MFP doesn't seem to be working

MelHoneyRocks

Thank you for replying.

I use the FitBit instead of a pedometer

Unfortunately that is a bit expensive for me on my salary, so I have to make do with a free pedometer app for my phone. It calculates the calories burnt from walking, which I simply add to the cardio exercise section of MFP. For the last few days it has given me a figure of about 350calories, which increases my calorie intake limit to about 2350; marginly less than the 2500 calorie RDA for males. This is why I'm concerned though. I know I am tall and so will require a bit more energy to function, but I'm concerned MFP has over-estimated my metabolism.

Anyway, thank you for your advice about different people responding differently to diets. That does put my mind at rest.

if this is part of your daily routine and not a workout, I would not add those calories into your day. We all burn calories being alive.
Hope this helps.

Mawkish1983

I see absolutely nothing wrong with losing 2lbs per week.

The implication being that I do see something wrong with losing 2lbs per week? This is the plan to which I am subscribed, and as I've stated elsewhere in this thread, I do not feel that target is being met.

To put it in perspective, you are losing double this off your body every week [image of fat blob]

Yes, that is something to think about

wisebadger53

I started on MFP at 286 lbs., and I am 5' 10" tall. My original calorie goal (sedintary as well) was set at 1,800 calories per day. I reset my goals after about every 5 - 10 lbs. lost or so, to adjust for the weight loss and changes in my activity level. I also keep a close watch on my sodium, and am convinced that this has also helped me along the way with not retaining water.

I think that you have your goal calories set correctly for now...just give it a couple of weeks. I only record my weight once a week - always at the same time - to keep myself from obsessing over the scale. Remember, if you are eating healthier you are getting healthier - the scale will show a change in your weight eventually.

Good luck!

UrbanRunner81

Eat past your BMR. I do. I eat 2300-2500 a day. Sometimes more. Be patient. If you lose the weight slowly by eating past your BMR, weight lifting and if you like cardio you are more likely to keep it off and not gain it back. You didn't put the weight on overnight. It took me 2 years to lose 40 lbs. I did slowly, eating plenty and exercising. Sure I would have loved to lose it faster but I am pretty happy with the end result.
Good luck.

secretlobster

The implication being that I do see something wrong with losing 2lbs per week?

I didn't read your entire thread, but from your OP: "my weight loss started at 2lbs per week and I'm concerned that it may slow down dramaticaly to a steady 0lbs per week from now. "

A consistent 2lbs per week is a lofty target. I don't know anyone who did that throughout their weight loss plan. I don't see anything you're doing wrong except giving yourself a very specific goal to meet every week.

fatgirlslove

Saturday to today isn't even a full week. Give it time... Don't worry about everyone else - some people lose big in the beginning and taper off, others lose steadily all along w/out the big numbers. I use the FitBit instead of a pedometer so it does the syncing and all the mathy stuff for me - because I can't figure out on my own what MFP already has calculated for calories I burn just by living and what extra I earned by walking during the day.

^^^^great advice

Mawkish1983

if this is part of your daily routine and not a workout, I would not add those calories into your day. We all burn calories being alive.

Do you feel it would be better for me to select a higher activity level than 'sedentary' and, hence, multiply my BMR by an arbitrary factor that does not take into account variations in physical activity from day to day instead of carefully recording all physical activity above and beyond the amount required for the absolutely least energetic job possible? I considered that, but opted for a more controlled approach.

Mawkish1983

Remember, if you are eating healthier you are getting healthier - the scale will show a change in your weight eventually.

Thank you for the advice

Mawkish1983

Eat past your BMR. I do... It took me 2 years to lose 40 lbs... I would have loved to lose it faster.

I wonder if you'd have been able to lose it faster had you have eaten up to or below your BMR. I'll stick to the MFP plan, it makes me less accountable

Sonnie124

Give it 12 weeks!

Mawkish1983

The implication being that I do see something wrong with losing 2lbs per week?

A consistent 2lbs per week is a lofty target.

I don't understand, are you suggesting that you see something wrong with the target of losing 2lbs per week? I certainly do not, which is why it is my target.

heybales

MFP recommends I eat just over 2000 calories per day. My BMR is about 2300 calories. I am of the ilk that 'in for a penny, in for a pound'. I suspect if I was to eat more, I would lose weight more slowly. To be honest, I'd probably prefer not to have a discussion about the validity (or otherwise) of 'starvation mode' or the effect of diet and exercise on metabolism. My mind is a simple thing, and as I see it, if I consume more energy than I expend I will gain weight, if I consume less energy than I expend I will lose weight. The greater the difference, the greater the effect. For now, I'll stick with that philosophy.

