Weight Loss advice needed

taentea

I've been overweight all my life and I'm trying to change this now. But I'm a bit confused with the numbers and results I'm getting aren't that great. I'm not the one to panic and I have a really long way to go, so I have no deadlines. But I'd love to understand better what's going on and how I could possibly improve things. So any opinion / advice would be greatly appreciated.

I'm 32. 163cm (5'4"). And I've started losing from 120kg (265lb) back in February. First 5kg (11lb) were gone without me noticing. I got sick and my appetite went down significantly. Three and a half weeks ago at 115.3kg (254lb) I've decided to actually do it. I've signed up to a calorie tracking service (lifesum) and have tracked every single gram of what went to my mouth ever since. I eat all of my meals at home and use electronic scales, so I'd like to think my measurements are more or less precise.

I've set 1kg (2.2lb) as my target weekly loss and chose the lowest activity level the service gave me. I do know that 1kg can be a very aggressive number but I assumed that for someone this overweight it was actually reasonable. I planned to pick a smaller number once 1kg becomes more than 1% of my weight.

The service gave me 1498 as my daily calorie goal. And this is the first thing that confuses me. Lifesum advises 1460 calories at 113.3kg while using the same numbers and goals on MFT pal gives me just 1200. I don't mind the number. I wasn't reaching 1.5K when that was the goal anyway. But it seems to be quite a difference. And I'm a bit worried that I have calorie goal this low at such a heavy weight. What happens later in the process?

I've registered here just couple days ago and I switched to MFT for calorie tracking. So my food diary here is only 2.5 days long. But I do have all my previous logs at hand, so here are the numbers:

Week 1: 1239 cals average. No activity. 1kg (2.2lb) lost.
Week 2: 934 cals average (1001, 1012, 1043, 778, 1030, 772 and 904). No activity. 0.9kg (1.98lb) lost.
Week 3: 1011 average (1038, 1010, 479, 745, 1284, 1229 and 1293). Several kms walked. 0.3kg (0.66lb) gained.
Week 4: half done. 0.3kg keep appearing and disappearing.

This just doesn't seem to make a lot of sense. There is no logic behind gaining from eating 1000cals at 250lb.

Two things happened in during Week 3:
1) Holidays. My calories remained in order but food quality went down compared to almost paleo weeks 1 and 2. A salad with mayo, tuna and corn in it happened. A piece of bread and some sweets. All accounted for hence the rise in last 3 days of the week.
2) V-drips, 2 extra pills and 1 injection 5 days a week. The treatment for my neck/head issues began. But neurologist swears none of the medicine should be affecting my weight.

I do realise weight loss is not linear, that starts could be rough. I'm not going to act on these results and do stupid things.

I'm posting this do make sure I don't do anything obviously wrong. Are my numbers fine? Should I keep doing what I do and hope that once treatment is done results follow? Or is it the diet? Are sweet things and a bit of higher fats / lower carbs a possible reason for lack of results?

Ninkyou

First, I want to ask, why are you eating below 1200 calories? If your goal is 1200 calories on MFP (and 1400+ on other sites), why are you not meeting at least one of those goals?
Second, weight loss isn't linear. There will be weeks that you lose, some that you don't and others you gain. As long as there's a downward trend, you're good to go.
Third, give it more time. You've been using MFP for only 4 weeks. The numbers might not be as high as you were expecting, but you are losing. Plus, if you've done any exercise or increased it, you could be retaining water, making your numbers smaller or stagnant. Also, hormones, sodium, ToM, Ovulation, etc all influence the scale, which again, can mask losses.

malibu927

It sounds like Lifesum uses TDEE to track, which includes exercise in the goal. MFP uses NEAT, where you add in your exercise, which is why when you add exercise in you're expected to eat those calories back (though generally 50-75%).

I wouldn't worry about the stall so much. Increasing/starting exercise often leads to water retention that will disappear, and if you're weighing everything as you say you are, it's probably masking your loss. Also, if you're nearing your period, you'll retain water for that as well.

I would suggest making sure you do try to hit your 1200 calorie goal to ensure you're getting enough nutrients in your body

yondermountain

Off topic, Ninkyou, but that has got to be one of the cutest babies I've ever seen!

taentea

Ninkyou wrote: »

First, I want to ask, why are you eating below 1200 calories? If your goal is 1200 calories on MFP (and 1400+ on other sites), why are you not meeting at least one of those goals?

