Okay, I'm worried!

KarenJanine

Classic sign of a yo-yo dieter. This isn't meant to be offensive - I used to be like this too and guess what? I gained it all back.

You need to re-evaluate your goals. You are clearly someone who is obsessed by the scale, and I imagine if you lose 2lb a week and then the next week lose 1lb, you are going to be disappointed, right?

If you stick with these unrealistic expectations you will be back on WW or here next year after regaining the weight.

1200 cals is probably too low as it is, let alone going any lower.

Would it not be much better to pick a sensible calorie goal where you won't feel starved, lose 1lb a week and be able to maintain it for the rest of your life?

^^

agggie550

1200 Caloires a day is the bare minimum with no exercise, if you are exercising it is recommended that you eat some of that. I mean i eat 3000+ a day, i work a large percentage of it off, but its important to eat if you actually wanna loose weight and maintain it, because starving yourself will give you great results, but not in the long term and it really messes with your body.

I think the easiest way to look at is though, did you put on two pounds a week, did you wake up one moreing unhealthy, no it happened gradually, so yes 2lbs a week would be ideal, but just living a healthy life style and being active will give you what you want, when your body is ready to give it to you. Scales can be the worst thing in the world, take measurements, or measure your healthy based on how you feel (i know fantasy idea, because pounds downa nd smaller clothes is alot more fun) but sometimes you need to take a step back and realize you put in alot of work to get unhealthy, so now you have to put in alot of work to get back to were you want to be. Good luck.

jesz124

Your focus is all wrong. A scale can only show us a number, often this number won't correlate with the effort put in. Not all progress can be shown by stepping on a scale. If you get de-motivated by weighing yourself I would suggest you throw away your scales and use progress pictures and measure yourself instead. It cannot be stressed enough that this is a long term game. Short cuts and quick fixes won't help you. You need to rethink your goals in my opinion. And no 1200 is generally not enough unless you are tiny in stature and do very little.

UticaBoy51

1 week is a retarded sample size. You can't draw any conclusions from it.

Well aren't you a sweetheart! LOL!

If you're going to look for weekly validation it's just going to mess with your head and make you lose focus. You need to set a caloric target and then stick it out for at least a month - log everything accurately, track your weight readings in a spreadsheet, etc and then review.

But wondering why after 1 week you're only down 1 lb and not 2 lbs is counterproductive

I get what you are saying and I agree with you. I have always been a slave to the scale and it drives my husband crazy. He tells me I'm too obsessed with the numbers and he's probably right. But he also tells me I'm not fat and that I'm beautiful. I think that's because he's scared to say otherwise lol.

Maybe he actually means it.

tschaff04

I am currently aiming for 1lb weight loss a week, if I don't hit that I am not at all worried but that's just a target I like to aim for. Anyway, that being said I only came here to say I sort of understand where you are coming from. I was on weight watchers for 11 months and in that 11 months I lost 98 pounds. So I was averaging 2lbs a week most weeks. It was great to see a steady loss every week and it kept me motivated. I then got pregnant with our third child and have some to lose again. This time I decided to do cal counting for two reasons. 1. I don't like the new PP system at WW. and 2. IT'S FREE! lol I am noticing that it's impossible for me to lose more than 1lb a week, I wouldn't even get close to 1.5 little lone 2. But I am also noticing I am making much smarter food choices and seeing food in a whole new way. Slow and steady is fine by me as long as the end goal is maintaining this for the rest of my life.

I do understand how hard it can be to go from 2lb's a week to 1 or less though. It's a whole new mind set. Good luck on your journey!

rreese10

Hi there! Ok, I will weigh in here, no pun intended. Ha! This is how I did it. 1200 is not too many. My recommendation, cut out the starches and replace it with protein, fruit or veggies or even nuts. Nuts have a starchy consistency and you will feel like you are getting a starch. You will go through withdrawals, but trust me, it is well worth it, and you will see the pounds drop off.

I was working with a doctor with my weightloss goals. He shared with me a key component that helped me drop weight. I learned when we eat starches, our body turns it in to sugar. So when you think you are eating that wonderful whole grain bread that is good for you? Well, your body turns that into 5 tsp of sugar. I found out that M & M's have about 7 tsp of sugar. Well, I don't know about you, but I would rather eat the M&M's. So I cut out pasta, whole grain bread, white bread, pizza, rice, oatmeal, all the stuff that is suppose to help you lose weight, and replaced it with protein and nuts. I eat between 120 & 150 grams of protein a day, sometimes go over my calories and don't have a problem. I have been on maintenance for 2 months. To test this out, on Monday, I ate 1 slice of bread with a salad, and a protein, after a very heavy intense cardio work out. I woke up the next morning and gained 1.3 pounds, and I only ate 1400 calories. Now my body obviously retained water to break down the bread. Tuesday, no bread, nuts, protein, veggies and fruits, (and about 5 m& M's), and lost 1.2 pounds.

