confused: so fast!

bluehippo2

Hi all,

I'm new here, trying to lose just a bit of weight. I usually track with a spreadsheet, and of course a kitchen scale. Signed up in the end because I'm confused.

Start weight: 65.6kg
current weight: 63.1kg
goal weight: around 58kg maybe
finished third week.

female, 44, 169cm. Sedentary (desk job and spend lots of free time on the sofa), not a fiddly type but a stare at monitor and hyperfocus kind of person.

So basically, I lost 2.5kg in three weeks - not with a quick start, but consistently.
Week1: 65.6-65
Week2: 65-64.3
Week3: 64-63.1

I've set MFP to lose 250gr/w. I generally don't hold onto a lot of water. I did start working out at the same time, about 20-35 minutes of interval bodyweight training most days, but I could not work out for the past few days as I having a cold. I eat all calories allotted (1340) plus a bit extra for workouts. Not working out has not changed my rate of loss.

Could I really be such a unicorn where bmi calculators don't work? Any ideas?

kommodevaran

It's common to lose a bit of water weight in the beginning; what's not so common, is actually logging correctly. If you've underestimated your daily activity level too, and not added phantom exercise calories, your loss is percectly explicable.

bluehippo2

That's the question. I put everything I eat on the scale before preparation and use USDA information, or what's on the package for non-raw food. Thus I'm certainly not undereating. I'm also not eating differently by a lot but just cut out sugary drinks and most snacks, and eat veggies instead of fruits between meals.

Workouts: ok, I probably am underestimating, but how many calories can you really burn doing a few pushups (poorly, I'd like to add), squats, lunges and the likes? I give myself about 200kcal for a workout of 35 minutes. And I've not worked out for the past 5 days. I get about 5000 steps daily, which is mainly walking from the parking place to the office and back again. Or doing groceries in the weekend.

TavistockToad

So your TDEE is slightly higher than you thought, that's a nice problem to have! And easy to fix, just add a couple of hundred cals to your calorie goal.

bluehippo2

About 800kcal per day higher based on current data? That sounds like a lot for a woman getting into menopause in a couple of years, not? And I somehow managed to gain weight since January in the first place. Ok, I have no idea how much I ate too much but it must have been a lot.

TavistockToad

bluehippo2 wrote: »

About 800kcal per day higher based on current data? That sounds like a lot for a woman getting into menopause in a couple of years, not? And I somehow managed to gain weight since January in the first place. Ok, I have no idea how much I ate too much but it must have been a lot.

Tbh, 3 weeks data isn't enough to do the maths from I don't think.

Not sure what other answer you want other than eat a bit more if you think your loss is too fast?

yirara

Maybe look at it for another week or two to see if it slows down, and if it doesn't then eat more. I lost weight at a similar fast rate and our stats aren't that different (well, I was heavier, but loss didn't really slow down near the end). So no idea. I guess we just have a build in turbo.

Gamliela

My first month of weght loss I lost 15 pounds snd I was eating about 350 calories a day over mfp recommendations. I was slightly into the overweight category according to bmi and I was not doing any excersize. In the months that followed my losses were predictably 4 or 5 pounds a month and by the third month I began to eat the mfp recommended amounts, successfully got down to a mid to lowish bmi in 8 months ith weight loss slowing down significantly in the last few months.
My journey is a very ordinary one, you will find similar patterns of weight loss all over the place.

So just go with it for now and keep being as accurate as possible in your logging for excersize and foods. You will find a pattern to your losses. You could try to look at it over a month, not just days. That helps to really be able to get your own personal understanding of the calories you eat and calories use up in your activity and how it all effects weight losses for you.

AnnPT77

bluehippo2 wrote: »

About 800kcal per day higher based on current data? That sounds like a lot for a woman getting into menopause in a couple of years, not? And I somehow managed to gain weight since January in the first place. Ok, I have no idea how much I ate too much but it must have been a lot.

I agree with others that you need 4-6 weeks of data to have a good idea of your actual loss rate on a new regimen. Some people appear to lose faster in the first couple of weeks because of lost water weight (from eating fewer carbs and/or sodium) and reduced average digestive system contents in transit.

But you needn't be "a unicorn" for the calculators to underestimate or overestimate: You only need to be non-average. They're just spitting out an estimated average calorie requirement for someone of your characteristics, and actual people vary. It's quite rare for the calculators to be far off, but it happens. (Most of them are off by a few hundred - though not 800 - for me, and I'm 62 and postmenopausal.)

Stick with it for a while longer. If you get weak or fatigued, eat a bit more; otherwise, wait to see your average loss rate over a longer time period.

cwolfman13

It's been a mere 3 weeks...Pretty much everyone drops a considerable amount of water weight when they start dieting, particularly if they cut back on carbs (ie sugary drinks)...every gram of carbohydrate holds 4 grams of water.