It's something that just happened naturally when I changed the quality of the food I eat. Meat, veggies, fruit and cottage cheese don't fill up those numbers fast. Also I'm still sick, so my appetite is naturally low. I planned to get to 1300 average at least even after the gain on Week 3 but MFP gave me 1200, so I'm sticking to that for now (if that's ok). I'm not going low on purpose. I added some treats to my menu to meet the numbers. I still have to work on meeting my macros though. Those things take time to fine tune.

Emilia777

My weight was ALL over the place as I started off a couple of months ago, and it still does funny things. I habitually gain a pound and then lose 2, for instance. Water weight and glycogen make a big difference. All I can say is, wait it out, and make sure you meet your nutritional needs in the meantime.

In terms of caloric intake, I did 1200 for about 6-7 weeks. I know it’s do-able. I even hit over 100g protein with that. However, after a while, I started being too fatigued, and a bit miserable. I upped it just to 1350 and it already makes a difference. What I’m getting at is, eating too low isn’t really worth it in my opinion, especially if you don’t have to.

Regarding what you’re eating, it is all about calories in - calories out: it really doesn’t matter if the calories come from mayo, Nutella, or broccoli. The only difference is that you can eat more of the latter while staying within your calorie goals. Most people around here are firmly of the If It Meets Your Macros (IIFYM) mentality: eat anything as long as you maintain your deficit and hit your macros. To make sure this is accurate though, I highly encourage using a food scale rather than measuring cups.

If you want a better idea of how much your body burns every day, you can play with the calculator on here: http://iifym.com/tdee-calculator/ Like @malibu927 explained, MFP uses NEAT, while your TDEE is how much you burn every day with exercise levels already accounted for.

taentea

I've been doing fine calories wise past few days, staying within +/-50 cals to 1200. I do not find this limit uncomfortable, at least for now. It allows me enough food to feel full + a dessert.

I've tried that calculator before but I don't know my fat% unfortunately, so it refuses to give me results. I used the Harris-Benedict formula and I think it gave me around 1900 for BMR and a bit under 2300 TDEE (using 1.2 coefficient for low activity). What confused me was I used 'Little to no activity' in both apps, so it's a bit strange that the results vary. Did Lifesum somehow assume extra exercise on the top of NEAT?

futuremanda

taentea wrote: »

Ninkyou wrote: »

First, I want to ask, why are you eating below 1200 calories? If your goal is 1200 calories on MFP (and 1400+ on other sites), why are you not meeting at least one of those goals?

It's something that just happened naturally when I changed the quality of the food I eat. Meat, veggies, fruit and cottage cheese don't fill up those numbers fast. Also I'm still sick, so my appetite is naturally low. I planned to get to 1300 average at least even after the gain on Week 3 but MFP gave me 1200, so I'm sticking to that for now (if that's ok). I'm not going low on purpose. I added some treats to my menu to meet the numbers. I still have to work on meeting my macros though. Those things take time to fine tune.

Make sure you're getting enough fat. 1 tbls of olive oil to cook your meat and veggies would up your cals by about 120, and help with the fat macro! And don't eat things like fat free cottage cheese (if you are indeed low on fat, as I suspect you are with so few calories). Fat is really important for a number of things, including hormone regulation and proper digestion, so don't cut it out thinking you're doing yourself a service. And you don't have to eat MORE food, you just have to eat food with more calories (usually this means you were over-cutting fat, which is why I mentioned it) aka calorie-dense foods.

As for weight gain, that happened the week you started doing activity, right? No activity, loss. No activity, loss. Several kms walked, gain. So whenever we add new activity, increase intensity, increase frequency, etc, we typically retain water. It helps the muscles adapt.

Or you're somewhere in your menstrual cycle (ovulating, pre-menstrual, menstrual). Or it's fluctuating because you're sick. Or because of your food changes when sick. /shrug

Emilia777

Mmm, the Harris-Benedict does overestimate TDEE a bit, as it says in the description on there. I know variations can be a bit tedious, but at the end of the day I try to remind myself that there is always a margin of error with these types of estimates. As for Lifesum, I have no idea how it works - sorry!

taentea

futuremanda wrote: »

Make sure you're getting enough fat.

