And the quote of the century is...
BFDeal
Posts: 3,160 Member
Someone from my friends list:
"I'm sorry man, IDK what to tell you. Like you said, it makes no sense. 5'6" 128 lb female, lifts 4x a week for 35 min, elliptical 1x a week for 25 min, sedentary desk job, eats 2400 cals/day and loses."
OK. So I don't have an elliptical in my home gym. Maybe that 25 minutes I'm missing is a total deal breaker. Maybe that's my entire plateau. Beyond that we have roughly the same routine. Only she weighs 100lbs less and loses weight eating more than I do. Me? No loses. Nope. Eating 300 calories less. I'm pretty much at the throw in the towel and give up moment. There is literally no logic to this. Now even if my logging is a little off lately do to birthday season (in my life at least) it sure as heck wasn't off last year when this plateau began and I stalled out eat 2300. So, logical explanations that aren't stupid and don't involve the standard "well, dur, you're eating too much?" Go.
"I'm sorry man, IDK what to tell you. Like you said, it makes no sense. 5'6" 128 lb female, lifts 4x a week for 35 min, elliptical 1x a week for 25 min, sedentary desk job, eats 2400 cals/day and loses."
OK. So I don't have an elliptical in my home gym. Maybe that 25 minutes I'm missing is a total deal breaker. Maybe that's my entire plateau. Beyond that we have roughly the same routine. Only she weighs 100lbs less and loses weight eating more than I do. Me? No loses. Nope. Eating 300 calories less. I'm pretty much at the throw in the towel and give up moment. There is literally no logic to this. Now even if my logging is a little off lately do to birthday season (in my life at least) it sure as heck wasn't off last year when this plateau began and I stalled out eat 2300. So, logical explanations that aren't stupid and don't involve the standard "well, dur, you're eating too much?" Go.
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First, give yourself a little credit. You have gone from 365 lbs to 228 lbs. That is phenomenal, and don't let anyone tell you otherwise.
Second, one way to break a plateau (there was actually a pretty good blog post at Hello Healthy yesterday about - give it a read) is to re-acclimate your body to maintenance calories for a couple of weeks. So find your TDEE and eat back your exercise calories for two weeks. Then get back to a calorie deficit. This will readjust your metabolism and once you are at a deficit again, your body will keep burning more calories because it will expect more.
Also, work some cardio into your routine. The "magic" here is that cardio is an excellent way to ramp up your metabolism. Higher metabolism = more calorie burned just doing everyday things. You don't have to kill yourself with cardio; if you prefer weights by all means do that, but just a little cardio can do a great deal.0 -
CSB. Stop whining about how people are eating more than you'd like to be eating yourself.
Also realize that caloric intake is pretty much perceived caloric intake. If you aren't weighing then you are easily eating above or below your logged intake by a few hundred calories on a regular basis.
And this woman could be "sedentary" at work, sure. And maybe she also walks a shite-load, or does a lot of work at home, or lifts intensely while doing VERY high intensity cardio once a week.
You really need to stop complaining about this.
(ETA for anyone who reads and thinks I'm being a betch, this poster once hijacked a thread in the fitness or food forums where another poster was looking for other users eating >2000 calories. Hijacked and complained and whined and argued. And will post crap like this in other threads too. So you know, I'm done with it and have no patience with people like this.)0 -
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PlaydohPants wrote: »Try not compare. She could be eating far less than she thinks and that is why she's losing weight so "easily".
Yup. Especially if she doesn't log daily and/or doesn't weigh her food. OR she simply has more lean muscle mass which might be helping her lose on more calories. OR she is more active than she realizes because activity doesn't just entail exercise. Simply walking and standing results in burned calories. And working out more intensely = more calories burned.0 -
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Finding your maintenance is good advice and you really might need the break.
If it's absurdly low compared to where it should be for someone of your size, bring that information to the doctor and decide what you want to do about it.
Otherwise, all you can do is cut calories or up activity.
For what it's worth, people differ. The person you cited is about my weight, and I do a lot more cardio, and yet I'd be gaining on less than she's losing on. Could be she's over-counting or has a more active life than she gives herself credit for or just has a faster metabolism. It has no bearing on me, though.0 -
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PlaydohPants wrote: »Try not compare. She could be eating far less than she thinks and that is why she's losing weight so "easily".
Yup. Or as others have pointed out, sits at a desk all day--but gets up to talk to her coworkers instead of email, doesn't count walking as exercise, has active hobbies, runs around after kids/pets . . .
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Just doing my little part....0 -
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Some people can eat more, some people have better agility and endurance, some can lift more.. it is what it is. In the end, you do what you have to do FOR YOU. Don't compare yourself to others around you, it will get you nowhere and make you bitter. Your maintenance, yes is on the low side for someone with your stats. Why? I wish I could tell you. If you are that concerned, maybe see a doctor and get some bloods done.0
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And do you know your body fat percentage to be 30% for certain? I tried to help, but it does seem to me like you just want to complain rather than learn. Self-pity won't help you lose more weight. Taking charge of your life will.So at 100lbs less than me she has more muscle mass than I do? LOL How is that possible. Even at 30% body fat my muscle mass would be more than her entire body weight.
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So does this mean I can't count on your help?
Who cares? The times I have offered help you basically whined and betched about what I said and argued that your logging was just fine. I don't have time for people like yourself.0 -
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No one here can make you able to eat more and lose weight.
