My weight was ranging between 92 to 86kg in 2024. My highest weight was in 2019 when I was 103kg and my lowest was around June 2020 when I was about 73kg, that was when my first journey of losing weight was completed, losing up to 33kg within 6 months from January to June of 2020.
At the time when I was 73kg, I cut all the carbs and ate only chicken breast and veggies, no sugars at all. I do fasting on many occasions where I only eat 1 meal a day, sometimes I treat myself with an apple as a replacement for any desire for sweets. I was working out 5 days a week before, doing a lot of compound lifting like deadlifts and squats, and bodyweight workouts like pull-ups and chin-ups, I also did a lot of cardio and HIIT exercises like sprinting and rowing. The result was significant: I was able to lose at least 6kg a month, after 1st COVID quarantine, no one could actually recognize me, and everyone was cheerful to see me. Except for my parent, they think I was too small for their liking.
Then boom, once I met my girlfriend in 2020, I just started dropping the cut habits, I stopped eating chicken breast and salads and started drinking milk teas, consuming cakes, grilled meats, and lots of unhealthy stuff. My work schedule is tighter and I only had just enough time for the projects at work and hanging out with my girlfriend. The result is significant: in a period of one year from 2020 to 2022, I regained my big belly, but this time, I peaked at only 97kg, so it’s like 26kg bump. My girlfriend left me. I started to realize that it’s my 6 months journey of losing weight does not really bring any benefit long-term: it’s simply impossible to maintain that in the long term.
You can’t tell how much time I had spent reading about insulin, ketosis, glucose, fat, protein, metabolism, calories in food, calories burnt on different workout exercises, sleeping habits, temperature, moisture, the ways of cooking, the temperature of food, types of food, types of hormones, any types of supplements, hundred brands of supplements: whey, BCCA, creatine, CLA, and so on. Anything, anything that related to keeping ourselves fit and healthy has just already hit my eyes.
So I am telling you this, I lost weight for the second time already, my weight reduced from 97 to 92kg between May to December of 2023, so 5kg loss. I started loose an extra 92 to 86kg between December to April (at the time of this writing), so an additional 6kg loss. As you can see, my weight loss journey is very different, In terms of speed, I lost only around less than 1kg per month rather than 6kg per month compared to my journey in 2020. This means that I feel like I finally able to find a sustainable way to keep myself lower in weight. I can say I have somewhat experience to share with you. Here are 5 rules I’m applying for my more sustainable of losing weight and just losing weight in general.
- Eat less: simply not eat out, only eat out if you decide to fast for the rest of the day, and use the small disk.
- Plenty of water: yes, 2 liters or more for me.
- Workout: as often as 4-5 days a week. The more you work the easier diet control you will have.
- Enough sleep: 6 hours or more, please.
- Fasting: 1 to 2 meals a day in the morning or within the afternoon.
About Carbs, you can eat carbs, as long as you keep the proportion small, by small I mean a maximum of 4 slices 4 bread, or 2 potatoes or 2 bowls of rice or 1 cup of instant noodles, or 1 bowl of oatmeal, something like that. No sugar, please. For me, I do consume sugar through fruit and juice. But if I do decide to drink juice, I will eat less than 4 slices of bread, for example: just eat 2 slices of toast bread. I don’t eat cake, donuts, or any kind of bread that adds more than 30 grams of sugar, try to have no sugar at all.
Eating is a significant part of any journey of mine. Working out does assist, although, I would say the most important thing is diet. It’s much easier to lose weight by cutting the food from my diet alone: working out, and fasting are just the assistants. I mean, fasting does significantly help in losing weight, I may not do any workout for a few weeks, but fasting alone can already keep me healthy.
Conclusion: by keeping only one to two meals a day, with a small 9-inch plate, and a daily habit of working out (at least 3 times a week), I can’t be happier with my current body and the progress I have been making so far. And the future is bright: I am confident that I will soon go down to 75kg within this year by keeping the current pace.