Here's where the simple philosophy must have a simple fact included. that the wise comments you quoted were stating.

Your body can and will slow down metabolism. Adaptive thermogenesis - Google it.

Now, you really don't know how much energy you are expending, do you, if it slowed down?

When your metabolism is slower, all your daily activity actually burns less too. Net result - you are burning less than you think.

The deficit you think you have - you don't really have.
Go lower to try to keep that deficit - guess what your body is very willing and able to do? This has nothing to do with starvation mode. Oh, you'll have some lag time of better loss, though slower, until balance is reached again.

Hence the great advice to get a handle on what you REALLY may be burning each day, and take the deficit off that - not some figure you have no idea about, and selecting Sedentary didn't magically tell MFP either.

If you really want to keep a simple view and not educate yourself on something that is undoubtedly going to frustrate you, then at least learn from it when you come back again with another stall of weight loss - even though you are there already.

You are getting some good advice on here from those it worked for, because of very scientific reasons, even though they seem counter to what your knowledge/experience would indicate.

Mawkish1983

Give it 12 weeks!

Seems very specific. Why should 12 weeks be a good amount of time to wait?

chocoholicdiva

Don't kill yourself if you don't lose any weight one week. It's just exactly that, one week. Keep your exercise routines going and keep an eye of what you're eating. Keep in mind, you could be holding water retention (if you're drinking it) or building muscle. Muscle weighs more than fat after all, and if you're doing any weight training you could be gaining some from this. Don't quit just yet, there are lots of people like you who have a long way to go, so don't worry about it.

secretlobster

The implication being that I do see something wrong with losing 2lbs per week?

A consistent 2lbs per week is a lofty target.

I don't understand, are you suggesting that you see something wrong with the target of losing 2lbs per week? I certainly do not, which is why it is my target.

You're not going to meet it every single week. You just aren't.

FitLink

Hello people,

MFP decided that I should have a goal calorie intake of just over 2000. I'm 282lbs right now and 6'7" tall (in the evening, closer to 6'8" in the morning). I'm a teacher, and I think I spend about half of my time sitting down. I decided to plump for the sedentary lifestyle setting on here and simply add all of my exercise by using a pedometer to calculate how many calories I burnt throughout the day.

I have a target weight loss of 2lbs per week. I weighed myself on Saturday morning and I was 282lbs. I weighed myself this morning and I am still 282lbs. Although slightly heartbroken by the scales revealing my efforts bearing no fruit, I have decided to stick to MFP for the time being.

I have been careful to record all of the food I eat and at a 2000 calorie target I can eat rather a lot. I'm concerned that perhaps the 2000 calorie target is too high though. I'm also concerned that many people I've spoken to told me how they lost a lot of weight initially, and the weight loss slowed down dramatically after the first couple of weeks to a steady 2lbs per week; my weight loss started at 2lbs per week and I'm concerned that it may slow down dramaticaly to a steady 0lbs per week from now.

Could any of you kind people please help me with my concerns? Based on what I've said, do you think I'm using MFP correctly/effectively?

Many thanks in advance.

Well, if you even get out of bed you should be losing. Your BMR has to be in excess of 2500 calories and your TDEE has to be in excess of 3000.

Are you sure your recording is accurate? When I started I wasn't weighing foods and when I started weighing them I discovered I'd been eating twice as much as I'd thought.

mixedfeelings

There is no correct rate for weight to drop off, some people lose a bit weekly some people lose every few weeks. A slower rate of loss is preferable. I know people say wait two, three weeks but wait a year, if you are eating healthily and getting more exercise you are doing it right, in a year you will notice a big difference, just be patient and healthy. MFP is a tool so only the person using the tool can be doing it incorrectly.

UrbanRunner81

Eat past your BMR. I do... It took me 2 years to lose 40 lbs... I would have loved to lose it faster.

I wonder if you'd have been able to lose it faster had you have eaten up to or below your BMR. I'll stick to the MFP plan, it makes me less accountable

If you eat below you BMR you don't just lose fat but you lose muscle mass. You want to keep your muscle. It comes in handy.

