVERALL doing a high dose for a shorter period of time + maintenance, versus doing a moderate dose for a long time + maintenance.

Fear would be liver stress, I guess.  I didn't ask my doctor how much is too much.  She was still getting used to the idea that I was taking oil "by itself." 

[go2grl]

Question for you - what do you fear would be the longterm effects of more oil?  It would be interesting to figure out how much overall oil one would ingest OVERALL doing a high dose for a shorter period of time + maintenance, versus doing a moderate dose for a long time + maintenance.

Fear would be liver stress, I guess.  I didn't ask my doctor how much is too much.  She was still getting used to the idea that I was taking oil "by itself." 

Good news is that your liver is processing less food overall these days, right?  So it's getting a break - kicking back & putting it's feet up really! 

Ok, I have no clue if oil is harder on your liver than other kinds of food.  My guess is that our systems are designed to handle it ok. Take something we know is hard on livers - alcohol.  Your liver can process food and 1-2 glasses of alcohol a day with no long term negative effects.  So an extra 1 or 2Ts of oil  seems fairly benign to me.

[chrianna]

i'm definitely no scientist but because i have a history of fatty liver disease (ah, one of the blessings of being apple-shaped), i googled liver function and olive oil.  found one abstract:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/query.fcgi?cmd=Retrieve&db=PubMed&list_uids=12748416&dopt=Abstract

will post more if i find them.

another one:

http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=17108040

ok, the scientific abstracts are making my head spin.

there are also several links to recipes for liver cleanses with the main ingredients being lemon juice and olive oil.  i wonder if the ACV has similar benefits to the lemon juice . . .

[flickad]

Mine also plateaus and bounces, but the overall trend has always been downward. I won't pretend to claim that the bounces don't freak me out, though.

[Stephen M (Ethesis)]

...I am beginning to think many people don't take quite enough to get the weight lose going.  I had to take double what the book recommended (2T versus 1T).

There's big resistance to doing certain amounts of oil & SW, even among those of us who stick with it.  We do our best not to increase our dose of either and worry it's bad for us.  When in reality getting the weight off is the best health present we can give ourselves!

We forget that the dose you need to lose weight is not likely to be the dose you'd take to maintain that weight.  Viewing 4T of oil as a short-term action (say 1 year versus the rest of your life)  might be easier to handle in that context.

I think you are right go2grl.  We all seem to have skipped over this statement on Page 55:  "After a few weeks or a month you will probably adjust the values up or down to lose weight faster or slower.  Don't try to lose more than two pounds per week."  But who among us is losing more than 2 pounds a week after the first month?  It seems like all of us would have to adjust up to lose at that rate.  Either we have less hunger but not the satiety, or we have bouncing AS.  We are losing an average of 0.6 lb, not 2.  Since it's taking 420 calories out of a typical daily 1200 calories to lose 0.6 lb a week, how much would I need to lose 2 lbs?  I am assuming an ungodly amount, so it's easier to settle for 0.6.   

I think what also slowed me down on tweaking is that I thought I read a comment from Seth that whatever it took to lose the weight, that's the level it will take to maintain.  I would be happy using 2T forever, but I don't like the idea of staying at 4T or more.  Since then, I've read about some who have been able to skip; Spacehoppa for awhile was taking oil only every 4 days, or I think it was MEM (?) who skipped for months without losing AS.  And now that we have more reporting their maintenance experiences, there seems to be some play in the steering wheel, as Frenata puts it.  But I'm still confused about the long term implications of upping the oil now.

Dang, when I got started I was losing more than two pounds a week, eventually slowed down.  I remember slowing down to eight pounds or so a month and worrying that meant the diet wasn't working very well.

