Frustrated

FitnessFreak1821

So I have been on a calorie deficit "diet" for almost a year now to try lose the baby weight again. I lost 42 pounds after my first to find out right as I lost it all..I was pregnant again 😆

This pregnancy I went up to 168/169 pounds. I gained 33 pounds with this last pregnancy. I seemed to have lost 20-22 pounds quite easy. I'm stuck at 148 pounds and I know last march I was overeating because I had some anxiety issues. I eat sometimes when stressed. So i know that was either what caused me to gain or stay the same. I was 145 for brief moment there. I got over it though April and May I'm back into everything(i never stopped working out just ate more when i was stressed). I'm deficit of 500-800 calories. Work out 4-5 times a week. I feel and look kind of like I should of lost weight but the scale still says 148-149.

Last week I was on my monthly visitor I was bouncing 148-149 ,back and forth. So I was thinking great I'm most likely 144-145. I usually lose 3-4 pounds after my period goes away. It still not going away. My soreness from my last strength weight training on Thursday is pretty much gone. We did have some McDonald's yesterday so I don't if it's the salt keeping my weight up there with water weight? 😑

All I know is its frustrating when I know for fact I'm in deficiency. I weigh my food make sure I know how much I'm eating. I increased work outs. So far it doesn't seem to be helping. I'm going to keep pushing on though. I mean I see a slight difference. I know my calf muscles got more defined looking.

Maybe it is muscle ? Tips on getting out of this plateau. I have decreased cals again...worked out more. This worked in the past to get out of my plateau. It isn't this time

cmriverside

Your answer is likely here:
https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10683010/the-weird-and-highly-annoying-world-of-scale-fluctuations/p1

However, if it's been a year then you aren't actually in a calorie deficit. Eat a little less, move a little more or both.

FitnessFreak1821

I definitely changed my calorie intake over the year and increased my activity so I'm not sure what's going on. Hopefully numbers go down soon.

PAV8888

How overweight are you? Sounds possibly to me that you're already normal weight. Sounds as if you're exercising plenty. Maybe more exercise is good. Maybe it is not helping anything. That I don't know at the other side of a keyboard.

But if you're normal weight and exercising enough / lots (hint coming from screen name) and only increasing to lose weight to, for example, the low end of bmi after two kids that may have affected shape... that may be a sub optimal strategy.

cmriverside wrote: »

However, if it's been a year then you aren't actually in a calorie deficit.

She did lose 20+lbs till March. Ate more in April and May either without any gain, or with at most 3lbs gain. Her pre-pregnancy weight seems to be about 10lbs away.

sarabushby

You may want to share your diary so some of the experienced successful maintaining folk on here could take a look and spot any things that might be holding you back but most likely you just need to hold out that teeny tiny bit more patience!

Deffo check you updated your current weight and activity levels in MFP and that you’re not double counting if you’ve got a sports watch linked for calorie burn from exercise etc.

But also yes, do reassure us you’re not aiming for some unrealistically low BMI

FitnessFreak1821

Thank you everyone. I'm 5'5.5 feet tall and 148.2 pounds. So technically normal range for my body. I just have 12 pounds to lose(136 pounds was my prepregnancy weight). I just want to be 130s then its maintenance. Last time I got to 140s before I got pregnant the second time was hard to but i made it to 136. I'll keep pushing on... I'll hopefully get out of this plateau. I do feel good, I'm starting to like how i look..so i have to remember the scale is just a number. It's just discouraging when you know you have been working hard. You know😄

PAV8888

So, especially for maintenance.... **unlink** the working hard part from your mental narrative!

You've got no timeline -- just a long life to live. You want to be heading in the right direction, yes, absolutely. But you do NOT want to be hanging on for dear life and pushing to get to... maintenance fast.

It's not like maintenance and watching your weight and continuing to exercise for health is going to go away... not if you want to continue to maintain your weight and health.

So do try to make it a bit easier on yourself. You do NOT have a timeline or start or end date. If the general direction over time is good... you're good.

If you want to play shininning flashlight type of pet tricks... just stop exercising for a couple of days. The water weight drop will move the scale (which will of course go up again when you start exercising again). Increased exercise is unlikely to have helped the scale move down for you.

Essentially you really should only be aiming for a very small deficit and continuing on with normal life as opposed to trying to double down and quickly complete an "I'm back to pre-pregnancy weight" transformation in minimal time.

Take care of yourself and the babies... and give yourself the occasional break!

FitnessFreak1821

PAV8888 wrote: »

So, especially for maintenance.... **unlink** the working hard part from your mental narrative!

You've got no timeline -- just a long life to live. You want to be heading in the right direction, yes, absolutely. But you do NOT want to be hanging on for dear life and pushing to get to... maintenance fast.

It's not like maintenance and watching your weight and continuing to exercise for health is going to go away... not if you want to continue to maintain your weight and health.

So do try to make it a bit easier on yourself. You do NOT have a timeline or start or end date. If the general direction over time is good... you're good.

