Looking for advice and help

kay_bear52

Just finished a drs appointment. Increasing my BP meds. I HAVE to lose weight. I'm up almost 30lbs since 2013. I go to the gym three times a week. Cardio and weights. I'm not great with logging here but i do keep a journal
I can't seem to drop weight, and no my clothes are not getting loose.
I'm out of ideas
Weight watchers hasn't worked
I don't want to take shots like at quick weight loss

Surely there is someone that has been thru the same that can help

I'm 45
Not in menapause or pre-menapause
High blood pressure
Drink 60 oz of water a day
Try to eat 3 meals and two snacks
No meals after 7
No sodas or high sugar drinks
Hardly any alcohol

I shoot for 1200 calories a day.

rosebarnalice

You didn't say anything about how many calories you consume, and how many calories you burn.

Spliner1969

CICO. There's your answer. Add in exercise.. bonus! Be careful with the high blood pressure. Make sure you doctor is ok with the exercise you're doing. You don't have to exercise at all to lose weight, and if your blood pressure is weight controlled (mine is) losing weight will help. Steady state cardio like walking, jogging, might be better for you than weight lifting if you have high blood pressure. Just an assumption, talk to your doctor.

kay_bear52

rosebarnalice wrote: »

You didn't say anything about how many calories you consume, and how many calories you burn.

Sorry about that. I shoot for 1200 a day

jemhh

kay_bear52 wrote: »

rosebarnalice wrote: »

You didn't say anything about how many calories you consume, and how many calories you burn.

Sorry about that. I shoot for 1200 a day

Ah, but shooting for a calorie count and hitting it are two different things.

How tall are you?

Full grown active adults of your age do not generally maintain or gain weight on 1200 calories. You are eating more than that. What kind of food journal do you keep? Do you weight or measure out servings and count calories or are you eyeballing things or not counting calories at all?

trigden1991

kay_bear52 wrote: »

rosebarnalice wrote: »

You didn't say anything about how many calories you consume, and how many calories you burn.

Sorry about that. I shoot for 1200 a day

You shoot for 1200 a day but you aren't consistent, don't weigh your food and consequently you are not in a calorie deficit.

Set MFP correctly and then eat to the calorie goal by weighing everything you eat/drink that has calories.

kgirlhart

Definitely get a food scale and weigh all your food. You don't say how tall you are. 1200 might be appropriate if you are fairly short. I am 48 and lost 60 pounds over the last year. My goal was around 1300 most of that time. I raised my calorie goal as I got closer to my goal weight If you are not losing at 1200 you are either under 5', or you are eating more than you think. A food scale will definitely help.

kay_bear52

thank you.
I am 5'1
I do use a food scale and when I journal I have a planner that I log my meals in.
I have played around with my settings here so many times based on what I read that it gets confusing. One nutritionist I saw told me to do 1400 a day. So I did that for a while but that was just too much I think. So I dropped it back to 1200 since that is what I have felt more comfortable with.
I have been chatting with a friend about Whole30 so I am looking into revamping everything based on that.

afiyaandrews

kgirlhart wrote: »

Definitely get a food scale and weigh all your food. You don't say how tall you are. 1200 might be appropriate if you are fairly short. I am 48 and lost 60 pounds over the last year. My goal was around 1300 most of that time. I raised my calorie goal as I got closer to my goal weight If you are not losing at 1200 you are either under 5', or you are eating more than you think. A food scale will definitely help.

Hey am 4"11 would 1200 be a good calorie intake daily for me to lose weight

courtneyfabulous

Get tighter & consistent with your logging and maybe need to eat MORE than 1200 calories- I know this might sound weird but I know a couple of women personally who shoot for too low calorie intakes and are overweight because they usually eat too little but occasionally eat way too much- so basically flip flop between being in starvation mode and then packing on fat every time they over eat.

I know some people will say "there's no such thing as starvation mode" but I mean I think they're lowering their BMR/metabolism by consistently under eating and then occasionally bingeing or eating high calorie when they go out to eat which immediately gets stored as fat.

Try a higher calorie intake that is appropriate for your weight and activity level- I like to calculate my TDEE and then subtract 300 calories from that and set that as my daily calorie goal. I include exercise in my calculations to get the TDEE number so I don't eat back any exercise calories. OR you can just enter your stats into myfitnesspal and use the number they give you and do eat back exercise calories- but make sure you pick a loss rate of 1/2 pound or 1 pound per week at the most and no more.

If you give me your height and weight and daily activity level not counting exercise plus tell us how long you do weights and cardio for on those 3 days of exercise per week I could calculate your calories for you if you want, but I'm guessing you probably need to be in the 1500/1600 calorie range at least.

