Starvation Mode?

Why in the world? EEEP! Take care of yourself!

This is a question I've had for quite a while and I still don't have a satisfactory answer. But one thing I do know is that there's a difference between loosing weight and loosing body fat, and its easy to get such high calorie deficits that significant portions of your weight loss don't come from fat loss (ie: you loose muscle mass as well).

[edit: you're probably a fair bit below the optimum calorie intake. I suspect you're be depriving your body of nutrition for no good reason (ie: not increasing the rate of fat reduction), unless you're achieving that deficit through a really punishing exercise regime, which carries its own problems. Low nutrition isn't just pie in the sky, future health problems, how do you feel, stuff, it impacts the way you look as well, as in, your hair can thin out, you age prematurely, that sort of thing... eating well is important and sacraficing that for super-deficits is a real cost for probably very limited real gain. Hope this helps]


Unfortunately I can't tell you a really good answer. The best I found last time I looked (I didn't search academic literature, just the web) was this:
http://www.mindandmuscle.net/articles/lyle_mcdonald/maximum_fatloss?page=0,0

Its still a bit unsatisfactory, but it might help. Here's the intro and conclusion in case you can't be bothered pasting the link into your browser

"A long-standing question in my mind has been, “What is the optimal (or maximal) deficit for a fat loss diet?” Yes, I know I’m not the first to address the issue but I’ve always wondered if we couldn’t figure out exactly what an optimal deficit might be on a diet, rather than relying on annoying trial and error.
...
Conclusion:
In this article, I’ve been able to give dieters a starting point for the maximum sustainable deficit which can come from calorie restriction. To summarize: simply determine how many pounds of fat you’re carrying. Then multiply that value by 31 calories. That’s how much you can potentially decrease your daily food intake. If you want to try to increase fat loss, any further increase in the deficit should either come from increased activity or compounds that either increase the mobilization or burning of fatty acids for fuel. As well, as you get leaner/lighter, you will need to periodically recalculate your daily calories to take into account your diminishing fat mass and decreased maintenance requirements due to both decreased bodymass and the adaptive component of metabolic rate. An argument can also be made for saving increases in activity for later in the diet when your diet deficit has to be lower.

Please keep in mind, however, all of these theoretical calculations sort of pale to real world results. If you’re losing strength in the weight room like crazy, your deficit is too big regardless of what the math works out too, increase them until you stop hemorrhaging strength (and probably muscle). And even if you have to trial and error it a bit, the above should at least give you a starting point."

I just wonder if there is really a starvation mode. Or if it just an excuse. I still feel this way, but since I have cut way back on my calories about one week ago. Three of the days have been the same weight & one day I gained 1/2 Lb. So I will keep this up through friday, to see what happens.

it's not an excuse, it's real.

Here's the thing the body doesn't work on absolutes, nor is there a "line" you cross to enter starvation". In reality the body is constantly monitoring how much energy you are using, how much energy you have available for use, and how much you need to function correctly. the minute you create a deficit, your body starts to compensate by looking for additional forms of energy, much of this is fat, but the body also recognizes lean tissue (for it's protein) as a source of energy as well. When the body needs more energy than you are taking in, it starts to suck energy from storage (fat) but the problem is that converting body fat to energy takes a long time (relatively speaking) and the body can only pull what's available (think of a block of ice, you can't melt the ice in the middle until the ice on top melts) so it'll grab protein for conversion as well.

So, the bigger the deficit, the more energy you are pulling from alternate sources, add to this that the body will "recognize" that you are at a deficit and trigger the starvation response, while the deficit is small and enough energy is recaptured from fat and lean tissue, this process is at a minimum, but as the time and deficit increase, so does the body's "panic" at not having enough available energy, so it starts to slow down non-vital metabolic systems I.E. it will start to slowly shut down certain organ function, certain non-vital metabolic processes, hair and skin growth...etc.) Please not that it won't STOP doing this stuff, it'll just try to slow them down to try and match calorie intake with calorie use. This is the "starvation mode". One other thing that becomes more promenant is that when you are in starvation mode your body will put a higher priority to storing fat and a higher priority to buring protein, because muscle is metabolically active, the body will see reducing muscle mass as a good thing and storing more fat as a good thing. So you see, it's a vicious cycle. This is why people who eat drastically reduced diets can still see a plateau and sometimes even small weight gains even though the calculations they do on maintenance calories are telling them that they are at a large deficit.