If you want to play shininning flashlight type of pet tricks... just stop exercising for a couple of days. The water weight drop will move the scale (which will of course go up again when you start exercising again). Increased exercise is unlikely to have helped the scale move down for you.

Essentially you really should only be aiming for a very small deficit and continuing on with normal life as opposed to trying to double down and quickly complete an "I'm back to pre-pregnancy weight" transformation in minimal time.

Take care of yourself and the babies... and give yourself the occasional break!

Thank you! I definitely need to be easier on myself. I agree! I gave myself a break this weekend Friday to Sunday. Weighed myself again. I'm still 148. I should at least be down a pound or something. I'm tracking everything not just calories but my deficiency. I add it up each week I should be down 1.355 pounds mathematically...but my body says otherwise.
I know I need to stop being so obsessive now and just be happy I'm no longer overweight. The rest will come off when it does. Time to chill just abit 😄

AnnPT77

FitnessFreak1821 wrote: »

PAV8888 wrote: »

So, especially for maintenance.... **unlink** the working hard part from your mental narrative!

You've got no timeline -- just a long life to live. You want to be heading in the right direction, yes, absolutely. But you do NOT want to be hanging on for dear life and pushing to get to... maintenance fast.

It's not like maintenance and watching your weight and continuing to exercise for health is going to go away... not if you want to continue to maintain your weight and health.

So do try to make it a bit easier on yourself. You do NOT have a timeline or start or end date. If the general direction over time is good... you're good.

If you want to play shininning flashlight type of pet tricks... just stop exercising for a couple of days. The water weight drop will move the scale (which will of course go up again when you start exercising again). Increased exercise is unlikely to have helped the scale move down for you.

Essentially you really should only be aiming for a very small deficit and continuing on with normal life as opposed to trying to double down and quickly complete an "I'm back to pre-pregnancy weight" transformation in minimal time.

Take care of yourself and the babies... and give yourself the occasional break!

Thank you! I definitely need to be easier on myself. I agree! I gave myself a break this weekend Friday to Sunday. Weighed myself again. I'm still 148. I should at least be down a pound or something. I'm tracking everything not just calories but my deficiency. I add it up each week I should be down 1.355 pounds mathematically...but my body says otherwise.
I know I need to stop being so obsessive now and just be happy I'm no longer overweight. The rest will come off when it does. Time to chill just abit 😄

If your calorie goal came from MFP, a fitness tracker, or a TDEE calculator . . . then the average person of your size, age, etc., would expect to lose 1.355 pounds of fat. You, the individual, are not necessarily average, so you may legitimately lose more or less fat than that average amount.

(Most people are close to average - i.e., statistically speaking, there's a small-ish standard deviation, a tall-ish/narrow-ish bell curve. A few will be noticeably off the average, either above or below average in calorie needs. A very rare few will be surprisingly far off, still in either direction. (I'm one of the "surprisingly far off" people. Both MFP and my good brand/model fitness tracker - one that's close for others - are off by 25-30%, which is hundreds of calories daily. It's rare, but it happens. I've been logging for almost 7 years now, so I'm pretty confident of my data.))

On top of that, fat loss can play peek-a-boo on the scale with water retention changes and differing digestive contents on their way to become waste. In particular, someone who's been dieting fairly aggressively, or less aggressively for quite a long time, plus stressing about losing, is more likely to be retaining some water because of stress hormones.

So, yeah. Relax. Go slow. Estimate your personalized maintenance calories based on your own logging/loss data (using the most recent couple of months). Eat a little under maintenance most days, be flexible about how much, and slow loss is likely to happen.

FitnessFreak1821

AnnPT77 wrote: »

FitnessFreak1821 wrote: »

PAV8888 wrote: »

So, especially for maintenance.... **unlink** the working hard part from your mental narrative!

You've got no timeline -- just a long life to live. You want to be heading in the right direction, yes, absolutely. But you do NOT want to be hanging on for dear life and pushing to get to... maintenance fast.

It's not like maintenance and watching your weight and continuing to exercise for health is going to go away... not if you want to continue to maintain your weight and health.

So do try to make it a bit easier on yourself. You do NOT have a timeline or start or end date. If the general direction over time is good... you're good.

If you want to play shininning flashlight type of pet tricks... just stop exercising for a couple of days. The water weight drop will move the scale (which will of course go up again when you start exercising again). Increased exercise is unlikely to have helped the scale move down for you.

Essentially you really should only be aiming for a very small deficit and continuing on with normal life as opposed to trying to double down and quickly complete an "I'm back to pre-pregnancy weight" transformation in minimal time.

Take care of yourself and the babies... and give yourself the occasional break!

Thank you! I definitely need to be easier on myself. I agree! I gave myself a break this weekend Friday to Sunday. Weighed myself again. I'm still 148. I should at least be down a pound or something. I'm tracking everything not just calories but my deficiency. I add it up each week I should be down 1.355 pounds mathematically...but my body says otherwise.
I know I need to stop being so obsessive now and just be happy I'm no longer overweight. The rest will come off when it does. Time to chill just abit 😄

If your calorie goal came from MFP, a fitness tracker, or a TDEE calculator . . . then the average person of your size, age, etc., would expect to lose 1.355 pounds of fat. You, the individual, are not necessarily average, so you may legitimately lose more or less fat than that average amount.