Also your macronutrients ratios matter too- how much protein, carbohydrates, and fat you get. Also sugar and fiber is kind of important. You're not going to know your levels on these unless you track everything and track accurately. You need to get enough protein and enough fiber at the very least, it's very important!

It was a total game changer for me when I started tracking calories and eating less than my TDEE but more than my BMR and making sure to get enough protein every day. I worked out regularly and are healthy & clean for 9 months straight without losing ANY WEIGHT. Then as soon as I started tracking I started losing weight immediately and am down over 10 pounds in 3 months, most of which is actual body fat loss not just water weight and very little muscle loss! You really do need to track (not just journal) if you want to see results.

Also I would quit the alcohol 100% until you lose the extra weight. Or at least save it for special occasions only, and even then keep it to only 1 or 2 drinks. Alcohol makes me bloated and if you combine alcohol with excess calories those will go straight to fat storage instead of being burned for energy because of the effects that alcohol has on the way the body metabolizes alcohol and fat.

You're almost there, you just need to make a couple of small changes and you could easily lose the weight. Do yourself the favor of measuring, weighing, and logging all your food. Use a digital food scale for accuracy. You can do this!

yirara

Kay, you are not very tall and your calorie expenditure might not be very high. That means you need to be extra careful with measuring and weighing. To give you two examples:

I'm a bread addict. I love my bread. The bread I usually eat comes in at 104kcal per slice. One slice is 44 grams as per packaging. If I weight those slices I find they are usually around 52 to 59 grams per slice. I eat 6 slices per day. That's in fact 123-139kcal per slice, or on average an extra 162kcal I did not account for.

Cooking oil: one table spoon of cooking oil is often mentioned as holding 15ml. That's approximately 121kcal. But what does 15ml on a spoon look like, and how big is your spoon compared to the 'standard spoon'? I can easily pile 20ml of oil on my spoons. That's an extra 40kcal.

Both things together give you an additional 200kcal per day. And that's just a few things. I do eat much more than this of course, and not tracking would easily give me 300-400kcal more than I wanted to eat simply by not using a scale. This is the reason why weight loss is not happening in your case.

courtneyfabulous

Whole 30 is just clean eating. At most this will help you drop excess sodium weight and improve your health but not necessarily help you lose body fat because that has to do with calorie intake.

Just saw that you at 5'1" so you may indeed need to eat in the 1200/1300 calories range but may just be actually eating more than that due to not tracking in a calorie counter.

And again I must stress the importance of getting enough protein- do you know how many grams you get per day currently?

kgirlhart

afiyaandrews wrote: »

kgirlhart wrote: »

Definitely get a food scale and weigh all your food. You don't say how tall you are. 1200 might be appropriate if you are fairly short. I am 48 and lost 60 pounds over the last year. My goal was around 1300 most of that time. I raised my calorie goal as I got closer to my goal weight If you are not losing at 1200 you are either under 5', or you are eating more than you think. A food scale will definitely help.

Hey am 4"11 would 1200 be a good calorie intake daily for me to lose weight

Probably. It will depend on what your maintenance calories are. You need to eat at a deficit to lose weight. But at 4'11" you will probably need to go down to 1200 as your maintenance will be lower than someone who is a lot taller than you.

Ready2Rock206

kay_bear52 wrote: »

I'm not great with logging here but i do keep a journal
.

If you want to lose the weight you'll probably have to be better at logging. Without tracking you have no idea how many calories you're really eating.

Liftng4Lis

Without logging, you're not going to be sure how much you're really eating. Start there.

evarochelle

I just got back from my Dr. She said 1200 calories is too low. She said bump up to 1500 your body is hanging onto everything with 1200. 5'4" 216 stuck in a rut too

emmam1212

I discovered Keto this week (low carb-high fat). It takes a lot of commitment but I started five days ago and I see differences already in how I look and feel. I'm down 4 lbs (mostly water weight) but I'll take it. I have more energy to work out and I'm not craving the crappy food I did before. I wish I would have found it sooner because I feel an almost renewed sense of motivation from it. Try looking into it. Best of luck!

janejellyroll

evarochelle wrote: »

I just got back from my Dr. She said 1200 calories is too low. She said bump up to 1500 your body is hanging onto everything with 1200. 5'4" 216 stuck in a rut too

That's not how the body works though. You'll lose weight in a calorie deficit -- your body doesn't "hang on" to weight when you eat too little. If you aren't losing weight even if you're logging accurately and allowing sufficient time, it means you aren't in a deficit.

