Non-newbie cry for help

rowdylibrarian

So… I kind of gave up tracking on here for a month or so while I adjusted to my new job, and I'm ready to begin again. I need to seriously evaluate how many calories I should be eating. Now that I'm not a newbie anymore, I know a bit more about the various "methods" here (EM2WL, IF, Eat Less/Move More, 1200 cals, TDEE -%, etc.) Each has their proponents and detractors, and I'm open to hearing about almost anything that is a healthy choice at this point.

I'm 40, Female, 5'3", 162 pounds, about 37% body fat, medium-boned, and frustrated. Normal adult body weight was always around 130.

Since my tested RMR was 1195, do I really need to eat closer to that level in order to lose weight? No calorie level that I have chosen so far has actually worked, and I've stuck with them for long periods of time. 1200? 1358? 1400? 1660 (my probable TDEE)? Nada. Cardio and/or weight lifting didn't make a change in weight or inches, either. Doctor says its not medical. It seems like every calorie level I choose IS my maintenance level, since that's all I do. I'm neither gaining, nor losing. Just stuck. Since June. I'd appreciate some input! Thanks!

kristen6022

How many calories does MFP give you to eat if you set it to lose .5lbs a week?

berthabunny

So… I kind of gave up tracking on here for a month or so while I adjusted to my new job, and I'm ready to begin again. I need to seriously evaluate how many calories I should be eating. Now that I'm not a newbie anymore, I know a bit more about the various "methods" here (EM2WL, IF, Eat Less/Move More, 1200 cals, TDEE -%, etc.) Each has their proponents and detractors, and I'm open to hearing about almost anything that is a healthy choice at this point.

I'm 40, Female, 5'3", 162 pounds, about 37% body fat, medium-boned, and frustrated. Normal adult body weight was always around 130.

Since my tested RMR was 1195, do I really need to eat closer to that level in order to lose weight? No calorie level that I have chosen so far has actually worked, and I've stuck with them for long periods of time. 1200? 1358? 1400? 1660 (my probable TDEE)? Nada. Cardio and/or weight lifting didn't make a change in weight or inches, either. Doctor says its not medical. It seems like every calorie level I choose IS my maintenance level, since that's all I do. I'm neither gaining, nor losing. Just stuck. Since June. I'd appreciate some input! Thanks!

Maybe you need to look at what you are eating too. Some people can cut calories and lose nothing, but cut carbs and lose a lot. Just food for thought.

arnfolly

you are sure your doctor has checked your thyroid? The reason I ask is because my sister who is a personal trainer for a living was having issues with calories despite her INTENSE workouts several times a DAY! She finally got checked after 2 years of struggling and she was hypothroid (sluggish thyroid).
what is your daily activity level? that will also determine how many calories you should consume. Also, exercise is KEY to getting the body going. WHAT you are eating too. I cannot go near carbs (a diet controlled diabetic) w/o weight gain. So, for me, it is low carb, high fiber and NOT just calories. Does this make sense? I use to ONLY count calories, then started lowering carbs and increasing fiber and WAH LAH. After a year of struggles I actually began losing!

rowdylibrarian

you are sure your doctor has checked your thyroid?

Yup. I am hypothyroid, and have been for years, but two doctors have thoroughly checked my levels, and they are satisfied.

behind_blue_eyes_83

I once watched a BBC documentary called 'Why are thin people not fat?' (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00hbsk2). They ran an experiment which showed that when 'naturally' slim people (i.e. found it hard to gain) were fed extra calories (surplus to their normal energy needs) the body compensated by increasing its energy consumption (I believe they just did more jiggling/moving around, I don't recall). They didn't gain weight, while others in the experiment (slim or overweight) did. Whereas when overweight people are fed less, their bodies want to remain at the same weight, so they do the reverse - burn fewer calories throughout the day (even though the people thought they had the same activity level as always). There is a strong inertia to remain at that set point. If you are eating a strict calorie deficit each week and exercising actively, could the answer lie in the rest of your day? My job is sedentary (similar to a librarian's, I'd imagine) - but buying a Fitbit means I am aware of how much I've moved around and I try to eat accordingly.

rowdylibrarian

I've heard about people being "stuck" at a particular weight, and the body fighting mightily to stay there. That certainly seems to be the case here!

rowdylibrarian

How many calories does MFP give you to eat if you set it to lose .5lbs a week?

