Struggling!

W2obx
W2obx Posts: 17 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I have struggled with the same 2 lbs for over two weeks now! My doctor had me on phentermine for a month and I lost most of my weight while on the medication, but did lose some after the medication. Any ways, I became so accustomed to eating well below the required calorie amount that I continued this even after phentermine. My recommended calorie intake for the day is roughly 1800 but after exercise I am lucky to clear 1000 a day. I am not gaining, which some believe is the response to large weight loss so quickly through medication, but I do lose and gain the same 2 pounds a couple times a week. According to my doctor, 500 calories below your goal calorie intake a day will give you about a pound of weight loss a week. Well, it appears my body has shut down! If I eat the recommended amount of calories a day I gain weight, but if I eat below 1000 a day I lose weight to a point then it stops. Any suggestions or has anyone else faced this before and can provide some advice or encouragement?

Thanks

Mark

Replies

  • Acg67
    Acg67 Posts: 12,142 Member
    I have struggled with the same 2 lbs for over two weeks now! My doctor had me on phentermine for a month and I lost most of my weight while on the medication, but did lose some after the medication. Any ways, I became so accustomed to eating well below the required calorie amount that I continued this even after phentermine. My recommended calorie intake for the day is roughly 1800 but after exercise I am lucky to clear 1000 a day. I am not gaining, which some believe is the response to large weight loss so quickly through medication, but I do lose and gain the same 2 pounds a couple times a week. According to my doctor, 500 calories below your goal calorie intake a day will give you about a pound of weight loss a week. Well, it appears my body has shut down! If I eat the recommended amount of calories a day I gain weight, but if I eat below 1000 a day I lose weight to a point then it stops. Any suggestions or has anyone else faced this before and can provide some advice or encouragement?

    Thanks

    Mark

    You are a 225ish lb male eating 1000 or below? I would hope it's at least entirely protein for a PSMF style diet, otherwise eat more, a lot more and stop worrying about the scale. The long term trend is what is important not day to day or week to week fluctuations
  • ArroganceInStep
    ArroganceInStep Posts: 6,239 Member
    What's an average day like for you with food?
  • aprilnicole333
    aprilnicole333 Posts: 1
    My husband (260lbs - 5'11") - ate 1000 calories a day for two weeks. He didn't lose a thing. Meanwhile, I ate the same (250lb female - just had our first baby). I lost 9lbs. We consulted a dietician and his doctor's office. They have him on a 1700/cal/day diet. He has now lost 7lbs in 2 weeks. He HAD to give his body more calories and more frequent meals. >>>> Dipping below the recommended actually didn't help him lose any weight and he was starving all the time.

    Second... the dietician also suggested a 'cheat' day every few weeks - bump up our calories to kick-start our metabolism again after they slid into a routine.

    Good luck, hang in there!!
  • W2obx
    W2obx Posts: 17 Member
    Thank you for the quick responses… The reason I am worried about the scales is the body fat calculations. Even though I do not agree with the weight to height calculation it is what everyone seems to go by. I am six feet tall and currently weight 236 lbs. According to the body fat calculation it has me at 32% body fat and that has my doctor all over me. Using the military calculations of neck waist and height I come in at 26% but that doesn’t matter to most. It appears everyone needs to be skinny as a rail!

    I do take in more protein than required a day but my entire meal is not made up of protein. A few days ago I increased my calorie intake to 1700 a day but after workout which burns 600-700 calories I still come in just above 1000 a day. My recommended maintain amount is 2500 calories a day and after 2 lb loss a week estimation it puts me at 1500 a day so that is what I try to shoot for. It is very hard to maintain that amount and still eat small portions of food.

    Maybe I can throw a few more protein shakes in during the day to help increase the calorie amounts.
  • ArroganceInStep
    ArroganceInStep Posts: 6,239 Member
    Thank you for the quick responses… The reason I am worried about the scales is the body fat calculations. Even though I do not agree with the weight to height calculation it is what everyone seems to go by. I am six feet tall and currently weight 236 lbs. According to the body fat calculation it has me at 32% body fat and that has my doctor all over me. Using the military calculations of neck waist and height I come in at 26% but that doesn’t matter to most. It appears everyone needs to be skinny as a rail!

    I do take in more protein than required a day but my entire meal is not made up of protein. A few days ago I increased my calorie intake to 1700 a day but after workout which burns 600-700 calories I still come in just above 1000 a day. My recommended maintain amount is 2500 calories a day and after 2 lb loss a week estimation it puts me at 1500 a day so that is what I try to shoot for. It is very hard to maintain that amount and still eat small portions of food.

    Maybe I can throw a few more protein shakes in during the day to help increase the calorie amounts.

