I lost 200 pounds in 4 years — these are the 4 secrets to my success

At his highest weight and lowest point, Nicolas Garratt was 400 pounds and 15 years old.

Garratt, now 19, told Today.com last week that he always struggled with his weight. He began eating junk and fast food at 5, and the habit led him to pack on pounds as the years progressed.

Faced with relentless bullying at school, the UK resident welcomed the pandemic lockdown. “I was relieved when COVID happened because I didn’t have to leave the house,” he told the outlet. “We had to quarantine, and I was relieved that I could just stay in and not have to see people. I would only go out at night when it was dark.”

Ostracized by his peers and feeling like a “freak, a monster,” Garratt would distract himself by binge eating and drinking alcohol. Barely able to walk around the block without pain, he visited a physician to help him with anxiety — he was told he was at risk for a heart attack .

Determined to change, Garratt experimented with extreme fasting . However, losing weight without gaining muscle did not assuage his self-hatred: “I was very unsatisfied. I thought, ‘I’ve done all this for nothing. What was the point?’ I lost all the weight, and underneath, it’s just this ugly person that I still don’t want to be,” he told Today.com.

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Shifting his approach to weight loss, Garratt stopped fasting and joined a gym in January 2023, lifting weights and sticking to hourlong daily walks outside or on the treadmill.

Now, he’s down to 196 pounds — and he’s an aspiring fitness influencer on Instagram .

“I want to help people do what I did,” he said. In the spirit of helping others, Garratt shared his four tips for weight loss .

Garratt maintains that diets are secondary to calorie counting. He aims for 1,400 a day, which may be enough to satisfy some people’s needs.

His allegiance to calorie counting has some scientific support . A study published last year in the Journal of the American Heart Association found that calorie counting is more effective for shedding unwanted pounds than fasting for certain periods .

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Garratt said he’s also found that adding vegetables and salad to every meal has helped him feel fuller and more satisfied while still maintaining a caloric deficit.

Though dieters often malign carbohydrates, Garratt stresses that they are not evil and are, in fact, necessary fuel for training.

This tip echoes the advice of dietitians who suggest that workouts should be front-loaded with carbs to sustain energy and maximize effectiveness.

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Garratt credits the fitness tracking app MyFitnessPal with helping him reach his health goals.

A writer who lost 30 pounds in a year, meanwhile, found success with a scale that displays body composition data, a smartwatch to log steps and a Google doc to track progress.

Garratt cites a shift in mindset as the greatest contributor to his achievements. He encourages others to embrace ironclad determination: “Even when you’re not motivated to exercise, you can still be determined to go to the gym.”

He hopes his fitness journey will inspire others to make changes and, more importantly, persist in spite of setbacks: “You’re going to fail 100 times, but it wouldn’t be a true journey without getting back up. Determination is what makes you get back up.”

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