This whole "Starvation Mode" Kick

wackyfunster

There was an article in Newsweek a few weeks ago about how America is dieting all wrong and how obesity has skyrocketed ever since the FDA came out and said to eat fewer calories and exercise more. Basically, the article said sugar is your biggest enemy and that red meat (and other meats) are healthier for your body to digest. It also said exercising makes us hungrier (we all know that) and that it doesn't necessarily make you lose weight, while it may be doing good things for your heart, lungs, muscles, etc. So starvation mode I really don't know about that. Anorexics (while not to be admired) don't stay fat from eating less. But basically the article said not all calories are created equal and it's not just about the # of them you put in your body. Stay away from the refined grains and the starches and you'll see better success. Apparently, Atkins was actually onto something.

Not this crap again. How many really fit Atkins dieters do you know? I've never met one. OTOH everyone I know with a bodybuilder physique eats hundreds of grams of carbs/sugars. Also every marathon runner and cyclist. Heck, some of my cyclist friends consume well over 1000g (one thousand) of sugar in a day. I guess bodybuilders and marathoners have been secretly fat and unhealthy all these years? Or perhaps it really is about net calorie intake and sugar doesn't violate the laws of thermodynamics?

Tired of all this misinformation... All it does it hurt people.

Yes, eat healthy foods.

If you eat 5000 calories of healthy foods a day, you will still become obese and unhealthy.
If you eat crappy foods at a deficit you will still lose weight.

Weight loss is all about net caloric intake. Being a healthy body-weight makes you healthier.
Eating high quality foods makes you healthier as well, but will not necessarily make you lose weight.

This is not rocket science.

ironanimal

YUP, THEM STARVING AFRICAN KIDS ARE A RIGHT BUNCH OF FAT FECKERS

They never have the opportunity to develop muscle mass nor excessive fat stores, so their situation is ever so slightly different.

Although I think that (reasonably obviously) the original poster was making a hyperbolic statement for effect, I'll amend that quote so that it's more to your first-world liking (and ignore the fact that physiologically there's barely any difference between this and the original):

YUP, THEM ANOREXICS DYING OF PROLONGED MARASMUS ARE A RIGHT BUNCH OF FAT FECKERS

Ahh, the rampant ignorance abounds. Anorexics usually have nigh 0 muscle mass either, and people undereating to intentionally achieve the look lose their lean mass prior to their fat which is why they appear skinny-fat on their way down.

crisanderson27

There was an article in Newsweek a few weeks ago about how America is dieting all wrong and how obesity has skyrocketed ever since the FDA came out and said to eat fewer calories and exercise more. Basically, the article said sugar is your biggest enemy and that red meat (and other meats) are healthier for your body to digest. It also said exercising makes us hungrier (we all know that) and that it doesn't necessarily make you lose weight, while it may be doing good things for your heart, lungs, muscles, etc. So starvation mode I really don't know about that. Anorexics (while not to be admired) don't stay fat from eating less. But basically the article said not all calories are created equal and it's not just about the # of them you put in your body. Stay away from the refined grains and the starches and you'll see better success. Apparently, Atkins was actually onto something.

Not this crap again. How many really fit Atkins dieters do you know? I've never met one. OTOH everyone I know with a bodybuilder physique eats hundreds of grams of carbs/sugars. Also every marathon runner and cyclist. Heck, some of my cyclist friends consume well over 1000g (one thousand) of sugar in a day. I guess bodybuilders and marathoners have been secretly fat and unhealthy all these years? Or perhaps it really is about net calorie intake and sugar doesn't violate the laws of thermodynamics?

Tired of all this misinformation... All it does it hurt people.

Yes, eat healthy foods.

If you eat 5000 calories of healthy foods a day, you will still become obese and unhealthy.
If you eat crappy foods at a deficit you will still lose weight.

Weight loss is all about net caloric intake. Being a healthy body-weight makes you healthier.
Eating high quality foods makes you healthier as well, but will not necessarily make you lose weight.

