Are you on a weight plateau? or have experienced one

I'm on my second plateau....

First one was around the month of June....after losing 55 pounds in 6 months.

I broke it by buying a bike and biking like crazy.

This time I have been stuck since September.

And yes, both times I have stayed well below maintenance calories. In fact this one I think is from eating too far below for sooo long.

I went up to maintenance for a few weeks and just dropped down to around 1600 on Monday....hope this gets the scale moving again.

Two main factors contribute to plateaus:
Metabolic adaption and muscle catabolism

Metabolic adaption occurs whenever you eat a calorie deficit for a prolonged period of time. Your body decreases your metabolism because it sees this as a famine or some other kind of hardship and it doesn't know how long it will last. To fight this it starts rationing. The general advice for getting over this kind of plateau is to eat at maintenance for 2 weeks to reset your metabolism. This probably won't fully reset you, but it will get your body to stop being so stingy with the fat oxidation for a little while. As your body fat gets lower, this process happens faster and so you'll need to do resets more often. At very low body fat percentages, there is a technique known as "refeeding" that basically involves doing a metabolic reset once or twice a week (one or two days of eating at maintenance) to try to stave off metabolic adaptation as much as possible.

Muscle catabolism is kind of the dark side of weight loss. Your body uses both muscle and fat for energy in a calorie deficit and it turns out that muscle is actually more bioavailable than fat. So if your body is really stressed and taxed for energy, it will preferentially break down muscle tissue for energy. As your body breaks down more and more muscle (and you won't replace that muscle while in a caloric deficit), your metabolism decreases. The best way to prevent this kind of plateau is to eat a high protein diet and do whole body resistance training. This basically tells your body that you need that muscle and it shouldn't break it down unless it really really has to. Also, you shouldn't run a huge caloric deficit, eat a very low calorie diet or engage in extreme cardio training while in a caloric deficit (these are all very stressful on your body and encourage catabolism) if you want to preserve your lean body mass and subsequently, your metabolism.

This is what I struggle with. I have plateued three times at the same weight, and cannot seem to get below it. The previous two times, I have given up and ended up gaining the weight back, but this time I am determined to get through it. I have increased my workout level and gained lbs, but lost a few inches overall, but no real results, so yesterday, i started a new plan. I decreased my workouts slightly and I am going to eat more. Fingers crossed that this works! I have been on this plateu for 2.5 months.....

It's not that simple.

I'm on my second plateau....

First one was around the month of June....after losing 55 pounds in 6 months.

I broke it by buying a bike and biking like crazy.

This time I have been stuck since September.

And yes, both times I have stayed well below maintenance calories. In fact this one I think is from eating too far below for sooo long.

I went up to maintenance for a few weeks and just dropped down to around 1600 on Monday....hope this gets the scale moving again.

^ Are you sure it was a plateau? Were you checking your weight loss (pounds), inches, and body fat percentage? Just seems odd that none of those would go down.

I plateau more often than not. My TDEE is around 1900 and I was eating 1200 cals a day so I don't think I was feeding my body enough. So I upped my cals and am now waiting to see if there is a change. I plan on having to wait a month or so to actually see anything, since I had done this same thing before and lost 5 pounds in a month.

When I got near my goal weight, I hit a 14 week plateau. During that time I would lose a little weight, but put it back on next weigh in. I do a fair amount of strength training, so although my weight didn't budge, I dropped a dress size. I stuck with it, and eventually my weight moved in the right direction.

Judging by my MFP pal's experiences, most people on a long term weight loss journey go through some sort of weight loss stall.

Two main factors contribute to plateaus:
Metabolic adaption and muscle catabolism

Metabolic adaption occurs whenever you eat a calorie deficit for a prolonged period of time. Your body decreases your metabolism because it sees this as a famine or some other kind of hardship and it doesn't know how long it will last. To fight this it starts rationing. The general advice for getting over this kind of plateau is to eat at maintenance for 2 weeks to reset your metabolism. This probably won't fully reset you, but it will get your body to stop being so stingy with the fat oxidation for a little while. As your body fat gets lower, this process happens faster and so you'll need to do resets more often. At very low body fat percentages, there is a technique known as "refeeding" that basically involves doing a metabolic reset once or twice a week (one or two days of eating at maintenance) to try to stave off metabolic adaptation as much as possible.

Muscle catabolism is kind of the dark side of weight loss. Your body uses both muscle and fat for energy in a calorie deficit and it turns out that muscle is actually more bioavailable than fat. So if your body is really stressed and taxed for energy, it will preferentially break down muscle tissue for energy. As your body breaks down more and more muscle (and you won't replace that muscle while in a caloric deficit), your metabolism decreases. The best way to prevent this kind of plateau is to eat a high protein diet and do whole body resistance training. This basically tells your body that you need that muscle and it shouldn't break it down unless it really really has to. Also, you shouldn't run a huge caloric deficit, eat a very low calorie diet or engage in extreme cardio training while in a caloric deficit (these are all very stressful on your body and encourage catabolism) if you want to preserve your lean body mass and subsequently, your metabolism.

Do you know how to do a proper refeeding if you are doing a low carb diet?

Hi, Im on a weight plateau and its been going on for about a month now. I've been working out 6x a week for an hour and I only lost 1lb so far! Somebody please tell me How I can get off this pateau and start losing again.

By doing what this guy said.....you have to re-boot. I re-boot every 6-8 weeks.

Two main factors contribute to plateaus:
Metabolic adaption and muscle catabolism

Metabolic adaption occurs whenever you eat a calorie deficit for a prolonged period of time. Your body decreases your metabolism because it sees this as a famine or some other kind of hardship and it doesn't know how long it will last. To fight this it starts rationing. The general advice for getting over this kind of plateau is to eat at maintenance for 2 weeks to reset your metabolism. This probably won't fully reset you, but it will get your body to stop being so stingy with the fat oxidation for a little while. As your body fat gets lower, this process happens faster and so you'll need to do resets more often. At very low body fat percentages, there is a technique known as "refeeding" that basically involves doing a metabolic reset once or twice a week (one or two days of eating at maintenance) to try to stave off metabolic adaptation as much as possible.

Muscle catabolism is kind of the dark side of weight loss. Your body uses both muscle and fat for energy in a calorie deficit and it turns out that muscle is actually more bioavailable than fat. So if your body is really stressed and taxed for energy, it will preferentially break down muscle tissue for energy. As your body breaks down more and more muscle (and you won't replace that muscle while in a caloric deficit), your metabolism decreases. The best way to prevent this kind of plateau is to eat a high protein diet and do whole body resistance training. This basically tells your body that you need that muscle and it shouldn't break it down unless it really really has to. Also, you shouldn't run a huge caloric deficit, eat a very low calorie diet or engage in extreme cardio training while in a caloric deficit (these are all very stressful on your body and encourage catabolism) if you want to preserve your lean body mass and subsequently, your metabolism.