[malfist]

I really appreciate your empathy here. Nobody has the same biological factors nor the same hormones, so expecting everyone to have the same drive to consume a vice is just wrong. But at the same time, there is nuance here. Calorie restriction is hard work, sometimes there's not an easy way to do something and knuckling down is the only way to achieve it.

But I don't know where that balance is, between empathy and tough love, but it's definitely a spectrum. Me personally, I'd prefer to fall on the side of too much empathy.

On your orthogonal subject, I had post-SSRI libido side effects (still highly recommend SSRIs, I'd rather have a low libido and alive than the alternative), without symptoms of ED, which is really hard to treat in men. I had good luck finding a doctor willing to write me a script for PT-141, and it was fantastic for me.

[Aurornis]

> Calorie restriction is hard work, sometimes there's not an easy way to do something and knuckling down is the only way to achieve it.

Caloric restriction as the parent comment describes it is a strawman argument that people use to discredit diet advice.

Real dieting advice isn’t “eat 833 calories of pizza and then stop instead of eating the whole pizza”. Real diet advice involves picking better food choices first.

Pizza is a highly palatable, calorie dense food. If someone is feeling hungry after devouring an entire pizza, they need to stop eating pizza. They need more fiber, more filling foods, and foods that are less calorie dense. Even just picking foods that are slower to eat will make changes because our hunger and fullness signals aren’t instant. It takes some time for your body to process what you eat.

Counting calories does work if it’s done correctly, but modern dieting advice hasn’t been that reductive for decades.

[nearbuy]

You're not factually wrong, but framing this as a fight between calorie restriction vs healthy eating and siding with healthy eating isn't right either. Both methods work for some people. Both methods have low long term success rates because people struggle to stick with them.

Yes, intentionally restricting calories is hard for most overweight people. But eating healthy is also hard for most overweight people! And there's no guarantee it'll cause weight loss without calorie restriction. You can eat healthy foods and still have a large appetite and eat too much.

It's two different tools that each require different kinds of willpower. Sometimes one tool works better for some people. You can use both at once.

If there was an easy solution that worked well without willpower, we wouldn't have our current obesity rates. Hopefully the new weight loss drugs will help with this in the future.

[Projectiboga]

Another issue is the body goes on lockdown around 5 days in eating below weight maintenance. The trick may be to only diet 4 days a week in a row targeting a weight below current like 10 or 20 lbs lower and eat for current weaight the other 3 days. And it might be able to flip that once at desired weight.