    So you're saying you're netting just over 1k not grossing it. That's good for starters. How many calories per day do you burn with exercise? What do you do?

    What are your meals like? You say you get more than required, how much is that?

    Are you lifting?
  • W2obx
    W2obx Posts: 17 Member
    Rtalencar85- By the time I finish my day that includes exercise and food intake I am finishing around 1,000 calories a day. I average around 1,500 – 1,600 calories of food then exercise which varies between 400 – 600 calories a day putting me around the 1,000 calorie a day total. My protein intake is normally around 70 grams a day, yesterday I hit 80 so it does vary some. My meals are all homemade so I can track the contents… lots of grilled meat. I do not drink any soda or sugar products strictly water only and that is normally 4 – 5 33 oz bottles of spring water a day. As for weight training I use my own body weight to do pushups, situps, squats, pull-ups, etc. I do run/walk about 3 miles a day for cardio.
  • Greenrun99
    Greenrun99 Posts: 2,065 Member
    I would say start eating larger portions of your meals to get you at 1600 NET a day if you are going to continue with your workouts.. you probably need to eat more than that but for now you can try that... my suggestion and then when your used to that, increase to your TDEE - Cut percentage (where you probably should be)
  • ArroganceInStep
    ArroganceInStep Posts: 6,239 Member
    Rtalencar85- By the time I finish my day that includes exercise and food intake I am finishing around 1,000 calories a day. I average around 1,500 – 1,600 calories of food then exercise which varies between 400 – 600 calories a day putting me around the 1,000 calorie a day total. My protein intake is normally around 70 grams a day, yesterday I hit 80 so it does vary some. My meals are all homemade so I can track the contents… lots of grilled meat. I do not drink any soda or sugar products strictly water only and that is normally 4 – 5 33 oz bottles of spring water a day. As for weight training I use my own body weight to do pushups, situps, squats, pull-ups, etc. I do run/walk about 3 miles a day for cardio.

    How confident are you in the calorie estimates for your food? What I mean by that is say you have a stir fry for dinner. Do you weigh each item before it's cooked (including cooking oils) and then figure out eactly how much of the whole you ate or do you rough math it? I'm not trying to belittle your measurements but recognize that estimating calorie intake is one of the things people are absolute WORST at. Even scientists doing studies have trouble controlling calorie intake in test subjects.

    So that's the first thing.

    Assuming that's fine, 1000 net calories, for a guy your size, is far too little without direct doctor supervision. 70 to 80 grams of protein is also pretty low. Shoot for 150 minimum. Adding in protein shakes could definitely help you in that regard (and doesn't require a substantial change in how you eat).

    How many of each of the BW exercises can you do at one time?

    When you say walk/run for cardio, are you doing interval training? Are you able to jog 3 miles non-stop?

    Take before and after pictures and measurements. After the month or two is up, assess your progress. Your goal should be to have a better understanding of your body and what it responds to. For that to happen you need to have consistent, accurate measures of your progress. Unfortunately that's something you're going to have to determine for yourself. There's a wealth of knowledge on this site (and others) about things that have worked for many other folks. At the end of the day all of those paradigms are garbage if you can't get them to work for you and stick with it consistently.

    Consistency trumps any efficacy gain you might derive from one plan or the next (assuming they aren't complete garbage of course).

    With that in mind, and given that you're eating so little, here's my (recognize I'm just an amateur from the interwebz, take my advice with a grain of salt) suggestion:

    1) Set your total calorie intake to 2000 per day. Be as meticulous as possible with your logging for 1-2 months, log EVERYTHING you eat. Try not to cheat during this time as you're trying to get a baseline, but if you do, make sure you still log all of your intake.

    2) Get 150 grams of protein and 50 grams of fat minimum. The remaining 950 calories you can eat however you like, but make sure you hit those minimums.

    3) Do some resistance training. You're doing bw work, I don't do a lot of that. Make sure you're hitting everything and do it often enough to make progress. I like supersetting press and pull movements, and try to make sure you get the vertical and horizontal components. Situps are fine, but lots of people like planks better. And for legs make sure you're working up to pistol squats over full bodyweight squats.

    4) Cardio. I like cardio, it's not necessary for weight loss but it's good for you. Just do it. Try a combination of interval training and steady state.

    Above all, track your progress and stay consistent. Be smart about it. If you're losing weight but your training is sucking or you feel like crap, increase your intake. If you're not losing or are gaining, decrease your intake. These are both over time and once you're eating a reasonable amount of food to begin with. If you don't lose in a 5 day period, that's not enough of a sample size. If after 5 weeks you're still stalling, then you should make a change. Find out what you respond to. Once you do, it's just a matter of sticking with the program.

    Good luck.

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