MoveitlikeManda

janejellyroll wrote: »

evarochelle wrote: »

I just got back from my Dr. She said 1200 calories is too low. She said bump up to 1500 your body is hanging onto everything with 1200. 5'4" 216 stuck in a rut too

That's not how the body works though. You'll lose weight in a calorie deficit -- your body doesn't "hang on" to weight when you eat too little. If you aren't losing weight even if you're logging accurately and allowing sufficient time, it means you aren't in a deficit.

also doctors are not always that clued up on this stuff, when I told mine my weight was up a few lbs due to time of the month she said "no its because you have been building muscle when you work out at the gym"
this was said after we just talked about the fact Id rejoined the gym 2 days before.

I must be like a superwoman to build that much muscle in 3 days from rejoining the gym and had been twice for an hour each time hahahaha

kay_bear52

Thank you

JaydedMiss

evarochelle wrote: »

I just got back from my Dr. She said 1200 calories is too low. She said bump up to 1500 your body is hanging onto everything with 1200. 5'4" 216 stuck in a rut too

No. Just no. Thats not how our bodies work get a new doctor. I started at higher weight and im shorter. 1200 a day for past 7 months and im losing fine, Because i actually am in a deficit. My body isnt "hanging on" to anything. And practice your food tracking.

kay_bear52

I would say between 80-90 grams of protein a day. That is what I have my macros set on and work to get at least that. Protein has always been tough for me but I'm getting better at it

courtneyfabulous wrote: »

Whole 30 is just clean eating. At most this will help you drop excess sodium weight and improve your health but not necessarily help you lose body fat because that has to do with calorie intake.

Just saw that you at 5'1" so you may indeed need to eat in the 1200/1300 calories range but may just be actually eating more than that due to not tracking in a calorie counter.

And again I must stress the importance of getting enough protein- do you know how many grams you get per day currently?

courtneyfabulous

kay_bear52 wrote: »

I would say between 80-90 grams of protein a day. That is what I have my macros set on and work to get at least that. Protein has always been tough for me but I'm getting better at it

courtneyfabulous wrote: »

Whole 30 is just clean eating. At most this will help you drop excess sodium weight and improve your health but not necessarily help you lose body fat because that has to do with calorie intake.

Just saw that you at 5'1" so you may indeed need to eat in the 1200/1300 calories range but may just be actually eating more than that due to not tracking in a calorie counter.

And again I must stress the importance of getting enough protein- do you know how many grams you get per day currently?

Sounds good!

cerise_noir

Try to eat 3 meals and two snacks

The amount of meals/snacks does not matter. All that matters is calories.

No meals after 7

This does not matter. You CAN eat after 7 unless eating later disturbs your sleep or causes reflux.

No sodas or high sugar drinks

Sugar-free/diet/zero sodas are okay, and nothing wrong with sugar

Hardly any alcohol

Alcohol is fine as long as you measure it and log it.

I shoot for 1200 calories a day.

You don't use a food scale, though...all your entries are cups/spoons/pieces/medium/small/large. Stop using these for solid foods and get a digital food scale and start weighing everything that isn't a juice/beverage, stock or clear soup. Log more accurately.

Weight loss isn't about eliminating "ALL THE BAD FOODS". Weight loss is about having the proper energy balance. If you eat less than your TDEE (the calories you need to maintain your current weight), you will lose weight no matter the food type. Carbs don't cause weight gain, fat doesn't cause weight gain, sugar doesn't cause weight gain....eating too many calories does.

You listed your amino acids at 0 calories, but calorie count says there are 40 cals per serving. There is no way this is 0 calorie.

How heavy is the 'large' apple? What is large to you may not be large to someone else....weigh your apple after coring.

Not all large eggs are the same weight or nutrition.

You need to be more consistent in logging and not under eat. Eat up to the 1200 calorie mark and NOT below 1200. Add exercise calories and eat back half.

Weigh butter, mayo and peanut butter.

Stop using generic entries for your recipes. You do not know what or how much of certain ingredients the original creator of the entry added. Create your own recipe entries with the recipe builder and weigh ALL your ingredients.

Weigh bacon and log it as cooked.

Your diary does NOT indicate that you weigh. There are gram entries for the foods that you eat. Choose the brand of the food and pick one with grams available as the entry. A large apple is not weighed. Put 'usda' in the food search field when searching for a specific food.

Weigh rice/spaghetti/pasta raw as that is what the package nutrition relates to.

evarochelle wrote: »

I just got back from my Dr. She said 1200 calories is too low. She said bump up to 1500 your body is hanging onto everything with 1200. 5'4" 216 stuck in a rut too

Not true. Not one bit. The body does not 'hang on to everything'. If this was the case, no one would die from starvation. Think about it.
You need to weigh all your food, too.