How I Lost 130 Pounds Without Being Miserable

A mixture of math, science, and personal motivation.

About me Jeffrey Quesnelle 25 years old Software engineer at automotive supplier Developer of popular Nintendo DS emulator

nds4droid Born, raised, and lives in Macomb County, MI Weighed 286.6 pounds on July 20, 2009 Website: http://jeffq.com Facebook: http://facebook.com/quesnelle Twitter: @jquesnelle

Basic agenda Why should we lose weight and get healthy? How should we lose weight? How can we actually do this day to day? Closing thoughts Time permitting: Q&A / Discussion

Why should we lose weight and get healthy? This is an important question! If you are significantly overweight, one year of

losing weight can add ten to your lifespan (especially if you are young).

Leading causes of death in America (2010) Heart disease: 599,413 Cancer: 567,628 Chronic lower respiratory diseases: 137,353 Accidents (unintentional injuries): 118,021 Alzheimer's disease: 79,003 Diabetes: 68,705

Don’t die. More than half of all deaths every year are

directly attributed to unhealthy lifestyles. No one is perfect, but let’s do what we can to

mitigate these. Beyond death, being overweight makes you

unable to enjoy life to it’s fullest. But as everyone knows, “deciding” to lose

weight is the easy part.

My story Gradually gained weight throughout middle

school and high school. Food became central to my life. Emotional factors unique. Generally high self-

esteem. Underneath, ashamed. Vicious cycle. “Come to Jesus Moment” – July 20, 2009.

How should we lose weight?

Eat less,move more.

How should we lose weight, really? Calorie – amount of energy needed to

increase the temperature of 1 gram of water by 1 degree celsius.

In food, each calorie is actually a kilocalorie (1000 calories).

Gives us a way to measure foods. Activity

Precise calorie counting What does this mean? What are we looking for? BMR – basal metabolic rate. Can we reduce everything down to a single formula? Starting points:

Harris – Benedict (1919) Mifflin – St. Jeor (1990)

Body mass based forumulas: Katch – McArdle Cunningham

Given these choices, where do we start? Frankenfield et al. (2005) showed Mifflin – St. Jeor

best general-case forumula.

Mifflin – St. Jeor

m = mass in kilograms, h = height in centimeters, a = age in years, s = gender offset (5 for males, -161 for females)

MS-J for 5’ 10”, 24 year old male MS-J for 5’ 1”, 47 year old female

Considerations Mifflin – St. Jeor calculates BMR – what you get

if you were in bed all day! What are we trying to calculate? Activity scalar (1.2~1.9). This leads us to the One Golden Rule of

Weight Loss

Golden Rule of Weight Loss

The only way to lose weight is to expend more calories than you consume.

Predicting weight loss on a fixed-calorie diet Using a fixed calorie diet, we can formulate a

differential equation to predict our weight at a given time.

First, start with a modified M-SJ equation.

Here, f is our activity factor and m is expressed in pounds (dividing by 2.2 converts to kilograms).

The RHS is how many calories we need. Subtracting this from our intake will give us the net calorie difference (how much we’ve gained or lost).

Predicting, continued

d is our daily calorie intake. 3500 calories = 1 pound! m replaced with some function w(t) which gives

our weight at time t. So, this is the change in our weight we expect

to affect by eating d calories when we weigh w(t).

But this is precisely the derivative of w(t)!

Predicting, continued

This is a first-order linear ordinary differential equation.

The general solution is pretty messy and being a 7-dimensional surface won’t offer much in the way of visualization.

But, for each individual person, f, a, h, and s are constants.

Predicting, continued

This is the weight function for a 24 year old, 5’ 10” male with a 1.2 activity factor (desk job).

c1 is the difference between our starting weight and final weight (since the derivative only gave the change in weight).

The right hand side is our final weight (our “plateau”).

If plug in a starting weight, eliminating one free variable…

24 year old male, 5’ 10”, low activity, starting at 300 lbs

36 year old female, 5’ 1”, light activity, starting at 135 pounds

Fixed calorie diets Even with “only” three dimensions, that’s a lot

of information to take in. Eliminate one more axis by fixing d. Weight loss game plan: commit to eating a

fixed number of calories. Benefits: easily measurable, easily

predictable. Downsides: hard! No “freebies”. We must understand that there is no way to

make this painless. Fixed calorie diets give us the best long-term

weight loss plan.

24 year old male, 5’ 10”, low activity, 1900 calorie diet, starting at 300 lbs,

44 year old female, 5’ 5”, light activity, 1700 calorie diet, starting at 190 pounds

My personal progress (first 100 pounds)

7/20

/200

9

7/29

/200

9

8/7/

2009

8/16

/200

9

8/25

/200

9

9/3/

2009

9/12

/200

9

9/21

/200

9

9/30

/200

9

10/9

/200

9

10/1

8/20

09

10/2

7/20

09

11/5

/200

9

11/1

4/20

09

11/2

3/20

09

12/2

/200

9

12/1

1/20

09

12/2

0/20

09

12/2

9/20

09

1/7/

2010

1/16

/201

0

1/25

/201

0

2/3/

2010

2/12

/201

0

2/21

/201

0

3/2/

2010

3/11

/201

0

3/20

/201

0

3/29

/201

0

4/7/

2010

4/16

/201

0

4/25

/201

0

5/4/

2010

5/13

/201

0

5/22

/201

0155.0

175.0

195.0

215.0

235.0

255.0

275.0

295.0

How can we actually do this day to day? How many calories are here?

4185

Secrets of the trade Low calorie density foods Eat without feeling like you’re not getting

anything AVOID: High calorie density foods Good low calorie density foods

Grilled chicken breast Normal (unfried) sushi Salads with basic dressings Fish More or less all vegetables

Secrets of the trade, 2 My rule of thumb: never ate anything unless I

knew how many calories it contained. Many, many restaurants post their nutritional

information online. Before going, look it up! Aim for around 600 calories/meal. Avoid spoilers: appetizers/bread often contain as

many calories as the main course. Self-control exercise: always leave some food on

the plate. Meal plan: Breakfast, dinner only? Create a routine in which you’re not miserable!

Secrets of the trade, 3 Go to bed somewhat hungry – spend the time

sleeping burning fat Success will become it’s own motivation Example:

10:00am – Protein bar (300 calories) 2:30pm – Banana/apple (150 calories) 7:00pm – Grilled chicken entry with small salad

(850 calories) Keeping (mentally) busy helps avoid “idle

munchies” Don’t tempt yourself – clean house of all

snacks!

Closing thoughts

You have the power to dramatically improve

your life, starting today.

The End! Q&A / Discussion (time permitting) I’m around all weekend!