FYI it takes anywhere from a few days to a few weeks to get out of starvation, In that time, even while eating at a higher calorie amount (to "right the ship") you will probably gain some weight. This is ok and it is a necessary evil. Don't worry, new fat (like new ice if you remember my previous analogy) can be quickly burned by the body.

Hope this helps. It's a very simplistic explaination, it goes much deeper than this, but it's the basics of starvation mode.

FYI, 1200 calories is not something you specifically should be following. 1200 calories is the consensus average minimum calories needed for nutritional balance (not caloric balance, just nutrition) for an adult WOMAN.

For men it's 1800, and even then, that's a gross generalization, your balance could be very far away from that.

-Banks

That's a bad idea, your metabolism with deteriorate and you will lose muscle, not fat.

It is very, very real. Starvation mode is terrible and results in the exact opposite of everything you're trying for by starving yourself in the first place. You need to eat more, a lot more, to get out of the mode and start losing weight effectively again. But, now because your body has gone into starvation mode your metabolism has dropped to far lower-than-average maintenance. You're going to need to exercise and eat small meals often throughout the day in order to get your metabolism back to a healthy and normal burning capacity. Good luck! And please, people....don't starve yourselves. I was always overweight, significantly overweight, because I would starve myself and then inevitably binge after an hour, a day, two weeks. I started eating more than I averaged before every day and worked out slowly, building up; 30 pounds melted off in a month and a half.

I don't believe in starvation mode, I can eat 200~1000 calories for months and lose weight then get off that diet and not gain anything as long as I eat well (1200) and exercise

Yeah that's lovely ... good luck with that.:sick:

*double post*

Why the desire to go into starvation mode? Are you perhaps using that term based on some reading you've done? I wonder it you are thinking of something like ketosis - the goal of the initial phase of the Atkins diet. Even that is controversial.

Set your deficit in the settings on MFP and go from there. You are about my size - I 5' 10" and started MFP at 282. I'm down to 251 in 3 months eating at least 1800 calories per day - sometimes more. I'm also fairly active - at least relative to what I was doing before MFP.

It takes a long time to lose the weight we've taken a lifetime to put on. Going into starvation mode to accomplish this faster is dangerous for your health and, generally, a recipe for failure in the long-term.

As for the pro-ana looking pic, that's just wrong...

I find it hard to belive that I can be in starvation mode so fast. If I still don't lose any weight tomorrow, I will go back to my 1,500 - 2,000 calories per day.

I don't know that it's particularly starvation mode, but personally, if I hit 4 or so days of being under by 500 or 600 (goal of 1500 a day) I lose ALL energy. Sometimes I don't mean to miss my cals but it just happens. Last week I was under at least 4 days in a row by about 600 and Sat and Sun I literally was too tired to even get off the couch.. I sat on my butt all weekend because the thought of moving around wore me out... and usually I am rather active - walk the dogs, work on the yard, clean... for me it kicks in quick! Like I said, don't know that this is starvation mode in the sense of long term effects when going back to eating, but definitely on the way to screwing with my metab if I stuck to it!

I don't believe in starvation mode, I can eat 200~1000 calories for months and lose weight then get off that diet and not gain anything as long as I eat well (1200) and exercise

Except that a grown woman isn't meant to exist on only 1200 calories for a life time. Even someone very small in stature (like 5 feet tall and 90 lbs) needs about 1400 calories/day at maintenance, and that's if she is sedentary -- she needs more if she exercises. Of course, this is assuming that the woman has a healthy metabolism and hasn't cannibalized much of her own muscle mass on a starvation diet. I, for one, don't want to lose weight only to be stuck eating just 1200 for the rest of my life or risk gaining back the weight.

Disclaimer******I am not starting a debate or an argument, I am merely presenting articles that support the WAY I Feel. This may not reflect the way you personally feel and that is ok. Please do not harrass or start arguing.

I am aware that there are just as many articles and studies that say otherwise, but I disagree. If this were the case, I would never lose an ounce because I practice Intermittent Fasting (and sometimes go 20 hours or longer without eating).


