Help! I've lost more weight than I intended to and need to think about maintaining.

sefajane1

erickirb wrote: »

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sefajane1 wrote: »

collectingblues wrote: »

sefajane1 wrote: »

collectingblues wrote: »

sefajane1 wrote: »

PAV8888 wrote: »

I wish you success; but I note that your chosen calorie level is one geared towards weight loss and not one geared towards eating well with your family at maintenance.

Why? Because: maintenance, as given by MFP, depends on your activity setting. And based on your original post you're selecting sedentary but showing evidence that you're not.

And 50% of exercise calories are, on paper, not your actual net exercise calories. Again based on your sedentary selection you're targeting only: 0.5* ( EAC - 0.25*BMR). You probably would need to eat back 80+% of your mixed exercise calories to actually be eating back your "on paper" net exercise calories and the % would increase the more vigorous your exercise.

Based on the title of your original post the only encouraging aspect is that you're eating a lot more than you have been since the end of February!

I'm sorry, I know my posts are confusing. I said I lost too much weight and would like to change to maintenence but I don't seem to want to stop losing or, god forbid, gain. It's like there's a devil on one shoulder and an angel on the other. It's the old ED thought process that pops back every so often.

I'm used to it but I know that my way of thinking often doesn't make sense to anyone else 🙄

It's all fine though, the angel is stronger than the devil right now 😇

Do you have a therapist that you can see? I think this is the time you need to reconnect with them, or tell your PCP that you're struggling, and ask for a referral to a new team.

I have an ED, so it's not like I don't understand, and I'm worried about you.

Oh please don't worry about me, I'm fine 😊 There's no ED help here, at all in my area. All the times before, I was in the UK with our wonderful NHS but now I live in the back of beyond in Turkey and there's nothing. I'm sure I don't need any outside help anyway as I just ate a tuna salad roll and plate of chips. Washed down with 2 beers 😉😂

I can feel myself getting bigger but that's probably down to the carb's (bread, rice, potatoes etc.) that I'm eating daily but haven't haven't eaten since February.

How are you? Do you have support? 💐

But you don't *sound* fine. You're panicking about gaining weight again, and you don't want to stop losing. That's not *fine*.

Having a meal and two beers does not equal being OK. Even broken clocks are right twice a day. If you were OK, you'd be OK with eating at full maintenance when you got off of holiday.

I have support, but this isn't about me.

Well, providing that I don't put on too much weight over the rest of my holiday, I almost certainly will stick to maintenance calories plus 50% of any exercise calories I gain. I don't want to get too big, just not as skinny as I look now. Or before I ate today 😄

Then you will still lose weight... if you don't want to be as skinny as you are now you will have to eat above maintenance, not maintenance + 50% of what you burn. maybe set your activity level to light active, set to gain 0.5lbs/week and ignore exercise calories.... if afte 3-4 weeks you lose or gain more than you want, adjust cals up or down by 100

Sorry, reading my last post back to myself, it's obvious that I didn't make it clear. I meant that after the holiday weight gain (whatever that comes to) I'll use that weight as my maintenance goal.

As I mentioned before, I don't want to alter my activity level because it will soon be far too hot here for me to be able to take my usual walks. I'll only have the swimming pool (when there's not a load of kids in it! 😂)

GaleHawkins

PAV8888 wrote: »

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sefajane1 wrote: »

neugebauer52 wrote: »

No pun intended - but you should write a book ! It will be a best - seller, maybe you found the answer to (consistent) weight loss? Please let me know!

Well obviously I'm burning much more calories than I'm taking in. Nothing new about that 😁 I just haven't figured out how much more I should eat 🤔

What I'm doing now is;

Calculate my daily exercise calories.
Halve that number.
Add that figure to my BMR (1113).
Take 1200 (my MFP set calorie goal) from that and that's how many exercise calories I eat back.

Does that sound right? I don't want to add the exercise calories directly to the 1200 if my BMR is so much lower because that would mean an extra 87 calories/day - 609/week.

Forgive me for saying this, but you're making this WAY too complicated. You're losing weight. You don't want to.

Eat more.
Eat all the dang exercise calories.
Stop eating at a deficit.

