How long before I lose weight or make an adjustment

melicious276

Hi all! I'm sure everyone hates these kinds of posts but here goes.

I've been at this "healthy eating" and "exercise" thing for about 2 weeks and have yet to drop a pound. I track everything religiously, use my food scale or measuring cups whenever possible, wear a heart rate monitor and a FitBit at the gym (and the FitBit in life too). I've gone to the gym all but (I believe) 2 days in these two weeks. I eat back my exercise calories (earned in the gym [spinning, yoga and zumba] or via FitBit) and I was definitely much better week one, but this week I'm averaging a net of 1,304 when goal is 1,200. I had seriously disgusting eating habits before (eat a large pizza in one sitting? No problem. Mozzarella sticks for dinner with a side of cheese fries? Sure!), so this is a big difference even if I'm a little over.

I feel like I'm doing things pretty right. I could probably eat more whole foods, but my macros are right on the money and I'm close on the calorie front.

Weight loss has always come easy to me when I committed so this is new for me (is this because I'm about to turn 30? Ugh! Getting old sucks). How long should I stay the course before making adjustments to what I'm doing?

Potentially relevant: I stopped taking my BCP around the time I committed and I also quit caffeine cold turkey (after seriously drinking 5-10 cups a day of coffee and diet soda). Majorly upped the water consumption, after only drinking like 1-2 cups a day.

Thanks so much for your insight! I *am* going to the doctor today for a physical so I'll definitely run it by her, but would like to hear from you as well.

shadow2soul

4-6 weeks

Coming off BCP = possible hormone fluctuations... Need to give that a bit to settle down/can cause water retention
New exercise routine or increasd intensity = water retention

My guess is that you are experiencing water retention that is masking your loss. Give it a couple more weeks.

healthygreek

Also make sure you're not eating back too many exercise calories! Only eat back half of your exercise calories because the counts on the equipment, mfp etc., are not accurate!

queenliz99

Op, I peeked at your food diary it's not very accurate. Read and watch below

http://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1234699/logging-accurately-step-by-step-guide/p1





https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVjWPclrWVY

vespiquenn

Mirroring what the others said above, I would also try to measure yourself. You may be losing inches without losing on the scale. You don't want to drop your calories if you really don't have to, so that might help figure out if the stall is due to CICO, or just your body being sneaky.

LKArgh

Do not eat back all your exercise calories, aim for half of them and reevaluate after two weeks. Also looking at your diary, even with eating back all your exercise calories, you have many days where you are eating way over your target. It is very probable it all evens out to being maintenance on average.