Healthy Weight Loss Goals

[jsr3143]

I was wondering what healthy weight loss goals look like according to Ray Peat? I know most experts claim 1-2 lbs./week is considered “healthy”, but somehow that seems awfully fast and a surefire way of decreasing T3 levels.

If you’ve had success losing weight while Peating what was your experience like? As a woman, I would really appreciate hearing from other women!

 

[Blossom]

I’m not sure what Ray himself would say is a healthy rate but I averaged about 1.5 pounds per month. I wasn’t forcing things though and just trying to maintain/improve my health while increasing physical activity. I mainly tried to honor my hunger without going overboard and enjoy time doing physical activity in nature (mainly walking). I’m in my early 50’s and my weight loss started in my late 40’s so that might have made the process slower. I was also post menopause.

 

[bogbody]

I started eating a Peat diet in august of this year (i’m 41 F) after coming from a paleo/low carb background. I gained about 13 pounds over the first 4 months or so and am now trying to lose that weight. I’ve started doing mild caloric restriction while sticking to Peaty foods (so i’m tracking all my food) It’s going well and i’m losing around .5-1 pound a week. I’ve been doing it for a month now. I find that eating higher carb and keeping fat low really helps because i’m able to eat more food, plus the higher carb intake mitigates the stress response of doing less calories. i started out with a macro ratio of around 50C 30P 20F but have settled on 50C 35P and 15F.

 

[Linnechka]

I also started Peating in August 2020 after 10 years of an eating disorder that overlapped with 10-11 years as a vegetarian followed by low-carb and high-intensity bodybuilding and cardio. I worked with Kate Deering and we got my intake from 800 calories to 1900 calories. We did it slowly and I only gained 3 pounds, but I wasn't super lean to begin to. (If stats are helpful for anyone, I'm 5'10" and currently 158 and am fairly muscular.) I'm just starting out a small cut sort of as a gauge to see if my body feels safe enough to let go of some weight. I know my calories need to be higher -- likely somewhere around 2100-2200 depending on my activity level for the day -- but I'm more comfortable cutting a little and then reverse dieting back up again. I'm trying a very minor calorie reduction (-150), and my weight stayed exactly the same the first week.

I'm happy to update and let people know how it's going periodically. Kate told me to watch for disrupted sleep and keep tabs on my temperature as a way to make sure my body's still healthy. So I'm keeping tabs on that, being very conservative with exercise (mostly weight lifting to retain muscle as I lose weight), and eating higher carb and lower fat.

But I also think it comes down to your "stress bucket." You may be able to lose 1-2 pounds a week if you're dealing with relatively few other stressors.

Would also love to hear from people who have successfully lost weight without tanking their temperatures, sleep, or HR.