One of three things will happen!

You will continue to lose weight which means you will need to eat even more.

You will stop losing weight and you be maintaining. This means that you're goldilocks!

OR, you will start gaining slowly. And guess what, it can't be a fast fat gain given that you are currently still losing and that your total adjustment based on what you're saying will be less than 500 Cal a day which at most can add up to a lb a week using the 3500 Cal per lb conversion.

So if you start gaining slowly you can adjust and back off a bit.

Just start eating all your exercise calories and all your maintenance calories and take it from there! Adjust based on your weight trend over a few weeks,,,

Or there is a medical condition developing causing unwanted weight loss.

PAV8888

GaleHawkins wrote: »

Or there is a medical condition developing causing unwanted weight loss.

Gale, when you read back from the OP and through the rest of the thread, it is fairly obvious to me that the amount of calories our good friend is allowing herself to eat is a primary driver.

Unfortunately, it is also fairly obvious that she is struggling with her two shoulders and that the correct shoulder is currently still on the losing side of the battle.

@sefajane1 I would listen to @collectingblues because she walks the walk.

All *I* know is that, from the outside, and just going at it objectively and with zero emotion, there is ZERO reason for you to be below the 122 to 125 weight range on a trending weight application and that is not, by the sounds of it, where you are.

Given your history, continuing to think about it and being unable to commit to an outcome that can be measured objectively (even if it is by someone else if it is triggering for you to do so) means that you ARE playing with fire.

And, given what we know about all this, there is no reason NOT to be worried about you at this time!

I have heard about people engaging in ED counselling over Skype / similar when living too far away. Could that be something to explore?

sefajane1

PAV8888 wrote: »

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GaleHawkins wrote: »

Or there is a medical condition developing causing unwanted weight loss.

Gale, when you read back from the OP and through the rest of the thread, it is fairly obvious to me that the amount of calories our good friend is allowing herself to eat is a primary driver.

Unfortunately, it is also fairly obvious that she is struggling with her two shoulders and that the correct shoulder is currently still on the losing side of the battle.

@sefajane1 I would listen to @collectingblues because she walks the walk.

All *I* know is that, from the outside, and just going at it objectively and with zero emotion, there is ZERO reason for you to be below the 122 to 125 weight range on a trending weight application and that is not, by the sounds of it, where you are.

Given your history, continuing to think about it and being unable to commit to an outcome that can be measured objectively (even if it is by someone else if it is triggering for you to do so) means that you ARE playing with fire.

And, given what we know about all this, there is no reason NOT to be worried about you at this time!

I have heard about people engaging in ED counselling over Skype / similar when living too far away. Could that be something to explore?

Sorry that it's taken so long to get back but we've been travelling around a fair bit.

So, I've been eating and drinking loads more than normal but also trying to be active as well and over the last 7 days I've lost 1.6lbs. My measurements have also decreased by a smidgen too. Ive just calculated my average net calories per day (stupidly I was calculating using gross calories before!) and I'm around 50 calories/day UNDER the MFP maintenance calories.

I think I do need to change my activity level from sedentary to lightly active and stick with the maintenance calories it gives me for that. Also I'll eat back more if my exercise calories 👍

PAV8888

sefajane1 wrote: »

Sorry that it's taken so long to get back but we've been travelling around a fair bit.

So, I've been eating and drinking loads more than normal but also trying to be active as well and over the last 7 days I've lost 1.6lbs. My measurements have also decreased by a smidgen too. Ive just calculated my average net calories per day (stupidly I was calculating using gross calories before!) and I'm around 50 calories/day UNDER the MFP maintenance calories.

I think I do need to change my activity level from sedentary to lightly active and stick with the maintenance calories it gives me for that. Also I'll eat back more if my exercise calories 👍

Glad to hear the vacation has been going relatively well in almost all aspects, other than the obvious.

Sadly, I am not sure whether I am actually helping?

