I started at 6' 228# about 3 months ago and wanted to lose about 20 pounds. I switched to Paleo from a "Nourishing Traditions" diet (pretty close to Paleo, but with selective grains and some bread, allows much higher carbs and starch). Upon switching I lost about 6-7 pounds almost immediately, like in a week. You may call this "water weight", but it has stayed off, and my waist line went down an inch too. About the only thing I changed was to drop the relatively small amount of grains that I was eating (oatmeal most days and occasional rice or bread) and drop all sugars. I was amazed that what I thought was a relatively small change made a big difference in my weight.

At the time I was running about 10-11 miles per week and was feeling fantastic, better than I have in years. Apparently the grains were really keeping me down. I kept this up for about 6 more weeks and didn't lose any more weight. As an experiment, I switched from running to strength training (kettlebells, floor exercises, etc) and again lost weight, about 6-7 pounds almost immediately, like in a week.

It was strange to lose the weight so fast. My low is now 212#, and I'm up around 215# now, and I'm down 3 notches on my belt, in fact I'm on the smallest notch. When I was above 212#, I had a very decreased appetite. But when I hit 212#, suddenly my appetite increased a lot, and I had a hard time controlling what I ate.

My goal of 20 pounds was kind of arbitrary but would require me to be 208#, which incidentally would probably be my lowest weight in > 15 years. Obviously my body wants to stay at 212# or above, so it might be tough going. I still have fat around my middle that I'd like to lose, and I entered my height and weight into a BMI calculator and it still tells me I'm overweight.

My next goal is to try to get back to 212# in a way that I'm not constantly starving, and just try to establish a comfortable plateau at that level. I am considering giving up alcohol for a couple of weeks... which will be tough...