15-ish lbs in 7-ish weeks?
CaitlinELaird
Posts: 106 Member
My title is super descriptive, I know! But I am recovering from a nasty knee injury that had me on crutches and my butt for about four weeks (and depressed as the scale crept up instead of down). I have been cleared for low impact workouts and am curious if anyone thinks it is possible to lose 10-15 lbs in 7 weeks.
Some info on me: I’m a 30 y/o female, 5’9” and currently 168 lbs. I am going from not tracking anything and eating everything to cutting soda, fried/junk foods and sweets, watching my carbs and starches. (Plan to stick between 1,200-1,500 calories a day) I also plan to bike to work 4 days a week (5 miles), hit my 10,000 steps each day, add in some yoga and strength training as well about 4-5 times a week.
The only reason there is a deadline is because my sister is getting married in July, I’m in the wedding and have the dress and it doesn’t fit anymore. I’m just a pinch too big for it and the store of course won’t let me exchange it.
Am I screwed or is it possible?
Some info on me: I’m a 30 y/o female, 5’9” and currently 168 lbs. I am going from not tracking anything and eating everything to cutting soda, fried/junk foods and sweets, watching my carbs and starches. (Plan to stick between 1,200-1,500 calories a day) I also plan to bike to work 4 days a week (5 miles), hit my 10,000 steps each day, add in some yoga and strength training as well about 4-5 times a week.
The only reason there is a deadline is because my sister is getting married in July, I’m in the wedding and have the dress and it doesn’t fit anymore. I’m just a pinch too big for it and the store of course won’t let me exchange it.
Am I screwed or is it possible?
3
Replies
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It's definitely possible, 1-2 pounds per week is the "healthy" range of weight loss, after all. Just try not to focus on the scale portion of your weight loss. If you bike and exercise more, you MAY gain weight but lose fat (1 pound of fat = twice the mass of 1 pound of muscle) and focusing on the scale can really throw you through a loop if you start seeing the numbers go up after all that work.
I will say, cutting the fried foods and sugars alone should help you drop pounds!
And if worst comes to worst, try contacting a seamstress in your area. They may be able to offer some help with getting that dress to fit properly (and nicely!) if you dont happen to fit into it perfectly.
The best of luck!14 -
Since you don't have that much to lose, 2 lbs a week is probably too aggressive. Try it, but if you are constantly starving then add some calories so you are targetting 1 lb a week.11
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You're already in your optimal BMI range, so this is not a healthy or reasonable pace of weight loss for you. For people who have very little to lose, 0.5 lb/week is advised. You may lose a little more quickly than that at first because it's common to lose some water weight at the beginning of a new diet.
In addition, the increased exercise you're describing is very likely to cause water retention if it is new for you. When starting a new exercise plan, it is normal to see the scale go up for a few weeks due to water fluctuation, which is part of the muscle repair process.
My advice would be to have the dress altered.17 -
That's a pretty aggressive deficit. You might feel miserable, plus that's a lot of changes to your lifestyle very quickly which could be difficult to sustain.
I'd probably aim for .5 to 1 pound a week. Crash dieting to fit in a dress isn't any better for your health, IMO. Echo getting it altered or maybe purchasing another one and wearing the original down the line.
Also if the goal was to fit into a dress I'd say measurements are more important than a number on a scale.5 -
Losing 2lb per week requires a 1000 calorie deficit every day. So you'd need a todal daily energy expenditure (TDEE) of at least 2200 calories as well as eating at absolute rock bottom.
It's technically possible, but after a very short time you'd be constantly tired, hungry and grumpy - and since you don't have that much fat for your body to burn, you would definitely lose muscle as well.
I'd strongly recommend not!7 -
I was figuring that since I am at the high end of my healthy BMI that I can do it. I was on track with the same changes preinjury and was just an idiot during my recovery so the changes are not drastically new to me.2
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If you are in recovery you shouldn't be trying to lose any weight. Also, your body may be holding on to water due to inflammation and you may not even have as much to lose as you think.9
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An amendment to this post. My husband was being a wimp with the zipper, it is just a butt to get up, not that I am too big for it. It is still a little snug, but the zipper goes up. I figure some good clean eating and toning exercises and I should be good to go.
Crisis averted I think!9 -
2 lbs per week is typically only realistic for those who have a lot of weight to lose. You will have to burn a lot of calories to get your TDEE high enough to actually have a 2 lbs per week deficit. And considering you are only recently cleared to exercise, this seems unlikely without risking reinjuring your knee.
Losing weight fast is stressful on the body. The last thing you want to do right now is put unnecessary stress on your body while you are still recovering from a nasty injury. It could reduce your body's ability to fully heal your injury.
