Been on this site for year. Frustrated.

maillemaker

As for set point, I've not found any scientific evidence to truly support the theory.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3673773/

brianpperkins

maillemaker wrote: »

As for set point, I've not found any scientific evidence to truly support the theory.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3673773/

Not quite ... nice try though.

PAV8888

maillemaker wrote: »

I This is because after about 3 months, I end up getting ravenous and eating everything in sight and I stop logging my calories. It's like my body is fighting back. I understand that losing weight too quickly can cause you to regain. The general advice is to lose weight slowly, if you want to keep it off. It's hard for me to lose weight slowly when I lose weight faster than I am supposed to based on myfitnesspal's estimated calories. I know that the common sense thing to do would be to raise my calories, but I guess I am afraid I will raise it too much and not lose any weight or lose weight TOO slowly. ANYWAY, I want to do this RIGHT this time!!! I am also thinking about using set point theory, which is the theory that our bodies have a set weight that it likes to be at, and when you lose more than 10% of your body weight, your body increases your appetite so you will regain the weight you lost and get back to your point. Anyway, I would like to lower my set point, by losing 10% at a time, and then going on maintenance for awhile, and then losing another 10% and so on... The problem is that the literature on set point says it takes about 6 months of maintenance to reset your set point. Ouch! That would take forever... I'm wondering if 2-3 months on maintenance would do the trick? Has anyone else had these problems? Anyone else tried the set point method or switched between weight loss/maintenance to increase their success?

You are correct! Your body is fighting back! It's called "Adaptive Thermogenesis".

Our bodies monitor Leptin levels. Leptin is made by your body fat. As body fat declines, so do Leptin levels. This triggers a response in our bodies to try and preserve the falling fat stores. It does this by increasing hunger feelings, and by increasing skeletal muscle efficiency about 20% which results in an overall metabolic reduction of about 10%-15%.

Unfortunately, the effect is long-term. It's been extrapolated out for years. The only thing that has been shown to reset these hormonal-neural responsivities is surgery.

This is why most people, like yourself, fail at dieting long-term. They just can't tolerate the body's defense mechanisms and eventually give in.

There is evidence to suggest that exercise, particularly vigorous resistance training, might counter the metabolic reduction. But I think the hunger is always going to be there. You body wants those Leptin levels to go back to where they were.

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3673773/

Muscle efficiency gains are because of extensive exercise not because of leptin levels.

There is other research that points to the effects being smaller, shorter lived, and longer lived.

Full consensus there is not.

However, there is a good enough indication of the possible existence of these effects that reverse dieting at the end of a long period of caloric restriction is probably a good idea, and the existence of adaptive thermogenesis would be one of the arguments against larger deficits and faster weight loss.

There is also enough of an indication to (in my mind) make it a bad idea for people with a normal fat %s to restrict calories for no good reason, especially if they could achieve their goals through increased exercise instead.

Then again adaptive thermogenesis seems to be a controversial enough topic where consensus seems to be hard to reach.

In my mind, a 15% penalty while substantial, is a no brainer for someone approaching Obese 3 levels!

The possibility of a 15% reduction to your base metabolism to go from a bmi of 20 to a bmi of 18.5.... not so much of a no-brainer.

maillemaker

Not quite ... nice try though.

Perhaps you could elaborate on which part you disagree with?

Muscle efficiency gains are because of extensive exercise not because of leptin levels.

That's not what the study says. Muscle efficiency gains are because of reduced Leptin levels (probably among other things) that are a result of reduced body fat levels. The body tries to conserve body fat stores and one way it does this is by increasing skeletal muscle efficiency by roughly 20%, which results in an overall metabolic reduction of 10%-15%.