If you started mid March, how much could you have lowered your risk profile by eating healthy, excercising, stopping smoking or vaping, getting enough sleep, and generally trying to live a healthier lifestyle?
Is 3.5 months enough time to make a difference?
And not just for coronavirus. For the full range of health issues.
If people start now, how much improvement could they make by the end of the year?

Work out
I drink 1/2 my weight in water (oz)
Lean and green dinner

Add vitamin D to your list. Maybe magnesium and zinc supplements as well.

Everyone has their own recommends, but what's probably most important is finding something that works for you. That is, you can stick with it and integrate into your lifestyle on a permanent basis.

If you try something but can only reasonably keep it up for a few weeks or months, you're going to be right back where you started. And I say that having yo-yo'd on the scale plenty myself.

I've gotten fatter.

Stress eating.

Its all about nutrition. I'm not saying don't exercise, but your hour on the treadmill doesn't mean jack if you chase it with a Big Mac.

Depending on desired weight loss, just making better decisions can go a long way. Sparkling water instead of soda, unsweet tea instead of sweet, skip the cheese, ranch, etc., and that extra slice.

My recommendation is My Fitness Pal. Its enlightening and not just how that slice of pizza is loaded in calories, but also the opposite. Don't think you will be hungry eating "clean". You can eat a lot of food with a good mix of lean protein, fruits and veggies. I'm sure for some "Oh that's too much work" but if you can't commit to 30 seconds of putting your food log together, you'll never commit to better nutrition.

Another thing is start slow. Don't go salads three meals a day and 2 hours of cardio. You'll burn out and/or plateau with with no room for changes. Start with a 1 lb a week weight loss goal. My Fitness Pal will calculate your caloric needs. Walk 30 minutes a day. You'll start shedding lbs if you do that. Once you've established yourself, I do think it is important to start weight training.

Lastly, you do have to enjoy what you eat, so don't be afraid of a little cheese, or honey/sugar, a dessert but just do it in moderation.

I would recommend these videos on Youtube...Athlean X Its geared quite a bit toward being lean and athletic but lots of good nutrition advice.

Moxley said:

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I've gotten fatter.

Stress eating.

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No stress eating for me but making homemade sourdough and pasta is not the way to lose weight.

Moxley said:

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I've gotten fatter.

Stress eating.

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Try being locked in the house with a pregnant woman.

ElephantRider said:

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Moxley said:

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I've gotten fatter.

Stress eating.

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Try being locked in the house with a pregnant woman.

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For real...my wife had twins and I bet I gained 40 lbs.

aggielax48 said:

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Its all about nutrition. I'm not saying don't exercise, but your hour on the treadmill doesn't mean jack if you chase it with a Big Mac.

Depending on desired weight loss, just making better decisions can go a long way. Sparkling water instead of soda, unsweet tea instead of sweet, skip the cheese, ranch, etc., and that extra slice.

My recommendation is My Fitness Pal. Its enlightening and not just how that slice of pizza is loaded in calories, but also the opposite. Don't think you will be hungry eating "clean". You can eat a lot of food with a good mix of lean protein, fruits and veggies. I'm sure for some "Oh that's too much work" but if you can't commit to 30 seconds of putting your food log together, you'll never commit to better nutrition.

Another thing is start slow. Don't go salads three meals a day and 2 hours of cardio. You'll burn out and/or plateau with with no room for changes. Start with a 1 lb a week weight loss goal. My Fitness Pal will calculate your caloric needs. Walk 30 minutes a day. You'll start shedding lbs if you do that. Once you've established yourself, I do think it is important to start weight training.

Lastly, you do have to enjoy what you eat, so don't be afraid of a little cheese, or honey/sugar, a dessert but just do it in moderation.

I would recommend these videos on Youtube...Athlean X Its geared quite a bit toward being lean and athletic but lots of good nutrition advice.

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Agree with this. It's worth it for everyone to go out and do a basal metabolic rate calculation. It may be fairly crude/oversimplified, but you get the gist. At 43 years old, the difference between me being 180 lbs (where I am now) and 215 lbs (where I get if I give in to the low hanging temptations) is only about 200 calories a day IIRC.

If people drink three beers at home after work, have sweetened beverages every day, eat bread with every meal, etc., you can get there really quickly. The trouble with counting calories is that you have to get to a steady state, long term average that works. You can do it for a few weeks/months to get to a goal but it will come back. The whole "process focus" rather than "goal focus" approach is what helps me.

Maybe on the other side of this thing, the broader idea of people taking their nutrition seriously will get more traction. But as ever, the trouble of delaying gratification is no small thing.