Plus you will likely be hangry and fatigued by the time the wedding rolls around if you do manage to crash diet successfully.
Not trying to rain on your parade, just don't want to see you end up worse than you're starting from!
If I was just cleared to exercise after a nasty knee injury, I would be eating at maintenance and slowly ramping up my activity level to ensure my knee could continue to heal and strengthen fully. And I would take the dress to a good tailor and find out if a simple adjustment coupled with some good shapewear could solve my problem.8 -
caitiedid5 wrote: »An amendment to this post. My husband was being a wimp with the zipper, it is just a butt to get up, not that I am too big for it. It is still a little snug, but the zipper goes up. I figure some good clean eating and toning exercises and I should be good to go.
Crisis averted I think!
And never underestimate the power of Spanx!
10 -
collectingblues wrote: »caitiedid5 wrote: »An amendment to this post. My husband was being a wimp with the zipper, it is just a butt to get up, not that I am too big for it. It is still a little snug, but the zipper goes up. I figure some good clean eating and toning exercises and I should be good to go.
Crisis averted I think!
And never underestimate the power of Spanx!
This^
If the zipper goes up, you are close.
Set a weekly weight loss goal of no more than 1 pound a week. Exercise if you can, but don't risk an injury. "Clean eating" whatever your definition is, is not important for weight loss. Calories.....it's all about the calories.10 -
I just mean lots of fruits and veggies, no junk food and excess sweets and plenty of water like I described above.9
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caitiedid5 wrote: »I just mean lots of fruits and veggies, no junk food and excess sweets and plenty of water like I described above.
Protein is hugely important...healthy eating is more than just fruit and veg.13 -
I don’t think you should overdo your exercise/activity while you are still recovering.
However, if you can get back into strength training, even if you have to adjust your programme to go gentle in your knee, or just do upper body, you may find you will ‘tighten up’ a little.
I say this because I have been running a recomp/decomp/maintenance cycle for the past couple of years (long story) and am quite amazed at how fast my little old body firms up again, after a 2month break, once I get back to my 3x week lifting routine.
Just a thought.
Cheers, h.5 -
I think eating at a 500 lb deficit, light exercise (biking to work, 10,000 steps, and some yoga and strength training, so long as you don't ignore your knee injury can fit that), and eating a healthful diet with an emphasis on fruits and veg (probably not a bad idea when recovering), cutting out the fried stuff and sugary soda and excess "junk" are all quite sensible ideas and could lead to a water weight drop initially too (unless you overdo the exercise). Water weight often increases when one is recovering from an injury too, so as you recover you may get a drop for that reason too.
You may well have less to lose than you realized.
I think you'd already decided this, especially since the dress seems not to be as tight as you feared, but go with the sensible plan and 500 lb deficit, don't stress about hitting 15 lb on a timetable, and see what happens.5 -
middlehaitch wrote: »I don’t think you should overdo your exercise/activity while you are still recovering.
However, if you can get back into strength training, even if you have to adjust your programme to go gentle in your knee, or just do upper body, you may find you will ‘tighten up’ a little.
I say this because I have been running a recomp/decomp/maintenance cycle for the past couple of years (long story) and am quite amazed at how fast my little old body firms up again, after a 2month break, once I get back to my 3x week lifting routine.
Just a thought.
Cheers, h.
Echoing strength training (though maybe see a PT so they can help advise on your injury?)
I've been the same weight since around October but I've lost a dress size. Hooray for recomp.5 -
I agree with not overdoing it (both in terms of exercise and attempted weight loss), making sure you get enough protein, and the fact that there's like a large chunk of water weight that you'll gradually lose. It's important to let your body heal at the moment, way more important that losing those 15 pounds (some of which will be lost during that time because of water weight).1
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caitiedid5 wrote: »I was figuring that since I am at the high end of my healthy BMI that I can do it. I was on track with the same changes preinjury and was just an idiot during my recovery so the changes are not drastically new to me.
Err, no. 2 lb per week is safe for people who are actually obese; you are not even overweight.13 -
caitiedid5 wrote: »I just mean lots of fruits and veggies, no junk food and excess sweets and plenty of water like I described above.
None of those things on their own have anything to do with weight loss. Weight loss happens when you take in fewer calories than your body burns. You can eat “junk food” and sweets, and you would still lose weight if you were in a calorie deficit. You can also gain weight eating nothing but fruits and vegetables, if you eat more calories than you burn.
Protein and fat are necessary for health. If your diet is mostly fruits and vegetables, then you need to make sure you are getting enough protein and fat.
Drinking more water also does not cause fat loss. It causes you to pee a lot.
