Losing Weight

briannadalej

I've been a relatively healthy person since I began eating healthy and exercising when I was about 14. After my mom died about two years ago, I gained quite a bit of weight and have been struggling to lose it since.

I've lost about 25 pounds in the past (almost) year and still have about another 20 to go, but I feel like I'm not making any more progress and think it's because I'm not eating enough calories.

I'm about 5'5" and weight 160 pounds. I'm fairly active (exercise 6 times a week for 45 min to an hour, incorporating cardio and weightlifting). I currently have my target calories set at 1100 calories (I burn about 1300 cals resting).

Any fitness buffs out there want to weigh in on why I'm plateauing? Everything I've read so far says I should be eating more calories (around 1400) but am nervous to up that because I don't want to gain any more weight.

Thanks in advance!

diannethegeek

Opening your diary might help to get you more specific advice, if you're comfortable doing so.

These are my general tips. Maybe something will help you out.

1. If it's been less than 3 weeks or so, don't sweat it! Normal fluctuations happen and unfortunately sometimes we stall for a week or two even when we're doing everything right. Give your body some time to catch up with the changes you're making.

2. If you aren't already, be sure that you're logging everything. Sometimes people forget about things like veggies, drinks, cooking oils, and condiments. For some people these can add up to enough to halt your weight loss progress.

3. Consider buying a food scale if you don't already have one. They're about $10-$20 dollars in the US and easily found at places like Amazon, Target, and Walmart. Measuring cups and spoons are great, but they do come with some degree of inaccuracy. A food scale will be more accurate, and for some people it makes a big difference.

4. Logging accurately also means choosing accurate entries in the database. There are a lot of user-entered entries that are off. Double-check that you're using good entries and/or using the recipe builder instead of someone else's homemade entries.

5. Recalculate your goals if you haven't lately. As you lose weight your body requires fewer calories to run. Be sure you update your goals every ten pounds or so.

6. If you're eating back your exercise calories and you're relying on gym machine readouts or MFP's estimates, it might be best to eat back just 50-75% of those. Certain activities tend to be overestimated. If you're using an HRM or activity tracker, it might be a good idea to look into their accuracy and be sure that yours is calibrated properly.

7. If you're taking any cheat days that go over your calorie limits, it might be best to cut them out for a few weeks and see what happens. Some people go way over their calorie needs without realizing it when they don't track.

8. If you weigh yourself frequently, consider using a program like trendweight to even out the fluctuations. You could be losing weight but just don't see it because of the daily ups and downs.

9. Some people just burn fewer calories than the calculators predict. If you continue to have problems after 4-6 weeks, then it might be worth a trip to the doctor or a registered dietitian who can give you more specific advice.

juggernaut1974

No one ever stopped losing weight from not eating enough calories.

My first guess would be that you're not accurately calculating your true caloric intake. That's not a criticism, per se. People as a general rule tend to vastly underestimate portion sizes and caloric values.

Are you currently weighing and logging everything you're eating and drinking?

queenliz99

How accurate is your logging? Do you use a food scale? How do you calculate your calorie burns?

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10155495/just-another-plateau-and-weigh-in-thread

vivmom2014

Why would you only want to eat 1100 calories a day to lose only 20 pounds?

lavaughan69

Are you eating back your exercise calories? Perhaps there's a combination of not properly weighing food and logging correctly and overestimating your exercise burn? When you say plateau how long has it been since you lost any weight at all? The closer you get to a normal BMI the slower you lose weight.