So, I hope this helps. You will go through withdrawals, and you will feel like your muscles and organs are shutting down, but trust me, they are not! It takes about two weeks to get rid of the starch addiction. Once you do, you will feel so free! No more addiction to food! I am finally at peace with food! I wish this for everybody! My two cents.....just sayin.....Good luck! Here to support!!!

stephdeeable

Fast weight loss is nice in theory, but (sorry for how corny this will sound but..) you will miss a lot of learning and growing if you try to rush the process. I just upped my calories to slow my weight loss down, as being on the "2 pound a week" setting was having me lose 3/4 pounds a week, which may sound great but I don't want that. Slow for me, better chance to keep it off and better chance of not having my skin look like a deflated air mattress.

rreese10

Agreed! I did lose it fast, but whether it is fast or slow, it definitely is a journey. You shed lots of baggage, from the past. You have to be willing to allow the skinny you emerge. I talked to her and gave her permission to emerge. I told my skinny self that we would work together so I could allow her to emerge. We started exploring food. Appreciating for example, how apples are made. Think about it. Look at an apple, the colors, the wholeness, roundness, the pureness. Being mindful, and dealing with my emotions vs. using food to calm them. Appreciating food for what it is. Loving my body. It wasn't my body's fault for getting fat. It only got fat because of what I did with it. I truly believe my body did the best it could with the food I put in my body. When I started feeding it the right stuff, it changed and the new me emerged. Feel free to check out my pics. But I agree, it is a journey, one that can be truly spiritual and a journey into one's self, to shed all the excess baggage, and allow the true beautiful you to emerge!

ILiftHeavyAcrylics

Try to adjust your expectations and realize that getting healthy is not an event. You're not going to be able to do it, walk away, and never have to think about it again. This is the way you're going to eat and behave for the rest of your life ideally, so try not to think so much about the short term. MFP is a way to learn behaviors that you will use from now on, not just from now until you reach your goal.

1 lb per week is excellent. But realize that some weeks you may not lose anything, and some weeks you may show a gain due to water retention. You can't let it derail your efforts. Just think where you'd be if you'd stuck with it in 2011, losing 1 lb per week on average, you would have reached your goal a long time ago and be working on maintenance (which is a challenge in and of itself).

WinnerVictorious

After reading olaloki's rant post, she may come here and chew my *kitten* for posting this but neener neener, I'm going to anyway lol. I tried this apparently back in April of 2011 according to when it says I joined. I thought it was more recent than that but I guess not. Anyway, I'm not gonna lie...I only did this for a week and got discouraged because I only lost 1 lb. the first week. I have always lost 2 lbs. per week on WW so I'm sure I got off of here and back on WW to obviously not stick with it. That was my reason for the post about how this was in comparison to WW. I guess I could get off my *kitten* and figure out my points vs. my calories and see how they compare. I'm okay with losing slowly...2lbs. per week is slow but I want to lose at least that per week. I'm just worried that 1200 calories per day may be too many.

take a large glass and fill it up with water. stand on the scale holding that glass. now put down the glass and stand on the scale again. did you see the number on the scale change? do you understand the subtle point i'm trying to make?

do not weigh yourself daily. if you weigh yourself weekly, understand that your weight fluctuates due to metabolic processes occurring in your body. those weekly numbers mean NOTHING when seen by themselves. they only mean something over a long period of time. your scale is a long term trend tool, that's all.

you need to understand this fact. the number on the scale from week to week really doesn't matter at all unless you understand it in context.

klroll

Add exercise to your day to earn extra calories. That's how I do it! That makes it much easier for me to eat my calorie allotment. Plus exercise has so many benefits, that it can't be a bad thing. Good luck!

WendyTerry420

After reading olaloki's rant post, she may come here and chew my *kitten* for posting this but neener neener, I'm going to anyway lol. I tried this apparently back in April of 2011 according to when it says I joined. I thought it was more recent than that but I guess not. Anyway, I'm not gonna lie...I only did this for a week and got discouraged because I only lost 1 lb. the first week. I have always lost 2 lbs. per week on WW so I'm sure I got off of here and back on WW to obviously not stick with it. That was my reason for the post about how this was in comparison to WW. I guess I could get off my *kitten* and figure out my points vs. my calories and see how they compare. I'm okay with losing slowly...2lbs. per week is slow but I want to lose at least that per week. I'm just worried that 1200 calories per day may be too many.

