Weight Loss

Sarahcspr

At 66 I have started to try and loose a few pounds. My calorie intake is 1200 and I walk about 45 mins. a day. I have been doing this now for two weeks and the scale has not moved. Any suggestion would help.

svelte2013

What types of food are you eating?

capaul42

Better question: are you weighing all solid food on a food scale?

janejellyroll

How are you measuring your food? Are you using a food scale? Or are you using measuring cups? Are you entering your own recipes into the recipe builder? Or are you choosing generic/"homemade" entries from the database?

godlikepoetyes

Why are you eating 1,200 calories? Did MFP give you 1,200, or have you determined this on your own? The questions janejellyroll asked are spot on--you must log properly and you must log every, single day, every single bite. And you must be patient. It's only been two weeks. It can take up to six weeks to see results.

Need2Exerc1se

2 weeks? Give it time. It's very common not to see any loss in the first couple of weeks, especially if the exercise is new.

CajunCher2005

Sarahcspr wrote: »

At 66 I have started to try and loose a few pounds. My calorie intake is 1200 and I walk about 45 mins. a day. I have been doing this now for two weeks and the scale has not moved. Any suggestion would help.

Two weeks isn't nearly enough time. It takes some people 4 weeks or longer before the pounds start dropping. Took me eight weeks.

Sarahcspr

Too answer a few questions, I am weighing food on a scale or measuring in a cup. I try to log everyday and do good unless I don't have access to the internet. Yes, MFP gave me the 1200 calories per day. Thanks for the input, I will not get to frustrated over the next several weeks.

diannethegeek

We've covered some of these, but here are my really generic tips:

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.