First off, about BMI, think of it as a guide and not a cold hard fact. It is a figure that is more untrue and some true for most people, its based on figures that is no way near your body and how it functions. But BMI is great if you want to get a fast peek at how your system is doing.

Ok, so it’s only an “index” in the sense that it’s a “made-up number to reflect your ratio of height-to-weight”.  I think the target BMI’s should differ for men and women, or at least for muscular/non-muscular people.  As it doesn’t, it’s hard to get worked up about being the “wrong” BMI, when BMI is just a made-up number.

Its like saying that the life expectancy for a human theese days are 80 years but i see alot of people everyday talking about how their sister died at age 25 or how they just celebrated their grand mothers 92th birthday. Another guide.

Life expectancy is not something I aim for.  I do not expect to die at 80.  It’s useful in the aggregate, but no one ever tries to make it personal for me in particular like they do with the BMI.  But I appreciate your analogy.

About your weight loss stalling, that can depend on a million things because its just how the body works. Sometimes the rate your body burns fat (and muscle if you dont eat at all) slows down and it can have a thousand different reasons. There is one that is especially troubling tho and that is if the body thinks that you are starving, then it will stop consuming calories and store it as fat because your body thinks that you are more or less starving to death and has begun preparations to give it a good fight.

I’ve heard this before, and even experienced it.  10 lbs seemed to be my “starve limit”, after which the body would fight back.  This time, though, I think my stalling is totally related to my falling off the wagon.  My wife is not on a diet, and sometimes when I’m around her, I indulge in normal eating just for the sake of connecting with her.

This week was her birthday, and I stalled again, ever-so-briefly, as I ate cake over the weekend.

In both cases, I resumed losing weight after the brief stall.

Thats why you cant really loose weight if you dont eat sensible, if you think that you will loose weight and only eat 1000 calories of sweets, then you will problably gain weight.

I’m pretty sure if you only ate 1,000 calories of pure sugar and lard every day, you would lose weight, provided you were still able to burn over 1,000 calories per day in energy.  However, the malnutrition that would result might make you bedridden at some point, and then your calorie deficit could level off.  I understand what you mean about the body (system) fighting back, but even it cannot create calories out of thin air.

There is a ton of information to this, what i have learned is that it will feel like you loose less when you stand on the scale everyday and that you will start loosing weight after a considerable amount of time when you have gotten to terms with how it all works, how your body reacts and what you can expect.

This is what I find handy about John Walker’s book.  He goes into agonizing detail selling you on the idea that your body weight will fluctuate up and down day-to-day, and that this is expected.  Thus, as he explains, it’s important to look at the trendline, not the day-to-day comparisons.  I think I understood this intuitively, but reading it, studying it, and using the tools for it make it much more palatable.

Thanks for the feedback.  I’m glad to see I’m not the only BMI skeptic.

First off, about BMI, think of it as a guide and not a cold hard fact. It is a figure that is more untrue and some true for most people, its based on figures that is no way near your body and how it functions. But BMI is great if you want to get a fast peek at how your system is doing.

Not even experienced physicians or doctors will be able to give you rock solid proof for how your body is doing and what it is doing right/wrong, they will charge your for a similar guide. Its like saying that the life expectancy for a human theese days are 80 years but i see alot of people everyday talking about how their sister died at age 25 or how they just celebrated their grand mothers 92th birthday. Another guide.

About your weight loss stalling, that can depend on a million things because its just how the body works. Sometimes the rate your body burns fat (and muscle if you dont eat at all) slows down and it can have a thousand different reasons. There is one that is especially troubling tho and that is if the body thinks that you are starving, then it will stop consuming calories and store it as fat because your body thinks that you are more or less starving to death and has begun preparations to give it a good fight.

Thats why you cant really loose weight if you dont eat sensible, if you think that you will loose weight and only eat 1000 calories of sweets, then you will problably gain weight. But if you cut down on 500 - 700 calories a day and eat the remaning with smarts and eat fish, chicken and so on, then the body will continue to burn calories and also loose weight.

There is a ton of information to this, what i have learned is that it will feel like you loose less when you stand on the scale everyday and that you will start loosing weight after a considerable amount of time when you have gotten to terms with how it all works, how your body reacts and what you can expect.

Cheers,