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MyFitnessPal Community

Weight Fluctuations (How does one know it's actual weight loss?)

Labouffecestbon

I posted something similar in the EM2WL group, but I figured it wouldn't hurt to get more opinions.

Pretty much I'm feeling frustrated and discouraged. Right now, my mind is playing tricks and I've been tempted to cut further (but I haven't done that). The scale numbers are killing me. Deep down I know they don't tell the whole story but with 30 lbs left to lose, I'd think it would move...faster? Ugh.

I weighed daily during this time to check out weight fluctuations.

I need third party input here.
Do these numbers mean anything?
Am I on the right track? Should I adjust anything? Too early to tell?

So far...

From 3/29 to 4/24
Average caloric intake: 1795
Average TDEE (Fitbit): 2193
Starting weight (on 3/31): 158
Highest weight recorded: 159.8 (on 4/6 and 4/7)
Lowest weight recorded: 156.4 (on 4/17)

I'm not sure that lowest # equals an actual loss due to weight fluctuations. I'm dancing around 158 most days.

When do you know it's an actual loss?

Replies

Psychgrrl

Weight loss isn't a linear process. But over time, the trend will be downward. It may spike up, but it will head down.

What's your BMR? My observation from what you've posted is there's not a huge difference between your TDEE and your calories consumed. About 300. A calorie deficit of 300/day is between .5 and 1 pound per week loss. And your gender, height and age make a difference, too.

Of course, this depends on your logging accurately. Weighing solids and measuring liquids.

unknown

This content has been removed.

Liftng4Lis

When it hits the lowest

snowflakesav

It is all weight loss. Fat loss? That is more difficult. I think it is common to see the scale fluctuate several pounds through the day. And progress isn't linear for most people. it seems that it takes me about 12 or 15 days and the. I suddenly drop 2 pounds.

Labouffecestbon

Psychgrrl wrote: »

Weight loss isn't a linear process. But over time, the trend will be downward. It may spike up, but it will head down.

What's your BMR? My observation from what you've posted is there's not a huge difference between your TDEE and your calories consumed. About 300. A calorie deficit of 300/day is between .5 and 1 pound per week loss. And your gender, height and age make a difference, too.

Of course, this depends on your logging accurately. Weighing solids and measuring liquids.

I think my BMR is around 1315. Not sure. I think it's higher according to Fitbit.

Yes, there isn't a huge difference. Going for about 15% cut. No more than 20%.

Female
~5'3
31

I do log accurately and use a scale.

Labouffecestbon

Liftng4Lis wrote: »

When it hits the lowest

Hahaha that's what I secretly wish!

Labouffecestbon

snowflakesav wrote: »

It is all weight loss. Fat loss? That is more difficult. I think it is common to see the scale fluctuate several pounds through the day. And progress isn't linear for most people. it seems that it takes me about 12 or 15 days and the. I suddenly drop 2 pounds.

I do know that it fluctuates several pounds during the day. I can "put on" 2 pounds from morning to evening. But the numbers above are from weighing daily, in the morning, after using the toilet (not always pooping!) and before eating anything.

MysticRealm

You could use an app that will give you your trending weightloss. I have an app on my phone called Happy Scale. I enter my weigh ins everyday and it gives me an average based on how things are trending, and shows me a graph so I can see that it's going down.
This way the fluctuations even out and I can tell if the trending number is going down, staying the same, or going up. I can also see the line on the graph going down, staying the same or going up.

Labouffecestbon

1592984904984984089984980 wrote: »

Your height would help. But if you're maintaining at 158 with exercise and cutting calories it could just be that you're putting on some muscle. Also try cutting your daily calories by 100 which is equal to 700 calories a week and should net you about a pound loss or more in a month.

I can't put on muscle on a deficit.

higgins8283801

Psychgrrl wrote: »

Weight loss isn't a linear process. But over time, the trend will be downward. It may spike up, but it will head down.

