1250 cals/day -- no weight loss?

lq022

Hi MFP’ers .. so I have a question for those of you who have been on diets for awhile. Since May of this year, I have been increasing my exercise and cleaned up my eating habits. I was consuming anywhere between 1400-1700calories per day, and initally lost 15 pounds. The beginning of this month, I enlisted the help of my friends fiance who is a bodybuilder/personal trainer/nutritionist. He gave me a 1,250 calorie diet to follow along with my regular workout routine. The first two weeks were rough – I was sick, only made it to the gym twice each week and just generally felt runned down. I tried to stick to the diet as much as I could, with most days hitting the 1200 calorie mark. This week, I am finally feeling better, back to the gym on my regular schedule (fasted cardio x3-4 days, plus ~3 lifting sessions), and keeping to the diet to a T . While I understand I didn’t follow the diet exactly the first two weeks, I at least thought I’d make some progress ..... I am staying the same!
Here is what I am thinking about this: 1) I need to give it probably another week of solid dieting and exercising to see the weight drop; 2) my body was used to losing those first 15 pounds so now it might be going into starvation mode, or at the very least, it is fighting to hang onto this weight; 3) I might be doing more damage on my cheat day than I realize.

I’d just like some of your opinions if anyone has ever been in this same type of situation before. I feel like with eating 1250 calories I should be dropping this weight like nothing, but thats not the case. I seemed to drop more when I was doing my own diet – eating more than just protein, veggies and 60g of carbs day – and going hard in the gym.

Tiranoua

Were you exercising this much when you were consuming 1400-1700 cals a day?
I know you haven't included your current weight, but perhaps 1200 cals a day is too low for you, you may be right about going into starvation mode. If it is right for you, then perhaps you should give it another week and see what happens. If you're still not losing, perhaps there's another reason why you're not losing weight.
Take into account that you've lost 15lbs already - well done! You're also a woman, which means that weight usually fluctuates during menstruation Just a few ideas! x

navyrigger46

I didn't get much past "personal trainer" Google a TDEE calculator, fill in the boxes honestly and hit calculate. This will give you a good baseline and you can tinker with it from there based on your own observations over time.

Personal trainer and nutritional advice, that's a good one. :laugh:

Rigger

cavia

There are a lot of days in your diary where you haven't logged what you've eaten. The entries on days you have logged make me wonder if you're weighing your solids/measuring your liquids. If you were losing on 1400-1700 calories, you would be losing on 1250.

Instead of needing a cheat day, why not set your daily calories a little higher so it's not so restrictive and you can fit daily treats in more easily. If you keep the cheat day, those calories need to be logged too. It's really easy to wipe out the caloric deficit you've worked hard all week to accumulate.

Invest in a food scale, be more consistent in logging and the scale should start moving down again for you.

Marilyn0924

Weigh everything, log everything, every single day.
If you have a cheat day, log it.
You'd be surprised how much you can consume in a meal, never mind a whole day!.
Eat back some if not most of your workout calories.

Good luck!

kefryar

I gain or stay the same on 1200 calories a day, I lose on 1400. IDK if starvation mode is a thing, but I hold on to everything that low. It's so frustrating to not lose on 1200, but, maybe it just doesn't work for you. You have to do what works for you personally, not what may work for someone else.

pander101

1) Starvation mode is a myth
2) Weight loss is not linear

Make sure you weigh all solids that you are cooking at home on a food scale if you are not already using one. Most of the time when people see a stall in the weight loss it is because they are eating more than they realize. Also, if the initial calorie goal was working for you, why did you change? Some nutritionists do not need certifications to give people advice on dieting. Just a couple of college classes. If your previous regime was working for you, go back to it.

hill8570

Awful lot of blank days in your logs, so you really have no idea how close you're getting to your goal calories. And why change to 1250 when you were losing OK before? That's silly, and a recipe for doing unlogged flybys into the pantry.

aneary1980

Why have you posted this twice?

tracenco

I just googled TDEE - Thanks Rigger!!!

psuLemon

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