Why would I not lose weight?

xmusicloverr

I'm new to dieting and working out and I've been looking in the forums to learn up and avoid making mistakes. I've been on MFP for 4 days now and so far, I've eaten under my calorie goal each day and burned more calories than my exercise daily goal. My daily calorie goal is 1810 and my exercise goal is 228, but I've been burning nearly 450 calories a day (pilates and cardio) and eating maybe 1200, give or take a few. I've heard that 1200 isn't horrible and I won't put myself into danger or anything, but will what I'm doing really prevent me from losing weight? How?

diane_will_lift

Please read these:
http://skepchick.org/2014/02/the-female-athlete-triad-not-as-fun-as-it-sounds/
http://www.fitocracy.com/knowledge/why-is-it-much-harder-for-overweight-women-to-lose-weight/

amwbox

You are probably underestimating the amount of calories you're taking in.

Weigh things. Don't go by volume, go by mass.

Give it a bit longer. Wait a couple weeks under current conditions and its a pretty sure thing that you'll lose. If your actually eating that amount of calories, that is. Most people massively underestimate.

amandalynne23

If your calorie goal is 1800 and you're only eating 1200, then you're really not feeding your metabolism enough. Your body isn't burning calories as efficiently as you think it is because it will be holding on to as much as it can since it's not getting enough in the first place. Your metabolism is like a fire, you need to feed it to keep it going. If you want to burn calories more efficiently you need to get enough calories. I would suggest going to http://www.webmd.com/diet/healthtool-metabolism-calculator and find out how many calories is required to maintain your current weight and then subtract 500 from that so you will lose weight and then you can change your calorie goal in MFP and make sure that's how much you're eating every day!!

Hope this helps

asciident

Assuming for just a minute that you're not underestimating your calories and overestimating your burns. You probably are unless you're weighing all solids and wearing a heart monitor during exercise, but let's put that aside for now...

You're eating 1200
Burning off 450
Netting 750

This is a bad idea unless you are on a medically supervised very-low calorie diet.

Read through this:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1175494-a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants

lemonlionheart

It's only been 4 days! Come back when you've been trying for a few weeks with no results. You should be able to eat at your calorie goal AND eat back exercise calories and still lose weight in the long term. Trust me, calories in vs calories out works every time unless there is a medical condition preventing you from losing weight.

Don't get discouraged if you go a few days or a week with no loss or be tempted to lower your calorie intake, sometimes I will go a week and a half with no movement on the scale then drop half a kilo the next morning. Actual fat loss can be hard to measure with the scale what with factors like water retention (if your sodium is too high or you've started a more intense regime at the gym - your body could be holding onto water to recover), food and drink in your body that hasn't been digested/expelled and ToM if you are a lady (doesn't happen to me but I've seen reports of up to 5lb fluctuations around that time).

Be patient, eat at a reasonable deficit and you will see results

1princesswarrior

Assuming you are weighing all your food and logging it correctly here's what will happen if you keep doing what your are doing.

1. You will lose weight.
2. You will also lose a significant amount of lean body mass (muscle, bone density, organ tissue, etc.)
3. You risk losing your hair, nails, having no energy, etc. because your body will not get the right nutrition

Cardio and pilates are great exercise but you should also consider weight training to try to keep as much lean body mass as possible, muscle helps burn more calories throughout the day, cardio only burns calories while you are doing it.

Here are a couple more links you should take a look at:
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1235566-so-you-re-new-here
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/1234699-logging-accurately-step-by-step-guide

Follow the MFP recommendations and eat back 1/2 to 3/4 of your exercise calories because gym machines and the MFP database overestimate the calories burned during exercise.

Also there is a search function in the forums, you can use it to find more information about strength training, cardio exercises, 30 day shred, and anything else you might have questions about. The newcomer information is also extremely helpful in explaining a lot of the weight loss language. You also want to understand BMR, TDEE, and macros. This will help you in the future when you get set up and need to adjust. MFP also has a mentor program, using the search function you can find an experienced member to help you get started too.

Good luck!

xmusicloverr

Hm... I'm glad I asked now rather than waiting til I was half dead to ask what I was doing wrong lol. Thanks for your responses everyone

EDIT: Oh wait! I have another question! I've heard that after exercising, we should eat our calories/net calories back. If I'm gonna exercise and eat back what I burned off anyway, why should I exercise at all?

Aaron_K123

If your calorie goal is 1800....why are you only eating 1200?

In general four days is really not enough time to be able to evaluate your progress, you are going to have to be more patient. It takes months to establish clear weight loss from the background of general weight fluctuations.

Aaron_K123

Hm... I'm glad I asked now rather than waiting til I was half dead to ask what I was doing wrong lol. Thanks for your responses everyone

EDIT: Oh wait! I have another question! I've heard that after exercising, we should eat our calories/net calories back. If I'm gonna exercise and eat back what I burned off anyway, why should I exercise at all?

Because exercising is about being fit and strong, not about losing weight. If your only interest in exercise is weight loss then yeah, why bother to exercise....just eat less.

lemonlionheart

Hm... I'm glad I asked now rather than waiting til I was half dead to ask what I was doing wrong lol. Thanks for your responses everyone

EDIT: Oh wait! I have another question! I've heard that after exercising, we should eat our calories/net calories back. If I'm gonna exercise and eat back what I burned off anyway, why should I exercise at all?

Because exercising is about being fit and strong, not about losing weight. If your only interest in exercise is weight loss then yeah, why bother to exercise....just eat less.

Exactly. I read this scenario somewhere on here which makes sense to me:
Person A eats 1500 calories and never exercises.
Person B eats 2000 calories and exercises an hour a day, burning 500 a day calories with cardio and weightlifting.
They both lose weight at the same pace. Who do you think is healthier?
Personally, I exercise to get fit but also so I can eat more and sometimes I save up some of those exercise calories to have some drinks and a nice dinner with friends on the weekend

xmusicloverr

Ah I see. Thanks for your help, everyone

StaciMarie1974

If you use a map but don't follow it very closely - would you be surprised if you don't reach your destination? Same thing here. You put in your information & goals, MFP gave you a goal (map) for what to consume in order to lose weight. If you're drastically missing your goal calories, why would you expect to reach the intended result? Your body is a machine and needs fuel.

Eat as planned. Fuel your body. And keep at it for more than 4 days. 4-6 weeks is a better frame for seeing results.