You're speaking with someone who has had success. I've had success using both keto / Atkins and if it fits your macros (basically calorie counting with more tracking). I would be happy to share my experience with you / provide advice if you would like. Alternatively, please feel free to refer to my post here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15604761

That's great! Thank you. I definitely want to know how long you've been able to do it for. I've had similar successes but then much longer failures about a dozen times since 8 years old.

How should I contact you? There's no info in your profile. Thanks.

I can be reached at [email protected]

I have been successfully managing my weight for the last 8 years.

Your disagreement is not relevant. We know categorically that anyone who consumes fewer calories than they expend will lose weight. Many people lack the discipline to stick with caloric restriction over a long period, but it's not a universal problem. If you're asking doctors for success stories then you're wasting their time.

Interesting, I've never actually heard this point of view.

Do you mean I'm wasting their time because it's not their responsibility to know if they have had successes? Or because it's my fault for eating too much when I could decide not to?

I'm honestly asking this, please don't take this as an attack. I am very curious as to your thoughts about doctors.

I'm generally asking because I am hopeful that they provide me with a motivation to believe that someone else has done what they're asking me to do.

Why do you want others to provide you with motivation? You know what you have to do. Just do it. Right now it seems like you're expecting to fail, and looking for excuses to not even try.

Because I have questioned for decades if it is possible.

Similar to an alcoholic finding comfort in Alcoholics Anonymous, I would love to find someone who has been lifelong obese who has shed the pounds for more than a year.

Do you mean that it is wasting a doctors time because they don't owe me motivation? I am talking about my obesity specialists. They are giving me diets and exercise plans that I am doing. I don't feel like I am not trying.

Do you mean that I am not trying because I am not successful?

Do or do not. There is no "try". If you consume fewer calories then you expend then you are guaranteed to lose weight.

Oh I wasn't clear. I was just using the word "try" because you did in your previous reply. I totally agree with you. I think I said that in my original comment. That is unassailable. You are correct.

With respect to doctors and motivation though, do you think that I should not ask them for success stories?

If you're not really willing to take action then you can always find a plausible excuse about why it was too hard or outside your control. You can certainly ask doctors if you like but I can't imagine how their answers would make a difference.

I'm mainly looking for their successful treatment of others because that is a typical way to assess medical professionals. When a surgeon wants to perform a bypass, most people ask how successful that surgeon has been in the past.

I understand that you're saying that the doctor can't do anything if I'm so lazy that I find excuses all the time, but I don't feel like I have ever given a doctor an excuse. I feel like doctors give me excuses constantly about their success rates.

From my perspective, if they give the same advice to 100,000 people and of them they have 0 successful treatments by their own data, I'm going to assume I should find other advice

The advice is always going to be some variant of consuming fewer calories than you expend. Obviously the success rate is >0. Other than that I suspect you're just looking for reasons to argue instead of taking responsibility for your own choices.

I wish I found that a success rate is >0 to be so obvious, or else I wouldn't be asking the question.

Do you know anyone lifelong obese that has had a year or more of losing weight?

I've been consistently dropping weight since highschool (c. 2005, ~250lbs - now, ~160lbs) by simply cutting my caloric intake little-by-little. Started by switching out regular soda to diet soda. I think we generally underestimate our caloric consumption.

I feel you. All I can say is that weight loss is simple. But it's not easy. To be successful, you have to change a lot and some of it will suck.