Starvation mode (again probably...)

it's great that you are feeling good, about your body. and yes your diet is working, for you it's doing what you want it to do, you are losing weight. but your diet affects so much more than your weight. a proper diet is essential to maintaining your heart health, bone health, fertility. if losing weight and looking good is whats most important to you, then you should know that an improper diet can also affect your teeth, your hair, your complexion, and your finger/toenails. when you are at an unhealthy weight, losing weight is important. how ever just because you lose the weight doesn't mean you are any healthier than you started.

if you really truly aren't hungry after only 500 calories, then you need to see a doc, because there might actually be a serious physical issue causing it. if you don't like your current doc, get a new one, doctor shop until you find one that you are comfortable with.

like i said before being skinny (or curvy) is great, but you can't enjoy it if your dead.

It sounds like you're a student? Congratulations on your steady weight loss. I can see how if you're focused on studying you aren't eating as much some days. The good thing about that is you're not stress eating and you have the ability to focus on things. Probably drinking coffee or other caffiene that also supresses appetite. If you're low on calories, think in terms of eating brain food - like a strawberry banana protien shake or something. As long as your body can use everything you give it, that's great and you'll need the sustenance to stay sharp day after day!
Keep in mind the things that are part of your lifestyle now that are working for you so you'll know how to adjust after school to maintain your healthy body.

Starvation mode isn't a myth - if you are eating too far below BMR for too long you will have problems, but what is a bit of a myth is the idea you need to eat every few hours to “boost” metabolism or that skipping a meal here or there is a sign of problems to come. The human body is pretty amazing. We as humans didn’t evolve eating mini-meals or protein evenly spaced throughout the day. (If that works for you, great, but some of us only eat 2-3 times per day without snacking or grazing.) So, evolutionally, we can go a relative amount of time without eating and without experiencing negative effects. Many may be familiar with this already in the medical realm – before testing or surgery you are requested to fast, sometimes up to 24 hours. Your blood glucose and blood pressure stabilize. Each time you eat, the levels raise a bit. If you’ve ever practiced intermittent fasting for religious or health reasons, well, you know what I’m talking about.

starvation mode doesnt exist.
ur metabolism goes down =(
but "starvation mode" isnt real.
eat less, lose more.

Um, what exactly do you think starvation mode is?! It's your body decreasing your metabolism to stay alive when incoming energy (food) is low. :laugh:

Sorry, and to answer the OP. Everyone is different. I've been fighting my way out of this mythical (haha) starvation mode for nearly 3 months now! I've gone from eating 1200 cals a day to an average of about 1600-1700 a day and I've still lost weight. After 4 months at 1200 calories (which was about 500 NET calories after exercise most days), my body refused to drop another pound for nearly a month. As I started eating more, it started letting go of more, but I've had to continually increase the amount I'm eating over the last 3 months. And, since I wasn't losing weight at 1200 calories a day and I AM losing weight averaging about 1700 calories a day (around 1200 NET calories after exercise), that right there is proof to me that my body had slowed my metabolism WAY down to cope with how little I was feeding it.

In short, no, I don't recommend eating so little. Nothing good is going to come of it. It will also do you some good to take a break from studying & go for a 30 minute jog or bike ride or walk each day. Relieves stress and gets your muscles working (which increases your metabolism). We can't always trust our bodies to tell us what it needs. When I weighed 270 pounds, I often got up at 7am and didn't eat anything until 10pm. I wasn't hungry. This eating habit kept me a lot heavier than I would've been if I had eaten regularly throughout the day (not necessarily because of the time I ate, but all of the circumstances the situation entailed was probably at least 75% of the reason I had gotten so big). Weighing 270 pounds is obviously not what my body needs, but that was the "natural" pattern it fell into.

Good lord people. Please stop scaring this girl into thinking she's got an eating disorder. :huh:

Bottom line is - listen to your body. If you feel hungry, eat. If you don't, don't force yourself. Make sure you get a balance of fruits, veggies, healthy proteins and fats.

If you have a day or two a week of 500 calories (especially days you don't do anything but sit around) you WILL not go into starvation mode. Everyone loves to throw around that term.

Someone who eats 500 calories every day will eventually stop burning and their metabolism will shut down. Then the body will stop losing weight and you will get sick. But this would take a certain amount of time...it isn't going to happen in a day or two.

My best advice would be to keep doing what you're doing, it is obviously working and you're losing weight. Good for you! Calorie cycling is awesome too - keep changing up the calories and keep your body guessing. Your body will eventually adjust to a steady amount of calories so it is good to keep it changing depending on your activity level, age, etc..

I couldn't have said this better myself! :drinker:

If I'm feeling hungry, I don't check how many calories I have left in the day. I eat something. That's about as basic as it gets.

Telling her she is obsessive and on the brink of an eating disorder is about the worst advice anyone can give her.

She obviously has weight to lose --- she isn't 90 pounds asking how to lose weight --- she was asking why should she eat if she isn't hungry? And she shouldn't. The body will eventually tell her she's hungry again and she will eat.

We (general public) get too obsessive and emotional over every minute detail and I'll tell ya, it isn't healthy. I believe that is why most "diets" eventually fail - we get sick and tired of obsessing and throw in the towel.

I think everyone has good intentions here. Obsessing over counting isn't healthy for some, but listening to our bodies doesn't work for everybody either. Eating when I feel like it is what gets me into trouble. I can't trust my body to give me good info, so tracking is vital for me. For someone else who might obsess, tracking and counting could lead to unhealthy behavior. I don't know if the OP has those tendencies, but I do believe 100 percent that she needs to rely on science right now more than trusting what her own body is telling her if she's eating only 500 calories on a daily basis.

Good lord people. Please stop scaring this girl into thinking she's got an eating disorder. :huh:

Bottom line is - listen to your body. If you feel hungry, eat. If you don't, don't force yourself. Make sure you get a balance of fruits, veggies, healthy proteins and fats.

If you have a day or two a week of 500 calories (especially days you don't do anything but sit around) you WILL not go into starvation mode. Everyone loves to throw around that term.

Someone who eats 500 calories every day will eventually stop burning and their metabolism will shut down. Then the body will stop losing weight and you will get sick. But this would take a certain amount of time...it isn't going to happen in a day or two.

My best advice would be to keep doing what you're doing, it is obviously working and you're losing weight. Good for you! Calorie cycling is awesome too - keep changing up the calories and keep your body guessing. Your body will eventually adjust to a steady amount of calories so it is good to keep it changing depending on your activity level, age, etc..

I couldn't have said this better myself! :drinker:

I could've. "Listen to your body" is pure bs when it comes to food intake. My intention isn't to offend kdiamond here, but seriously.

I'd disagree that it's "pure BS" when my body says "enough is enough, push away the plate." We have natural receptors for hunger and different receptors for cravings (outside of true hunger) - problem is many can't tell the two apart very well.