What Am I Doing Wrong?!

glowgirl14

Well, everyone has already said most of what I think...

I don't buy into the "clean eating" thing. It's good for you. Better for you than anything else you can do, but it's just not realistic for my lifestyle. If you eat at a deficit, and that deficit does not take you below your BMR, you're going to lose weight.

That said...I don't eat "low carb" per se...but I do eat pretty high protein. Because to fit my diet into my calorie allowance, I cannot eat a lot of carbs. I wouldn't have enough energy to get through my day. I'd be starving...

The food scale thing...YES. You will be shocked at how different measuring spoons can be. If you're eating fat free sour cream, not a big deal. If it's peanut butter...well. That adds up really quickly.

Also. Every time I change my exercise routine, I gain weight. It's water weight...but the scale just shows a gain. I will be up for a week or two, and then it will drop off if I'm drinking enough water to help my muscles repair themselves.

Maybe weekly weigh ins are not a good thing for you. I weigh every day, and it can be maddening. Up 3, down 2...but after months of doing this every day, it doesn't bother me any more. You start to really see the cycle your body is on. As long as my weight is TRENDING downward, I'm still losing weight. I was up for 10 days straight, and now, it's falling off again, and I hit a new low today. If I had weighed in on Friday mornings for the last three weeks, it would have looked like I hadn't lost anything.

You say you feel better. Try and focus on that. This really should be about health, not just weight loss. Fat people don't feel great, in general. The more you move, and the better your food choices, the better you'll feel...the more you'll feel like moving and making better choices. It's all connected, and builds over time.

Measure everything you eat. Accurately log your exercise. Make sure you net your BMR every day...and be patient. It will come.

Lyns180

Thank you, I think if I was to weigh in every day I'd dement myself lol.

I think I'll give it another week or two and see if it sorts itself out, if not I'll reassess. Definitely pay more attention to measuring etc.

Lyns180

Make sure you net your BMR every day...and be patient. It will come.

According to Scooby and fitness frog, my BMR is 1850. My calorie goal on MFP is 1470.

kr1stadee

Make sure you net your BMR every day...and be patient. It will come.

According to Scooby and fitness frog, my BMR is 1850. My calorie goal on MFP is 1470.

They use different methods. If you go the TDEE/BMR way with the calculators, ignore MFP's numbers and set your own.
If you go with MFP, make sure you don't underestimate your activity level, and eat back at least half of the exercise calories (unless you have a HRM) ..

If you stick with MFP, make sure you net your BMR (you can look it up with MFP's Apps), and net meaning after exercise, make sure you're above this number.

Francl27

First don't listen to people who say your diet is the issue. It's not. It's just that your weight will fluctuate a lot from day to day and week to week... It takes 3500 extra calories to gain a pound. Most of the time, it's water weight. But you have to weigh your food to be 100% sure you're logging the right amount of calories.

After that, just pick MFP or TDEE-20%. With MFP you're supposed to add your exercise calories, but it's not always accurate, so I find it easier to do TDEE-20% and not bother with logging exercise.

cafeaulait7

Hi again. I'm new, so I don't know how people here feel about insulin, but let's talk insulin . I have PCOS and I do find that it's harder for me to lose weight if I don't eat clean. Clean for me is low glycemic. I do great on low glycemic diets, but I haven't made the full lifestyle change that means no dessert!

Apparently insulin can change the metabolism of carbs enough that it does affect your metabolism. A calorie is not just a calorie if your insulin system is enough out of whack (because it changes your carb metabolism).

For me, I can cheat it by building muscle or doing enough strength-cardio very often, like 5 days a week minimum. Presumably that helps my insulin levels enough. I've tried losing weight through calories alone, and it only works for me if I eat clean. OTOH, I can eat dirty (a dessert a day and a sweet protein drink) and exercise enough and that also works. So I feel I personally need to either eat very clean or do lots of strength work to lose weight. YMMV, but it's worth mentioning, I think.

I like the fitness part of things and it's great for health, so I go that route and have dessert! That's a win-win for me Folks who don't enjoy exercise might have to figure out a different way of getting their insulin levels in check, like eating clean. Folks without insulin issues can eat dirty and just worry about a deficit, imho.

I should add that I'm eating my maintenance levels at the weight I want to be (for a lifestyle change, not a diet), so my weightloss is quite slow. But it was successful before (and slow then too). I just let my intake and exercise both slide too far over a couple of years and gained too much again! The slow weightloss will really drive you batty at the beginning! That's where I am now again, lol.

gypsyrose64

I'm no expert, but I tracked every freaking measured morsel for a year straight. There wasn't a day that I didn't enter everything and at the end of the day, I pasted it to a spreadsheet with a few formulas and my daily weigh in. Honestly, I'm sick of tracking numbers but I cannot stop now.

Bottom line for me, refined carbs count! I spent months trying to lose a pound, and was clearly in a deficit (even without exercise).

I'm not saying the OP issue couldn't be water bloat. If I can drink a couple beers and eat a slice of pizza, I will gain 5+ lbs of bloat overnight! Not only the scales, but the expanding waistline and swollen face too. Diuretics will pull that water back out, but then I am right back where I started again. Diabetes runs in my family, and I'm no doubt insulin resistant.

Others might be able to lose eating "whatever" and staying within their calorie budget, but I can't. I've tried it for months. A fibrous vegetable carb doesn't convert to my waistline like a bagel will. I LOVE bread, but let me eat turkey & wheat sandwich for two days straight, and I'm looking like a puffer fish!

If my back wasn't screwed up, I'd do more physical activity, but for now... it's all about the diet. Everyone has a different opinion on here and I love that. You just have to keep trying different things until you find what works for you. No change you make yields results overnight. Patience is doing it - even when the scales refuse to budge.