Only 7 lbs Down in a Month...

IrZeo

So my monthly weigh-in was today, and I have lost 7 lbs this month, which brings me to a total of 42 lbs since August.

I feel so disappointed by this.. I was expecting more, especially at my size.
I've gone over all the possibilities and the only thing I did differently this last month was not get enough sleep due to stress and general struggling to fall asleep (despite working out every single day). Sigh...

TavistockToad

only?

what is your size?

Sued0nim

7lb in a month is great weight loss and completely appropriate, why are you giving yourself a hard time about it

- you're on the right pathway - although maybe you should consider some meditation work to get your stress and insomnia under control

trinatrina1984

7lbs off is great, you may find that at the start the weight came off quicker as it's likely you dropped quite a lot of water weight. Keep at it you have nothing to be disappointed about!

aniqa109

7lb is good .as long as its a loss i dont think you should be disappointed!

IrZeo

I am currently 411 lbs, and meditation actually helps with insomnia? >_<

Sued0nim

Mindfullness meditation absolutely helps with insomnia (and also with stress)

sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S000578940700072X

sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1550830708003248

999tigger

If you have 75+ lbs to lose 2 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 40-75 lbs to lose 1.5 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 25-40 lbs to lose 1 lbs/week is ideal
If you have 15 -25 lbs to lose 0.5 to 1.0 lbs/week is ideal
If you have less than 15 lbs to lose 0.5 lbs/week is ideal

Would you have been happier if it was 30lbs? just what were you expecting? 7lbs is great, It would have been more if you had eaten less and moved more. You still have scope to lose a lot of water weight. The idea is to make sure you lose at a healthy rate and that you dont just pile it on again.

Its not going to happen quickly, but it will happen if you keep your deficit up and you keep at it consistently. As people say it took you a long time to put on so it will take you a long time to lose. Your expectations need to be realistic. Sighing and being disappointed isnt going to be helpful unless it makes you more determined.

You may wnat to weight once a week so you have more up to date information, but be aware loss isnt linear and the body fluctuates. If you cnat handle that , then stick with fortnightly or monthly. Look on the success board and you will see people who have lost the amount of weight you are looking to lose.

TavistockToad

opening your diary might help...

stress can affect weight loss, but 7lb is still a good loss... any loss is a good loss!

999tigger

Yep opening your diary would be helpful if you wnat advice on losing.
Are you doing any exercise? How much and what type?

caitconquersweight

Lol only. The most I lost in a month was ten pounds, and that was back in June. I've lost quite a bit since then. Pretty much ever since I've been lucky to crack four or five pounds a month.

Any loss is a good loss. Slow and steady wins the race!

Icandoityayme

I've been losing on average about 7 lbs a month for going on 6 months give or take. That's not bad at all. Keep in mind, you didn't gain it overnight and you aren't going to lose it overnight. Your weight loss will happen. You will have days when you are frustrated and disappointed but as long as you push past those feelings and keep doing what you know will benefit you in the long run, you will be glad that you did.

TimothyFish

I can understand the 7 lbs in a month being disappointing, but it is progress all the same. The biggest impact on weight loss is calorie intake. But stress can be a problem in that many people tend to eat more and exercise less vigorously when they are stressed. Consider also that the number of calories you're burning every day has decreased by several hundred calories since when you started this journey. You may lose weight by doing the same each month, but weight loss will slow down as you get closer to your goal.

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trinatrina1984

MrM27 wrote: »

I get 7 lbs at your weight being disappointing but it's still a success. Open your diary and post here what kind of exercise you've been able to do. How many calories are you eating daily? Are you logging accurately?

Looks like your stealth ban or whatever the issue was has been fixed

Sued0nim

trinatrina1984 wrote: »

MrM27 wrote: »

I get 7 lbs at your weight being disappointing but it's still a success. Open your diary and post here what kind of exercise you've been able to do. How many calories are you eating daily? Are you logging accurately?

Looks like your stealth ban or whatever the issue was has been fixed

he was banned? LOL - why?

I know you're the spam / abuse flag winner but seriously I like reading you Mr M

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IrZeo

I do 25 minutes of stationary bike twice per day (morning and night) and also walk the dog for an hour a day. My diary was public as far as I know.. I'll go check that now, I did make it public.

And I did sigh yes, but I am more motivated than ever, I've came this far.. I am never going back, ever. I've never had consistent weightloss, ever.. and now I've lost just over 40lbs.. yeah, no way I'm going back!

Liftng4Lis

7 pounds is awesome! Keep doing what you're doing an it will come.

999tigger

The point was consistency in the key and remind yourself that it will take time to get to target.

Pthers will be better at looking at your diary. The exercise sounds good, but the thing I noticed is you are eating very little and I would question as to whether you are going too severe. The danger of too severe is you can give up due to boredom or you binge out.

The estimate for your mainteance calories I looked at was near 4000, so 2lbs a week would be 3000 calories a day but looking at your diary it shows you are eating between 1300-1500 calories a day and not taking into account your exercise calories. Talk to your Dr and dietician. You need to pace yourself and be patient.

ewhip17

So congratulations on losing over 40lbs so far. That is outstanding. Be proud of it...
Can I make a suggestion that you are going to thing is a bit crazy? What caught my eye is you mentioning that you are working out "every single day" and then saying you are actually working out twice per day. When I look at your log it seems you are eating 1200-1300 calories per day with an 800 calorie day thrown in there. I'm going to suggest you might want to bump that up. I say this because I did the exact same thing for a long time and I've recently discovered that it was totally unnecessary. The fact is that you could be eating more, still losing and thereby have much greater chances of long term success. Just my observation based on experience.

