I'm not losing weight :'[

Maybe it's the work out you do? Your body can get used to a specific work out or exercise. Also, depending on you weight, you should probably eat more. I say start at 1500. Don't give up honey. You can do it.

Hiii. I know it's hard but don't give up. Sometimes it takes awhile for your body to adjust and for you to lose. Are you measuring it in terms of something other than the number on the scale? like inches? I don't like following for the scale because it fluctuates so much that it can play with your head when the number goes up and down. I find many people start obsessing over that number. My suggestion would be to increase your calories and keep at it. It might take a month before you start noticing weight loss. Increase your calories, exercise (add strength training), and remember to keep a positive attitude. Eating right + exercising is making you healthy and that's the main important thing. The number on the scale or the inches lost is a bonus. That's how I look at it

Maybe it's the work out you do? Your body can get used to a specific work out or exercise. Also, depending on you weight, you should probably eat more. I say start at 1500. Don't give up honey. You can do it.

Negative on the exercise, its definitely the diet.

If you don't fuel your workouts or daily physical activity your body may burn muscle instead of fat, this causes your metabolism to drop like a stone. If you then eat a normal diet you can regain much of the weight as fat not muscle which makes you larger for the same weight. 1200 is far too low for anyone who is at all active unless they are absolutely tiny (in which case no dieting required). Losing seven pounds in two weeks could well indicate you lost water weight, ie. you underate/ overexercised, the glycogen (carb fuel) in your muscles was depleted. 1g of glycogen is stored alongside 3g of water. You haven't tried everything because it's only been a few months, you have only given every change a couple of weeks which is not long enough to reset your metabolism and tell your body it is not surviving a famine.

Walking is not going to lose you a significant amount of weight, it burns an average of 100 calories a mile (more for a larger person, less for a slimmer person) and you get no afterburn. You'd therefore have to walk an average of 35 miles to lose one pound of fat which at a brisk three and a half miles an hour will take you ten hours. You need to build lean toned muscle to boost your metabolism long term, and do high intensity interval training/ serious strength training to get a short term boost to your metabolism (up to two days after a workout!).

If you have anxiety issues stop tracking calories, you can change the settings. Start tracking nutrient intake and number of portions. Base your day around nine or ten portions of non starchy vegetables and low sugar fruits in the full rainbow of colours. This is a huge amount of food so you will need to train your body to accept it, loads of nutrients and relatively few calories. Try to include olives, coconut or avocados within that for a little healthy fats.

Then add in three portions of reduced fat dairy a day and oily fish several times a week preferably daily, calcium and omega-3s are linked with lower fat mass. Protein (meat, fish, eggs, nuts, seeds, low fat soft cheese, cottage cheese) at every meal and snack which helps you maintain/ build/ repair muscle and all the cells in your body, also a percentage of the calories are wasted simply in digestion.

Be sure you are getting enough healthy fats from the aforementioned oily fish, nuts, seeds, olives, coconut, avocados and cocoa powder/ low sugar dark chocolate if you like that as a treat. These are all nutrient dense foods, supplying vitamins minerals and antioxidants as well as the fats. Lastly check you are eating enough mineral rich foods - nuts, seeds, beans, lentils give you more quality nutrition than grains/ cereals.

if you wont open your diary then its hard to really help too much.

you say you are on your feet 8 hours a day? if that is true then 1200 cals is nowhere near enough....

and as someone esle has pointed out, you need to stick to one thing for at least 6 weeks at a time to see if it works!

Agreed! Make sure your activity level is set at least at lightly active and set your weight loss goal to 1 or 1.5 pounds a week - don't try for the two pound since that's a fairly unreasonable goal with the amount of weight you have left to lose. (I know it seems like a lot but it's not compared to someone who's morbidly obese.) Not sure what you're eating but try cutting out those light/diet foods and eat real stuff taht has more nutrients and calories. This will get you over that 1200 mark and your body will thank you.

I'm sure some will poo-poo this suggestion but I'd like to see you break up your meals and try to eat something every couple hours. You say you don't snack but snacking can actually be really good, not the evil wrong that so many think of when dieting. I'm not talking cookies, chocolate, etc but something healthy, filling and nutritious. It doesn't have to be much, just a handful of nuts or a fruit with some peanut butter or a couple hard boiled eggs... And I know this is seen as a myth to many people but for those whose metabolism has nearly shut down due to eating issues it can help. A friend of mine did this and it really helped with her weight loss. Worth a try anyway...

