Hacking The Fat Man
What drives someone to contemplate ending their life at nearly 550 pounds, and what unexpected insight transforms that same person into someone who loses over 300 pounds? Drew Maness, an information security professional with 25 years of experience and former elite water polo player, takes you through his journey from rock bottom to remarkable transformation.
Drew opens his heart completely, revealing how he walked into a motel room in August 2022 with the intention of taking his life. Trapped in a body that caused constant, excruciating pain and believing he had exhausted every possible weight loss method, he had reached his breaking point. What happened next changed everything.
With raw honesty, Drew shares his breakthrough realization: what if he approached his body like a computer system to be hacked? This shift in perspective led to a revolutionary approach to weight management that finally worked after decades of struggling. His most powerful innovation? A cyclical diet framework that rotates different nutritional approaches throughout the week, preventing the metabolic adaptation that dooms most diets to failure.
The podcast delves into Drew's strategic use of supplements to combat inflammation, his experiences with GLP-1 medication, and the life-changing moment he realized his struggles weren't about willpower at all. This revelation freed him from the depression rooted in self-hatred that had plagued him for years.
Join Drew in his continued journey from 550 to see if he makes 175.
Hacking The Fat Man
Finding Joy in Dieting: My Journey to Sustainable Weight Loss and Wellness
What if the secret to sustainable weight loss isn't found in rigid meal plans or punishing restrictions, but in a flexible framework designed to adapt to life's inevitable curveballs?
After experimenting with over 30 different diets throughout my life, I've discovered something revolutionary in its simplicity: diets fail when they demand perfection. In this eye-opening episode, I share my journey from 275 pounds to the 230s and reveal the mindset shift that finally made sustainable weight loss possible.
The breakthrough came when I made a powerful decision: everything in my life, including the food I eat, must bring joy. This meant no more choking down bland "diet foods" or denying myself simple pleasures. Instead, I created a flexible weekly framework that combines the most effective elements from various nutritional approaches—incorporating fasting, micro-fasting, keto principles, and modified zone eating depending on what my body needs each day.
My approach isn't about willpower or discipline—it's about forgiveness and adaptability. I explain how I rotate through different nutritional strategies throughout the week, starting with more restrictive days early in the week and building in flexibility for weekends and social events. This rotation has allowed me to lose weight steadily while still participating fully in life's pleasures.
Whether you're struggling with plateaus (like my current one), trying to overcome rigid thinking about food, or simply tired of diets that collapse the moment life gets complicated, this framework offers a refreshing alternative. Join me as I break down exactly how I structure my week, handle cravings, and maintain consistency without demanding perfection.
Ready to transform your relationship with food while still enjoying the journey? Subscribe now and discover a sustainable path to weight loss that bends with life's demands rather than breaking under pressure.
Link to download the Hacking The Fat Man Diet, Schedule and Supplements
Hi, I'm Drew Maness. Welcome to Hacking the Fat man. Episode 2, the Diet. So for a weekly update. As far as my weight's going, I'm still hovering around the mid-230s. I've been in a plateau for the last couple of weeks. Which Plateaus are common? It's just your body reconfiguring. I was in a major plateau from September 24 to early the beginning of March in 25. In April and May I went from 275 to the 230. So I'm not surprised that I'm sitting in a plateau.
Speaker 1:I've also added some light exercises. Up until the last couple of weeks I hadn't even started to do any exercise at all. I didn't want to try to outwork out my diet. I wanted to know the diet is working. But I've started to add in some light, just old man chair yoga, countertop pushups and squats, that kind of thing. What else did I do last week? Oh yeah, I started a podcast, I created an Instagram account, I created a Facebook page, I created a YouTube channel. Thank you for everyone that watched or followed me on any of those, and also thank you to those that have actually commented.
Speaker 1:Which gets me to the point is I do want to hear from you so you can follow on Instagram or Facebook. It's Instagram, it's just Hacking the Fat man and Facebook. Well, you're going to have to look me up. Look up Hacking the Fat man. Both Instagram and Facebook are verified. So if you find something that looks like it's pretending to be me, if it doesn't have the verification seal, it's not me. I also have a WhatsApp or you can SMS me at area code 424-644-6342. I'm not necessarily going to answer that, but I will answer. I mean as far as a phone call, if you try to call it, but I will answer a text to it. And then there's just the old school email If you want to send your question that way. It's thefatman at hackingthefatmancom. As I mentioned, you can find me on YouTube Hacking the Fat man, buzzsprout, which is just podcast, at Hacking the Fat man, and Spotify. And Apple Again. I think by now you know what I'm calling this. Fine apple Again. I think by now you know what I'm calling this.