As I've gotten older I lost my ability to sleep as soundly as I did when I was younger. One thing that helped was blacking out the bedroom. Fairly easy change.

The biggest bang for the buck is still weight loss and eventually weight management. I don't see any way to argue that isn't at least 80% diet. Silly TV shows like the Biggest Loser and such are misleading because they portray weight loss as significantly about exercise.

IMHO, with diet there are at least three factors that matter: How much you eat, what you eat, and when you eat. Those all make a difference, the relative importance seems to vary by person, and the interactions are complex and may change as you lose weight and manage things going forward.

The when factor seems least appreciated. I've talked to people that have made real improvement by restricting when they eat. A tipoff is to try no snacking or limit all your calories to a period of only 10-12 hours a day and see how you feel. Just try it. If you can't deal with that you may be headed to type 2 already. If that gets your attention, try changing what you eat. For instance, limit simple carbs and replace them with complex carbs.

Exercise and fitness definitely help. But, don't get hung up on the depictions of gyms, cardio and weight lifting. Walking seems to be sufficient to get going.

Not a doc, YMMV.

With a new baby its been tough to stay in shape.

Before my son I lifted three days a week then ran six miles on the weekend.

Then when he was born I switched to just running 3-4 days a week.

Starting this week I'm back on the weights, I really missed my garage gym.

Fitch said:

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Well hot damn, if you guys have any tips I can persuade my dad with to get in shape, I'd be much obliged.

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I lost 40 pounds before my first kid was born. I've been able to keep it off since then, too. You don't lose weight in the gym, you lose it in the kitchen. That's really the only way to make any meaningful progress. And all you have to do is limit caloric intake to start shedding pounds. Use a TDEE calculator to find out what his "normal" intake would be to maintain his current weight, then reduce by 500-1000 calories per day depending on how aggressive he wants to be. Use MyFitnessPal app to log everything he eats and it's super easy.

Once he gets that going, start walking more. Try cutting out more carbs and eating more protein/fat instead and the weight will start coming off even faster. Then it's just about staying on track and working out more to keep the pounds off and become more "fit".

There really is no secret to it. Calories in just needs to be lower than calories out.

RockOn said:

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Back in late 2010, I got my act together. Cleaned up my diet, reduced alcohol intake, started (slowly) jogging using the "Couch to 5k" program.

Overall it took me about 6 months to lose 50 pounds and start to feel "in shape".

I now live in the mountains, run 30-40 miles with 4-5 mountain summits each week. And 2-3 times a year I'll run an ultramarathon.

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That is AWESOME. Very cool. Especially the mountain summits. Never done one of this.

Diet is #1.

One example....my wife and I did Dry January. She kept going and has quit drinking all together. With just that one change she has lost 18 pounds since January 1. No changes to food or exercise.

I also started taking Vitamin D in late December because I was abnormally low last year at my physical. We both just got our physicals this week and for both of us are numbers are better across the board. My Vit D number is now normal.

JDL 96 said:

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If you started mid March, how much could you have lowered your risk profile by eating healthy, excercising, stopping smoking or vaping, getting enough sleep, and generally trying to live a healthier lifestyle?
Is 3.5 months enough time to make a difference?
And not just for coronavirus. For the full range of health issues.
If people start now, how much improvement could they make by the end of the year?

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My FIL has been prediabetec for 10 years, last blood test was full blown diabetic last December. In March (not because of covid), I started on a plant-based diet (health reasons - not ethical veganism). Got my FIL to hop on board a week or two after me. I've lost 30 lbs (6'1" 215 -> 185 (haven't weighed this since high school). FIL got his blood work done last week and is not just no longer diabetic, but no longer even prediabetic. Normal blood pressure, HbA1c and cholesterol. 40 lbs down. So a lot can be done in 3.5 months.

All this eating as much food as I want, no calorie counting on restriction, and only exercise mild walks.

In my opinion, 80% of the battle is controlling what goes in your mouth. I started with the low carb diet and had success but realized that was not sustainable for me. I moved over to a lower calorie diet using my fitness pal app to track food and mixed in some intermittent fasting. I exercise 40 min a day at least 5 days a week but exercise without controlling ur diet is not going to shed pounds. As Keegan said, you have to find something that works for you long term otherwise you will end up right back where you started

I've lost 10 pounds during all of this. Working out 4-5 days a week and golf once a week. My biggest issue is I like to have 3-4 beers on a Saturday in the pool. Otherwise, I only have 1-2 drinks a week. Beginning to cut those out too.