You're overthinking things.

bluehippo2

Thanks a lot guys. I'll have another look at this in a week or two. This is what my trend looks like at the moment anyway. Still down with a cold, thus no working out as I get headaches too quickly.

bluehippo2

Ok, little update: I was driving a lot the week before last and hiking a lot (gosh, such sore muscles from hiking downhill) probably eating at or just above suspected maintenance. Then worked out again at home after this trip and a break from being sick. So I guess all of this stored quite a bit of water. Looks like I lost part of it last night (ugh! I'm tired now!) and I'm currently at 62.3kg. So I lost about 3.3kg since 18 June, unless I'm not done losing water weight yet.

Ok, do you think I should eat a bit more, or just continue like this? My abs are getting visible (I never had visible abs before!) thus this is very cool!

TavistockToad

bluehippo2 wrote: »

Ok, little update: I was driving a lot the week before last and hiking a lot (gosh, such sore muscles from hiking downhill) probably eating at or just above suspected maintenance. Then worked out again at home after this trip and a break from being sick. So I guess all of this stored quite a bit of water. Looks like I lost part of it last night (ugh! I'm tired now!) and I'm currently at 62.3kg. So I lost about 3.3kg since 18 June, unless I'm not done losing water weight yet.

Ok, do you think I should eat a bit more, or just continue like this? My abs are getting visible (I never had visible abs before!) thus this is very cool!

if you don't want to lose more weight, then yes, eat more.

bluehippo2

Well, no. I still have quite a bit to go.

AnnPT77

TavistockToad wrote: »

bluehippo2 wrote: »

Ok, little update: I was driving a lot the week before last and hiking a lot (gosh, such sore muscles from hiking downhill) probably eating at or just above suspected maintenance. Then worked out again at home after this trip and a break from being sick. So I guess all of this stored quite a bit of water. Looks like I lost part of it last night (ugh! I'm tired now!) and I'm currently at 62.3kg. So I lost about 3.3kg since 18 June, unless I'm not done losing water weight yet.

Ok, do you think I should eat a bit more, or just continue like this? My abs are getting visible (I never had visible abs before!) thus this is very cool!

if you don't want to lose more weight, then yes, eat more.

That's sounding like you're still averaging around a pound and a half per week (3.3kg = 7.28 pounds, over about 5 weeks = 1.452 pounds/week (0.66kg/week).

You started at 65.6kg (144.6 pounds), and are now 62.3kg (137.35 pounds). The usual rules of thumb around here for avoiding health risk would be to lose no more than 1% of your body weight on average weekly, which would now be 1.45 pounds/0.66kg, and perhaps less than that if within 25 pounds or so of goal.

Your goal is around 58kg (127.86lbs), so you have about another 9.5 pounds (4.3kg) to go.

At a similar point in my weight loss, I slowed my loss rate to 0.5lb/week (close to 0.25kg/week in round numbers), because I thought that was less risky, and would help me start gradually transitioning to maintenance (sort of an off-ramp) rather than trying to go to maintenance in a big jump.

Generically, if you want to slow weight loss, you eat 500 calories more for each pound less that you want to lose per week. So, if you wanted to slow to 0.5lb/week, you would eat around 475 calories more daily.

If that sounds alarming, and as long as you don't feel fatigued or weak or anything bad, you could add a couple of hundred calories daily, wait a week or two to see the effect on loss rate, add another 100 calories or so daily, and just keep going like that until you reach your desired loss rate . . . which by then may even be a zero desired loss rate.

Be aware that if you add more than a trivial number of daily calories in one jump, you may see a scale jump in the next day or two from extra carbs or sodium (which involve a little more water weight to metabolize them), and/or from increased digestive system contents in transit. Don't let that worry you if it happens; it's not fat gain; it'll quickly settle out.

Best wishes!

bluehippo2

Thanks a lot @AnnPT77 yes, your estimate is about right. This morning I'm 62kg, so I guess the waterweight loss wasn't quite finished yet. Checking my setup again: Yes, age, weight, gender, sedentary (sit at my desk all day and drive by car to work) fit. Set to lose 0.25kg per week. So that probably means I'm one of those magical unicorns who have a higher calorie burn despite being hypothyroid, or I'm so restless sitting at my desk, staring at a computer all day that I burn tons of calories. Yes, I know why I gained weight in the first place, and it's called compensating depression with snacks. Lots of them.

At the moment I feel that I'd like to lose the depression weight as quickly as possibly to leave that dark period behind me, and I'm kind of ecstatic that it's happening so fast without going too low on calories (1320 atm) and without feeling tired. So I kind of feel that I should let it run it's course a bit longer and then maybe increase calories once I reach 60kg.