Speaker 1:So I wanted to take a step back. As I was going through the diet last week I can see it in my face I realized I wasn't being clear about something and I didn't know what it was. So I want to take a step back to one of the first things I thought about when I decided to continue and to move forward was I made an agreement with myself to make my life just slightly, a little bit every single day, and initially that was reduced pain. But I also realized that I had not had any real joy in my life, that I was not adding joy into my life. Now, trust me, my kids were successful at times, I was proud of them, I had love and happiness, but joy was not something I was bringing to my life at all. So I made the decision that everything I do is part of making my life a little bit better every day. Everything I do, everything I participate in, needs to bring me joy. And I'm not talking just like I'm talking real joy, like I really need to enjoy it. And this includes the food I eat, the food I choose. I am not going to eat kale. I am not going to eat if I have a sandwich. I'm not going to eat a hardcore wheat fortified with sawdust. I don't want the diet chips, I want real potato chips, and so I have approached that joy into my food selection and I'll get into this a little bit more.
Speaker 1:And I also wanted to stop a second and talk about consistency and this was a fault of my own. You own some miswiring in my brain. It actually came from being an athlete, came from being hyper-focused and hyper-critical. I've been on this path now for over two and a half years, and consistency is often associated with that critical thinking, that strict adherence to specific schedule and routine and getting the perfect workout or getting the perfect thing, and however, it's more effective and sustainable because, especially when it comes to our life, eating diet is our life. It's not just a workout. It's something we have to do every single day and life throws you curveballs all the time. And so, instead of just approaching this consistency, it's not about perfection. It's about showing up and making progress in whatever way possible, even when faced with obstacles or changing circumstances. It's about having a mindset of resilience and finding a way to stay on track, even if the method needs to change. So I'm constantly tweaking what I'm doing.
Speaker 1:This also realized I I kind of had um 14 different things and I realized that I needed to break it off into two parts. One is, is, and I'm stealing from asimov. Here are the laws of uh robotics, but this is the laws of my diet, the hacking, the fat man diet, and the first thing I I put in there because I didn't list it was everything needs to bring you joy, including the food you eat. If it doesn't bring you joy, stop it and remove it. If you don't like what you're eating, don't eat it. Find something better. There are great choices that you can make out there that are fantastic. That will do just the same thing as eating that sawdust potato chip. So again, I covered some of these before.
Speaker 1:This isn't a diet, it's a life cycle change. It should be simple as breathing. I don't want to plan it, I don't want to meal prep and I don't want to track calories and the program should be adaptable and sustainable, regardless of one's location. This gets down into the flexibility. So what you'll see here is I've created more of a framework than necessarily a true diet. Right, I'm not going to talk about necessarily the diet recipes or eat this meal or look at this type of thing, because you can take from each one of every diet out there in the world and put them together and to make this framework work. And, most importantly, it's acceptable to make mistakes and you need to forgive yourself. You can't change what you did yesterday, but I can change this second and what I'm about to do, and that's where the power really comes from. So, talked about this last time.
Speaker 1:Diets I've tried. I've tried the low-fat, non-fat. You can hear my disdain still in that one. It's completely worthless. Um, well, actually I shouldn't say it's completely worthless for me. Um, ketos or keto or atkins I've done fasting, I've done the zone diet and I've done the modified zone diet, which is, instead of being carb heavy, you make it protein heavy. Mediterranean the doctor's health cure my jokingly of the sumo diet and the juice cleanse. I'm not going to get into all these, really, because those are just things you can choose from.
Speaker 1:I do want to take a note on keto. So I did get some fetal fetal Awesome, you got to love it that Drew can speak well. So a note on keto. So I did get some feto feto Awesome, you got to love it. That Drew can speak well. So a note on keto.