I'm actually looking for a way to lower my fats a little. I meet my proteins on most of the days, I tend to go a bit over with my fats and I make like 1/3 of my carbs, which makes my fats % even bigger in the whole diet.

Emilia777 wrote: »

Mmm, the Harris-Benedict does overestimate TDEE a bit, as it says in the description on there. I know variations can be a bit tedious, but at the end of the day I try to remind myself that there is always a margin of error with these types of estimates. As for Lifesum, I have no idea how it works - sorry!

The Mifflin-St. Jeor formular gives me 60-80 less. So to lose 1kg I should be 1000 short of 2200 which makes 1200 calories about right.

futuremanda

taentea wrote: »

futuremanda wrote: »

Make sure you're getting enough fat.

I'm actually looking for a way to lower my fats a little. I meet my proteins on most of the days, I tend to go a bit over with my fats and I make like 1/3 of my carbs, which makes my fats % even bigger in the whole diet.

Emilia777 wrote: »

Mmm, the Harris-Benedict does overestimate TDEE a bit, as it says in the description on there. I know variations can be a bit tedious, but at the end of the day I try to remind myself that there is always a margin of error with these types of estimates. As for Lifesum, I have no idea how it works - sorry!

The Mifflin-St. Jeor formular gives me 60-80 less. So to lose 1kg I should be 1000 short of 2200 which makes 1200 calories about right.

If you are going to go low carb, then... you are going to be high fat. Look up LCHF. And since the default MFP macros are not set up to assume you ARE doing LCHF then the default fat macro is low. If you want to stay low carb, you'll want to do some research and figure out where your fat macro should be, and set a custom macro spread. And I'd bet you'll need to up fat.

Otherwise, you'll need to up carbs to hit your calorie target, which might mean eating a higher volume of food.

Psychgrrl

Sorry for only speaking in pounds ... The metric system usually confuses the bejesus out of me (I'm American). And then when you throw in the stones ... Thanks for providing all the conversions for the metric ignorant. It really helped with the frame of reference!

You're right--all those different conversions and formulas are confusing. I can tell you what did the trick for me. I bought a wearable fitness tracker (my choice was a Body Media armband--I admire Jillian Michaels and they wore them on the Biggest Loser). MFP food diary imports there (I think it does that for FitBit and Nike FuelBand and probably others as well). And BM burn appears on MFP.

I use MFP to track my food. I ignore the over/under calories and the "if every day were like this in 5 weeks you'd weigh ..." I look at the Body Media dashboard. Which I found to be much more accurate regarding calories burned and deficit. It eliminated the exercise calories confusion that I had with MFP. When I was losing, I used BM to help me determine if I was at, above or below my desired deficit for the day. It spells it out really clearly. The daily calorie deficit goal was set at 500 calories (to lose a pound a week) and the deficit line was its own line in the dashboard.

I admit to being a numbers nerd and having things spelled out so there was not a shadow of a doubt really helped me.

And I don't even notice I'm wearing it unless someone comments on it.

nancyjay__

Are you weighing your foods? Are you using a scale or other measure. Also take into account water weight/bloating/sodium/water retention. Are you weighing at the same times and under the same situations (ex empty stomach in the morning)

taentea

futuremanda wrote: »

taentea wrote: »

futuremanda wrote: »

Make sure you're getting enough fat.

I'm actually looking for a way to lower my fats a little. I meet my proteins on most of the days, I tend to go a bit over with my fats and I make like 1/3 of my carbs, which makes my fats % even bigger in the whole diet.

Emilia777 wrote: »

Mmm, the Harris-Benedict does overestimate TDEE a bit, as it says in the description on there. I know variations can be a bit tedious, but at the end of the day I try to remind myself that there is always a margin of error with these types of estimates. As for Lifesum, I have no idea how it works - sorry!

The Mifflin-St. Jeor formular gives me 60-80 less. So to lose 1kg I should be 1000 short of 2200 which makes 1200 calories about right.

If you are going to go low carb, then... you are going to be high fat. Look up LCHF. And since the default MFP macros are not set up to assume you ARE doing LCHF then the default fat macro is low. If you want to stay low carb, you'll want to do some research and figure out where your fat macro should be, and set a custom macro spread. And I'd bet you'll need to up fat.

