[AnnieBL]

I seem to be holding my own on the weight front at present. As I understand it, while PM may possibly help to put fat in the right places, it is my task to take it off from the wrong ones. We can but see. At least being overweight makes it easier to camouflage any development from the public eye, and at my age and size one may be able to get away with a somewhat moobish figure.

Good luck with your own development - I've always thought that a jiggle would be a real milestone


"Experience is what you have just after you needed it most"

[EricaB]

According to the paragraph headed "The functional breast" in Wikipedia, the non-lactating female breast is almost 50% fat "the milk-glands-to-fat ratio is ... 1:1 in a non-lactating woman". I know that eating fatty food does not mean you immediately get additional fat deposited on your body, but you have to eat enough nutritious food for the body to build breasts. Maybe skinny prepubescent girls are skinny because so much of the body's effort is directed to growing breasts.

What I do think is counterproductive is to expect the body to lose fat from everywhere while at the same time adding fat on the chest, although that is exactly what I am trying to do. Who said we had to be logical?

[bryony]

According to the paragraph headed "The functional breast" in Wikipedia, the non-lactating female breast is almost 50% fat "the milk-glands-to-fat ratio is ... 1:1 in a non-lactating woman". I know that eating fatty food does not mean you immediately get additional fat deposited on your body, but you have to eat enough nutritious food for the body to build breasts. Maybe skinny prepubescent girls are skinny because so much of the body's effort is directed to growing breasts.

What I do think is counterproductive is to expect the body to lose fat from everywhere while at the same time adding fat on the chest, although that is exactly what I am trying to do. Who said we had to be logical?

I would leave the breast fat deposition until weight loss is achieved, simply because it is so unhealthy to be even a little overweight. I'll be 60 this year, and I feel healthier now, losing only 28 lbs (a 15% weight loss) than I did in the previous 10 years.

Once you get your weight down to a good BMI, and keep the E level in your bloodstream up, a little increase in food intake over and above your energy needs will preferentially deposit fat where it is wanted. Dieting won't stop breast tissue growth, and, anyway, there is no perfect diet so your weight will oscillate somewhat; when it does, fat will go where it is wanted, and you will see it happen.

My weight oscillates with the low carb lifestyle that I live now, and I tend to eat a little more at the weekends, and less during the week to compensate. The fat that I put on at the weekends tends to go now more towards breast and hips than waist (though there is still about 10 lbs to lose there also), and during the week as I eat less, it reduces. So I'm pretty sure that what I'm saying is correct - for me, at least.

B.

[EricaB]

Bryony, I so know that you're right. But I want boobs now and if I wait to achieve my desired weight I'll have to wait at least a year and a half as, despite just having lost 17 pounds, I still need to lose between 100 and 115 additional pounds, depending on which website you believe.

If you thought you were uncomfy carrying an extra 28 pounds, just think about my situation. I've been carrying an entire additional person. I guess you might consider it "the woman within".

BTW way, I don't understand my scale. Monday morning showed a gain of 0.2 pounds, today a loss of 2.4 pounds, and I did nothing different on the two days except eat some almonds (probably a bit too many) on the day covered by the weight loss and went for a 2 mile walk the day covered by the weight gain. Things are so backwards!!

[JanetCD]

Bryony, I so know that you're right. But I want boobs now and if I wait to achieve my desired weight I'll have to wait at least a year and a half as, despite just having lost 17 pounds, I still need to lose between 100 and 115 additional pounds, depending on which website you believe.

If you thought you were uncomfy carrying an extra 28 pounds, just think about my situation. I've been carrying an entire additional person. I guess you might consider it "the woman within".

BTW way, I don't understand my scale. Monday morning showed a gain of 0.2 pounds, today a loss of 2.4 pounds, and I did nothing different on the two days except eat some almonds (probably a bit too many) on the day covered by the weight loss and went for a 2 mile walk the day covered by the weight gain. Things are so backwards!!

I weigh myself every morning before breakfast and my morning mile walk, that way if there is weight gain it usually is around a pound or two. Also weigh myself without any clothes on, that way the clothes wont add or subtract weight.