I believe it sticks with the standard 1200, but I'd have to reset to see it. I'll check.

cmriverside

How did you figure that 37% BF? When I run those numbers, I got 27.8%. That's a big difference.

If I were you I'd eat at my TDEE for two weeks. (Maintenance) Just use this site and set it at "Maintain my weight". Then at the end of two weeks, subtract 200-300 calories. Eat that for a month. And and eat your exercise calories for the whole time.

Be honest and realistic in setting your "activity level" here. No one is sedentary. If you have any kind of job, go to school, or care for childrfen at home, you are not sedentary. Choose accordingly.

The key is to stay with it for a month. You can't possibly make any kind of educated adjustments otherwise.

FitN50s

I struggled with finding the "right" amount of calories, too. I got the BodyMedia Fit armband, and now I can see what I'm actually burning every day. It takes the guesswork out of it. I know at a glance (I got the Link armband that syncs to my phone) whether or not I can have the dinner I was planning, or if it's going to be a salad night. Even when I go over my calorie deficit goal, I'm at least aware of it. Some days I'm amazed at how many calories I've burned, other days I'm dismayed at how few. Either way, I'm working with the most accurate information I can.

rowdylibrarian

How did you figure that 37% BF? When I run those numbers, I got 27.8%. That's a big difference.
......
Be honest and realistic in setting your "activity level" here. No one is sedentary. If you have any kind of job, go to school, or care for childrfen at home, you are not sedentary. .....

I think it depends on which calculator one uses for body fat, but that actual number comes from the Omron handheld calculator at my rec center. I've used it multiple times, and it's always right around 37%

I still have my activity level set at "sedentary". I agree with you about the job, kids, etc. part, but since my medically measured RMR is so low (1195), it also means that my TDEE is lower than even this site expects. If I'm not purposely working out at all, my TDEE is probably less than 1500 a day. At least that's my best guess.

Mia_RagazzaTosta

You have exactly the same stats as me. I'm 5'3", 162, and bf 37%. My BMR is 1492 and my TDEE is 2313 (moderate exercise).

rowdylibrarian

You have exactly the same stats as me. I'm 5'3", 162, and bf 37%. My BMR is 1492 and my TDEE is 2313 (moderate exercise).

Weird, right? The tech actually did the RMR test twice, two weeks apart, because we were worried that the test had been inaccurate somehow because it was so low. We even used a different breathing machine at their second facility, in case the first one had a calibration problem. The first result was 1205, the second was 1195.

rowdylibrarian

How many calories does MFP give you to eat if you set it to lose .5lbs a week?

I believe it sticks with the standard 1200, but I'd have to reset to see it. I'll check.

I was wrong... it was 1450....

bcattoes

Be honest and realistic in setting your "activity level" here. No one is sedentary. If you have any kind of job, go to school, or care for childrfen at home, you are not sedentary. Choose accordingly.

If you have a desk job, normal daily movements like going to the bathroom or kitchen, walking to/from car, cooking, light cleaning are figured into the sedentary setting.

cmriverside

How did you figure that 37% BF? When I run those numbers, I got 27.8%. That's a big difference.
......
Be honest and realistic in setting your "activity level" here. No one is sedentary. If you have any kind of job, go to school, or care for childrfen at home, you are not sedentary. .....

I think it depends on which calculator one uses for body fat, but that actual number comes from the Omron handheld calculator at my rec center. I've used it multiple times, and it's always right around 37%

I still have my activity level set at "sedentary". I agree with you about the job, kids, etc. part, but since my medically measured RMR is so low (1195), it also means that my TDEE is lower than even this site expects. If I'm not purposely working out at all, my TDEE is probably less than 1500 a day. At least that's my best guess.

The Omron calculator is not really that accurate.

If I were to go by the calculators, and used Sedentary, I would be told my BMR is 1215. I don't have a job, I'm single, and I get about 60 minutes of walking in, 3-5 times a week. My TDEE would be about 1700. As it turns out, my weight loss calorie intake needs to be around 1800-1900.

I'm just saying, don't rely 100% on some calculator. Especially an Omron $39 one. Experiment.

You missed the most important part of my previous post. You've tried various calorie intakes. Try each one for no less than a month. If you keep jumping around calorie-wise, you'll never figure it out. If I were you, I'd eat more than 1200. I'd eat more like 1500 every day for a month. Weigh and measure all the food you eat, and log it religiously. This is a science project. Treat it as such. Keep graphs and charts.

It took me a year on maintenance to figure out my "actual" calorie needs.