Otherwise, you'll need to up carbs to hit your calorie target, which might mean eating a higher volume of food.

I'm looking for a lifelong change rather than a temporary fix and a diet with high fat and very low carbs just does not sound right to me. Maybe I'm being stupid but I'd rather stick to a more neutral plan. So I'll have to up the carbs it seems. I have a lot of options as I currently don't eat breads, pasta or rice but then fitting into 1200 will be a bit more of a challenge, so I'll have to thread the waters carefully.

Psychgrrl wrote: »

Sorry for only speaking in pounds ... The metric system usually confuses the bejesus out of me (I'm American). And then when you throw in the stones ... Thanks for providing all the conversions for the metric ignorant. It really helped with the frame of reference!

You're right--all those different conversions and formulas are confusing. I can tell you what did the trick for me. I bought a wearable fitness tracker (my choice was a Body Media armband--I admire Jillian Michaels and they wore them on the Biggest Loser). MFP food diary imports there (I think it does that for FitBit and Nike FuelBand and probably others as well). And BM burn appears on MFP.
...

I always thought metric was easy. Everything is basically a 10, 100 or 1000 of everything But making the conversions seemed logical to me. After all I want help and answers. It's in my interest to make sure my questions are clear. You don't need to understand this. I need you to understand.

Fitness tracker sounds like a wonderful idea. In fact I've been eyeing some of them for a while. But the geek in me wants accurate movement tracker and heart rate monitoring and a smart alarm. And it has to not break every few months. I've been stuck at waiting and picking stage for a while now.

nancyjay__ wrote: »

Are you weighing your foods? Are you using a scale or other measure. Also take into account water weight/bloating/sodium/water retention. Are you weighing at the same times and under the same situations (ex empty stomach in the morning)

I am using an electric kitchen scale and measure everything to a gram. I always measure myself in the morning before eating or drinking anything. This past week it was at exactly same time but before that the time could vary.

Psychgrrl

I've had my armband for over four years. It does steps, calories, activity level (moderate or strenuous), sleep cycle, etc. It breaks down the day into hours so I can see where I did (or didn't do what). I think most of the wearables do things that are very similar.

The HRM has been invaluable for training. As I am trying to increase my intensity and improve my fitness. While I'm not overly thrilled with the chest strap--datawise I need accuracy.

There's always going to be something shinier and newer out there (i.e. Apple Watch). I think there are some tried and true things out there that will really help you get started. In the US, Consumer Reports evaluate and rated them, and there are other reliable sources out there as well.

taentea

Psychgrrl wrote: »

I've had my armband for over four years. It does steps, calories, activity level (moderate or strenuous), sleep cycle, etc. It breaks down the day into hours so I can see where I did (or didn't do what). I think most of the wearables do things that are very similar.

The HRM has been invaluable for training. As I am trying to increase my intensity and improve my fitness. While I'm not overly thrilled with the chest strap--datawise I need accuracy.

There's always going to be something shinier and newer out there (i.e. Apple Watch). I think there are some tried and true things out there that will really help you get started. In the US, Consumer Reports evaluate and rated them, and there are other reliable sources out there as well.

I'm not in North America and not being there has a bunch of downsides unfortunately. For example Body Media does not ship to my country and if I purchase through re-sellers, the price will be ridiculous (about 1.5 of my therapist's monthly salary for example) and warranty repairs would be a pain if available at all. There are also no reliable ratings, so I have to go by reviews. And if I see plenty of people writing that a popular option like Jawbone breaks every few months and I know I'll have to pay quite a bit for it and won't be able to replace it easily, it does give me a lot of doubts.

Also I'm a geek I just can't help being picky. If I wear something on my wrist I expect it to show time, so I don't have to take my phone out all the time. I expect it to have GPS to track distance properly. I need it to wake me up smartly as I really struggle with this and ideally get along with other devices, so I can pair it with light in my room for example. HR function is not critical but I'd rather have it than not. I do have a chest strap but I don't wear it all the time and sometimes I just need to know where my rate is approximately. Phone notifications would be nice as my phone is on silent a lot of times. And then there is the battery and synchronization. I don't mind charging every day but I don't want to spend part of the day or night without it in order to do that. And I prefer wireless sync. Modern laptops have few ports.

