Published on 12, July, 2020
Alright guys, this post is gonna be very difficult for me to write but I have no option but to seek for some help. Anyways let's get to my story. I started lifting around age 16 as the typical tall skinny dude that didn't like being lanky af. Up to age 18 things went well, I made a hell lot of newbie mistakes such as not eating enough not training legs etc. But with time kept improving on all these aspects. Then at age 19 I was keen to do a proper bulk where I did not weigh myself for 8 months straight as to not impede my progress(yes I had fatphobia going into the bulk). I managed to cruise from 89kg to 103kg. And at the end of the bulk I still had my abs clearly showing no belly or anything of the sort. Then things get interesting, I had slowly started to realize I was not as lean as the fitness industry standard, at the time I was watching [edited by moderator] of fitness youtube and spending [edited by moderator] of time scrolling tru IG looking at fake natties(Laid, Mike Thurston, and more). So naturally, my new goal had become to turn into a shredded *** for summer. And so I did through crash dieting, losing literally 10kg in less than 3 months. I was literally going to bed in starvation mode every day, I'd generally watch a lot of mukbangs and cheat meal videos to cope. All of this going on, I managed to survive tru my uni exams(studying frickin cs). Ofc the diet had to end at some point, late November 2020 I called an end to it. But ofc having[edited by moderator]up my ability to eat without overthinking I was left struggling, I could not start another bulk because my fatphobia had amplified massively to the point that on days I ate crap I would not go socialize, miss out on schoolwork and *** simply because I would think it was all over. As [edited by moderator] up as it sounds that was the state of my mind and I myself never ever would have imagined how fucked up human psychology can become. With the lockdown and gyms closing, you guessed it, I had fair bit of a rebound phase. Fortunately, I'm quite lucky in that being tall and fast metabolism allowed for the rebound, I was binging 2,3 times per week and even on other days eating crap and sometimes restricting and despite that I'm currently sitting at 217LBS. I soon realized the only way to get rid of binge eating is simply to allow myself more food and avoid restricting certain groups but *** I wish it was that simple. Though I am doing much better now compared to my rebound phase I still get unforeseen binge episodes and it makes me hate everything about this fricking sport and ruins that day obviously. I have tried everything from clean eating, to a set meal plan with precalculated calories(3200cal on training days and low carb on rest days) but I just can't stick to it. My current issue is, when I'm not following a certain diet structure or have to eat out with friends I feel next-level insecure and worthless. Not only that I don't know how to eat, I've literally lost my intuitive eating skill I had as a child and in my first two years doing this sport. I would never ever count macros or calories, just eat balanced and had a decent physique, but now when I sit at the dining table for breakfast and dont have my food scale nor my oats, I will either starve or end up eating copious amounts of nutella and ice cream for breakfast. With this low point in my life, I have currenty no option but to stop any form of dieting be it bulk or cut and just try to reset everything. I am also doing a social media detox from all the fake natty *** I have been ingesting over the years. I am continuing with my training because at the end of the day I still love it but I really need a break from this fitness bubble I have grown up in. If you guys have any suggestions or stories to share I'll be glad to hear from you because the one thing that hurt the most is the lack of awareness around eating disorders males undergo and I really want this post to hit home for other teens and males undergoing tru similar ***.
II used to do strength training (mostly focused on powerlifting) and have tried a few different things regarding diet, performance and weight loss. Without knowing your goals it's a bit difficult to give advice on those things as some of the things that worked well for me (for example I used the Keto diet and it worked brilliantly for me but it's not for everyone).
In terms of your insecurities, I think you have taken the perfect (and very difficult) step of stopping using social media as it's probably not helpful - it sounds like you're in danger of comparing yourself with people who spend every second of the day with the sole purpose of making themselves look good in pictures. Personally I don't think that's a good balance, and there's no way that people with regular lives/jobs etc can do that (certianly not reach that level without putting years of effort in).
I'm late 30s and have had a bit of 'dad bod' for quite a while. I used to drink lots of beer which gave me a bit of a belly, but now I don't drink alcohol at all and that is helping me lose weight. I'm also back using Keto for a couple of months. I found powerlifting worked really well for me as I hated cardio and found it really boring, however I am quite competitive and liked the structure so I followed a powerlifting program (which tested my 1RM every 4 weeks). I knew every session what I had to do ant it allowed me to focus on my goals 1 day or session at a time.
Physical appearance is subjective (and without the knowledge of how to pose and light yourself you're always at a disadvantage against the IG models). Weight isn't always a good indicator of progress either as muscle gain and fat loss can easily distort what is going on. I used strength as my focus - If I was getting stronger that was all I cared about and the rest would look after itself. Powerlifting isn't what most people would probably recommend for weight loss, but it was what I enjoyed, and because I enjoyed it I continued it long enough to get the results that I wanted.
Don't know if any of that is helpful or not, it's just some of my experience. Let me know if there's anything there that you relate to or want to find out more about. Maybe you could add a bit more detail about where you are at the moment - what are your goals, what are you currently doing to meet them and what specific challenges stop you from getting there? Maybe some of us can give you a few pointers of how to balance a healthy lifestlye without putting too much pressure on yourself