I found the holy grail of weight loss for lazy metabolisms

Nenabobena

I did a search in the forums and I only found a couple of topics that mentioned calorie zig-zag so I decided that I would make this post with instructions.

First things first: Go to http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calculator.htm fill out the form and click at the bottom where it says "7 day calorie cycle (zig-zag)"
All you have to do is follow the schedule (weight loss and extreme weight loss) and you will start to lose weight.

If this worked for me it HAS to work for you. Just to give you a little background, I am 31 years old, 5'2 and my highest weight was 170lbs. I have hypothyroidism and hypoglycemia. The combination of metabolic disorders has made it nearly impossible for me to lose weight with just diet and exercise. I've tried low cal (1200) , total energy expenditure with a deficit (2000) and everything in between that range; low fat, low carb, you name it! nothing has really worked until I tried calorie cycling.

I have been doing this for over 5 weeks and I have been losing 1lb each week consistently by following the weight loss schedule. If I plateau again I will try the extreme weight loss but so far so good.
I wanted to post this the first week I lost weight but I wanted to make sure that it really worked before getting your hopes up.

To adjust myfitnesspal I customized my calorie goals to my lowest calorie day ( tuesdays for me) and created 6 work outs with the calorie adjustments so I can just add it each day and count my calories the regular way. For example:
My daily calorie is set up at 1298
Then I add a "Monday zig-zag" exercise that I set up at 325 calories, this sets my Monday net calories to 1623
Do the same each day with a pre-set work out for each day and you are done.

Hope this helps!!!

5har0n1

thanks for the tip im defo going to give this a try

OpenHeaven

bump

spikefoot

I already have a bit of a fluctuating intake. But this will give me something to follow and it kinda keeps it a little more interesting as opposed to somewhat random. I will give it a shot. Thanks

exerciz4me

This looks very promising! Thanks so much for sharing it with everyone. Two follow up questions: (1) In your example, does that mean you are actually eating 1623 calories on Tues, or eating 1298 calories that day? And, (2) The chart created for me a different caloric intake each day. Do you adjust mfp each day or just stick w/ your lowest calories on the chart, i.e., 1298 in your example?

misschubbybutterfly

I like this! I'm going to log this away in case it's needed

audreygonzy

bump!

nycalison

I *just* broke my plateau this week, but if I stall again, I'll definitely give it a try, thanks!

BrownEyedSister

It looks very interesting. Thanks for sharing. I'm very surprised by the difference in caloric intake this tool recommends vs. MFP. I had been considering adding a cheat day and I guess this is kinda based on the same idea. The ability to eat a few extra calories to keep your metabolism from thinking you are in a famine.

Nikkilynn32710

I think I may just copy the chart it gave me and change it manually everyday. I'm not understanding how you did yours I guess. Or i could use the maintenance it gave me and then net the number they showed me on a daily basis with or without exercise......I wonder if that would work....which is usually what I'm doing anyway.... hmm....lol. So confused. I only want to drop 11 more pounds

Nenabobena

This looks very promising! Thanks so much for sharing it with everyone. Two follow up questions: (1) In your example, does that mean you are actually eating 1623 calories on Tues, or eating 1298 calories that day? And, (2) The chart created for me a different caloric intake each day. Do you adjust mfp each day or just stick w/ your lowest calories on the chart, i.e., 1298 in your example?

I eat 1298 calories on Tuesday (my lowest day). I have MFP set up to 1298 every day so on Tuesdays I don't do anything, just record the food for that day.
Today Wednesday (it's my highest day) I added a pre-set exercise (that I did myself) called "Wednesday zig-zag", when I made it I put 45 minutes (because I work out every day 45 minutes, you can put any number you want) and I put the calorie difference for Wednesday (for me is 638) so when I add it it says: "Nenabobena burned 638 calories doing 45 minutes of "Wednesday Zig-Zag"

I hope that answered your questions, if not I can elaborate again

jadesign19

Bump for later

xPOOKiEx

bump!

candctaber

bump for later

kent4j

Bump

spikefoot

I am sure you could move around the numbers with a bit of thought. But I sure wish it automatically put the higher calories closer to the weekend... lol

Code2fornow

It sounds like she just added a "faux workout" to the charts each day to up the calorie count so that it would show what she wanted.

solarpower03

Yup it works well. Professional use it to become leanest for competition. Read about Tome Venuto and Fed Hatfield who are the main proponents of this.

bdotshaw

Excellent tip. Thanks!

pugsley5

Thanks so much for the tip...Plateau seems to be my middle name!lol! Will let you know how it goes.

Crystal0827

Here is question, probably a stupid question, but if I am following this are these my NET calories or my total calories consumed. There for I would NOT be eating back exercise calories...Correct??

hipsgalore

the infamous bump

Minkime

bump

almc170

bump

tinacrane

bump

GurleyGirl524

BUMP....I wanna read this again later

TeresaWash

bump

Christine1110

Thanks for sharing...I will look in to it!

kmayne

Bump

starcatcher1975

I've been kind of doing this myself and it was working until I started working out again. Now I've gained 3lbs in a week and want to scream. Maybe this will help me be a little more structured with it and hopefully I'll see results. When you do this are you really exercising or saying you're exercising so you know to eat more? If you're really working out over the zig-zag calories are you eating back your exercise calories? I'm getting frustrated...I lose about 5lbs a month but it all seems to come off at once and I spend the rest of the month up and down and trying to keep it off.

TheDoctorDana

Bump for later....