What's your BMR? My observation from what you've posted is there's not a huge difference between your TDEE and your calories consumed. About 300. A calorie deficit of 300/day is between .5 and 1 pound per week loss. And your gender, height and age make a difference, too.

Of course, this depends on your logging accurately. Weighing solids and measuring liquids.

Yes like this. I spiked up, and if I were to break it down by month, you'd see them more, but I spiked a lot but the general trend was still downward.

Labouffecestbon

MysticRealm wrote: »

You could use an app that will give you your trending weightloss. I have an app on my phone called Happy Scale. I enter my weigh ins everyday and it gives me an average based on how things are trending, and shows me a graph so I can see that it's going down.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Wouldn't MFP graph be enough?

higgins8283801

Labouffecestbon wrote: »

MysticRealm wrote: »

You could use an app that will give you your trending weightloss. I have an app on my phone called Happy Scale. I enter my weigh ins everyday and it gives me an average based on how things are trending, and shows me a graph so I can see that it's going down.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Wouldn't MFP graph be enough?

That's what I use.

MysticRealm

Labouffecestbon wrote: »

MysticRealm wrote: »

You could use an app that will give you your trending weightloss. I have an app on my phone called Happy Scale. I enter my weigh ins everyday and it gives me an average based on how things are trending, and shows me a graph so I can see that it's going down.

Thanks for the suggestion.

Wouldn't MFP graph be enough?

I only enter my weigh ins on MFP once a week as friday's are my 'official weigh in days' that is the number that I use as my 'current weight' until the next friday.
So I use the Happy Scale app, mostly just for fun. It also uses the trending weight so you get an actual number read out for that which I don't believe mfp does.

Labouffecestbon

Yes @higgins8283801, that's the reason I've been weighing daily. Just to see the trend. And well, I'm not sure what to think of it. It really is up and down. I've only been doing it for a few weeks though. Perhaps I should give it more time?

rachylouise87

as you can see mine is far from linear. after figuring out my tdee for a month (fitbit) now looking to get back on it

Labouffecestbon

rachylouise87 wrote: »

as you can see mine is far from linear. after figuring out my tdee for a month (fitbit) now looking to get back on it

Thanks for sharing!
I suppose I should give it more time. Good luck with getting back on it!

MysticRealm

Here's what the Happy Scale graph looks like (there was a week where I did not have a scale to weigh on so that's why there are no dots in the middle)

Labouffecestbon

MysticRealm wrote: »

Here's what the Happy Scale graph looks like (there was a week where I did not have a scale to weigh on so that's why there are no dots in the middle)

Ooooh I like that. It shows the fluctuations, yet put a line through for the trend! I'll give it a shot!

Zedeff

You can overcome fluctuations by ONLY logging your lows. If the lowest point last week is higher than the lowest point this week, then it's pretty likely that you've lost weight. You can't expect every weigh-in to be the lowest ever, but when it IS the lowest ever, you can usually be confident that your weight has decreased. This is even more reliable than logging weekly or bi-weekly or on any time interval, as those can still be challenged by fluctuations.

Amerielle

I like Trendweight. It gives a nice picture like the Happyscale app.

Cortneyrenee04

It hasn't been long at all, not even a whole month. You must be patient

Are you super active? I'm 5'3" as well and eat about 1400 calories a day. I'm fairly active, and some times eat more, but 1795 would be too much for me.

kailyw05

Zedeff wrote: »

You can overcome fluctuations by ONLY logging your lows. If the lowest point last week is higher than the lowest point this week, then it's pretty likely that you've lost weight. You can't expect every weigh-in to be the lowest ever, but when it IS the lowest ever, you can usually be confident that your weight has decreased. This is even more reliable than logging weekly or bi-weekly or on any time interval, as those can still be challenged by fluctuations.

This is what I do. If I see a number lower than my last entry I log it. If it's up again the next day I don't log it, I just wait to see another number lower. Works for me!

kommodevaran

Fat loss and gain is a slow process. Large sudden variations are most probably water weight. Ignore it. Look at the trend. I weigh every day and use Trendweight.