There is a gazillion of devices on the market right now but even if I cut my expectations in half, finding one that fits is not easy. There are hardly any 5-star ratings for any of the devices in this niche. For some reason they all fail at at least one thing that matters. Including shiny toys like Apple Watch. I'd pay the high price but the problem, it just doesn't do what I hoped it would do.

---

Stood on the scale at my regular time today. If my weight does not change by Wednesday, I will have to log a gain of yet another 0.3kg (0.66lb) on the top of 0.3kg gained on week 3. What is this sorcery.

taentea

Logged my week 4 results this morning. -0.3kg (-0.66lb) from my week 3 results, bringing me back to the result of week 2. But I was seeing +0.4kg (+0,88lb) to the very same reference point just the morning before. I can't trust any of the results right now it seems. But I'm pretty certain I haven't lost 2kgs I planned to lose in these past 2 weeks. Well, at least I've done good on my calories, I guess. Got an average of 1196 against a goal of 1200 which is as close as it gets.

Psychgrrl

You've just got to have faith, keeping logging and working out. It really is a journey and not a destination. If you do what you need to, your body will respond. Really!

My weight fluctuates between 0-4 pounds up and down. Depends on what I ate and how I worked out. I weigh more the days after I lift.

taentea

Psychgrrl wrote: »

You've just got to have faith, keeping logging and working out. It really is a journey and not a destination. If you do what you need to, your body will respond. Really!

My weight fluctuates between 0-4 pounds up and down. Depends on what I ate and how I worked out. I weigh more the days after I lift.

Thank you for encouraging words. It feels really nice to have a stranger spend few minutes of their precious time on wishing you well and saying it's gonna be alright.

I'll just keep going. Thankfully, I'm not fuelled by motivation this time. I've started with almost none of it for a number of reasons and I don't regret it. My experience tells me motivation is a very unreliable friend. Will power doesn't last either, so I'm not pushing too hard and desperately needing something to show for it. I'm trying to find a pace that feels reasonably comfortable and natural and yet moves me in the right direction.

Of course results like this don't make me happy but they don't make me want to quit either. They just indicate that something is going on. Something I need to either wait out or take care of.

My calorie limit is already low and I fit into it, so I don't think the problem is there. I could improve the quality of my food but for now I'd rather not go to extremes unless I really have to. I'm keeping my diet where it is so I can exclude the effect of my treatment first. I had my last v-drip and injection today which strikes a number of meds off my list. I will see if they were to blame in a week or two from here. And in a month or so I will be completely free from pills hopefully. I will also see a doc to check on my hormones soon. If next 4 weeks don't bring me results I expect, then diet gets another look. That's the plan.

I wish exercise was a factor in this but unfortunately it is not for now. I got impatient yesterday and went to check out some light weights in a local spots shop. Picking up a 5kg kettlebell for a short moment messed me up for the rest of the day. This weight is a joke for my arms but my neck doesn't find it funny at all. I will add some cardio when movement stops making me sick. That will be soon, hopefully. For now walking, easy push-ups and light exercise for my neck/shoulder area is all I have.

bwogilvie

Since you say you are a geek, how about weighing every morning and tracking your exponentially smoothed moving average weight? That's a more reliable guide to results than a weekly weigh-in. John Walker explains how and why in The Hacker's Diet (free ebook); you can also use a site like TrendWeight.com to do the math.

taentea

bwogilvie wrote: »

Since you say you are a geek, how about weighing every morning and tracking your exponentially smoothed moving average weight? That's a more reliable guide to results than a weekly weigh-in. John Walker explains how and why in The Hacker's Diet (free ebook); you can also use a site like TrendWeight.com to do the math.

Thanks for the links. This was definitely an interesting read and not just about the weight loss but also some general concepts I was not 100% familiar with.

For me weekly weight-ins are already a way to average out the results I'm getting a little compared to daily spikes that I expect to be crazier. I don't see those numbers as absolute and something to beat. They are just checkpoints where I have a look at how I'm doing and if there's something requiring extra attention. Since past few weeks were a no-loss time, I was standing on the scales almost daily to make sure my numbers don't go up in a steady manner. I keep a detailed log of my journey on NF and report my progress every week – the routine I'm intending to keep. But I've also registered at trendweight and log my weight daily there because watching the progress from a slightly different perspective is both amusing and useful. Plus it's mostly effortless anyway. So thanks a ton for all this information again.