This is my favorite, (and exactly right for me) calculator. Plus it's a really cool gadget.

http://www.health-calc.com/diet/energy-expenditure-advanced

cmriverside

What did you mean when you said "medically tested RMR"? Did you have it done in a pod?

GauchoMark

If you have had your BMR tested and it came out to 1195, then eating 1200 a day of REAL calories, you will lose weight given enough time.

A couple of things you really need to reconcile:

1) 1200 REAL calories is different from 1200 logged calories. Most people, no matter how diligent, underestimate a portion of your intake. I do it too. So, I overcompensate on some things as well to try to make up for it. You need to really make sure you are accurate on calories, because apparently, your "window of opportunity" to lose weight is pretty narrow. You need to be dead on. Sucks, right?!

2) How long are you trusting your routine before you change stuff and are you taking enough measurements to actually be able to see a change. From a statistical standpoint, there is a rule of thumb that it takes 30 measurements as a MINIMUM to be able to have any statistical validity to an inference between values. That means you need 30 measurements on the scale to have any real confidence in a change in your real weight. The quickest you can really get that much data is weighing daily. You need to log your weights daily, even if it is in an excel spreadsheet and not "official", so you can watch the number decrease over the course of a month of so.

3) Finally, I admit that you have a couple of issues, but these are not showstoppers. They are just obstacles you need to overcome. At the end of the day, your body isn't all that much different and the same concepts apply. If you are not losing weight (and have the data to prove it) drop your calories some and give it another month. The thing is, the numbers are estimates, so it doesn't really matter what they are - you really care about the results. As an example, does it matter if you measure a stick using inches or centimeters? The length stick has a big number in centimeters compared to inches, but the stick is the same length. So, it doesn't matter which number you use, as long as you are consistent. Don't really worry about the actual number of calories that much, just be as consistent as possible logging and keep decreasing until you start seeing a 3-5 lb/month loss.

rowdylibrarian

How did you figure that 37% BF? When I run those numbers, I got 27.8%. That's a big difference.
......
Be honest and realistic in setting your "activity level" here. No one is sedentary. If you have any kind of job, go to school, or care for childrfen at home, you are not sedentary. .....

I think it depends on which calculator one uses for body fat, but that actual number comes from the Omron handheld calculator at my rec center. I've used it multiple times, and it's always right around 37%

I still have my activity level set at "sedentary". I agree with you about the job, kids, etc. part, but since my medically measured RMR is so low (1195), it also means that my TDEE is lower than even this site expects. If I'm not purposely working out at all, my TDEE is probably less than 1500 a day. At least that's my best guess.

The Omron calculator is not really that accurate.

If I were to go by the calculators, and used Sedentary, I would be told my BMR is 1215. I don't have a job, I'm single, and I get about 60 minutes of walking in, 3-5 times a week. My TDEE would be about 1700. As it turns out, my weight loss calorie intake needs to be around 1800-1900.

I'm just saying, don't rely 100% on some calculator. Especially an Omron $39 one. Experiment.

You missed the most important part of my previous post. You've tried various calorie intakes. Try each one for no less than a month. If you keep jumping around calorie-wise, you'll never figure it out. If I were you, I'd eat more than 1200. I'd eat more like 1500 every day for a month. Weigh and measure all the food you eat, and log it religiously. This is a science project. Treat it as such. Keep graphs and charts.

It took me a year on maintenance to figure out my "actual" calorie needs.

This is my favorite, (and exactly right for me) calculator. Plus it's a really cool gadget.

http://www.health-calc.com/diet/energy-expenditure-advanced

Yup, I do understand the benefits of not jumping around. I've stayed on the levels for more than a month, and sometimes much longer than a month, except at the very beginning in June, when I started getting confused while reading on here as a newbie. I actually was weight-loss-nerdy and kept an Excel sheet for awhile. Lol. Maybe maintenance for a little while is a good plan.

It is a neat gadget, but it still assumes that my BMR is 1470, and there's no way to change that. Since my _RMR_ is 1195, that means that my BMR is even a bit lower. If I subtract 275 from my total, using the RMR figure, I get 1720 for my TDEE. It's a cool gadget, though! I like the dials.

rowdylibrarian

What did you mean when you said "medically tested RMR"? Did you have it done in a pod?

