Working out hard and still no weight loss.

freespirit427

I started Aug 2016 at 223 lbs. I am a 5’3, 24 year old female who is CW 167 and GW 150.

I hit a long plateau for about 6 months where I sat around 180. I tightened up logging and weighed my portions and went down to 170 about 3 months ago.

I started doing 30-45 minutes of cardio on treadmill where I sweat and HIIT run/brisk walk.

I get my 10k plus steps per day. Drink my water. Eat all my calories plus half of my exercise calories.

Still hanging out at 167.

1400 calories daily.

Am I eating too much ? Too little?

For example my meals go:
Breakfast English muffin with peanut butter and coffee with 1 tablespoon creamer.
Lunch is 5 oz fresh baked tuna, peas or broccoli, skinny pop as a treat
Dinner ( I work evenings ) protein shake or bar, piece of fruit, Chobani yogurt.

And a protein shake with unsweetened almond milk after my workout.

Thoughts?

quiksylver296

Get a food scale. Weigh and log everything. No skipping, cheating, or forgetting.

malibu927

How are you measuring your calorie intake?

collectingblues

Are you weighing your peanut butter and all of your smoothie ingredients? Those ad up fast.

freespirit427

Yes I weigh, measure and log everything

rsclause

If you are not losing you must be getting calories from somewhere. If you are logging everything it is possible that you are underestimating the total. I can always find totals in the database that are too low. I always go for the high estimate to plug into my stats when I was logging.

L1zardQueen

Weigh everything solid, like your peanut butter.

CMNVA

What is your computation for exercise calories?

When you say you eat half of them back, is that in addition to the 1400 calories?

freespirit427

So I am set at 1200 and eat my exercise half way back and estimate 200.

RoxieDawn

freespirit427 wrote: »

Yes I weigh, measure and log everything

Do you use a food scale? The entries on your diary from what I can tell says no.

For example: Do you weigh the 2 tablespoons of peanut butter you log? Or your fruit? etc etc.

quiksylver296

So, I went back through your diary for the last week or so and don't see anything weighed out. You willing to experiment? Commit to weighing everything, your peanut butter, your English muffin, your banana, etc, for a week or two and see if you can identify any issues there. If not, you've at least eliminated a possible culprit. If yes, then you have your answer.

clayelliott847

Change it up. Try low carb. When I tried 150 carbs, I lost 10 lbs in a month. That was a little too fast.

sgt1372

It's really simple.

If you are gaining (or not losing) weight, you are still eating too much and/or not exercising enough.

So, your estimates for your calorie intake and/or exercise burn have to be wrong.

Eating less and/or exercising more is the only answer.

Good luck!

fb47

sgt1372 wrote: »

It's really simple.

If you are gaining (or not losing) weight, you are still eating too much and/or not exercising enough.

So, your estimates for your calorie intake and/or exercise burn have to be wrong.

Eating less and/or exercising more is the only answer.

Good luck!

...you forgot to add "weighing all your food" which doesn't seem the case when reading her diary.

sijomial

freespirit427 wrote: »

Yes I weigh, measure and log everything

Cups, spoons and scoops may be measuring (inaccurately!) but they aren't weighing.
Calories are in relation to weight not volume.

When your numbers don't make sense it's most likely your numbers are wrong.
Your diary doesn't give confidence you are accurately counting the calories in your food. That's really easy to fix.

CMNVA

One of the things that was very disappointing to me was finding out that 2TBPS of peanut butter (out of a measuring spoon) was a bit more than when I weighed it. And since peanut butter is so calorically dense, a little bit matters.

OP, peanut butter could be part of your problem, so I'd start there at a minimum. You should also weigh your English Muffin. I got a LOT of variance in bread calories based on what the package said and what they weighed out as. Usually it was in my favor, so I was underestimating in that case. Same with your Dunkin Donuts drink that you get at the store. You aren't making that one so it could be way off.

PAV8888

Do I think you, absolutely, need to weigh your creamer and peanut butter and scoop of protein before you're sure that you're not losing any weight at 1400?

Yes, I do.

BTW, do you use a trending weight app to measure your weight? You should!

Do I also think that after almost 2 years in a deficit you would benefit from a diet break if you are confident in your ability to return to a deficit at its end? Yes, I also do. Have a look at the first page of the re-feeds and diet breaks thread.

freespirit427

Thank you everyone! Will will follow these helpful posts and tailor it into my day to day!

Thank you!!

sgt1372

fb47 wrote: »

sgt1372 wrote: »

It's really simple.

If you are gaining (or not losing) weight, you are still eating too much and/or not exercising enough.

So, your estimates for your calorie intake and/or exercise burn have to be wrong.

Eating less and/or exercising more is the only answer.

Good luck!

...you forgot to add "weighing all your food" which doesn't seem the case when reading her diary.

While I agree that weighing your food is important to estimating your cals accurately and getting better control over your diet, you may still be able achieve resonable results w/o weighing your food.

There are lots of people in maintenance who claim to be able to maintain their weight w/o weighing their food and counting cals. I'm not one of them but, if true, there's no reason why you shouldn't be able lose weight w/o counting too.

In the OP's case, if she is not already weighing her food accurately, she may never do so.

Better to just recommend that she "eat less" - - as in eating one less of something or eat smaller portions or skipping snacks, etc - - than try to recommend a behavior that she probably is already aware of but has not yet adopted despite her inability to achieve her weight loss goals.

Whether you weigh it or not, if you "eat less" food in terms of quantity or volume, you will at least have a better chance to lose weight than if you continue to eat the same amount.

Just trying to offer the OP a simple suggestion that she could try to implement, rather than one that, while better, may be more difficult (if not impossible) for her to achieve.