[TalkingRat]

Haha, Stephen, that quote seems like eons ago.  That was one of the things about SLD, you moved along at what I was used to thinking of as classic "diet" speed, and I was working hard just to keep up with the average slower loss of 0.6 lbs a week on the graphs.  I originally thought it had to do with how few calories I needed to maintain, but now I think it was intermittent AS that caused all these wild fluctuations, that the flavor-calorie association was successfully blocked only part of the time.  Even your plateau pattern was what I'd expect, but my plateau pattern is wild upward spikes.  I think of truckman, so completely frustrated that 1300 calories made him gain.   I fluctuated all my life, but the pattern is so different with SLD.  Somewhere in there is a clue.

[frenata]

Every time I've gotten the serious weight loss, I've been not eating. I know that sounds "duh" but I mean really not eating. Like, when I added oatmeal and dropped eight pounds, it was because the oatmeal caused me to skip lunch (my big meal of the day). So basically, I had oil, oatmeal, light snack and booze for calories.

After the drop, though, the appetite suppressant properties of the oatmeal diminished. I'm very hungry at lunch again now. Of course, I'm in a hungry pattern at the moment.

[Clarinette]

For me, since I do SLD the pattern of my lost change too. When I was only on weight watcher I lost in average 2 pounds a week but I was starving. On the Oil and Weight Watcher my weight loss was regular but less then 2 pounds a week except for the first two weeks. Oil did help me to not starve anymore so it did help me to stay on track with Weight Watcher. I couldn't stay anymore on weight watcher being hungry. No matter what diet I do, I still gain about 2-3 pounds 10 days before my Periods and also during my Ovulation. Same with SW but sugar water was making me drop fast and then stay the same for couple of days and drop fast again. On CFF it is the same pattern with the period and ovulation and the weight loss is less impressive but very regular. I drop maybe 1.5 pounds a week but gain very fast if I cheat. The last time I gain 8.8 pounds for one night of cheating. So far for me CFF seems to be as good as the oil and as the sugar water. I have to drink a lot between meal but I it is to help me to lose the weight, I don't really mind. 

[xtine]

Fascinating thread!  I've been doing this (second round) for 6 weeks or so now, and in that time have lost 5.6lbs.  I lost two of them in the last 2 days and two in the first week.  My pattern has been about a 1-2 radius then a drop, then a plateau that wobbles around that radius, then another drop (it's early days though). 

Just on the dose front-- I share the concerns about extra calories esp. when I need to eat so little to lose.  BUT I did just change the timing and also up my dose from 1 to 1.25 TBSP 2x day and that coincided with the 2lb drop.  So for now, I'm sticking with the higher dose.   I do think though that fat gets lost steadily (for me) even though pounds don't,  because I feel and look different (slimmer) even though the scales don't budge-- then one day they do. 

[go2grl]

I think sticking with the higher dose is smart Xtine.  I thought in maintenance that I could get away with a half dose - but I was wrong. Still need my 2T or my body holds onto every last calorie.  I suppose I could try 1 1/2T but since 2T works and isn't making me gain, I haven't tried going back down.

[Vronnie]

This is amazing! I'm so glad this thread resurfaced. I'd come to the conclusion that I needede to tweak my dose upwards but felt as if somehow I was being naughty. Over the the last 10 days I've been doing 3T/day regularly & ,intermittently, 3.5T, 4T or even 5T on 2 occasions, depending on how hungry I feel.....it's amazing how it pulls the AS back into gear. For the 1st 4 weeks I lost nothing, then I lost 1.5kg in 1 week, then I put it back on, the next week I'd put on another additional kg. Since fiddling around with the oil dosage I'm back down to my lowest point. I'm hoping that now I've started adjusting the SLD oil relative to how hungry I feel that I'll just be able to stay on a downward trend.

[ambrosia]

This is a great thread!  It's very reassuring to see this pattern is not uncommon.  The first six weeks I had great success, but the rate of weight loss has slowed since the beginning of June, this may be my first real plateau period, but this encourages me to hang in there...

[bigbaddar]

Absolutely...Hang in there, Ambrosia...It can be tough not to see the scale moving downwards but the good thing is...you may be losing inches...That's my pattern.. Either I'm losing weight or I'm losing inches...It's never both at the same time...

You...?  Did you take measurements when you started...?  I didn't..now I wish I had...