(Most people are close to average - i.e., statistically speaking, there's a small-ish standard deviation, a tall-ish/narrow-ish bell curve. A few will be noticeably off the average, either above or below average in calorie needs. A very rare few will be surprisingly far off, still in either direction. (I'm one of the "surprisingly far off" people. Both MFP and my good brand/model fitness tracker - one that's close for others - are off by 25-30%, which is hundreds of calories daily. It's rare, but it happens. I've been logging for almost 7 years now, so I'm pretty confident of my data.))

On top of that, fat loss can play peek-a-boo on the scale with water retention changes and differing digestive contents on their way to become waste. In particular, someone who's been dieting fairly aggressively, or less aggressively for quite a long time, plus stressing about losing, is more likely to be retaining some water because of stress hormones.

So, yeah. Relax. Go slow. Estimate your personalized maintenance calories based on your own logging/loss data (using the most recent couple of months). Eat a little under maintenance most days, be flexible about how much, and slow loss is likely to happen.

Yes, I use a online TDEE calculator and after I lose abit I always double checked to see what my maintenance would be at that point and decrease calories from there. I eat 1700-1900 cals. I work out and burn anywhere 200-400 cals.

AnnPT77

FitnessFreak1821 wrote: »

AnnPT77 wrote: »

FitnessFreak1821 wrote: »

PAV8888 wrote: »

So, especially for maintenance.... **unlink** the working hard part from your mental narrative!

You've got no timeline -- just a long life to live. You want to be heading in the right direction, yes, absolutely. But you do NOT want to be hanging on for dear life and pushing to get to... maintenance fast.

It's not like maintenance and watching your weight and continuing to exercise for health is going to go away... not if you want to continue to maintain your weight and health.

So do try to make it a bit easier on yourself. You do NOT have a timeline or start or end date. If the general direction over time is good... you're good.

If you want to play shininning flashlight type of pet tricks... just stop exercising for a couple of days. The water weight drop will move the scale (which will of course go up again when you start exercising again). Increased exercise is unlikely to have helped the scale move down for you.

Essentially you really should only be aiming for a very small deficit and continuing on with normal life as opposed to trying to double down and quickly complete an "I'm back to pre-pregnancy weight" transformation in minimal time.

Take care of yourself and the babies... and give yourself the occasional break!

Thank you! I definitely need to be easier on myself. I agree! I gave myself a break this weekend Friday to Sunday. Weighed myself again. I'm still 148. I should at least be down a pound or something. I'm tracking everything not just calories but my deficiency. I add it up each week I should be down 1.355 pounds mathematically...but my body says otherwise.
I know I need to stop being so obsessive now and just be happy I'm no longer overweight. The rest will come off when it does. Time to chill just abit 😄

If your calorie goal came from MFP, a fitness tracker, or a TDEE calculator . . . then the average person of your size, age, etc., would expect to lose 1.355 pounds of fat. You, the individual, are not necessarily average, so you may legitimately lose more or less fat than that average amount.

(Most people are close to average - i.e., statistically speaking, there's a small-ish standard deviation, a tall-ish/narrow-ish bell curve. A few will be noticeably off the average, either above or below average in calorie needs. A very rare few will be surprisingly far off, still in either direction. (I'm one of the "surprisingly far off" people. Both MFP and my good brand/model fitness tracker - one that's close for others - are off by 25-30%, which is hundreds of calories daily. It's rare, but it happens. I've been logging for almost 7 years now, so I'm pretty confident of my data.))

On top of that, fat loss can play peek-a-boo on the scale with water retention changes and differing digestive contents on their way to become waste. In particular, someone who's been dieting fairly aggressively, or less aggressively for quite a long time, plus stressing about losing, is more likely to be retaining some water because of stress hormones.

So, yeah. Relax. Go slow. Estimate your personalized maintenance calories based on your own logging/loss data (using the most recent couple of months). Eat a little under maintenance most days, be flexible about how much, and slow loss is likely to happen.

Yes, I use a online TDEE calculator and after I lose abit I always double checked to see what my maintenance would be at that point and decrease calories from there. I eat 1700-1900 cals. I work out and burn anywhere 200-400 cals.

I'm not suggesting that you re-run the calculator as you lose to get new estimates. That's still an estimate that's the average of similar people. You can get an estimate of you, based on your own data.

I'm saying that after you have a few weeks of personal weight loss and calorie logging experience, you should ignore the calculator and use your own data to estimate your maintenance calories more accurately.

If you're female and still of the relevant age/stage, take a whole menstrual cycle (or two whole cycles) of eating and weight loss data. Other wise, use 4-8 weeks. Add up all the calories eaten. Multiply the pounds lost by 3500 (the approximate number of calories in a pound of fat), and add that number to the calories eaten. Divide that total by the number of days in the time period. That's your estimated maintenance calories, based on your own data. If it's close to the calculator estimate, that's great. If it's materially different from the calculator, use your own data as your guide.