IMO, two pounds a week is pretty aggressive for someone with less than 40 pounds to lose. I lost about two pounds a week until I got down to 60 pounds to lose, then I slowed it up. Personally, I'd rather lose steadily than quickly. But for me, I spent twenty years putting on an extra 100+ pounds, so it makes no sense to lose it all in a few months.

Pixi_Rex

1 week is a retarded sample size. You can't draw any conclusions from it.

With all the words that you could have used you chose retarded? You know what retarded means?

To slow.. so you realistically said
"1 week is a slow sample size". Please for the sake of humanity invest in a dictionary or thesaurus or both.


OP. 1 Week is not a good indicator as weight tends to come off the way it wants. However; I can tell you that from experience doing both (I currently do WW and use MFP) I can tell you that the points they give you should compair to what you are being told to eat here. I find that 29 points can be anywhere from 600 calories - 1900 depending on what your eating - I use MFP to figure these things out because I like knowing. Yes you get zero point food - but they still have calories so you tend to eat more fruits and veggies - lower calorie items which when plugged into MFP you will see that your daily points - mine is 29 right now...is used by my protein, carbs, fats etc. So I usually end up with about 1200-1300 calories right there, than you add your fruits and veggies and I normally end up around 1400 - 1600. Keep plugging along and you will get there.

now_or_never13

1. 2 lbs a week is pretty amazing. You may want to get
your expectations in check.

2. Read this;
http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/682138-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

2 lbs. per week is what I am aiming for. I would be thrilled with 2 lbs. per week!

2lbs per week is too much for how much you have to lose. 1200 is far too little to be eating. Do you want to keep your muscle or lose it? If you want to lose it continuing striving for too much while eating too little. If you want to keep it up your calories.

I eat 1600 a day plus exercise calories... I lose at least 1lb per week.

Set your goal to one pound a week and go from there... you will not lose weight the same each time you lose weight. Your body changes. Setting a goal too high and calories too low will only result in losing muscle which will lower your metabolism.

Check out in place of a roadmap and follow that. Try to listen to the advice given to you here... 2lbs is too much for what you have to lose. Some weeks you may lose 2lbs, some weeks 0.5lb.. some weeks you will gain or stay the same. Stop getting so caught up in what the scale says.

Tecia1970

Thank you to those who offered input and/or advice without being rude or talking down to me.

jesz124

I didn't see anyone being either of those to you!

CharRicho

The slower you lose the weight, the more calories you can eat per day, and therefore the more your "new lifestyle" is one that you can stick to. Permanently.

The more you deprive yourself, the less you can still to it, eventually you will give in. You want to work on changing your life permanently so that you are not always going to be on a diet. That is going to be more realistic if you set realistic goals. 1 lb per week is what is recommended by doctors and weight loss experts.

chusanchusan

This site also told me to eat 1200 per day. I don't get why so many people stress ++ that 1200 is too low. Can anyone enlighten?

btw - I tried ww for a short time just before I started MFP. I didn't like the points system, it seemed to have an added layer of and complexity and not great, I thought for lifelong learning and habbit forming. Do what ever suits you , This is workign for me. Good luck

jesz124

This site also told me to eat 1200 per day. I don't get why so many people stress ++ that 1200 is too low. Can anyone enlighten?

btw - I tried ww for a short time just before I started MFP. I didn't like the points system, it seemed to have an added layer of and complexity and not great, I thought for lifelong learning and habbit forming. Do what ever suits you , This is workign for me. Good luck

When you have been there, lived on 1200 a day for months then suddenly felt like you had no energy to even get out of bed let alone get to the gym you will understand why people say it's too low.

If you literally sit on your *kitten* all day and you are very obese then yes, 1200 might be right for you for a short time frame, but long term it's not conducive for a healthy active individual.

You will find a million and one arguments on MFP about eating 1200 calories a day, just type it into the search function above, you will soon see what I mean.

chantey16

you need to understand that it is supposed to be 1200 calories that is the bare minimum NET calories, not how much you eat. so if you are exercising at all, you must eat back your exercise calories, otherwise you will fall below 1200 and ruin your metabolism. also, like everyones saying, at your weight, you will most probably not be able to lose 2 pounds per week so be happy with 1!