Starvation Mode

cutmd

I am on the fence about starvation mode. There has to be something that is happening when someone is spending weeks exercising at high intensity, only eating 1200 calories a day or less, and still not losing. Yet, when calories are added, they do lose weight. Sometimes it really seems that weight loss is more than just simple math. Starvation mode is probably not the term for it, but it's something.

Of course, over time it makes sense that on can kill his or her metabolism by eating low amounts for years as another poster did, and the only real cure for that is going back to eating normal amounts and doing weight training until your body trusts you again. It's the in between stuff I'm unclear on.

Yes, it is called Metabolic Resistance.

If after 6-8 weeks of eating and exercising with a calorie deficit and you have not lost pounds or inches, that person should be evaluated by their physician for thyroid, PCOS, Pituitary, Adrenal issues (just to name a few Endocrine issues).............

So in your mind, plateaus should never exist unless the person is miscounting their calories/exercise or have an endocrine disorder? That's an interesting thought, and it makes sense. I think I personally may have underestimated my calories when I was plateauing before. I even wonder if people that supposedly only eat 700 calories a day or don't eat their exercise calories are in fact eating closer to 1200 when miscalculations are accounted for. Of course, I need to check my thyroid anyway cause I'm freezing cold and have other thyroid symptoms :frown:

adunkin22

this is all so helpful.
thanks everyone!

July24Lioness

I am on the fence about starvation mode. There has to be something that is happening when someone is spending weeks exercising at high intensity, only eating 1200 calories a day or less, and still not losing. Yet, when calories are added, they do lose weight. Sometimes it really seems that weight loss is more than just simple math. Starvation mode is probably not the term for it, but it's something.

Of course, over time it makes sense that on can kill his or her metabolism by eating low amounts for years as another poster did, and the only real cure for that is going back to eating normal amounts and doing weight training until your body trusts you again. It's the in between stuff I'm unclear on.

Yes, it is called Metabolic Resistance.

If after 6-8 weeks of eating and exercising with a calorie deficit and you have not lost pounds or inches, that person should be evaluated by their physician for thyroid, PCOS, Pituitary, Adrenal issues (just to name a few Endocrine issues).............

So in your mind, plateaus should never exist unless the person is miscounting their calories/exercise or have an endocrine disorder? That's an interesting thought, and it makes sense. I think I personally may have underestimated my calories when I was plateauing before. I even wonder if people that supposedly only eat 700 calories a day or don't eat their exercise calories are in fact eating closer to 1200 when miscalculations are accounted for. Of course, I need to check my thyroid anyway cause I'm freezing cold and have other thyroid symptoms :frown:

Yes, this is my thought process............

In my mind, starvation mode kicks in when there is no longer sufficient body fat for the body to properly function. Like for people with Anorexia..........

I truly believe that people are very guilty of underestimating calories. Vegetables and fruits are larger and contain more grams of "carbs or sugars" than in previous generations, so that does affect caloric and carb counts..........

I am also of the thoughts that it is not the number of calories that you consume (such as the calories in / calories out theory), but it is rather the type of calories you consume..........

I had tested this theory on myself and then read Good Calories / Bad Calories by Gary Taubes and this book seemed to validate my theory also.........

To test my theory, I ate a doctor prescribed 1,000 calorie, low fat diet and exercised. I gained weight.. did this for 3 months and gained about 20 pounds............

Switched over to all natural, higher calorie, higher fat, low carb diet (this is when I started Atkins) and lost about 28 pounds in 1 month alone. After the 3 months, I was 42 pounds down............I exercised also.............

SHBoss1673

People, this article is very old, we've already talked it to death. Read this article very CAREFULLY, you'll see that it's very wrong on a lot of things.

Duganhorse

Amen!
Why can't we all just help each other be healthy. This posted as an informational link that someone thought might be helpful information. Im sure it was not meant to start a fight.

Can i just suggest that it is not starvation mode people should be worrying about. Your body needs nutrition for physical and psychological well being and function. So whether or not you believe in "starvatio" mode, it is essential that your body is fed at least 1200 calories for psycholigical and physiological functioning.

