Are there any alternatives to successfully lose weight that don't involve using a scale and app to log food?

This will be downvoted to oblivion, bc r/loseit swears by CICO and heavy lifting, but here goes...

Counting calories doesn't work very well for me. My metabolism is a lot lower than most people's, and it takes a lot more than a 3,500 calorie deficit for me to lose weight. Used to obsess over measuring and weighing everything, only to be frustrated by the scale. Got to a point where I was eating ~500 calories a day and doing an intense TKD class 3 times a week. Stopped doing all of that after I wound up in the hospital.

Now I keep a journal (good old pen and paper variety) of the food I eat and the exercise I do. The Mediterranean diet has been very good for us. We eat a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables, whole grains, fish, chicken, and really good olive oil. I only drink water, but my husband has the occasional unsweetened tea.

We pay a little more for better ingredients, and it makes a world of difference. We eat a little more slowly, savor the flavors a little more, and get a calorie deficit without trying so hard. We walk regularly.

My husband's extremely high (stroke imminent range) blood pressure has come down enough to stop taking the heart pills, and mine is at the lower end of ideal. The weight is coming off at a steady rate. I just threw out all of my 3X shirts, and the 2Xs will be going soon, too.

The most important thing for weight loss is to eat less. It's a lot easier to do that if you completely remove sodas, fried foods, and most processed foods from your life. It takes a few weeks to adjust and appreciate the flavors of whole foods, but once you do... everything else seems to fall into place.

/r/loseit Thread