Mawkish1983

Adaptive thermogenesis

I am aware that one's metabolic rate can and does change.

Now, you really don't know how much energy you are expending, do you

The energy expended is the work done in moving and heating my mass. The work done moving my mass is easily calculated by multiplying the force required to move my mass by the distance over which that force acts. The force applied can be calculated by multiplying my mass by my acceleration and then adding the sum of any forces working to oppose my motion. As for heating my mass, my body maintains a uniform temperature. These are the two biggest ways in which the body 'expends energy'. The rate of respiration within my cells is largely irrelevent here.

When your metabolism is slower, all your daily activity actually burns less too. Net result - you are burning less than you think.

But not significantly less. The work done climbing the stairs, for example, depends much more on my mass and the height difference from the bottom to the top of the stairs than anything my muscles are doing.

The deficit you think you have - you don't really have.

The energy deficit I think I have is the energy deficit calculated by MFP. The less involvement I have, the less accountable I am.

Go lower to try to keep that deficit - guess what your body is very willing and able to do?

I think you are suggesting that reducing energy intake would result in the body expending less energy, however the amount of work required to be done for me to walk up the stairs, for example, remains the same. The amount of energy required to maintain my body temperature remains the same.

Hence the great advice to get a handle on what you REALLY may be burning each day

Which is precisely what I am doing.

take the deficit off that - not some figure you have no idea about

I do have an 'idea' about the amount of energy I am expending because I am using a pedometer to track it. There is no guess work here on my part.

selecting Sedentary didn't magically tell MFP either.

Magic has nothing to do with anything here, and I've explained my reasons for selecting sedentary elsewhere in this thread.

If you really want to keep a simple view and not educate yourself on something that is undoubtedly going to frustrate you, then at least learn from it when you come back again with another stall of weight loss - even though you are there already.

Ad hominem.

You are getting some good advice on here from those it worked for, because of very scientific reasons, even though they seem counter to what your knowledge/experience would indicate.

I've seen no reason to take your 'very scientific reasons' seriously and, as I've said elsewhere in this thread, I don't want to get into a discussion about 'starvation mode', semantics notwithstanding.

Mawkish1983

Don't kill yourself if you don't lose any weight one week.

I have absolutely no intention of doing so.

Don't quit just yet, there are lots of people like you who have a long way to go, so don't worry about it.

Thank you. I have no intention of quitting

jedibunny

Thought to chip in because I'd been frustrated with no (literally, zero) loss after my initial "oh dear we're not getting enough calories anymore" couple of pounds... I hit a plateau hard and fast. Started researching etc. Here's a little of what I found/what was shared with me.

Disclaimer: I'm obviously neither male nor extremely tall/heavy. The info I'm sharing here is pretty generic, but I'll pepper it with my own numbers here and there to illustrate.

MFP calculates based on height/weight/activity level/desired weight loss. This you know. It seems you already know the factors it uses as well, so I won't point them out. When I started here I also listed myself "sedentary" since I teach and work in data management - so literally 12+ hours/day at a computer (I teach long distance) counting leisure. Then I started working out, 20--30 mins of cardio/day 4--5 days/week and a little strength training here and there. I still listed myself as sedentary. I drank lots of water. I didn't lose a pound. At that point, MFP was telling me to net 1200 calories, which I was doing (adding back exercise calories, sometimes going slightly over on days I didn't work out).

What I didn't realize was that I was eating WELL below my BMR, and so my body was storing all the food it got. Yes, my job was still "sedentary," but *I* was not. I used a variety of tools (Fat2Fit Radio, a custom spreadsheet from the "Eating for Future You" group here, etc.) and each one came up with a figure that surprised the hell out of me.. somewhere close to 1500 in order to maintain my current weight, and closer to 1310 at my "goal weight". Below that becomes a danger zone.

My brain, being a stickler for detail and quite the Devil's Advocate, was yelling at me about not wanting to add calories to its diet now that my body was "used to" eating less. It also told me that if I was eating lower than my BMR I'd lose weight. Wrong. The more I read about all of this the more I understood that I actually NEED a good amount of calories (good calories, mind you). If I'm burning on average 161 cals/day ((225 * 5) / 7) PLUS my normal daily activity of walking around, cleaning the house, gardening, carrying stuff (like my 6 y.o. niece), even pushing grocery carts, that all adds up to an average 475 cals/day. So if I want to maintain my current weight, I would eat 1975 cals/day. If I want to lose--which I obviously do!--I need to eat about 1785.