This is not rocket science.

See! You're drawn to that same flame I mentioned on my wall lol.

manymicks

I couldn't agree with you more....high quality food allows for lower calorie intake.

crisanderson27

I couldn't agree with you more....high quality food allows for lower calorie intake.

There are plenty of high calorie, high 'quality' foods as well.

fiveohmike

I couldn't agree with you more....high quality food allows for lower calorie intake.

There are plenty of high calorie, high 'quality' foods as well.

And they sure are tasty.

emrys1976

Many people following CRON diets manage to maintain their weight on 600-1000 calories per day precisely because of "starvation mode." Granted, they are super-skinny, but even skinny people have a higher BMR/TDEE than that!! Perhaps "starvation mode" is thrown around too liberally on this site, but it's not a myth. People are too black and white on this issue.

Zerashen

I listen to my body. It's been getting full around 700-800 calories, so I choose to listen to it lately and ignore MFP's "not eating enough." Eating too much got me the weight I am today.

I figure, if I'm full and have energy while losing weight, it shouldn't matter what anyone says I *should* be at.

crisanderson27

I listen to my body. It's been getting full around 700-800 calories, so I choose to listen to it lately and ignore MFP's "not eating enough." Eating too much got me the weight I am today.

I figure, if I'm full and have energy while losing weight, it shouldn't matter what anyone says I *should* be at.

Many people get straight up fat on sub 1000cal diets. Others diet and diet and diet for years at a similar calorie level...and still somehow remain obese.

Hunger is a very misunderstood thing...and is so often confused with other hormonal signals...it's nearly useless as an indicator of the proper diet.

I know you won't listen to me...but I had to say it anyhow. Maybe someone will.

mkenyon78

It's a question of time. I was easily coping on 800-1000 calories per day and dropped five dress sizes. But the longer I kept to this regime, the slower my weightloss became. Other members (it was on another weightloss site) were losing faster than me and they all seemed to "cheat" whereas I always kept to 1200 per day and rarely, if ever ate my exercise calories back.

By year 3, I noticed that I was always cold. A bone-deep cold to the point that my work colleagues made fun of how cold I always was. My exercise sessions never seemed to improve and I was never ever hungry. I could easily go from breakfast until 5pm with scarcely anything. My hair was becoming thin and my joints ached. These symptoms came on slowly - so slowly that I barely noticed them. I thought I was feeling the cold because I was now thinner - partly true, but certainly not to extent that I was shivering in jumpers when everyone else would be wearing sleeveless dresses!

I joined MFP in January this year and whilst I've only lost 8 pounds in that time (because I am repairing my busted metabolism) I am now eating 2,000+ calories on exercise days (NET: 1500) and have discovered hunger pangs before meal times, my running times have improved and I am again beginning to lose weight whilst eating far more than I have done in years.

So by all means, stick on a 1200 or even sub-1200 "diet", but you won't be able to sustain it long term.

I absolutely agree with you!! It is all about time and people don't really understand that aspect. I am in this mode right now and I am having a really hard time getting out of it. When I tell people that I don't have time to eat, they look at me like I am crazy. I can easily go all day long and only consume 400 to 600 calories and then I am struggling to eat more at night to get my calorie count up but I just can't force myself to eat. I think about it all day long, "how many calories have I had today? what have I eaten?" Things like that. I have found it easier to drink my calories. I have been trying to drink slimfast shakes a couple times a day. I have lost 4 pounds so far but it just isn't coming off fast enough for me. I don't know how to get out of this mode though.

BlueDahlia77

The thing is anyone can lose weight if they're only taking in 600-800 calories a day, but what happens when they lose the weight and begin eating a 1200 calorie diet? Most likely, they'll gain some of that weight back because their body now thinks they're getting food again, so it should save up for a rainy day (i.e. starvation).

Plus, she may be losing weight at first, but her metabolism will slow because her body will want to begin conserving energy. This will mean that she'll have less energy to exercise so her weight loss will stall, if not stop altogether.

