week three - still no progress?

lizzieliladunst

I've been working out pretty hardcore and following MFP's calorie goals for three weeks now.

I'm 19, female, I weigh 148, 5'7" and am trying to slim down and get some muscle toning.

I eat the amount of calories MFP tells me to (1200, also eating back workout calories).

I do thirty minutes of cardio 6 days a week, pilates for an hour 6 days a week, and I walk for an hour 3 days of the week.

I'm just wondering why the scale hasn't budged from 148?

any help would be much welcomed. thanks!

dawnp1833

Did you take your measurements before you started? Do you see a difference in the mirror? When I went from doing nothing to exercising, the pounds didn't fall off like I hoped, but the inches did.

Wpbarr

Swap the pilates for strength training and the scale will start moving pretty quickly, but not as fast as the shrinking tape measure.

tlc12078

Try to switch it up a bit.

fhsjewfro

you should be noticing some kind of progress with your body if you arent seeing much movement on the scale

i would definitely recommend lifting heavy three times a week and taking out all that cardio. you dont need all that to lose weight, technically you do not need cardio at all to lose weight. All cardio does is burn cals which means you ultimately get to eat more throughout the day, and thats about it.

cut back the cardio, lift heavy three times a week, and let your body recover more

lizzieliladunst

absolutely none of it has changed, sadly.

lizzieliladunst

i can't lift light. lol

wrecktechno

You gotta start somewhere. Get a PT for a couple sessions to show you how to do it (or ideally once a week or fortnight to keep you on track and constantly give you new weights to do).

Open your diary so we can see what you're eating.
When you do cardio, are you working hard? and are you using a heart rate monitor to confirm the calories you are burning

lizzieliladunst

i do different parts of my body every night; back, shoulders, arm, core, inner thighs, outer thighs, calves, all of it.

pilates is good for me because i'm not strong enough to really life weights effectively. so i use my body weight instead of big chunks of metal.

and i feel that pilates is just as good as "strength training" such as pushups and situps because i DO pushups and what could be called a variation of situps.

lizzieliladunst

You gotta start somewhere. Get a PT for a couple sessions to show you how to do it (or ideally once a week or fortnight to keep you on track and constantly give you new weights to do).

Open your diary so we can see what you're eating.
When you do cardio, are you working hard? and are you using a heart rate monitor to confirm the calories you are burning

PT as in personal trainer? yeah, i don't have money for that. lol.
i do try to work as hard as possible. and i do not have a monitor.

also, the thing about what i eat is i'm at home right now for the summer, so my mom does all the food planning and while she DOES try to keep my diet in mind, she also has to prepare food for the other three members of my family. so it probably isn't always as good as it should be.

kris4chloe

would love to be able to see your diary, that helps.

also it might be more beneficial to try to figure out the amount of calories you need based on your activity level and not eat back exercise calories based on a 1200 calorie diet.

usually your overestimating your calories burned

or your underestimating the calories consumed

or a combination of both

lizzieliladunst

would love to be able to see your diary, that helps.

also it might be more beneficial to try to figure out the amount of calories you need based on your activity level and not eat back exercise calories based on a 1200 calorie diet.

usually your overestimating your calories burned

or your underestimating the calories consumed

or a combination of both

i just made it public, if you would like to take a look.

sunny_yogi

Swap the pilates for strength training and the scale will start moving pretty quickly, but not as fast as the shrinking tape measure.

Pilates *is* a form of strength training.... just using one's own body weight.

lizzieliladunst

Swap the pilates for strength training and the scale will start moving pretty quickly, but not as fast as the shrinking tape measure.

Pilates *is* a form of strength training.... just using one's own body weight.

thank you for saying that.

ishtar13

1. You're at a healthy BMI, if on the high end, so you may not lose fast at all because you don't have much to lose.

2. Overestimating calorie burn. It's really high on a couple of days.

3. Are you actually weighing and measuring your food? because some of that seems a bit off. Like, the other day you had a sandwich that was one piece of bologna, one slice of cheese, ketchup, and horseradish mustard? One piece of meat and one slice of cheese?

and

4. Patience. It takes time, and lots of people don't see much change at first. If you really are doing well over 1,000 cals of exercise most days and this is new for you, then you might be holding onto some water and such as your body gets used to the change.

What kind of exercise are you doing?

ETA: I just saw that you're doing pilates. That makes me really doubt the calorie burn estimation.

lizzieliladunst

1. You're at a healthy BMI, if on the high end, so you may not lose fast at all because you don't have much to lose.

2. Overestimating calorie burn. It's really high on a couple of days.

3. Are you actually weighing and measuring your food? because some of that seems a bit off. Like, the other day you had a sandwich that was one piece of bologna, one slice of cheese, ketchup, and horseradish mustard? One piece of meat and one slice of cheese?

and

4. Patience. It takes time, and lots of people don't see much change at first. If you really are doing well over 1,000 cals of exercise most days and this is new for you, then you might be holding onto some water and such as your body gets used to the change.

What kind of exercise are you doing?

well i figured like the walking was too high, but i usually eat like 500 less calories than what they advise me eat, which is lower than the goal but doesn't give me the message about undereating, so i figured that was okay.

and yeah, it was one piece of meat and one piece of cheese, lol. i don't go very crazy with my sandwiches.

i'm doing walking for an hour three days a week, thirty minutes a day for six days i do cardio (burpees, jogging in place, jumping jacks, squat jumps, etc.) and for an hour six days a week i do pilates.

if you want to see exactly what i'm doing, i get videos from the BlogilatesTV channel on youtube, the pilates and the cardio videos. i actually have most of her videos because i do a different routine every night working different parts of my body.



