Need advise....please!!!!

wedjul05

I need advise on my food/workout routine. I've hit a major plateau and I don't really know how to overcome it.

I started losing the extra post-baby weight back in 2011. Lost nearly 2 stone (28lbs). I've hovered around 170lbs for a long while now but lost all the time. I stopped exercising for about 4 months last year as myself and my husband moved house/location and he was gone for almost 1 month abroad. I started back exercising/diet in Jan of this year. I didn't change my workout routine/diet alot in the 2 time frames but I found that I was consistently losing weight before and not now. I am baffled.

THe only thing I am doing differently is I am lifting more weights now and heavier weights. I get the whole thing about when you lift weights, you won't see a huge scales difference. But I've been back exercising since the start of 2012 and I've gone up 3 lbs and that's it. Not on single lb loss. My belly is hanging on in there for dear life, it didn't do this the last time.

My diet is 90% good and I know the things i have to cut to get this up to 100% so that's an easy fix. I burnt over 3000cals last week alone. I feel for the amount of effort I am putting in, I am getting nothing in return. I feel fat, look pudgey. I'm not seeing great results at all.

I am going to get my gym programme redone (if I can ever get in touch with a personal trainer from my gym!) to see if this helps.

Anyone got any words of wisdom? My diary is open too (be kind to me!) . Thanks

therealangd

Are you recording accurately? It looks like you are not recording everything (some days missing, some days less than 500 cals), or you are severely undereating.

How are you calculating your exercise calories?
Are you weighing your food?

If you are calculating your food and exercise calories correctly then you are nowhere near eating enough to fuel your workouts or to lose weight.

If you are not recording everything, then you need to start doing so, so that you can really see where your issues lie. If you have a binge day, you need to record it, so you can see how bad it was. You can't stick your head in the sand and "start again tomorrow"

If you have incorporated a weight program, did you take measurements? With weights you are not going to see a change (for the most part) in weight, you are going to see it in measurements and how your clothes are fitting.

wedjul05

Are you recording accurately? It looks like you are not recording everything (some days missing, some days less than 500 cals), or you are severely undereating.

How are you calculating your exercise calories?
Are you weighing your food?

If you are calculating your food and exercise calories correctly then you are nowhere near eating enough to fuel your workouts or to lose weight.

If you are not recording everything, then you need to start doing so, so that you can really see where your issues lie. If you have a binge day, you need to record it, so you can see how bad it was. You can't stick your head in the sand and "start again tomorrow"

If you have incorporated a weight program, did you take measurements? With weights you are not going to see a change (for the most part) in weight, you are going to see it in measurements and how your clothes are fitting.

99% of the time I record. THe odd day, I lose the rag altogether and pig out, hence I don't record. But this isn't that often, not enough to sabotage everything else i do. I know how bad the bad days are (2500+ cals).

Exercise cals: Polar HRM
Yes I weigh almost everything. make most of my own food so I know 100% what goes into them.

I feel like I seriously cannot eat anymore, I am not hungry enough. I add whatever I can to bulk up my meals like avocado etc. I eat alot come late afternoon/early evening as I exercise after the kids go to bed so that's 8pm, home at 10pm, bed at 11pm so I cannot eat after the gym.

I just recently got a flexible measuring tape (amazing how hard they are to find actually!) so I now know my measurements. I know I have toned up but I feel like I'm at the stage now where the toning has happeend, I feel I should be seeing some scale difference now. I don't want to up my weights jsut yet until I take to a personal trainer to see what's stopping my overall weight loss.

thanks for the input.

nz_deevaa

I feel like I seriously cannot eat anymore, I am not hungry enough. I add whatever I can to bulk up my meals like avocado etc. I eat alot come late afternoon/early evening as I exercise after the kids go to bed so that's 8pm, home at 10pm, bed at 11pm so I cannot eat after the gym.

You can't eat after the gym or don't want to?

wedjul05

I don't really have the time to be honest. I have a protein shake straight after the gym anyway. By the time i get home, it's 10pm. Between getting organised for work the next day, washing clothes, flossing my teeth (who knew this would take 10mins, headwrecking!), I honestly don't have time to eat. Oh and add blow drying my thick hair to the mix...I'd like to get 6hrs sleep before the next mad day starts. Up at 6am for work/get kids ready with husband etc.

Sometimes though, I am just too full after my protein shake to eat. The next day or even the day ofter that, the hunger will hit me alright.

Tana_Q

I will also add that I rarely use the calories burned here on MFP. I just don't believe a lot of them in general. It seems that MFP gives WAY too many calories burned per exercise. So when it says I've burned 600 cal. from walking, I chop that number in half. I agree with what the others have posted too.