That's crazy, right?

The WHOLE point of this thread is that you're probably not "sedentary" - especially if you're working out or even just walking at a moderate pace 3 to 4 days a week.

I'd suggest looking at some of those tools I mentioned, but also bumping your activity level to "active" for a little while and seeing if it helps. Of course, the basics need to be addressed in order to manage healthy weight loss: drink water, take a vitamin or two, eat well. My weight is starting to come off again since I've adjusted.

If I can be any help, let me know, and feel free to add me.

Mawkish1983

You're not going to meet it every single week. You just aren't.

Hmmm. Disappointing, but that is a message I'm getting over and over Thank you.

Mawkish1983

Are you sure your recording is accurate? When I started I wasn't weighing foods and when I started weighing them I discovered I'd been eating twice as much as I'd thought.

I've been very careful to weigh my foods as much as is possible and I tend to intentionately overestimate my energy consumption.

Mawkish1983

MFP is a tool so only the person using the tool can be doing it incorrectly.

Hmmm, sadly very likely to be true. Thank you for the advice.

Mawkish1983

If you eat below you BMR you don't just lose fat but you lose muscle mass.

I have never heard this before. May I ask where you found this out so I can read the source myself? Thank you

Mawkish1983

Thought to chip in because I'd been frustrated with no (literally, zero) loss after my initial "oh dear we're not getting enough calories anymore" couple of pounds... I hit a plateau hard and fast. Started researching etc. Here's a little of what I found/what was shared with me.

Thank you for your post, I enjoyed reading it. One thing rang alarm bells with me though:

I actually NEED a good amount of calories (good calories, mind you).

'Good calories' makes no sense to me. Energy is energy, it has no moral bias.

Anyway, that aside, thank you for the advice.

jedibunny

One thing rang alarm bells with me though:

I actually NEED a good amount of calories (good calories, mind you).

'Good calories' makes no sense to me. Energy is energy, it has no moral bias.

Anyway, that aside, thank you for the advice.

Ah - what I meant there was foods that have nutritional content. I don't always eat 100% healthily, but I'm striving to eat better than I had been in the past. I used to eat, for example, a ton of sugary snacks...

d2footballJRC

Hello people,

MFP decided that I should have a goal calorie intake of just over 2000. I'm 282lbs right now and 6'7" tall (in the evening, closer to 6'8" in the morning). I'm a teacher, and I think I spend about half of my time sitting down. I decided to plump for the sedentary lifestyle setting on here and simply add all of my exercise by using a pedometer to calculate how many calories I burnt throughout the day.

I have a target weight loss of 2lbs per week. I weighed myself on Saturday morning and I was 282lbs. I weighed myself this morning and I am still 282lbs. Although slightly heartbroken by the scales revealing my efforts bearing no fruit, I have decided to stick to MFP for the time being.

I have been careful to record all of the food I eat and at a 2000 calorie target I can eat rather a lot. I'm concerned that perhaps the 2000 calorie target is too high though. I'm also concerned that many people I've spoken to told me how they lost a lot of weight initially, and the weight loss slowed down dramatically after the first couple of weeks to a steady 2lbs per week; my weight loss started at 2lbs per week and I'm concerned that it may slow down dramaticaly to a steady 0lbs per week from now.

Could any of you kind people please help me with my concerns? Based on what I've said, do you think I'm using MFP correctly/effectively?

Many thanks in advance.

If you want the most accurate go and get your body fat measured. From then you can use one of the much more accurate calorie formulas. Especially with your height.

MFP estimates my calories way low for my body type. I had been eating 1700-1900 per MFP, after getting a water dip BF test and a metabolism test and figuring out my new amount I actually can eat 2.35k and be at a 1k deficit daily, first week I gained 3 pounds and was worried and it's been coming off since then.

Also remember once you start to exercise your body takes on more water.

Mawkish1983

Ah - what I meant there was foods that have nutritional content.

Ah, I understand. Thank you for the clarification

Mawkish1983

If you want the most accurate go and get your body fat measured. From then you can use one of the much more accurate calorie formulas. Especially with your height.

Oh, I hadn't considered that! Wonderful advice sir, thank you.

Also remember once you start to exercise your body takes on more water.

I'd better not exercise then!