Confused and not losing!

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Charliegirl1974
Charliegirl1974 Posts: 28 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hey folks, can someone out there help me?!

I have a fairly healthy diet, and in order to lose a few pounds the app tells me to eat 1200 calories. I'm quite often not eating enough calories based on the exercise I'm doing, so not losing anything. What should I be eating? How much carbs compared to protein, etc? Should I be eating more, exercising more, or what?! My problem area is my tummy really....not that it's fat but I can pinch more than an inch when sitting down! Should I give up bread? Confused.....

Thanks, C.
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Replies

  • concordancia
    concordancia Posts: 5,320 Member
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    The pinch an inch thing is based on standing up. Eat more and do some ab exercises.
  • GuybrushThreepw00d
    GuybrushThreepw00d Posts: 784 Member
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    You don't have much to lose, i think 1200 is too low. How long have you been doing 1200 cal's for?

    Can you use this, and post what your TDEE is?
    http://www.fitnessfrog.com/calculators/tdee-calculator.html

    If you open your food diary, you're more likely to get better advice.
  • _Peacebone_
    _Peacebone_ Posts: 229 Member
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    Eat more protein (1 gram per lb of lean body mass) and lift heavy weights. Also, you should probably eat more calories.
  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,868 Member
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    eat more calories to fuel your exercise or stop your exercise. If you need to only lose a couple of Lbs, 1,200 calories is pretty aggressive. I imagine MFP gave you that number because you said you wanted to lose 2 Lbs per week...very aggressive for cosmetic weight loss and the body doesn't usually respond well to it. 1,200 is the lowest caloric intake that MFP will give you and you should at minimum net to that...which means you need to eat back most of your exercise calories to get there.

    When you do not have a whole lot to lose, the body doesn't respond well to aggressive weight loss because it is smart and wants to hold onto those fat stores...when you go aggressive, and you don't have a lot to lose, you body will stall the metabolism in short order and shut down "non-essential" functions to cope with the deficit...you should be at a smaller deficit if you only have a few pounds to lose.
  • Abi_bug04
    Abi_bug04 Posts: 220
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    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/654536-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

    Read that link. It's a great tool, and goes through a step by step process of exactly how to set the right calorie goals for you!

    Good luck!
  • laylaness
    laylaness Posts: 262 Member
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    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/654536-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

    Read that link. It's a great tool, and goes through a step by step process of exactly how to set the right calorie goals for you!

    Good luck!

    This.

    Also, when you only have a few pounds to lose, you will lose slowly.
  • bathsheba_c
    bathsheba_c Posts: 1,873 Member
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    You should consistently eat at least your BMR in calories every day. BMR (basal metabolic rate) is the number of calories your body uses every day just keeping your organs alive. You want to be eating enough to fuel your heart, lungs, intestines, etc.

    Since you have so little excess body fat and you say it's all in your stomach, you may actually find that you would be better served by eating at or above maintenance and lifting heavy weights. You can look around the forums and find examples of that. They are usually labelled with something like "the scale lies" because you will gain weight, but lose body fat.
  • CapturedNightingale
    CapturedNightingale Posts: 10
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    Sounds like you need a metabolism boost! I also keep a fairly healthy diet (Although I eat way too few kalories sometimes) but after a while of healthy eating you just stop losing. It's so annoying! So, what you need is a boosting day! Eat whatever you want! I'm talking pizza, chocholate, cupcakes, ANYTHING! You'll probably think I'm crazy now, but this works. As long as YOU DON'T DO IT TWO DAYS IN A ROW. This is very important, cause if you do, you'll gain like crazy! So, my advice is to take a boosting day once a week. If you try it, tell me how it goes! xx
  • keychick25
    keychick25 Posts: 36 Member
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    Stop counting calories and just eat cleaner! You don't want to add stress to your body...
  • beachlover317
    beachlover317 Posts: 2,848 Member
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    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/654536-in-place-of-a-road-map-2-0-revised-7-2-12

    Read that link. It's a great tool, and goes through a step by step process of exactly how to set the right calorie goals for you!

    Good luck!

    This.

    Also, when you only have a few pounds to lose, you will lose slowly.

    Great information here in this link. I used it and was able to make a plan for eating healthy and losing fat. As you get closer to goal, things do slow down. But - you're close to goal - how awesome is that!!
  • GuybrushThreepw00d
    GuybrushThreepw00d Posts: 784 Member
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    Stop counting calories and just eat cleaner! You don't want to add stress to your body...

    You're on the wrong site darling.
    Mfp is all about the counting.
  • WendyTerry420
    WendyTerry420 Posts: 13,274 Member
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    Stop counting calories and just eat cleaner! You don't want to add stress to your body...

    Obsession about "clean eating" is WAY too stressful.

    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/822501-halp-my-sandwich-isn-t-clean

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