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sean23
sean23 Posts: 34 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I have come to this site for a lot of advice and have read and learned a lot to try to understand weight loss. Right now, my wife is totally frustrated again with her lack of weight loss. She is doing Weight Watchers and all was going very well until the holidays. She had lost 14 pounds over an 8 week period. We were very happy with the rate she was losing it, very consistently, with no signs of slowing down. Then she gained about 4 pounds over the couole weeks. She got right back into her routine but the weight loss stalled. She would lose 1/2 pound one week then gain 2 the next and so on, all the while doing exactly what she did to lose all the weight. In the 2 months since she is 7 pounds higher than she was before Christmas. She gets 35 flex points with the plan. She usually only dips into them on the weekend on 2 meals when we eat out, other than that she doesn't use them. She eats very healthy all week. I even made her try to eat most of her 35 extra points the last couple weeks in case she wasn't eating enough and she's gained 3 more pounds. What do we do? Does she go back to eating exactly what she did to lose weight, or does she eat even more?
Its very frustrating because it just doesn't make since why she cant lose weight or why she gains when she shouldn't. She doesn't go to the bathroom except for the first couple days of the week after eating out. She'll go 4or5 days without. She's always had somewhat of that problem. Plus, she's added fiber, drinks a lot of water and tried different foods to make her go more, and I think thats part of her problem. Her thyroid and lab work is good. I want to help but don't know how too. Why did this program that worked so well two months ago not work now? Should I get her metabolism tested? Any help would be appreciated. She is 5'1 and currently 155 pounds. She is wanting to get her eating down so she can start adding in workouts again. The week she was working out more, she didn't lose. Thanks

Replies

  • ttkg
    ttkg Posts: 357 Member
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    My aunt successfully lost 60 lbs on WW and she found that she absolutely needed to use all of her flex points each week. She did this over 18 months, it didn't happen overnight. However she has kept it off for several years now and looks great.

    Some tips for your wife would be to eat breakfast as soon as she wakes up, this will get her metabolism started right away. Also, don't wait to lose weight to start working out, even if it is just getting out for a walk each and every day. Exercise will help her burn calories and she may not see results for the first week or two but it is important to stay the course.

    Personally, any success I have had has been because I correctly managed my expectations, I do not expect to lose 2lbs per week, but I DO expect to feel better about myself and I do expect to continue on this path to a healthier version of me.

    Also, with any weight loss there will come the time when you hit a plateau, it's inevitable. It sucks and it is frustrating but it's important that we don't give up especially after we've put in so much hard work. Recently I was talking with a friend complaining that it had been 3 weeks with no changes, she told me to go out and have an ice cream sundae. She said sometimes our systems need to be shocked (she is not a DR, nor a nutritionist or a personal trainer; this was just her personal advice to me). I tried it, it tasted great, and it actually worked and more weight started to come off after that.

    The best thing I could say to you is to continue to support your wife. Encourage her when she hits those plateaus and maybe also help her to re-examine her expectations. If they are too high she will constantly be disappointed and may give up. She didn't gain weight over night and she won't lose it over night either.

    PS - you mentioned issues with bowel movements, is she eating enough of the good fat? Maybe discuss this with her DR?
  • osram34
    osram34 Posts: 54
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    Personally, any success I have had has been because I correctly managed my expectations, I do not expect to lose 2lbs per week, but I DO expect to feel better about myself and I do expect to continue on this path to a healthier version of me.

    Well said! Its about being healthy not just loosing weight... the weight will drop just be healthy stress can also impede weight loss.... focus on feeling goooddddddddddd
  • sean23
    sean23 Posts: 34 Member
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    Thank you. We aren't going to give up. Its hard to get her to try and eat all the extra calories when everytime she does the scale continues to go up. She would be happy to lose 1/2 pound a week if it continued to go in the right direction. Its hard to see the scale go up 2 or 3 pounds when she is eating as well as she is. Thanks for all the advice.
  • clhelms
    clhelms Posts: 6
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    Is she working out, doing any sort of exercise? I did WW and lost 30 lbs but combined that with a curves in order to really get things going. If she's staying in points and not starving herself and exercising she may have platued and needs a change in her exercise routine to restart her weight loss.

    Carrie
  • sean23
    sean23 Posts: 34 Member
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    Thank you everyone. We are going to just stick it out and add her exercise back in and see what happens. She won't give up. We're just not sure exactly the best thing to do. I would think by her staying in her points allowed and working out she shouldn't gain over the long haul.
  • here_I_go_again
    here_I_go_again Posts: 463 Member
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    She may want to think about adding flax seed to her cereal, yogurt, whatever. It is a great source of fiber and has lots of health benefits. It has helped me "go." I have the same problem as your wife.
  • kwardklinck
    kwardklinck Posts: 1,601
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    Ok not to be indelicate but it is her bathroom issues. She needs to work on getting those straightened out. I use Super Dieter's tea after dinner and it helps with that problem. If she could make herself go every day she probably wouldn't be gaining. Also she can't dramatically increase her fiber without causing the problems to worsen. She probably needs to back off on the fiber just a little bit and get rid of what she's carrying around all week.
  • marjaskow
    marjaskow Posts: 81
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    I too lost a great deal of weight with weight watchers and then it stopped. After the holidays and the 12 week session ending early Feb. I was the same weight as 12 weeks ago, going up & down. I decided to give paying WW a break and went to this site. I am still folllowing the WW guidelines/food requirements. But on this site every calorie counts including vegetables. Also it helps to see the sodium and carbs you are getting that you may not have realized on the WW plan. This site is low on the fiber requirements so I still aim for 25-35 a day and drink a lot of water. I also talked with a nutritionist and her calorie recommendation and amount of carbs per day were almost exact to this site for me. She did suggest that carbs help your metab. and are burned better if they are evenly spread throughout the day. Never have a high carb breakfast & none the rest of the day. After 2 weeks on here I lost 3 pounds. I get weighed again tomorrow for my 3rd week. I do exercise and try to eat the majority of the calories they recommend here for it, but am usually a bit low. As you can tell by my going to WW for over 2 years, seeing a nutritionist, and using this site I am really serious about getting all the weight off and take any advice I can get. I also go to a personal trainer one day a week to get in one really great workout and keep me motivated to do my own during the week. Good luck to you.

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