No, I had it done at the hospital. Ours offers it as a service. It's the kind of RMR test where you breathe into a mask for 30-plus minutes, and they measure the oxygen/carbon dioxide ratio conversions. It was pretty neat, even with a disappointing result.

rowdylibrarian

If you have had your BMR tested and it came out to 1195, then eating 1200 a day of REAL calories, you will lose weight given enough time.

A couple of things you really need to reconcile:

1) 1200 REAL calories is different from 1200 logged calories. Most people, no matter how diligent, underestimate a portion of your intake. I do it too. So, I overcompensate on some things as well to try to make up for it. You need to really make sure you are accurate on calories, because apparently, your "window of opportunity" to lose weight is pretty narrow. You need to be dead on. Sucks, right?!

2) How long are you trusting your routine before you change stuff and are you taking enough measurements to actually be able to see a change. From a statistical standpoint, there is a rule of thumb that it takes 30 measurements as a MINIMUM to be able to have any statistical validity to an inference between values. That means you need 30 measurements on the scale to have any real confidence in a change in your real weight. The quickest you can really get that much data is weighing daily. You need to log your weights daily, even if it is in an excel spreadsheet and not "official", so you can watch the number decrease over the course of a month of so.

3) Finally, I admit that you have a couple of issues, but these are not showstoppers. They are just obstacles you need to overcome. At the end of the day, your body isn't all that much different and the same concepts apply. If you are not losing weight (and have the data to prove it) drop your calories some and give it another month. The thing is, the numbers are estimates, so it doesn't really matter what they are - you really care about the results. As an example, does it matter if you measure a stick using inches or centimeters? The length stick has a big number in centimeters compared to inches, but the stick is the same length. So, it doesn't matter which number you use, as long as you are consistent. Don't really worry about the actual number of calories that much, just be as consistent as possible logging and keep decreasing until you start seeing a 3-5 lb/month loss.

Yes, the underestimating has derailed many a calorie counting plan for many of us! It's so easy (if inaccurate) to just eyeball it! Lol. When I was being diligent, I was weighing and measuring everything. You're right. The narrow window does suck.


I definitely stayed on each calorie level for more than a month, and sometimes much more than a month, with the exception of the very beginning of the process back in June when I was reading things on here as a newbie, and getting confusing, conflicting advice. It bounced around for a few weeks back then. I actually was using a spreadsheet for awhile! I should probably go back to it.

I'll agree that these issues are not showstoppers, just terribly frustrating! I appreciate your input!

yesmint

As someone who has had similar issues, I really understand your frustration. I sometimes feel that if I'm not going to lose weight while dieting, I might as well not lose weight and eat what I want. Ring true? However, keep going - as I'm going to try and do - and let's see where we are in the summer. I've failed a few times but hope this time it's different because I'm going to expect it to be slow and not look for huge losses which never materialise and get me down. Also, one thing i would say, is do try and enjoy it. I know that when I have been my most successful I've looked on this diet as not deprivation but healthy living. It's the same food and the same amount but feels better. All the best.

WBB55

Since you're hypothyroid, a lot of the online averages and rules of thumb might simply not apply to you. You really only have the option of trial-and-error.

How much do you exercise? I know the only way I've ever gotten thru a plateau was to add/change my exercise routine or change my diet (like become vegetarian for a while). Sometimes, the change was even to simply both eat and exercise less for a couple months. I lost most of my weight over a two year period. I hit a lot of plateaus.

rowdylibrarian

Since you're hypothyroid, a lot of the online averages and rules of thumb might simply not apply to you. You really only have the option of trial-and-error.

How much do you exercise? I know the only way I've ever gotten thru a plateau was to add/change my exercise routine or change my diet (like become vegetarian for a while). Sometimes, the change was even to simply both eat and exercise less for a couple months. I lost most of my weight over a two year period. I hit a lot of plateaus.

For awhile I was walking pretty regularly, and then I was "lifting heavy" for months, but nothing was changing. Right now I'm not doing anything, but I'm ready to start again.

rowdylibrarian

As someone who has had similar issues, I really understand your frustration. *********I sometimes feel that if I'm not going to lose weight while dieting, I might as well not lose weight and eat what I want. Ring true? ************ However, keep going - as I'm going to try and do - and let's see where we are in the summer. I've failed a few times but hope this time it's different because I'm going to expect it to be slow and not look for huge losses which never materialise and get me down. Also, one thing i would say, is do try and enjoy it. I know that when I have been my most successful I've looked on this diet as not deprivation but healthy living. It's the same food and the same amount but feels better. All the best.

That TOTALLY rings true! LOL!!