Hit a plateau, scared to up my calories...

funkyspunky871

Almost ever since I started dieting I've been eating too little. For the past 7-8 months, I've been eating anywhere from 1000-1150 calories a day, and not eating any of my exercise calories back. I know it's too little, but I'm scared to up my calories. I've hit a plateau and haven't lost much weight in the past month. Scared might not be the best word to describe how I'm feeling. I'm absolutely TERRIFIED to up my calories and gain weight. Anybody had any experience eating too little for months and then suddenly upping their calories? Should I slowly increase my calorie intake, or just jump up to something healthy? Do you think I'll gain? Help me please!!

holly0623

i had been eating under 1200 and loosing, then i hit a plateau, so i upped my calories to 1300.
I lost 1 pound and now i have been stuck at the same weight for almost 2 weeks. I didn't gain weight, but haven't been losing either..

maaalloryy

You've hit a plateau because you're not eating enough. Your body is holding on to whatever you eat because it doesn't know when it's going to get food again, and it has to save that energy because you're exercising. If you up your calories to a healthy amount, your body will allow itself to let go of what it's holding onto, & you should lose weight. You won't gain if you're eating a healthy amount of calories and you stay within your carb/fat/protein/etc levels.

saf621

I was told your daily calories is minus your excercise so if your daily calorie os 1200 and you burn 295 you need to take in 1495 to lose 2 lbs a week. Any thing under puts your body in storage mode and you hit a road block. Not an expert but thats what I have been told.

wolfchild59

I know just how you feel. I've been stuck in a plateau for over a month and felt the same way. Hit the internet for info and tips, found these boards (yes, I've been on MFP since March of last year and never found these until doing google searches about my plateau, I always just used MFP on my phone) and realized that I needed to up my calories and eat almost all of my exercise calories.

I just spent the last week zig zag eating between 1400 and 2200 calories each day (depending on how I felt and how much exercise I did) and only leaving a couple hundred of my exercise calories (as a buffer since I use my machine readouts and not an HRM) and I just recorded my first loss in over a month.

So I say up the calories, eat most of your exercise calories and see how it goes. It's definitely scary, I admit that. And I wanted to jump on the scale every morning, especially after my higher days of eating, just to see what was happening. But I stayed strong, and waited until this morning to step on the scale. And it was so exciting to see that pound gone after so many weeks of disappointing Sundays where it read the same week over week. My fears are definitely calmed now and I plan on continuing with this method for awhile to see if it can help me kill these last remaining pounds.

shannieboo

Do not be scared, you will stop losing weight if you are not eating enough. You're body hold on to every calorie you eat. I would up them a by 200-300 calories for a week or 2 and see what happens. You also have to understand, your body is re-shapeing itself as well. You may not have lost weight but you have lost inches. Keep it up and do not give up

Beegale

Crikey! You have lost over 100lbs!! AMAZING! I know its terrifying to think of putting on weight but surely, just a week or so to test the water and see what works for your body is worth it to enable you to carry on with your journey? Even if (heaven forbid!) you put on a pound or two at least it will give you the information you need to work out what your body now needs to carry on losing weight? Maybe just start eating a few hundred calories more over a week. Unless you suddenly start eating 10,000 calories a day I think you'll be ok. And again, a massive well done for what you've achieved thus far xx :happy:

msbanana

don't be skerrd.

I did the same thing (and honestly still struggle with it) BUT you need to. You need to fuel your body or you're going to stall out (like you have) and likely get sick. EAT. Eat what MFP tells you to eat and not only will you have more energy but you'll see the weight come off. Yes you should up your cals slowly or you'll get sick but you MUST. You're not going to gain weight if you up your cals a bit and continue to exercise. Just continue to make good food choices (don't eat junk just to get your cals up) and keep working.

I was skerrd too I was stuck for more than a month and when I did finally up the cals not only did I break the plateau I've been consistenly losing at about 1.5 lbs a week AND I finally hit the big 100. Think of it this way- your body is kinda like a fancy sports car. It needs a full tank of premium fuel to perform the way it's supposed to. If you put the minimal amount of crappy gas in it, it will continue to run but not well and yeah it may look good on the outside but there's no point if there's no get up and go. SOOO fuel up and get the most out of this new body you're building for yourself. :bigsmile:

Aeriel

Answered on your friends post too.

Both times that I hit a plateau, I reduced the rate I was trying to lose weight. First time, I went from 1.5 pounds per week to 1 pound per week. Started losing again within a week. That was when I was at 30 lbs lost. Been stuck again at 52-53 pounds lost, so Monday, I changed my rate to 0.5 pounds per week. 1 week later, I am down over a pound again, eating more. You can't go crazy, but a few hundred calories a day can make the difference. As you get closer to your goal, you won't lose weight as fast and you need more calories to keep losing. Hope that helps!

Edited to add:

If you have been really low for a long time, your first few weeks you might see a small gain while you metabolism rev's back up. Give it at least a month before you change it to give it a chance and I hope you get the same great results I did!

funkyspunky871

Thanks everybody.

tamiller93

I haven't hit a plateau YET, but I think it's going to happen very soon. I am down to the last 9 lbs and I would like to avoid the plateau thing altogether. I had my goal set at 1 lb of loss per week, which gave me 1220 calories daily. I am going to try increasing my daily calories to 1350. That's only 130 calories more per day, but I am hoping it will keep me going and not let me get into that plateau stage. I really want to reach my goal within the next 30 days. It may not be possible, but I feel like if I let myself get to that plateau, I will be wasting precious time! What do you guys think of this? Is it a bad idea since I haven't yet reached a plateau? I am just trying to be proactive in anticipation of the plateau since it normally happens to people during their last 10 lbs or so.

Thanks for any input.