“Clean eating” is a vague term that has nothing to do with weight loss (or anything else).4 -
I kind of figured that I could just barely mention changes and not have to go into the nitty gritty. I know what healthy eating is, and I know that ya’ll do too so I figured it was pointless to go through everything. I’m sorry I didn’t though, I would have saved myself some chastising.4
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caitiedid5 wrote: »I kind of figured that I could just barely mention changes and not have to go into the nitty gritty. I know what healthy eating is, and I know that ya’ll do too so I figured it was pointless to go through everything. I’m sorry I didn’t though, I would have saved myself some chastising.
No one is chastising you. What people are pointing out is that it's about the *calories*. If you want to lose weight, you need to be in a calorie deficit, and an error a lot of people make is to presume that just switching to "healthy" food will fix it -- and then they get frustrated when it doesn't.
If you want to lose weight, you need to reduce calories -- and ideally, weigh and track *everything* you put in your mouth.3 -
And I am, but I wanted to point out that I am focusing on healthy calories, not just random junk. (I see too many people try to make McDonald’s fit into their calorie count and I was just saying that I am putting down the junk and the sweets and am getting on track with good food.)
Anyway, I probably shouldn’t have posted at all. I am just frustrated and I apologize for getting snippy.6 -
caitiedid5 wrote: »And I am, but I wanted to point out that I am focusing on healthy calories, not just random junk. (I see too many people try to make McDonald’s fit into their calorie count and I was just saying that I am putting down the junk and the sweets and am getting on track with good food.)
Anyway, I probably shouldn’t have posted at all. I am just frustrated and I apologize for getting snippy.
The point is there’s no reason why someone can’t eat McDonald’s while losing weight if it fits into their calories. They will still lose weight as long as they’re in a deficit.10 -
caitiedid5 wrote: »And I am, but I wanted to point out that I am focusing on healthy calories, not just random junk. (I see too many people try to make McDonald’s fit into their calorie count and I was just saying that I am putting down the junk and the sweets and am getting on track with good food.)
Anyway, I probably shouldn’t have posted at all. I am just frustrated and I apologize for getting snippy.
There is two levels to this.
Discussion that is specific to the OP, and discussion that is pertinent to the silent majority that may be reading but not posting. Or who may run into this thread a "few" months down the road. In many cases even after many of us have stopped using MFP!
There are many people in this world who fail to achieve caloric goals consistently enough to achieve the results they seek, even when they try to do so.
Some fail BECAUSE they are trying to fit McDonald's every day. And it proves to be too many calories for the level of satiation that it offers them.
Others fail BECAUSE they try to eat "clean" in a manner that ultimately proves too difficult for them. And they give up.
Others fail BECAUSE they end up acting as if eating "clean" is all that matters and thus fail to control calories. And of course you CAN eat "clean" and still eat a number of calories that does not allow you to achieve your goals.
Your response indicates that you believe that trying to make McDonald's fit into your calorie count will somehow hinder your goals.
Your goals will be hindered if you try AND FAIL to make McDonald's fit into your calorie count.
If you try AND SUCCEED to make it work out for you, then eating McDonald's, healthy, or un-healthy will not hinder your WEIGHT related goals and may, or may not, hinder any health related goals.
By the way, I can assure you, that my DAILY McDonald's black coffee fits perfectly fine into my caloric goals.
Most of the time my less than daily Vanilla Cone (200 to 300 Cal depending on server), McMuffin (all three locally available varieties (300 to 470 Cal depending on sandwich and amount of raw onions I get them to add), or McDoubles (sub 400 Cal) also fit fine in my standard 2500 to 3,000 Cal day.
Overall though, I do try to control my saturated fat %, as well as my consumption of red meat and nitrates, so may often skip a sandwich in favour of an ice cream cone
That said I had beets, at home, today. They are also high in nitrates 
None of this has an effect on the total calories consumed which ultimately depend on how good of a choice each food item proves to be for your needs at the time and given the calories it costs!7 -
OP was quite clear that she was planning to focus on calories:caitiedid5 wrote: »I am going from not tracking anything and eating everything to cutting soda, fried/junk foods and sweets, watching my carbs and starches. (Plan to stick between 1,200-1,500 calories a day)
She also may well have some water retention issues (not only is she recovering from an injury, but based on her comments it seems like her eating changed during her recovery to include more of the foods she is cutting down on, and sweets and "fried/junk foods" can contribute to more water retention or bloating in some cases). What she's doing seems like it might help with that.
Many people look at their diets and identify foods to cut down on or out because they aren't adding much nutritionally and are more the result of mindless eating or laziness than something that would be missed.
