Advice needed from others that have been at a deficit for 15+ months or are very experienced.

mom2my4boys

Hi I'm 32y/F/5'4.5/fluctuating between 175-180lbs/large framed/body fat (for what it's worth) was tested via calipers at 22%. (although, after 4 kids i certainly don't look like the pic's of other women at 22% body fat ) In the past 15 months I have lost 99lbs and approximately half my body's fat. MFP puts my calories at 1600 to loose 1lb a week. My goal is 150lbs. My exercise consists of 50mins of cardio/5days a week/strength training 2x weekly, faithfully for 15months. I switch up the cardio machines regularly. According to the machines, when i go hard at it (think shirt drenched in sweat,long blond hair dripping wet) i burn 600cals. To account for not having a HRM and machine error, i only record my burns as 300cals and i eat them back. I clean houses as work for 5 days a week/4hrs a day and do the activity required to run a family of 6.(cooking/cleaning/soccer games ect) I'm set as lightly active.There, i think that's all the info needed.

I posted here before joking around about logging everything by grams except for my middle of the night peanut butter sammiches. In the past few weeks i have really tightened up my logging and cut out the sammiches. I found if i eat a little more substantial nighttime snack, i don't wake up at 3am starving.(as in a weighed/logged turkey breast sammich at 9pm prevents me waking up eating the 3am unlogged PBnJ)

My diary is open to the public, please have a look. Yesterday i didn't log/frustrated, I ate homemade comfort food-Shepard's pie.

Where am i going wrong? Why has my weightloss stopped? Will i ever reach a healthy BMI based on my current weight,body fat stat's? I'm inclined to believe cals in vs cals out or i was... Should i dip eating below my BMR? Is being in calorie deficit for 15+months making this harder?

Thanks for your time and constructive criticism.

WalkingAlong

Good job on sticking to it so long and for having so much success!

Here's my two cents- If you're truly logging carefully (no unlogged meals or sammies for weeks) and not losing at your current level of 1900ish, I would lower it. Your BMR has nothing to do with today's intake, if you have body fat to lose. Regardless of what the number in your log looks like or the online estimators of your burns, if you're not losing for weeks, you're eating at maintenance, all else unchanged (no major adjustments to exercise, etc.)

1900 is a fairly high intake for a 5'4" woman, even with your activity. I'm your height but somewhat lighter and older and I need to go down to 1400 and below to see results.

Good luck!

MelodyandBarbells

So you're eating a maximum of 1900 cals per day, exercise or not? And if you weren't logging the PB&J you have your answer right there. That could be anywhere from 250-600 calories every other night, and your account is setup to account for ALL your activity - lightly active plus eating back some exercise cals. With there being no buffer if you choose not to log food for whatever reason your body is still going to remember it and not shed the lbs

I say you're right on the edge of how many cals you should be eating because around your weight I was only able to get 1560 cals per day (net) when I set the account to 1/2 lb per week loss. I was set to sedentary as well though and logged exercise separately.

If you've now started logging precisely I'd give it more time and see what happens. Have you read these links?

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1296011/calorie-counting-101/p1

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1234699/logging-accurately-step-by-step-guide/p1

FYI I'm 5'5 and now around 145. It can be rough. Your body gets smaller and now needs less calories. If you screw around with the logging you simply won't lose weight. I go through bouts of it myself from time to time lol

allyphoe

I'm about your size (both weight and height), 10 years older, never exercise, and lose just fine at ~1800. Eat enough every day that you don't need to binge - and when you do binge, log it.

Not logging it doesn't mean it didn't happen. If someone said to you, "I don't understand why there's not enough money in my bank account, because I budget for and record every penny, and even have a side job to bring in extra. Oh, but a couple times a week I use my debit card to pick up some cute stuff, and I never write that down because I didn't mean to spend that money!" you'd know why that person was broke, right?

Also, you may well be at a deficit - when you're losing slowly, water weight fluctuation can mask an extended period of slow and steady loss.

mom2my4boys

So, I'm eating too much is the consensus? I guess I will try dropping my calories to 1500/day a see if I can get the scale to move. I'm not a quitter and I'm certainly not going to quit 4/5's of the way to goal. Thanks for your input, I'm just frustrated. (and hungry) It was so easy in the beginning! The struggle is real. I guess I was half heartedly hoping someone would come along and tell me I need to eat more because of one reason or another...(multiple weight loss calculator's say I should still be loosing and I'm not despite cleaning up my logging and essentially cutting out the 250cal pb's) I've already tried the eat more theory and that resulted in weight gain and 1600+300 exercise cals seems to be my maintenance. So, the only place to go from here is down. Thanks again!

sympha01

allyphoe wrote: »

"I don't understand why there's not enough money in my bank account, because I budget for and record every penny, and even have a side job to bring in extra. Oh, but a couple times a week I use my debit card to pick up some cute stuff, and I never write that down because I didn't mean to spend that money!"

This.

Log. Every. Thing.

First, guarantee you've logged every single bite for >4 weeks, THEN assess whether you're losing or not.

Also, what the person above said about making sure that you're eating enough to suppress the urge to binge. Especially if you're the type of person who seems to have a hard time honestly logging those binges. Just log it.

ank141

Another thought: foods that are high in sugar (sugar, skittles, apples) and refined carbs (bread, grains, noodles, corn chips, etc) cause an insulin spike. This messes with hunger levels (leptin and grehlin, the satiety and hunger hormones your body makes) and in turn makes you more hungry. You'll likely find that you can feel fuller on the same number of calories if you cut out all sweet items and all refined carb items. To further help control hunger, consider a breakfast that does not include any carbs - instead, consume a breakfast that's high in protein (sardines, eggs, chicken, unsweetened dairy) and good fats (coconut oil, avocado, or olive oil), and save your carby foods for lunch and dinner. Try it for 3 weeks and see what happens -- it might just help!