Speaker 1:For those of you that don't know, keto is a metabolic process where the body uses fat instead of carbohydrates to burn energy or create energy. This occurs when the body has limited amounts of carbohydrates, right? So basically, you fast, your body burns through all the carbohydrates that's in your muscles and in your bloodstream and will slowly start to use fat as an energy source, and it's a great way to burn fat. However and I found this myself I've mentioned my gout. My struggles with gout is especially at the very beginning. When you get into ketosis, which is the burning of the fat, it can raise the uric acid levels and cause gout. It also can lead to kidney stones and while keto doesn't necessarily affect gallstones, the rapid weight loss can lead to gallstones. So when I say the word keto or I write the word keto here, I'm talking about the food that makes up the ketogenic diet, not ketosis itself.
Speaker 1:In my diet I very rarely, if at all, get into ketosis. I maybe if I've gone. Monday pretty good, I've done the full fast, and Tuesday I've done a decent micro fast and Wednesday I'm now moving into a little bit more caloric but still a keto diet. Maybe by Wednesday night I get into ketosis. But, however, I am not trying to get there at all and, like I said, I seriously doubt I ever really get into ketosis. However, ketosis still works for some. If you're interested in it, you can research the cyclical keto diet, ckd. It's actually one of the. I had used it in the past and was one of the basis for the beginning of this, where, hey, I don't have to eat the same diet every day. So, ckd, you basically do five days of ketosis and fasting, fasting first, then keto, and then Saturday and Sunday you give yourself more carbs and it allows you to reset and get ready for the next week. So this is very similar to the cyclical keto diet, but I'm still not relying solely on keto.
Speaker 1:The other thing I wanted to talk about that I hadn't before and again, this is the mindset change. The hack in my mind that I had to do is every failed diet I had one thing in common it was rigid. It was because I was trying to stick to it and life threw me a curve ball. Whether I traveled or whatever it was. I demanded perfection. I tracked every calorie and eat the same things every day and never go off the plans. And then, if I slip, well, I'm done, I'm weak, I'm pathetic, right. And that mindset was toxic. It turned every mistake into a moral failure and every craving into proof. I was broken and I'd eventually just get tired of it and rebel.
Speaker 1:Because here's the secret that no diet book wants to admit or anyone's sticking telling you this diet is the way to go. Nobody sticks to a perfect plan forever. It's impossible. We're human, we make mistakes. Life happens, work gets crazy, your kids get sick, you travel, you forget to prep, you don't have the food. You get tired of eating the same damn thing over and over again, and if your whole plan falls apart when one variable change, it's not a good plan. So I learned to give myself grace. I don't regret a single failed diet. Each one taught me something and I learned something from it every single day. Each one showed me another piece of how my body worked and how my brain responded. And now I don't think of myself as someone who's failed 30-some-odd diets. I think of myself as someone who ran 30 experiments and finally built something that worked. Covered this in the last episode, the Hacking the Fat man Diet Framework.
Speaker 1:I've shortened this down a little bit to focus more on the exact schedule, and diet is. I'm only going to do one fasting day per week. I can't fast a whole week or three weeks like I used to do. I'm definitely not binging and purging. I put three days there, but I'm going to be honest. If I do one or two days max of micro fasting, which is keeping my calorie intake below 1,000 calories per day. So Monday is zero and then Tuesday is a thousand calories, maybe Wednesday as well, and depending on how I'm feeling throughout the day, regardless of whether I'm micro fasting or fasting or eating keto or zone or whatever I've told myself is, I will adapt depending on what my body start or feels like or is telling me. Depending on what my body feels like or is telling me.
Speaker 1:Listening to my body is one of the keys. Also, vegetables don't count. It's physically impossible to eat 2,000 calories of raw vegetables. I have frozen spinach and broccoli in the fridge. Carrots and fresh broccoli I'll consume whenever I need it, but when in doubt, stick with your green leafy vegetables. They're better for you, or at least that's what I'm trying to do.
Speaker 1:On breakfast, while I'm trying to minimize my calories, I am trying to make sure that I'm not starving myself to the point that the body is starting to retain calories. So I will use the juice diet, which is literally. I have something like this with me. I'm going to go ahead and take a sip. This is a can of sparkling water with 14 calories of juice in it and yes, oh, my God, I've got two grams of sugar in here, doesn't matter. I drink probably like three or four of these a day, along with the lemon juice and just regular water. That is my breakfast, and it also gives me calories throughout the day. It's a way of fooling the body into believing that it's getting more calories than it is and so that it doesn't try to hold on to the calories and turn them into fat. And that is the the trying to spread the calories out over the entire day. So, using those failures as framework, I came up with my diet and I've talked a little bit about this.