Also keep on eating those fruits and veggies - don't think of it as something to help you lose weight but as soemthing to help you be healthier. Try switching your focus up and maybe set fitness goals instead of weight loss goals. Especially considering your ED history, this may be helpful to you. It's less obsession about calories and more about making sure you get the right foods in every day. More lean protein, healthier carbs (natural, whole grain), healthier fats, fruits and veggies and plenty of water.

Good luck!

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/654536-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

Hi! Check out this site and figure out what you SHOULD be eating. Hunger, when we are in calorie restriction, is a misguided way to determine if we need to eat or not. Google leptin and read how this can screw up your hunger sensors in the brain. This is especially true for people who have been restricting calories for a long time or yo yo dieting.

Good luck with losing. It's hard to up your calories to fuel your body properly. I know, I didn't do it for years. Fortunately, I have hooked up with a group of 'road mappers' that understand how the body works and how to make it lose weight to keep it off! :flowerforyou:

I found for myself - it really depends on the TYPE of food i was feeding my body vs just the calories in and calories out...

I know for me personally in order to see any difference on the scale I have to sustain a eating style of 80 carbs or less a day...

Every person is different - so you have to find what works for you...for some people they can simply restrict thier calorie intake and they can loose weight...others can eat a ton of junk and simply up thier exercise and loose weight...others like myself have to really watch a certain set of macros in addtion to calorie intake and calorie burn...genetics is a fickle *****

I’m not sure if my advice may help but I can only say what my experience has been.

Like you, when I was younger I did various ‘fad’ diets – the most serious being the atkins which actually took me down to around 124 pounds. Loved it at the time but when I started eating normal food again the weight (and a lot more) piled on.

I have tried weightwatchers and it didn’t work.

I tried counting calories and it didn’t work.

I tried counting carbs and it didn’t work.

I literally thought my body was screwed and non-responsive due to the fad diets.


MFP HAS worked for me and I honestly think that it’s because it calculates how much sugar I’m allowed and I never go over my sugar limit. I have an incredibly sweet tooth and always thought that if I have low calorie sugary snacks then I’ll be okay cos I won’t go over my calorie allowance but in fact I was probably wayyyyy over my sugar intake.

On your diary monitor your sugar – try to eat veg rather than fruit and DO NOT cut out any food groups. Cutting out carbs will only lead you to binge on carbs – and the main carb is in fact sugar so that’s what you don’t want.

I’ve lost 20 pounds in 10 weeks and I want to lose 22 more. And I can honestly say I am now aware that for my body, carbs aren’t the enemy – sugar is.

Hope this helps xxx

csuhar: The thing is 1200 is a huge amount of food for me. I struggle to eat more than about 1500 to be honest. Whenever i hit 2000 or more calories i get very anxious and upset but thats just due to eating issues im trying to overcome. I eat when im hungry rather than just filling myself with calories. Sometimes it does go over 2000 if its a **** day [no one gets to my weight eating 1200 calories of veggies afterall!] but im eating less at the moment and ive found im actually eating more in my portions to make it to 1200.

If I may ask (again, feel free to not answer): What kind of "struggle" is it for you? Is it a personal / emotional one (you mention becoming anxious) or a practical one?

When I first saw the calculators saying I should be eating 3000 calories a day to maintain, I didn't believe it at first. It was a leap of faith for me to break away from the fact that, here in the USA, they're always talking about a 2000 calorie diet, which forms the basis for all our "nutritional information" on packaging and the general guidelines we teach our children. But, after making the leap and accepting that guideline, I've actually LOST a few pounds. It takes a lot of faith to go from what we've been brought up regarding as common knowledge or the "appropriate" way of doing things when these calculators tell us something different.

In the military, we see new recruits who sometimes have to make that leap. They don't believe us when we tell them they should be eating a lot when they go through training. They go from a civilian culture where we've often oversimplified things to say "if you want to keep a healthy weight, avoid eating" to one where their instructors are prompting them to eat more to maintain their health, a complete 180-degree turn from the path they originally followed. Even I was surprised when I went through training, loading my plate full and sometimes piling it high (something I never do on my own) for 3 meals a day for 4 weeks and I STILL lost 15 pounds.