Personally, I feel like starvation mode is a myth and the term is used around this website and many others I frequent, way to loosely. I highly doubt that anyone on this website is in starvation mode, unless you look like an anorexic person..........

Here are a couple of articles for you to read and decide for yourself.

http://www.weightwatchers.com/util/art/index_art.aspx?tabnum=1&art_id=35501

This article is very good at explaining what is "real" about starvation mode and what is "myth"............

http://www.healthscience.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=512:are-you-in-the-starvation-mode-or-starving-for-truth&catid=102:jeff-novicks-blog&Itemid=267

I tend to agree that the term "starvation mode" is batted around too lightly most of the time. However, I completely believe that a person can eat 500 calories/day and continue to lose weight. Eventually, that person will lose weight and will end up looking like the men in that starvation study. Keep in mind though that those men lost WEIGHT: fat and muscle.

I think that drastic cuts to calorie intakes will cause a person to lose weight. Sometimes lots and lots of weight until they whittle away to nothing. But I think a more delicate balance is needed when wanting to lose FAT and maintain muscle.

I think we've strayed far from the original topic. I have read about intermittent fasting and I can see it has some benefits. I don't think skipping a meal or even several meals will cause a person's body to start burning muscle. But fasting over long periods of time? Yeah. Look at those men in the photo -- not a lot of fat but not a lot of muscle, either.

Just my two cents. (Cora, I think we're in agreement. Not an attack. :flowerforyou: )

Cora, I never understood why people put out the Minnesota study as a reason why there is NOT starvation mode. It clearly proves that starvation mode is real, and even the weight watchers article proves the theory.

for example, straight out of the Minnesota study is the following quote (this is not taken out of context, this is a full paragraph, with no external meanings before or after it):


"As the men lost weight, their physical endurance dropped by half, their strength about 10%, and their reflexes became sluggish — with the men initially the most fit showing the greatest deterioration, according to Dr. Keys. The men’s resting metabolic rates declined by 40%, their heart volume shrank about 20%, their pulses slowed and their body temperatures dropped. They complained of feeling cold, tired and hungry; having trouble concentrating; of impaired judgment and comprehension; dizzy spells; visual disturbances; ringing in their ears; tingling and numbing of their extremities; stomach aches, body aches and headaches; trouble sleeping; hair thinning; and their skin growing dry and thin. Their sexual function and testes size were reduced and they lost all interest in sex. They had every physical indication of accelerated aging."

this is a direct quote from Dr. Keys, one of the researchers and comes from the conclusion. Mind you the Minnesota experiment did NOT cut their subjects off from food, instead they mimicked conditions in war-torn Europe (I.E. about 1600 calories a day of nutrient deficient food).


NOW, I agree that people who say that you AREN'T losing weight because of starvation are most likely in error, that doesn't mean starvation mode is not real. It simply means that many people don't understand the concept. That article you linked to IMHO had it wrong and he misread the Minnesota study's findings.

specifically taken here from his article:

"
There is a true phenomenon known as the starvation response and it is well documented in the Minnesota Starvation experiments and the Hunger Fasts that have been studied. However, it only happens in humans when they lose enough body fat that they fall below the level of essential fat. In a man, this would be below around 5% fat and in women just above that."

but I'm not sure where he get's these numbers as I've read that report, and I just re-skimmed it, and nowhere in the report do they limit any of their results to when a person is at 5% body fat. In fact, Keys specifically states in the report that the effects started within weeks of the semi-starvation phase beginning. Maybe he's talking about other studies, but if he is, he doesn't reference them directly and thus I cannot review them.

As to the weight watchers article,

I'm trying to find in that article where they dispute starvation mode. They dispute ones specific myth associated with starvation mode which is that you stop losing weight when in it, which I've NEVER been a proponent of, but again that doesn't mean starvation mode isn't real, it just means people's perception of it is wrong. And in fact, in the weight watchers article itself they state many times that the body slows it's metabolic rate on a reduced calorie diet, which is exactly what starvation mode is, a reduction of your metabolic rate triggered by prolonged time in a negative energy balance.