Logic says that you are still on a trend to lose weight when you shouldn't be.
Logic argues for a reversal and nullification of unwanted behaviour.
Logic argues for an MFP ACTIVE setting, 100% of calories from exercise, a reduction in actual activity and continuing in a similar manner until a multi-week weight reversal trend is incontrovertibly evidenced.
TBH, logic argues that MFP and logging may not be the best vehicle for your recovery and may be contributing to the problem.
Logic says lots of things, including that you know all this but are not yet implementing!

If you have no local help, have you looked into online counselling yet?
I've found at least a couple both out of Europe and the US just by googling around...

sefajane1

I hadn't realised that that kind of belp was available online. I've just searched and found some though 👍 Although, I really don't think that I need it right now, but thanks though 😊

collectingblues

sefajane1 wrote: »

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PAV8888 wrote: »

GaleHawkins wrote: »

Or there is a medical condition developing causing unwanted weight loss.

Gale, when you read back from the OP and through the rest of the thread, it is fairly obvious to me that the amount of calories our good friend is allowing herself to eat is a primary driver.

Unfortunately, it is also fairly obvious that she is struggling with her two shoulders and that the correct shoulder is currently still on the losing side of the battle.

@sefajane1 I would listen to @collectingblues because she walks the walk.

All *I* know is that, from the outside, and just going at it objectively and with zero emotion, there is ZERO reason for you to be below the 122 to 125 weight range on a trending weight application and that is not, by the sounds of it, where you are.

Given your history, continuing to think about it and being unable to commit to an outcome that can be measured objectively (even if it is by someone else if it is triggering for you to do so) means that you ARE playing with fire.

And, given what we know about all this, there is no reason NOT to be worried about you at this time!

I have heard about people engaging in ED counselling over Skype / similar when living too far away. Could that be something to explore?

Sorry that it's taken so long to get back but we've been travelling around a fair bit.

So, I've been eating and drinking loads more than normal but also trying to be active as well and over the last 7 days I've lost 1.6lbs. My measurements have also decreased by a smidgen too. Ive just calculated my average net calories per day (stupidly I was calculating using gross calories before!) and I'm around 50 calories/day UNDER the MFP maintenance calories.

I think I do need to change my activity level from sedentary to lightly active and stick with the maintenance calories it gives me for that. Also I'll eat back more if my exercise calories 👍

So now you’ll work on gaining that accidental loss back, yes?

sefajane1

collectingblues wrote: »

show previous quotes

sefajane1 wrote: »

PAV8888 wrote: »

GaleHawkins wrote: »

Or there is a medical condition developing causing unwanted weight loss.

Gale, when you read back from the OP and through the rest of the thread, it is fairly obvious to me that the amount of calories our good friend is allowing herself to eat is a primary driver.

Unfortunately, it is also fairly obvious that she is struggling with her two shoulders and that the correct shoulder is currently still on the losing side of the battle.

@sefajane1 I would listen to @collectingblues because she walks the walk.

All *I* know is that, from the outside, and just going at it objectively and with zero emotion, there is ZERO reason for you to be below the 122 to 125 weight range on a trending weight application and that is not, by the sounds of it, where you are.

Given your history, continuing to think about it and being unable to commit to an outcome that can be measured objectively (even if it is by someone else if it is triggering for you to do so) means that you ARE playing with fire.

And, given what we know about all this, there is no reason NOT to be worried about you at this time!

I have heard about people engaging in ED counselling over Skype / similar when living too far away. Could that be something to explore?

Sorry that it's taken so long to get back but we've been travelling around a fair bit.

So, I've been eating and drinking loads more than normal but also trying to be active as well and over the last 7 days I've lost 1.6lbs. My measurements have also decreased by a smidgen too. Ive just calculated my average net calories per day (stupidly I was calculating using gross calories before!) and I'm around 50 calories/day UNDER the MFP maintenance calories.

I think I do need to change my activity level from sedentary to lightly active and stick with the maintenance calories it gives me for that. Also I'll eat back more if my exercise calories 👍

So now you’ll work on gaining that accidental loss back, yes?

Yes I will 😃 I've got 2 more days of holiday left so I'll definitely relax a bit over food choices then look to maintain whatever my weight is afterwards.

It was my birthday yesterday and we had 2 meals out plus birthday cake. I daren't get on the scale today! 😂