MKEgal

number wrote:

if you're maintaining at 158 with exercise and cutting calories it could just be that you're putting on some muscle.

1 - It's hard for women to build muscle.
2 - It's nearly impossible for anyone to build muscle while eating at a calorie deficit.
I'm thrilled that this calculator says that
I've gained 4 lb of lean body mass while losing over 80 lb of fat. I think it's measurement error, and
have probably only maintained LBM, but I'm perfectly happy with that. At least I haven't lost any
appreciable amount.

.

number wrote:

Also try cutting your daily calories by 100 which is equal to 700 calories a week
and should net you about a pound loss or more in a month.

700 cal/week x 4 weeks/month = 2800 cal/month
1 lb is about 3500 calories

At 5'3", 31yo, & currently 156 lb, this calculator from the Baylor College of Medicine shows that to
maintain your weight you should eat 1407 cal/day if you're inactive. So cut 250 cal/day from that
(1150) to lose 0.5 lb/week. You're short enough that it's probably not going to hurt you to be that
low. That calculator also tells how many servings of the food groups you should eat.

I generally go with the "inactive" setting because it is the most conservative on calories. I probably use
more than that, but I also probably eat more than I log because I don't use a scale & rarely actually
measure volume. The errors cancel out.

And with only 30 lb to lose, it's going to be slow. (That's where I'm stuck right now. Frustrating.)
If you're aiming for a healthy BMI, being 135 would put you at 24.0 & you'd need 1312 cal/day to
maintain if you are inactive.
https://www.bcm.edu/cnrc-apps/healthyeatingcalculator/eatingCal.html

MKEgal

But yeah, like others have said - look at the long-term trend.
Not days, probably not even a few weeks, but a couple months.
I write my weight on the calendar every morning, log it here if it's gone down. Makes it easy to look back.

TiffanyR71

kailyw05 wrote: »

Zedeff wrote: »

You can overcome fluctuations by ONLY logging your lows. If the lowest point last week is higher than the lowest point this week, then it's pretty likely that you've lost weight. You can't expect every weigh-in to be the lowest ever, but when it IS the lowest ever, you can usually be confident that your weight has decreased. This is even more reliable than logging weekly or bi-weekly or on any time interval, as those can still be challenged by fluctuations.

This is what I do. If I see a number lower than my last entry I log it. If it's up again the next day I don't log it, I just wait to see another number lower. Works for me!

Me, too. I write down my weight every day in a separate calendar (to observe trends, etc.), but only log new lows in MFP.

minties82

Personally I don't know how you guys could just relax for so long with such a static weight? It sounds like the OP is maintaining.

KrunchyMama

I use Libra (same idea as Happy Scale). I log my weight every day, and even though I thought I was maintaining (bouncing between 177-179), I was actually going down, but only at an overall rate of 0.2 lbs per week.

Mr_Knight

It looks like you've gone nowhere for a month. Looking through your diary, I'm not really what is being weighted, what is by volume, what is guesstimated. Eg, there was an entry for 0.02xxx servings of bread. What did you mean by that?

I've never had a stall longer than ~10 days that didn't turn out to highlight a mistake in my logging. At a month, you're outside the typical "it's not linear" envelope, and it really does sound like you're eating at maintenance (ie, more than you think). If it were me, I'd be taking an extremely close look at my logging practises.

Good luck! :drinker:

Labouffecestbon

Cortneyrenee04 wrote: »

It hasn't been long at all, not even a whole month. You must be patient

Are you super active? I'm 5'3" as well and eat about 1400 calories a day. I'm fairly active, and some times eat more, but 1795 would be too much for me.

Trying to be patient, thanks

I'm quite active. I'm a SAHM of two and spend most of my days on my feet. On top of it, I do cardio 2-3 times a week (~30 min sessions) and lift 2x/week.

How close are you to your goal?