What do you think? I think maybe I'm just looking for an agreement to starvation mode being real and that many people on here have it wrong.

anyway, looking forward to hear your thoughts.

I agree that people don't really understand the concept. The main things that I think are not understood are:

* There is no strict calorie amount that will put each person into 'starvation mode' just as there is no strict calorie allowance for every single person.

* Eating below your basic requirements consistently will not stop you from losing weight. If you eat less than you burn you will lose weight. It will make you burn less and therefore slow your weight loss. Also, often people who do eat so few calories in a day tend to get very hungry and have extreme cravings... so you may be for example eating way below your calories for 5 days a week (and lowering what you are burning) then eating way above for 2 days and thus gaining weight.

I didn't look at the Minnesota study that is quoted above but wow! Is that even an ethical thing to study?!? Imagine signing up to eat like that? haha

it was during a very patriotic time in our country's history. All volunteer, and very closely monitored. These guys knew quite well what they were getting into. I know though, put a gun in my hand and ship me off to war, but I'll be damned if you're gonna starve me for 6 months!

Cora, I never understood why people put out the Minnesota study as a reason why there is NOT starvation mode. It clearly proves that starvation mode is real, and even the weight watchers article proves the theory.

for example, straight out of the Minnesota study is the following quote (this is not taken out of context, this is a full paragraph, with no external meanings before or after it):


"As the men lost weight, their physical endurance dropped by half, their strength about 10%, and their reflexes became sluggish — with the men initially the most fit showing the greatest deterioration, according to Dr. Keys. The men’s resting metabolic rates declined by 40%, their heart volume shrank about 20%, their pulses slowed and their body temperatures dropped. They complained of feeling cold, tired and hungry; having trouble concentrating; of impaired judgment and comprehension; dizzy spells; visual disturbances; ringing in their ears; tingling and numbing of their extremities; stomach aches, body aches and headaches; trouble sleeping; hair thinning; and their skin growing dry and thin. Their sexual function and testes size were reduced and they lost all interest in sex. They had every physical indication of accelerated aging."

this is a direct quote from Dr. Keys, one of the researchers and comes from the conclusion. Mind you the Minnesota experiment did NOT cut their subjects off from food, instead they mimicked conditions in war-torn Europe (I.E. about 1600 calories a day of nutrient deficient food).


NOW, I agree that people who say that you AREN'T losing weight because of starvation are most likely in error, that doesn't mean starvation mode is not real. It simply means that many people don't understand the concept. That article you linked to IMHO had it wrong and he misread the Minnesota study's findings.

specifically taken here from his article:

"
There is a true phenomenon known as the starvation response and it is well documented in the Minnesota Starvation experiments and the Hunger Fasts that have been studied. However, it only happens in humans when they lose enough body fat that they fall below the level of essential fat. In a man, this would be below around 5% fat and in women just above that."

but I'm not sure where he get's these numbers as I've read that report, and I just re-skimmed it, and nowhere in the report do they limit any of their results to when a person is at 5% body fat. In fact, Keys specifically states in the report that the effects started within weeks of the semi-starvation phase beginning. Maybe he's talking about other studies, but if he is, he doesn't reference them directly and thus I cannot review them.

As to the weight watchers article,

I'm trying to find in that article where they dispute starvation mode. They dispute ones specific myth associated with starvation mode which is that you stop losing weight when in it, which I've NEVER been a proponent of, but again that doesn't mean starvation mode isn't real, it just means people's perception of it is wrong. And in fact, in the weight watchers article itself they state many times that the body slows it's metabolic rate on a reduced calorie diet, which is exactly what starvation mode is, a reduction of your metabolic rate triggered by prolonged time in a negative energy balance.

What do you think? I think maybe I'm just looking for an agreement to starvation mode being real and that many people on here have it wrong.

anyway, looking forward to hear your thoughts.

Well, I do believe its real in the context that a human being has lost enough body fat that it can't really spare any more.......

I spoke with my Naturopath today and she says that yes the metabolism slows down, but that does not mean a person is starving.

She used the example of people getting Lap Band or Gastric Bypass. In weight loss surgery, they intentionally make the stomach small to hold a very small amount of food. The person that had the surgery is going to consume very small amounts of calories to force the body to burn its own fat as energy. She said in no way are these people in starvation mode.