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IrZeo

ewhip17 wrote: »

So congratulations on losing over 40lbs so far. That is outstanding. Be proud of it...
Can I make a suggestion that you are going to thing is a bit crazy? What caught my eye is you mentioning that you are working out "every single day" and then saying you are actually working out twice per day. When I look at your log it seems you are eating 1200-1300 calories per day with an 800 calorie day thrown in there. I'm going to suggest you might want to bump that up. I say this because I did the exact same thing for a long time and I've recently discovered that it was totally unnecessary. The fact is that you could be eating more, still losing and thereby have much greater chances of long term success. Just my observation based on experience.

Weirdly enough, especially coming from a guy my size, I'm struggling to get those calories up any further than I am currently.. I don't really know what to add to my meals to get them up and at the same time keeping the meals healthy.. man I find figuring the food part out so confusing and difficult. >_<

MrM27 wrote: »

OP, why are you subjecting yourself to so few calories?

Are you actually weighing and measuring your food?

^Like I said above, I find figuring the food part out quite difficult. I am weighing and measuring my food, yeah.

IrZeo

999tigger wrote: »

The point was consistency in the key and remind yourself that it will take time to get to target.

Pthers will be better at looking at your diary. The exercise sounds good, but the thing I noticed is you are eating very little and I would question as to whether you are going too severe. The danger of too severe is you can give up due to boredom or you binge out.

The estimate for your mainteance calories I looked at was near 4000, so 2lbs a week would be 3000 calories a day but looking at your diary it shows you are eating between 1300-1500 calories a day and not taking into account your exercise calories. Talk to your Dr and dietician. You need to pace yourself and be patient.

So far only my Dr is helping me with my plan, I have been referred to a 'weight management programme' at the Hospital in my city on the 12th December, so hopefully they'll help me figure it out a bit better... since I clearly suck at it so far.. I'm actually terrified I'm burning more muscle than fat because I can't really notice a whole lot of change after losing a little over 40lbs, besides one of my coats now fit a tiny bit better.

SLLRunner

IrZeo wrote: »

So my monthly weigh-in was today, and I have lost 7 lbs this month, which brings me to a total of 42 lbs since August.

I feel so disappointed by this.. I was expecting more, especially at my size.
I've gone over all the possibilities and the only thing I did differently this last month was not get enough sleep due to stress and general struggling to fall asleep (despite working out every single day). Sigh...

You're disappointed? Oh my goodness.......



I say to keep doing what you're doing because you've got it down!

You GO!

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jos05

7lbs is a great loss!!! Never get discouraged... too many people are in race against time; unwilling to consider the amount of time that it took you to become an unhealthy weight...Stick with it! Life happens; as long as you stay committed the results will come!! CONGRATS ON YOUR 7lb LOSS!!! There's a lot of people on this site that would love to lose 7lbs!!

msjohnson426

IrZeo wrote: »

So my monthly weigh-in was today, and I have lost 7 lbs this month, which brings me to a total of 42 lbs since August.

I feel so disappointed by this.. I was expecting more, especially at my size.
I've gone over all the possibilities and the only thing I did differently this last month was not get enough sleep due to stress and general struggling to fall asleep (despite working out every single day). Sigh...

STILL AN AWESOME LOSS!!

spideywebb77

OP,

I started at 297 and my weight loss was between 8 and 10 lbs monthly. You are going to have weeks and months where this is higher and then other times when it seems to crawl. Learn to recognize this now and say to yourself. ANY loss is a success. You will learn as you go and get better / more consistent which will help drive your success. Don't get discouraged and just keep doing what is working. Best of luck and keep it up!!

Also be aware that as you get closer to a healthy weight this weight loss will get harder / slower.

rbfdac

An 8 pound loss would have been absolutely "perfect" for someone wanting to lose 75+ pounds. You lost a pound less than that. That is absolutely excellent. Just remember, this is a process. The weight will not come off overnight. It took a long time to put it on and it'll take a long time to take it off (but probably less time than it took to put it on, if you're diligent!). Don't let this excellent loss get you down because it's not the number that you had in your head. If you start beating yourself up this early in the game, it's not going to turn out well. You're doing great, so just keep on at it! (And for reference- if you "only" lost 7 pounds a month for the next year, you would be down 84 pounds by this time next year---hardly anything to snarl at)

ewhip17

[/quote]

since I clearly suck at it so far...[/quote]

Here's where you are going to have to refocus. You clearly do NOT suck at this. You have made progress that hundreds, if not thousands of people on this site would love to have made. So take a breath and be easier on yourself. I know that, for me, if I hadn't been very, very diligent with my mindset at the beginning I would have failed - and that mindset was the expectation of losing 1-2lbs per week. That frame of mind has saved me on many occasions from frustration, anger, guilt and the desire to give up. 1-2lbs per week IS success.