ALSO, they're putting all the videos on weighttrainning.com with the proper calorie burn information, i'm just waiting to join until they have all or at least most of the videos up, because i literally do almost all of her videos.

d4rkn3ss06

1. You're at a healthy BMI, if on the high end, so you may not lose fast at all because you don't have much to lose.

2. Overestimating calorie burn. It's really high on a couple of days.

3. Are you actually weighing and measuring your food? because some of that seems a bit off. Like, the other day you had a sandwich that was one piece of bologna, one slice of cheese, ketchup, and horseradish mustard? One piece of meat and one slice of cheese?

and

4. Patience. It takes time, and lots of people don't see much change at first. If you really are doing well over 1,000 cals of exercise most days and this is new for you, then you might be holding onto some water and such as your body gets used to the change.

What kind of exercise are you doing?

ETA: I just saw that you're doing pilates. That makes me really doubt the calorie burn estimation.

^^ Agree with the over estimation of calorie burn! Are you just using the MFP generic calorie burn for your exercise? It tends to over or under estimate (but it usually is over estimating!) i would suggest getting a heart rate monitor and use that to find a more accurate calorie burn for your work outs!
I suggest you measure your self and see if there is any change there! For a lot of women you first start to see the change in measurements than in the scale. Good luck!!

on a side note you and your BF look adorable together!!

lizzieliladunst

1. You're at a healthy BMI, if on the high end, so you may not lose fast at all because you don't have much to lose.

2. Overestimating calorie burn. It's really high on a couple of days.

3. Are you actually weighing and measuring your food? because some of that seems a bit off. Like, the other day you had a sandwich that was one piece of bologna, one slice of cheese, ketchup, and horseradish mustard? One piece of meat and one slice of cheese?

and

4. Patience. It takes time, and lots of people don't see much change at first. If you really are doing well over 1,000 cals of exercise most days and this is new for you, then you might be holding onto some water and such as your body gets used to the change.

What kind of exercise are you doing?

ETA: I just saw that you're doing pilates. That makes me really doubt the calorie burn estimation.

^^ Agree with the over estimation of calorie burn! Are you just using the MFP generic calorie burn for your exercise? It tends to over or under estimate (but it usually is over estimating!) i would suggest getting a heart rate monitor and use that to find a more accurate calorie burn for your work outs!
I suggest you measure your self and see if there is any change there! For a lot of women you first start to see the change in measurements than in the scale. Good luck!!

on a side note you and your BF look adorable together!!

where do you buy the monitors? i don't know much about them. and i have done measurements, but they haven't changed since i started, so i haven't updated them since the first time i logged them.

and thank you!


yet another edit...

for my pilates, i put heavy calisthenics because Cassey, the woman who makes the videos recommended using this site to help track progress and said to either use advanced pilates or calisthenics. i used the heavy category because the site explained it as pushups and sit ups, and seeing as i do pushups and (what i think is a variation of) sit ups, i thought that would be the right category. i could be wrong about that.

shansen3292

Muscle weighs significantly more than fat. So chances are you're losing the "fat weight" and replacing it with muscle wieght. Its not about the number on the scale when you're trying to tone your body. If you feel stronger and are happier with what you look like in the mirror, the number is just a fact. So in reality you're getting there on your goal, your scale just doesn't show it.

d4rkn3ss06

1. You're at a healthy BMI, if on the high end, so you may not lose fast at all because you don't have much to lose.

2. Overestimating calorie burn. It's really high on a couple of days.

3. Are you actually weighing and measuring your food? because some of that seems a bit off. Like, the other day you had a sandwich that was one piece of bologna, one slice of cheese, ketchup, and horseradish mustard? One piece of meat and one slice of cheese?

and

4. Patience. It takes time, and lots of people don't see much change at first. If you really are doing well over 1,000 cals of exercise most days and this is new for you, then you might be holding onto some water and such as your body gets used to the change.

What kind of exercise are you doing?

ETA: I just saw that you're doing pilates. That makes me really doubt the calorie burn estimation.

^^ Agree with the over estimation of calorie burn! Are you just using the MFP generic calorie burn for your exercise? It tends to over or under estimate (but it usually is over estimating!) i would suggest getting a heart rate monitor and use that to find a more accurate calorie burn for your work outs!
I suggest you measure your self and see if there is any change there! For a lot of women you first start to see the change in measurements than in the scale. Good luck!!

on a side note you and your BF look adorable together!!

where do you buy the monitors? i don't know much about them. and i have done measurements, but they haven't changed since i started, so i haven't updated them since the first time i logged them.

and thank you!


yet another edit...

for my pilates, i put heavy calisthenics because Cassey, the woman who makes the videos recommended using this site to help track progress and said to either use advanced pilates or calisthenics. i used the heavy category because the site explained it as pushups and sit ups, and seeing as i do pushups and (what i think is a variation of) sit ups, i thought that would be the right category. i could be wrong about that.

I got mine online on Amazon.http://www.amazon.com/Polar-Heart-Monitor-Watch-Silver/dp/B001U0OFDC/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1340602255&sr=8-6&keywords=heart+rate+monitor Here is a link to one i think this is the same one that i got but Im not sure i dont have it on me at the moment. I got mine for about $70 which might be pricy but i love it and it has lasted! Im sure you can find a cheaper one if you need too! But it is worth the investment!

ishtar13

Are you taking a rest day?