That wasn't really the focus of OP's post, so she didn't go into that, but I didn't read anything else beyond "this is how I think it will be easier and healthier for me to reach my calorie goal and stop the bad habits I've been slipping back into."7 -
I am down 15.6 lbs in 25 days doing keto, cardio, body weight exercises, and weight lifting. Keto is the only thing that I can lose weight on. I also do intermittent fasting (IF) but not every day. However, I have about 113 lbs still to lose, so I am sure that is why my fat/weight loss is fast.10
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OP was quite clear that she was planning to focus on calories:caitiedid5 wrote: »I am going from not tracking anything and eating everything to cutting soda, fried/junk foods and sweets, watching my carbs and starches. (Plan to stick between 1,200-1,500 calories a day)
She also may well have some water retention issues (not only is she recovering from an injury, but based on her comments it seems like her eating changed during her recovery to include more of the foods she is cutting down on, and sweets and "fried/junk foods" can contribute to more water retention or bloating in some cases). What she's doing seems like it might help with that.
Many people look at their diets and identify foods to cut down on or out because they aren't adding much nutritionally and are more the result of mindless eating or laziness than something that would be missed.
That wasn't really the focus of OP's post, so she didn't go into that, but I didn't read anything else beyond "this is how I think it will be easier and healthier for me to reach my calorie goal and stop the bad habits I've been slipping back into."
Thank you for helping my posts to make more sense. I wasn’t trying to be confusing, I just was trying to give some background for my personal experience for advice that wasn’t super general and it wasn’t translating well.
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Not to belabor the calories point, as this is a different offshoot, but you said, that you're 5' 9", 168lbs, and "plan to stick between 1,200-1,500 calories a day". When you enter in a .5lb a week weight loss goal into MFP how many calories does it suggest? I ask because that seems way too low, but I could be wrong (well, the 1,200 definitely is).6
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caitiedid5 wrote: »My title is super descriptive, I know! But I am recovering from a nasty knee injury that had me on crutches and my butt for about four weeks (and depressed as the scale crept up instead of down). I have been cleared for low impact workouts and am curious if anyone thinks it is possible to lose 10-15 lbs in 7 weeks.
Some info on me: I’m a 30 y/o female, 5’9” and currently 168 lbs. I am going from not tracking anything and eating everything to cutting soda, fried/junk foods and sweets, watching my carbs and starches. (Plan to stick between 1,200-1,500 calories a day) I also plan to bike to work 4 days a week (5 miles), hit my 10,000 steps each day, add in some yoga and strength training as well about 4-5 times a week.
The only reason there is a deadline is because my sister is getting married in July, I’m in the wedding and have the dress and it doesn’t fit anymore. I’m just a pinch too big for it and the store of course won’t let me exchange it.
Am I screwed or is it possible?
I've had a bad knee for 10 years and think your exercise plan is way too aggressive for someone still recovering from a nasty knee injury. I understand you've been cleared for low impact workouts, but your plan sounds like too much too soon. Did you run this exact amount of exercise by your PT?
In your case I think switching to a keto way of eating makes sense. You will gain the benefit of the initial water weight drop, which should be all you need to fit into your dress, given your subsequent post about the zipper.
ETA: saw this in another thread and thought it might be apropos here:
3 -
kshama2001 wrote: »caitiedid5 wrote: »My title is super descriptive, I know! But I am recovering from a nasty knee injury that had me on crutches and my butt for about four weeks (and depressed as the scale crept up instead of down). I have been cleared for low impact workouts and am curious if anyone thinks it is possible to lose 10-15 lbs in 7 weeks.
Some info on me: I’m a 30 y/o female, 5’9” and currently 168 lbs. I am going from not tracking anything and eating everything to cutting soda, fried/junk foods and sweets, watching my carbs and starches. (Plan to stick between 1,200-1,500 calories a day) I also plan to bike to work 4 days a week (5 miles), hit my 10,000 steps each day, add in some yoga and strength training as well about 4-5 times a week.
The only reason there is a deadline is because my sister is getting married in July, I’m in the wedding and have the dress and it doesn’t fit anymore. I’m just a pinch too big for it and the store of course won’t let me exchange it.
Am I screwed or is it possible?
I've had a bad knee for 10 years and think your exercise plan is way too aggressive for someone still recovering from a nasty knee injury. I understand you've been cleared for low impact workouts, but your plan sounds like too much too soon. Did you run this exact amount of exercise by your PT?
In your case I think switching to a keto way of eating makes sense. You will gain the benefit of the initial water weight drop, which should be all you need to fit into your dress, given your subsequent post about the zipper.
ETA: saw this in another thread and thought it might be apropos here:
I appreciate your concern, but I have already cleared my exercise with my ortho and PT. I wouldn’t do anything without their permission.
2
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