To me, it sounds dangerous.

wendyjo3

Thanks for sharing that link. I have been going back and forth with reading all of theses posts about eat more weigh less. I thinks the author has got the right idea.

Pimpmonkey

The biggest thing with starvation mode is that EVERYBODY has a different range for their starvation mode. There is no set number. Each of us have different MBR's and different caloric needs.

mlewon

You enter "starvation mode" when you eat too few glucose molecules. Your body then starts to use ketone bodies in place of glucose to create energy. To enter starvation mode, you'd have to be eating fewer than 500kcal/day (approx according to my nutrition teacher). In this mode, you burn amino acids instead of glucose, synthesizing protein in place of carbs for the main source of energy. This can cause extremely low levels of calcium in bones, stringy muscles and excessive tiredness.

stupidloser

This one time I weighed like 168 lbs. I went on a 500 calorie a day diet. This 500 calories was usually bread or veggies. I drop to like 138lbs in like 4 months. I would not recommend it. It's very difficult to get by on this small amount of calories. I supplement this diet with diet pills containing ephedra(which is now illegal and banned). Without the pills I would not be able to eat only 500 calories a day.

mkenyon78

Hi
I don't know how old you are but I'm in my 50's. When I was in my 20''s very strict or weird diets were the thing. Pretty much the same as today it seems.I believed them when they said what they are saying to your sister and boy did I loose weight fast back then But I always gained it back no matter what promise I made that this time I would never go back to being fat. In my 30's, still battling my weight, you know yoyo style. Not that easy to be on a limited diet with kids. Tired all the time, not a lot of energy and feeling irritable easily. I used to have very thick hair and over the years, I lost a lot of hair and it is now very thin. But it happened so slowly that I didn't realize it. Now when I see women my age with a head full of hair, I can't believe that I did this to myself.
The worst though is that now, at 53, even with 1200 calories and good work outs with running and spinning 3-4 times a week, I am lucky if I loose half a pound a week!!!!! I follow my journal, I exercise and now I weigh myself every 2-4 weeks because it just kicks me in the gut when I know I've done good and the scale doesn't budge. And many of my friends, co-workers who were following the same fad diets, we were actually grouping together to stick with it ,are faced with the same issue.
So don't believe their crap. That's how they make their money , by selling the dream that it works and that once you loose the weight, you will stay at the same weight..
If I could go back, I'd just eat sensibly and exercise strenuously, which I didn't have the energy to do because of lack of calories.
Those friends of mine that didn't know the meaning of diet but whose second home was the gym are today still slim and not fighting the urge to binge whenever they are stressed. They deal with stress healthily, by working out their stress and not eating it.

Thank you for this post. I am in my 30s and I am struggling with this now. I am trying to change the cycle and eat more but it is hard. You are so right, it is hard to be on a limited diet with children. I have two small girls (ages 18 months and 4 years old) and two jobs and I am always tired and irritable. I try to eat as healthy as I can but I struggle with just putting food into my mouth. I have started walking on my lunch break everyday and I swing kettlebells 5 nights a week if I am not too tired. I am see a change in the shape of my body but the scale is hardly moving. It is so frustrating. I wish I knew how to break the cycle.

crisanderson27

This one time I weighed like 168 lbs. I went on a 500 calorie a day diet. This 500 calories was usually bread or veggies. I drop to like 138lbs in like 4 months.

If this post is serious...your screen name is appropriate.

mygastricsleevelife

I didn't read all the comments here yet, so this might have been mentioned, but I just recently had weight loss surgery & found this article on the Vertical Sleeve Talk message boards. I found it interesting that starvation mode doesn't really apply to obese people - http://fattyfightsback.blogspot.com/2009/03/mtyhbusters-starvation-mode.html - however, I do know if I have too much of a deficit or eat too many carbs or not enough protein, I lose weight slower than if I keep track and do well with my goals.