Speaker 1:This rotation gave me the ability to pivot if I need to. So if Monday I felt that I was inflamed, well, it's a fast day, so I'd go light. So let's take Thursday. Let's say Thursday, my inflammation, my legs are hurting or my knees are hurting or God forbid I start to feel gout coming on. And Wednesday is a keto day. If I'm feeling gout coming on, I'll just go ahead and switch to the zone and give myself some carbs to make sure that it doesn't get, the gout doesn't get triggered. And if I felt good on a Friday, like I'm not really that hungry, I don't. You know I list 1800 calories there for Friday and Saturday and I need to read this out a little bit for those that can't see the slides. But if like Thursday and Friday, saturday and Sunday, I have 1800 calories as my max. If Friday I'm feeling not hungry and I don't feel like eating, I made it drop that down to 1000 calories. So the schedule is I should start there.
Speaker 1:A Monday is a fasting day, zero calories. Tuesday I microfast at somewhere between 500 and a thousand calories Sometimes I'll go up to 1200, but 500 to a thousand. And Wednesday is a micro fasting, keto day. Again, I try to stay at the 500 to a thousand, depending on how I'm feeling. By Wednesday I tend to start getting a little bit hungry and so I do go above the thousand calories. That's why I'm kind of saying Wednesday I tend to start getting a little bit hungry and so I do go above the thousand calories. That's why I'm kind of saying that the micro fasting I'm not really doing.
Speaker 1:Two days of micro fasting. Thursday is again just depends on what I'm feeling. But I'll try to continue to do keto. But I will more than likely go to the modified zone, which is again the protein heavy, 40% protein. Actually, I do probably more 50% protein and then more fat balance between fat and carbs. Friday and Saturday is also the modified zone diet, getting up to 1800 calories, and Sunday is just whatever I feel like Like.
Speaker 1:Today I had a nephew's birthday Happy birthday, grayson and went and visited the family, had a couple pieces of pizza. I am well under 1,800 calories today, but I tend to you know whatever's going on. I just let myself go and enjoy the day, especially if I've been really good through the week. So that's really the the hacking, the fat man diet it's. It's a framework and a flexibility for you to plug in whatever your favorite foods are that bring you joy. Right, we've all done diets, we've all had.
Speaker 1:You know, during those diets you usually find like the two or three things that you like to eat. Really, this came from the fact that I took all those and put them together and realized I could make a schedule out of it. I try to be good in the early parts of the week. Give me flexibility in the later part of the weeks Doesn't matter whether I'm going to a fast food place or going out to dinner with the family or over for Thanksgiving. I know what my caloric intake is for the day, what my goals are, and I try to stay within it. In a pinch I will go for and I learned this from the Biggest Loser I watched every single episode of the Biggest Loser is a fist size of protein and two fist sides of vegetables, and if you get some rice in there along with it, it's fine. The salmon at every restaurant is usually the perfect meal if you're ever in doubt or ever in need. So is the tuna tartare, and I love tuna tartare, but hopefully I'll get it, not hopefully I'll get into that a little bit more. Again, this isn't about the foods or the recipes or anything else like that. It's about having a framework and flexibility to give yourself the tools that you need to fight life as you're trying to lose weight and trying to better yourself.
Speaker 1:So next time, on Hacking the Fat man. My good friend Tom Kennedy sent me this question. Tom and I go back to high school. He was our goalie in high school and I played with him in college. And Tom asked about. The other things he'd love to hear about is how to handle the BS foods and drinks like sweets and crackers, chips, cookies and even alcohol. You know the good stuff and it's an excellent question, thomas and I already started to give the answer. Actually, I just kind of gave a little bit of it, but you'll have to wait till next week for me to get the full answer. That's an excellent.
Speaker 1:Topic for the third episode of Hacking the Fat man is how to handle the things life throws at us, and what type of things life throws at us. I will cover how I deal with the constant issues that life has thrown at us. So thank you for joining this week's episode of hacking the fat man. Please, I'd love to hear from you. Reach out on Facebook or Instagram or WhatsApp, or even old school email. And, yeah, I'll see you next week. Thank you, bye.