Does eat more 2 weigh less work if you can't exercise?

latte188

Hi,

I've been having problems loosing weight recently. I was diagnosed with a neurological disease about 2 years ago that prevents me from exercising (unfortunately exercise makes my neurological symptoms worse - like a lot worse). I was very active before I got sick, averaging about 10 -12k steps per day and some light weight training. Now I can't walk 1000 steps per day. So, my activity level has dropped by over 90% and I've ended up gaining over 40 pounds in the last two years. I'm eating less than I was when I was healthy - but the weight has piled on. Now I'm really struggling to loose any weight, I was wondering if this method would be helpful to me or not? I'm finding it very difficult to consistently create a caloric deficit and then I worry that I won't be able to sustain it in the long run. Any thoughts?

agardengrrrl

I don't have any advice. That just sucks that you have gotten sick. My husband has rheumatoid arthritis which is an auto-immune disorder. He has a lot of pain and damage to his joints so exercising is difficult. Does your medical team have any advice for how to handle this problem? Is the problem the same no matter what kind of movement it is? I would say be kind to yourself in this situation since your weight gain was really out of your control.

heybales

So sorry to hear about the situation, not good when you mentally want to do more.

Since your body is already under stress, your level for reasonable deficit is going to be even less than others with a healthy body, in order to retain muscle mass, which is going to be even more vital for you.

So it sounds like you probably have MFP set to Sedentary already.

You mention steps, does that mean you have a Fitbit or such?

You should set MFP to a 250 deficit goal, or 1/2 lb weekly. That is under 15%.

And with that narrow a margin for error, you'll have to be great at logging food.
Weigh everything, even packages, for proper serving size to use.
This means eating out could wipe out a lot of hard work for the inaccuracies involved in estimates of calories eaten - unless a national chain with online menu/calories, but it'll still likely be off by 10%. So infrequent even there.

That minor of a deficit is hopefully more sustainable, but you just aren't going to get to eat at the levels you used to be able to sustain at. But you know that.

But by doing this right, slow and reasonable and retaining as much muscle mass as possible - it at least means your maintenance will be higher at goal weight than it would be if you attempted this with an aggressive diet, which I'm betting would fail anyway.

latte188

Hi, thanks for taking the time to respond. agardengrrl to answer your questions my doctors pretty much told me to use common sense and try out different activities to see if any of them are tolerable, and they agreed that tracking my calories is wise. I have an unexplained small fiber neuropathy but it also seems to affect my quad muscles, I have quad weakness so I have problems walking any type of distance. Any type of full body aerobic activity is a recipe for disaster - I tried moving around (not overdoing it) in a pool and it felt ok but then when I got out shortly thereafter I felt horrible. So any type of full body aerobic activity is out of the question for now. I am currently experimenting with some light upper body weights to see if I tolerate those so I could retain or hopefully build muscle. Haybales to answer your question I wear a pedometer and track my steps. I am hopeful that the upper body resistance exercises will help but I still find it frustrating that I can't walk around, it is amazing how many calories walking can burn off and that is no longer an option. I guess I feel a bit stuck, and also embarrassed because I know that people have noticed my weight gain at work and I get embarrassed when I see people that I haven't seen in a while - especially since I don't advertise that I have this medical issue going on.

heybales

While the upper body muscles are smaller, and can't provide nearly the calorie burn or need for repair compared to the lower body muscles - still doing upper is great.

You'll want to get as heavy as you can with compound lifts if possible.
The body doesn't add muscle when it's not needed, just because you are using it, so light weight will only get you so far, go as heavy as you can tolerate it.
If the full range of motion is the issue, isometric workouts with joints at whatever angle feels best would still be great.

And it could turn out that lower body is the same way, perhaps it's only certain points in the range of motion that cause problems, but pick the right spot angle and do 10-20 sec of hard push isometrically, and you've gotten something useful going on.

Might test it out. Even a mostly straight leg with slight knee bend, pushing against something, may be alright.

And I saw other thread that you were attempting 1.5 lb weight loss weekly - very bad idea. Kiss the muscle goodbye even if you use light weights with that extreme of a diet with a low TDEE.

Jennbecca33

Yes, stay with a small calorie deficit. How are you calculating your calories? Like Heybales said, either set MFP at sedentary for 1/2 lb loss weekly (no way that you'll be able to lose 1.5 lbs weekly - it just will not be sustainable as you would be eating way too low of calories) or if you're using the Scooby website (http://scoobysworkshop.com/accurate-calorie-calculator/), choose sedentary and no more than a 10-15% deficit and eat the same amount of calories every day.

You can do it. Just take it slow - try not to expect unreasonable results (quick weight loss) and be consistent with a small calorie deficit.

Graceious1

Well done on you for doing something. Like your doctor said try things that work for you and I would say as your body becomes stronger try more. All the best and you can heal yourself.