It is dangerous to your body and mind to restrict...it is NOT all about starvation mode

Therefore, people posting that they can eat only 700 calories are certainly putting areas of their health into jeapody! Yes, I'm sure you're losing weight, but it is difficult for the body to use up fat stores for psychological and body functioing! I know there will always be people who are at extremes of this programme but what I don't agree upon is them throwing their beliefs and opinions around as if it is completely normal and acceptable to be only giving the body 700 calories a day! No healthy person lives on 700 cals a day and this is certainly not the case if you are putting your body through an intensive exercise regime.

Now, that is MY opinion only :flowerforyou:

abricklin

bump to read after my workout today

Ms_Natalie

Amen!
Why can't we all just help each other be healthy. This posted as an informational link that someone thought might be helpful information. Im sure it was not meant to start a fight.

Can i just suggest that it is not starvation mode people should be worrying about. Your body needs nutrition for physical and psychological well being and function. So whether or not you believe in "starvatio" mode, it is essential that your body is fed at least 1200 calories for psycholigical and physiological functioning.

It is dangerous to your body and mind to restrict...it is NOT all about starvation mode

Therefore, people posting that they can eat only 700 calories are certainly putting areas of their health into jeapody! Yes, I'm sure you're losing weight, but it is difficult for the body to use up fat stores for psychological and body functioing! I know there will always be people who are at extremes of this programme but what I don't agree upon is them throwing their beliefs and opinions around as if it is completely normal and acceptable to be only giving the body 700 calories a day! No healthy person lives on 700 cals a day and this is certainly not the case if you are putting your body through an intensive exercise regime.

Now, that is MY opinion only :flowerforyou:

Lol, I wrote both of the above posts and certainly wasn't starting an argument with myself! :laugh:

nickkehagias

The amount of people who will come in to argue legitimate scientific arguments for six paragraphs, and then say that it doesn't matter what we say, it's just their opinion, honestly blows my mind.

I understand that it sucks to hear, but really? It's just not something I understand, there ARE people out there who have spent a lot of time and have gotten through hard fitness/diet issues. I just think experience should come into some sort of clout and that people who are trying to help others out are not evil people bashing others for their food choices. People should stop taking offense to it.

July24Lioness

The amount of people who will come in to argue legitimate scientific arguments for six paragraphs, and then say that it doesn't matter what we say, it's just their opinion, honestly blows my mind.

I understand that it sucks to hear, but really? It's just not something I understand, there ARE people out there who have spent a lot of time and have gotten through hard fitness/diet issues. I just think experience should come into some sort of clout and that people who are trying to help others out are not evil people bashing others for their food choices. People should stop taking offense to it.

You are very right.

The one thing I don't understand is why the comment was even made that someone was arguing. I don't see any post in this thread that is argumentative at all.

Everyone stated their opinion and we were engaging in a healthy debate.

I see this on every forum I belong to, where people say others are arguing and no one is arguing. There is no voice inflection or emotion, so things are very easily taken way out of context.................People are too sensitive!!!

cutmd

Yeah I felt that we were having a healthy debate that lets us think through our own issues. Lioness, I am astounded by the amount of weight gain you say you gained on a low calorie diet. You must have some food intolerance cause that makes no physiologic sense to me. Also, what's your explanation for people who get off long plateaus and start losing once they increase their cals?

imagymrat

True Starvation mode, from what I have gleaned from the medical profession, kicks in when somebody has less than 5% of fat on their body.

For guys anyway. For us gals, it's more like 10-12 %. Does that make us the lucky ones or them? :laugh:

I'm at 10.9% and i'm not in starvation mode...you have to take into account the type of athlete as well, many bodybuilders go under 6 %, they don't maintain it throught the entire year, but they also don't go into any type of starvation mode.

MacMadame

I agree that just having a low body fat percentage doesn't mean you are in starvation mode. However, true starvation mode, where your body shuts down and starts cannibalizing your organs, doesn''t happen until your body fat falls below essential levels, which are 5-6% for guys and 10-12% for women. And even then, you are going to lose weight. That's how people DIE from starvation!

But, as you point out, if you are a body builder and have body fat % below essentially levels, you won't necessarily go into starvation mode either. But you really have to know what you are doing and monitor yourself pretty carefully. For me, it's too dangerous, plus I don't like how my body looks when I get below 16-17% body fat.