[AnnieBL]

Bryony, what you say seems very good sense to me, as do many of your other posts that I have seen in this and other threads. The problem is of course actually losing the weight. Thirty five years ago I managed to shed a great deal of weight, almost to the verge of anorexia, but thereafter marriage and other factors led to an inexorable increase followed by a sawtooth over the last twelve years. What I really need to tackle is the intra-abdominal fat, which is the most unhealthy - a bit or even quite a lot of external padding is said to be relatively harmless by comparison. It may be wishful thinking, but if I can sawtooth off some of the internal fat on the downswings and replace it with external fat on the upswings, I may be making progress.

EricaB, my experience of trying to lose weight is that, even naked first thing in the morning, it varies wildly without identifiable cause and often contrary to reason, but over a more extended period there is a trend. One way to tackle this is to calculate a daily rolling average over say ten days but I've never been that obsessive.


"Experience is what you have just after you needed it most"

[EricaB]

I read an article that sort of proved that it was impossible to maintain weight simply by balancing calories expended and calories consumed on a daily basis. The premise was that it's too hard to measure accurately. I think the example that was given was that eating 3 extra almonds a day would result in gaining 20 pounds every decade. Of course that doesn't consider going on temporary diets when necessary to bring things back into line.

[bryony]

This is the beauty of the low carb method. It is impossible to not burn fat. Think about why the fat is there. It is there to burn. Your body is not aware that civilisation has developed to the point where excess energy input is no longer required.

We are programmed to eat more than we need. Get over it The body lays a fat store in the same way that hibernating bears do. They live off it over the winter. How? By not eating, but in particular, not eating energy sources.

Our will power is not sufficient for that. However, after you have used up all your blood sugar reserves, your body will burn fat. It has no choice! I don't think there are any cases of fat people starving to death without going through a thin phase.

The point is your body will use less energy by burning your fat than it takes to digest and use any protein that you eat; and the protein stops the hunger pangs that always, always, always make other diets fail. It's when you recognise that you are not dieting, but have made a lifestyle change in what you eat, that you succeed - and I made my change 2 years ago.

You will need a small amount of carbs to "pump prime" the process, but it need only be about 30g daily.

You will need to be rigorous; sendentary lifestyles need a very small amount of energy, and your body doesn't like to burn its hard-earned fat, so your metabolism slows down. This can be countered with exercise, if possible.

If you try it, remember that your body can use the energy in alcohol to avoid burning fat too (though it will not convert alcohol to fat).

This is old knowledge by the way, not Atkins. It's been around since the late 1700s.

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Low-carbohydrate_diet but ignore the criticisms; Wiki authors tend to follow current liberal orthodoxies slavishly, including medical orthodoxies e.g. food pyramid.)

[AnnieBL]

An interesting Wikipedia article.

I have in the past always tended to what I now know to be a reduced carb, high fibre, low glycemic index approach to losing weight, and it worked well when living alone or working away from home, but not nearly as well when living with someone who believes that one should not change one's diet but simply use wiill power to reduce intake of all food put before one, even if carb intensive, and too plentiful. Potatoes and baked goods are more important to my wife than myself, and we both cook too large meals, but her will power is stronger than mine!

[bryony]

An interesting Wikipedia article.

I have in the past always tended to what I now know to be a reduced carb, high fibre, low glycemic index approach to losing weight, and it worked well when living alone or working away from home, but not nearly as well when living with someone who believes that one should not change one's diet but simply use wiill power to reduce intake of all food put before one, even if carb intensive, and too plentiful. Potatoes and baked goods are more important to my wife than myself, and we both cook too large meals, but her will power is stronger than mine!

The only way to succeed is to do what I do - sadly - which is to share meals when we can, and diverge when we can't.

E.g. when she has a pasta meal, I have a really juicy peppercorn steak with a creamy mushroom sauce, a portion of peas and maybe a half a potato.

We eat salmon together, cooked in various different ways. When I was seriously losing weight, I had no pasta, grains or root vegetables at all. Now the rule of thumb is that I have no more than half the portion of carb veg than she does (apart from creamed, light fluffy mashed potatoes - my one weakness) but I will snack on low carb things like, e.g. brazil nuts, small portions of cheese, maybe a thin dried salami stick etc... anything but high carb snacks.

Eating separate meals is not a problem with modern technology.

B.