But I've also come across a practical challenge. My schedule is one that makes it harder to prepare enough food. Most of the cookbooks I use that include the nutritional information usually keep each item to 300-500 calories, meaning I would need to make between 6 and 10 different items. This challenge will be an ongoing one, but the way I've been able to deal with it is to try to balance what I make from scratch with what I can buy in the store (I know we're ideally supposed to avoid procesed foods, but I'm still limited to 24 hours in a day).


Either way, I really hope you'll be able to dig deep and find whatever inspiration and motivation will keep you going. You may take a while to find what really works for you, but CAN do it. Remember, you've only been on this path for a few months. These things will take time, but it will be worth it in the end.

Well until you can stop relating food to emotional ties and until you get past that anxiety, we can not really help. Your asking to help you solve a problem but won't tell us the problem. But here are my thoughts based on experiences of working with people with ED's. First, you need to follow ninerbuff's advice by sticking to a program for several months. In fact, since you had an ED, you probably destroyed your lean body mass, so it could take longer to rehabilitate everything. If you are active and you workout 4-6 days a week, you probably need to eat 1800-2100 calories a day. Second, you need to weight train, it needs to be heavy and it needs to be around 3 days a week to help preserve what is left of your muscle. Also, constantly breaking down the muscles so your body is forced to repair will cause your metabolism to increase and eventually stabilize again. Essentially, you want to reset your RMR to where it should be as opposed to it's suppressed state. Also, you should have a diet high in protein. This will allow your body to recover and repair the muscles. Generally, I suggest 35% carbs, 40% protein and 25% fats for macro's. It has worked for me as well as many others here and it lets you hit the rule of 1g of protein and .35g of fat per lb of lean body mass (pending you eat enough calories).


Outside of that, you need some help for the mental instability. And eliminate the scale. Start to take pictures and body measurements. If you eliminate the enabler of distress (the scale), you can just concentrate on getting stronger and more fit and you will see greater results. Weight is really meaningless. Weighing less doesn't mean you are skinnier either as demonstrated by the two below threads. If you work on being fit, then the rest will come.


http://www.nerdfitness.com/blog/2011/07/21/meet-staci-your-new-powerlifting-super-hero/

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/392784-skinny-fat-vs-fit-photo?hl=skinny+fat

I understand what your feeling, I have been dieting for 2 months and did so much homework on what is the right foods and wrong. I added exercise, and like you I ate my calorie count both ways before and after exercise. and ate less then allowed after exercise. I lost 10 pounds but the last week not one pound gone. It is very discouraging but I am determined to lose this extra weight. I read the ingredients before anything goes in my mouth. what the heck can I do to get past this platue. I even changed up my exercise because i read your bady can get used to the exercise. the only thing I haven't tried is starving myself. I know that is not what i need to do can anyone help

Well weight loss isn't linear, so adjusting your expectations will help. Also, try not to eat under your goals. Also, keep in mind a calorie deficit is stress on your body, and when you don't eat enough, it will add more stress. And as many studies show, stress prevents weight loss (due to cortisol). But keep at it, give it time and if you can't figure it out, then post a thread. Most women I know eat 1700-2000 calories (if they are active). So there might be some thought if you are eating enough.

I'm sure some will poo-poo this suggestion but I'd like to see you break up your meals and try to eat something every couple hours. You say you don't snack but snacking can actually be really good, not the evil wrong that so many think of when dieting. I'm not talking cookies, chocolate, etc but something healthy, filling and nutritious. It doesn't have to be much, just a handful of nuts or a fruit with some peanut butter or a couple hard boiled eggs... And I know this is seen as a myth to many people but for those whose metabolism has nearly shut down due to eating issues it can help. A friend of mine did this and it really helped with her weight loss. Worth a try anyway...

This.

I started keeping nuts in my desk drawer at work, as I was snacking on chocolate bars etc during the day. Now I just have a couple of small handfuls of nuts instead, and I'm less hungry, and feel better for it. Plus the protein makes up for days when my meat intake is low.

Honestly it sounds to me like you're having eating disorder issues and that you should seek medical attention to get you on the right road.