She told me the metabolic rate is lowered (but not stopped) to "prepare: for famine, but since there is plenty of body fat, there is no starvation mode.............She agreed that starvation mode is when the body gets to the point of Anorexia.

It is just another one of those debated topics.

In reading that paragraph from the weight watchers article, if you follow any type of reduced-calorie diet (which would include low carb too, LOL) then everyone is in "starvation mode" to lose weight. I don't think I agree with that.

The endocrinologist I went to when I lived in Virginia did not believe in starvation mode at all. I had that discussion with her when I first started Atkins in 2003 because everyone on the Low Carb Bulletin Board I belonged to then stated that if you didn't eat even 3-4 hours as Dr Atkins said to do in the book, you would immediately go into starvation mode.......... I got scared and asked her about it because I was never hungry enough to eat that often.

In 2003, I was really starting to learn about low calorie, low carb, etc.

This is follow up to Cora, I didn't want to quote the whole string as it gets long.

So I think we are just debating semantics at this point.

From my perspective, and technically speaking, I think you, and your naturopath are just confusing starvation with starvation mode (2 completely different terms).

I would wholeheartedly agree that starvation begins when the body runs out of resources and begins to shut down because it doesn't have the resources to continue functioning correctly.

BUT, starvation mode isn't starvation (at least, not how they have been defined to me), so lets call it something else so we don't get confused. Lets call it negative energy balance.

When the body enters negative energy balance (or catabolism, or starvation mode, or famine response ...etc. pick your poison), I would like you to ask her (your naturopath) what happens if the negative balance is greater than the amount of fat plus consumed energy the body can convert to energy at any one time. Because depending on how much wide spread adipose fat you have, you can get to a point, well before you reach any type of dangerously low fat percentage, where you can no longer supply enough energy to function at that metabolic level.

If you could, perhaps present this example for your argument (let's take me)

here are my stats currently.

6'2", 182 lbs, 9.5% body fat, currently I'm at 2678 calories (measured about 3 months ago in a lab) for maintenance.
What would happen if I were to eat say 1400 calories for 2 weeks. Obviously I would not lose 4.5% body fat in that 2 weeks (nor, I imagine, would I even lose 1%, dunno, I'm not going to try). If it were true that we never enter starvation before that anorexic level, I would simply lose fat % until I reached that point, and I don't think anyone believes that 9% fat is anorexic (not even close for a guy, more like 4 to 5%). Basically I'm asking that, if we never enter that mode, then where do the extra calories come from? Surface area of fat isn't a debate, that's a fact, your body can only take fat from areas where fat is open to extraction. Is she saying that you get your energy from some other stored form of fat? I'm just confused as to where it comes from.

I submit that my metabolic rate would slow (by shutting down organs), my body would begin to preserve more fat, and I would internally start to canabalize muscle tissue (thus actually gaining fat %) as well as becoming lethargic, have limp skin and hair, and become (probably because of nutrient deficiency) slightly anemic.

I really would love to hear her thoughts.

side note,

I went with my wife to an endo about 4 months ago because she was having a B*tch of a time with her loss (wife is one person I DO NOT council, to many pitfalls there with marriage), and that endo did NOT impress me with her knowledge, I was chatting with her (I went with the wife) and she had some pretty old concepts of metabolism (food metabolism) which kind of shocked me, and she hadn't read any of the recent studied from the NEJOM (like the diet study that did all the different types of diets that was done a few years ago) I was a little shocked, just adding a little warning to the endo thing, they're GREAT about hormones and glands, but sometimes they can get caught up in the mechanics and lose touch with the current findings. Especially with the epidemic of metabolic conditions out there, endo's are swamped with claims and it really felt like her exam was cursory and she was shuffling us out the door. It felt, to me, as if she was diminishing my wife's weight loss problems because she didn't have obvious symptoms of something more serious. My wife was crying talking about her struggles and this woman sat there stone faced and basically told her there's nothing wrong with you, you just don't try hard enough (not in so many words, but we got the picture), and she did this without a single test, all she did was feel her neck for inflamed glands (seriously? we paid HOW MUCH for her to feel her neck and tell her she doesn't work hard?). anyway, I wasn't all that happy walking out.