Plateaus happen for a number of reasons:
(1) under-estimating what you are eating and over-estimating what you expend in calorie burn so that you are not operating at a deficit
(2) doing things that lower your metabolism over things that raise it (too many carbs if you are insulin resistant, not eating often enough, not exercising, etc.) so that, again, you aren't operating at a calorie deficit even though you should be on paper
(3) water retention is hiding the actual fat loss - you see this when you lose inches but the scale doesn't move
(4) You are not eating enough to fuel your daily activities so you are doing things to counter-balance that -- not working out as hard, not working out as much (or at all), taking naps, talking slower, taking the car or elevator instead of walking, etc. You think your energy output hasn't changed, but it has -- you are taking in as much as you used to but you aren't expending as much as you used to so you aren't operating at a calorie deficit
(5) You are building muscle so the scale isn't moving even though you are also losing fat

IMO (1) is the #1 reason people go into plateaus. To combat this, I think you need to log your food and weight and/or measure it so you know what your portion size really. You need to exercise. You need to use a HRM to know what your actual calorie burn is during exercise. You need to know what your BRM *really* is, not what some online formula guesses it is. If you can't afford some of this, you need to be very conservative in your estimates of calories burned and BRM.

If you are suffering from (2) or (3), then having a high calorie day can change-up your system enough to kick-start your metabolism a a bit and/or cause the water retention to stop. This will cause a loss on the scale. BUT, if you don't go back to a lower calorie intake soon after, you will only continue to lose weight if you are still operating at a calorie deficit at this higher calorie intake and you won't lose as fast as if you ate less. Also, if the issue is water retention (3), then at some point you are going to lose the water weight no matter what you do. So eating the high calorie meal and then losing the next day could be a coincidence.

(4) is something that happens to some people when they are pushing themselves too hard. Note that "too hard" is different for everyone and every situation. I was training for a Sprint triathlon on 700 calories a day back when I was still 50 lb. overweight and still not able to eat much as a result of my surgery (yes, I was under a doctor's supervision and taking supplements). I had plenty of energy.

But, the less you have to lose, the less energy stores you have to pull from, plus not everyone is getting all the vitamins and minerals they need from food / supplements which can cause fatigue. Having an extra 100-200 calories a day, preferably of protein, can give a lot of people enough of an energy boost to get over that hump. But again, it's a very individual thing where that breaking point is for you and some people get so much energy from losing weight that they don't experience this at all.

(5) happens but is rare. First of all, it takes energy to build body tissues, either fat or muscle. If you are truly operating at a calorie deficit, you will not be able to store extra fat or to build up muscle. This happens more when you are operating at a calorie balance or surplus. Your body uses the energy you give it to build muscles and you gain weight or, if you are at balance, it will burn some fat to get the muscles. But, if you are truly operating at a calorie deficit, it's going to burn fat to supply your energy needs and there won't be enough left over to build muscles. Exercise, while losing weight, is more about not losing too much muscle, not about building up more. (Though sometimes it seems like you're building them as the fat falls away and the muscles you already have start to show.)

I agree that people lose sight of the fact that everything isn't about the number on the scale. Just because I believe (based on the research I have done) that starvation mode (as in "if you don't eat enough, your body will "hang on" to everything you give it and you won't lose weight") is a myth, doesn't mean I think everyone should be eating 600 calories a day. Then again I don't think all you have to do is never go below 1200 calories and everything will always be hunky dory! There are plenty of people who are eating 1500 calories a day who are suffering from vitamin deficiencies because the *quality* of what they eat is so poor.

These guidelines are just that -- guidelines -- they will vary on an individual basis and you have to tinker with them based on your individual situation.

RebelRenny

Interesting conversation and some very interesting opinions. I'll come back to it later

Rebel

cutmd

Great post, MacMadame, thank you! It should be an article

July24Lioness

Yeah I felt that we were having a healthy debate that lets us think through our own issues. Lioness, I am astounded by the amount of weight gain you say you gained on a low calorie diet. You must have some food intolerance cause that makes no physiologic sense to me. Also, what's your explanation for people who get off long plateaus and start losing once they increase their cals?

I have grain intolerances, thyroid disorder, adrenal gland fatigue and just found out that I have a pituitary tumor. So, I have some major Endocrine issues.

Also, most people that are either insulin resistant or Diabetic, or women that have PCOS are going to gain weight on a low calorie diet due to being extra sensitive to most carbs.............

I agree with a lot of what MacMadame is saying in the long post.

LotusF1ower

I agree with a lot of what MacMadame is saying in the long post.

Me too, great post from MacMadame!