BlueDahlia77

I'm in agreement with that. I don't advocate people eating less than 1000 calories/day for long periods.

What I don't like seeing is someone morbidly obese get the advice here to eat their 2500 calorie BMR PLUS their exercise calories, or else they'll go into starvation mode and permanently damage their metabolism, gain weight, not lose weight, lose muscle, etc. And I have seen that. There is no reason someone obese can't eat below their BMR. The added YEARS of obesity from having a tiny deficit are, in my opinion, much worse for the body than losing at a healthy 2 lbs/week. Not to mention most people will not track calories for 3 years while losing a half pound a week. They will say, "It's not worth it" and give up.

There is no reason most of us can't eat well below our BMR. Most of us burn at least 1400 calories in BMR. Eating 1200 is not going to hurt anybody overweight. For most of us, 1000 is not going to hurt us. Some of us, 800 is not going to hurt us. As soon as the discussion gets into the 'below BMR' level, the starvation mode myth starts getting thrown around, it seems like.

First of all, if someone is morbidly obese 1200 calories a day just ain't going to cut it. As someone who is super-morbidly obese, I can attest to that. I eat at my BMR and try to get most of my calories because otherwise I won't have the ENERGY to get through the day. And it's all good, well-planned things that I'm eating.

Second of all, starvation is starvation no matter the weight or size. A body that is used to consuming over 2000 calories a day can have its metabolism slow/shut down just as much as a normal-sized person's can. If that happens, it doesn't matter how much fat a person has on their body because the body will want to hold on to it for basic life support.

ssdivot

I lost 10 lbs in about a month when I started. I netted very low due to massive amounts of exercise and not eating back the calories. Then I kind of stalled out. I'm sure if I'd kept at it I would have lost more weight doing that. But what I started doing was getting into this cycle where I would overeat one day and then starve myself the next combined with tons of exercise to "make up for it". Followed by herculean efforts to keep the overeating thing from reoccurring. I had massive deficits.

However from reading on this site and also Fat2Fit I somehow came to the acceptance that it was OK if it took longer than what I previously would have thought was acceptable. If it meant I could eat more and therefore be more likely to sustain it. I started just going off of my Bodymedia Fit and eating 1000 less than what it says I burn. I burn about 2300 if I do absolutely nothing all day. Normally I burn 2700-2800. Since the beginning of April I have been eating around 1800 calories a day. I don't go below that general amount normally, even if I do no exercise. If I do enough activity to burn more than 2800, I eat more to keep the 1000 deficit if I'm hungry. I gained 3.5 lbs immediately and it slowly crept back down. For about 7 weeks it moved a lot slower than it "should have" if I was really at a 1000 calorie a day deficit. Now for the past three weeks I've really been dropping. - .5 one week, then 3.5 lbs the next, .5 lb the next and 4 lbs the next.

I'm sure if I'd stuck with my original huge deficits my weight would have dropped down too, but the difference in how I feel is too good to pass up. I feel that this is a huge breakthrough in my way of thinking about "diets"..to have truly accepted that it is going to take a while and that it is ok. I am eating more like a normal person instead of being in "diet mode full stop". This is WAY WAY easier for me and I believe this will lead to my finally conquering this weight issue that I've had my whole life and being able to maintain it when I'm done losing. I will reduce my deficit as the weight comes off and will never make my base calories be less than my BMR. Not because I think there is anything magical about that particular number but because it is reasonable and easily achieved without superhuman efforts on my part. I feel like I'm just living my life now instead of dieting. If I avoid any kind of starvation mode and have less loss of muscle mass, these things are bonuses!

I do know I'm not really following the totally proper way of doing the official EM2WL as I'm not always netting my BMR. Just eating at least that much. I think if people can lose eating way less that is fine if they are happy with it. The information is there for people who want to try it and if people are having trouble sticking to lower calories and feel like giving up, this is a good thing to try, to see if it can be something they are more likely to be able to sustain.