Seems like your choices are to find out if it's a medical problem (if your maintenance is really absurdly low), or to increase your calorie burn (do more cardio or walk more in your daily life), or to go with it and reduce your calories.
I'm not sure what you expect anyone else to do here. You aren't asking for ideas on the exercise to do or how to feel happy at a lower calorie level. You just seem mad that your maintenance level is as low as you think it is, and--barring a medical issue--that's something you have to accept and deal with.0 -
The other poster said maybe she has more muscle mass. I was pointing out that from a logical standpoint that's not possible.lemurcat12 wrote: »
Maybe she has more muscle mass than other females with her stats and activity levels, or more muscle mass than she herself realizes. Ffs, you are a man and she is a woman. Stop comparing yourself to someone of a different sex, and stop whining.0 -
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You've been given the advice to go to the doctor. Considering that you appear to be a biological anomaly, that's about as helpful as you can hope for at this point. Talking to a therapist about your obsession with how many calories women eat is another potentially helpful suggestion.0
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I read posts on here all the time from women who are shorter than me who weigh similar who eat a lot more than I do and lose. It's annoying lol But not to the point that I stress and worry about it
we are different people, different activity levels etc etc etc
It is what it is, I am me they are them. Move on and concentrate on you and your goals.0 -
Actually, people here ARE helpful... when the OP isn't just a bunch of whining. You didn't even ASK a question. You whined. And continue to whine. And when people DO offer the typical advice - suggesting cleaning up the logging, recalculating maintenance estimates, taking breaks, etc - you ignore the advice. Just like that one guy whose logging truly WAS terrible and he never listened to the multiple people telling him to clean it up, and would post regularly about plateauing and wanting to go on a 1200 calorie diet.Meh, I guess I'll wait to post again until I'm bulking or trying to lose the last 2lbs to get abs. Those are really the only circumstances anyone is actually helpful.
You are still adding "extra" to your servings. You are not eating consistently all the time (1400 one day, 3200 another, 600-some another day). For all I know you are using generic recipes sometimes or using incorrect entries; I've not bothered to look more closely at those two possibilities.
So eat to your goal within 100 calories every day, don't "add" more to your servings i.e. only log what you actually eat, if you exercise then eat back at least half of the calories unless you are doing TDEE (in which case, only do TDEE if you are consistent with your exercise),make sure you are using correct entries (e.g. cooked entry if you weighed it cooked) and only use USDA entries for produce, double check any name-brand entries against your own boxes, and weigh regularly. If after 1-2 months NOTHING has changed - same weight, same measurements, clothes are the same - then either take a diet break and try to find your maintenance calories (add 100 every week until you start gaining a bit of weight and then once that happens, eat that number for a month) or go to the doctor.
And stop posting on the forums if all you're going to do is whine and complain.
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LOL. you're fantastic.0 -
And do you know your body fat percentage to be 30% for certain? I tried to help, but it does seem to me like you just want to complain rather than learn. Self-pity won't help you lose more weight. Taking charge of your life will.So at 100lbs less than me she has more muscle mass than I do? LOL How is that possible. Even at 30% body fat my muscle mass would be more than her entire body weight.
I don't have an accurate way to know my body fat percentage. My scale says between 26 and 29%. It seems to vary based on how many carbs I eat honestly. I'm guessing due to the fluctuations with water weight, etc.
Then you could easily be 40% BF. Those scales are not accurate.0 -
BMR formulas (and by extension, TDEE) are just equations of lines fitted to data points. Roughly half of the data is going to be above the line (higher than calculated) and roughly half below the line (lower than calculated). It might be unfair but it's completely logical. We don't see very many people complaining on this board that they are losing faster than MFP calculates, but those high burning people must exist. Maybe they complain over on Gaining Weight that they need to eat more than MFP says.
And I second ana3067 on this person's actual activity. What she calls "sedentary" someone else may call "active". I assumed I was sedentary--I drive to the train, ride the train to work, sit at my desk, ride the train back and drive to my own driveway, and watch tv every night. I don't work out at all. Then I got a pedometer and found out I was walking 7 km a day between the parking lot and the train, between the train and my workplace, puttering around the office, and running errands at lunch, just my ordinary activities of living. Then I increased it by taking the long way, taking the stairs, and being less efficient in my errands so that I have someplace I need to go every day. I'm walking 11 km a day and burning 2000 calories. If I did any "real exercise" it would be even more. To the casual observer I'm a driving, riding, desk-sitting couch potato whose biggest leisure activity is knitting.0 -
Yes you do. Go to a doctor or a certified nutritionist/fitness trainer. They can accurately measure your body fat percentage. STOP GUESSING.
And do you know your body fat percentage to be 30% for certain? I tried to help, but it does seem to me like you just want to complain rather than learn. Self-pity won't help you lose more weight. Taking charge of your life will.So at 100lbs less than me she has more muscle mass than I do? LOL How is that possible. Even at 30% body fat my muscle mass would be more than her entire body weight.
I don't have an accurate way to know my body fat percentage. My scale says between 26 and 29%. It seems to vary based on how many carbs I eat honestly. I'm guessing due to the fluctuations with water weight, etc.0 -
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SSS - Special Snowflake Syndrome
- Just do what you need to do, it's that simple0
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