What am I doing wrong?

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So, I am 4'10 and 120.8 lbs. I have been counting calories and I just finished Jillian Michael's 30DS. I really want to get back down to 105-107. It has been a month and I've only lost 2 lbs. I'm new to all of this and I'm sure I'm doing something wrong. I also don't fully understand the concept of burning more than you eat...
Anyway, I'm just really discouraged and I just want to give up. I hear people all around me dropping pounds by just counting calories or even just cutting out soda. It doesn't seem fair. :(

I only drink water, green tea, and either almond milk or 1%milk with my cereal. My food board on here is mostly accurate with only a few days not entered properly.

Replies

  • kdiamond
    kdiamond Posts: 3,329 Member
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    How many calories are you consuming daily? Do you weigh and measure everything?

    You're not very big, so unfortunately for us small people it is harder to lose weight. That being said, it will happen if you are diligent and weigh everything accurately.

    Also, you might benefit by doing something else besides those Jillian workouts. In my opinion (and I've done them in the past) even when you do them at full speed they don't burn much. I'd recommend doing some weight lifting and throw in some cardio as a side note.

    Also, 2 pounds in one month is nothing to sneeze at if you're already small to begin with.

    I lost all my initial weight from 130 pounds down to 105 in 4-5 months. I did it by working out 45min 5x a week and counting everything. I also ate 95% at home with food I prepared myself.
  • spekkio12345
    spekkio12345 Posts: 18 Member
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    Well, you are so small to begin with that one pound per week is a significant amount of loss for you. Make sure you goal weight would still be a healthy BMI for you, then stick to the 500 calorie daily deficit MFP recommends and you will lose weight over time.

    Remember that MFP will not recommend less than 1200 daily calories for any person. In most cases that is the minimum a person should consume but it still may be too many for your personal circumstance (very short small female). Calculate your true Base Metabolic Rate from another site and compare it with the recommendations from this site.
  • chas0128
    chas0128 Posts: 4
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    I try to eat a minimum of 1200, eating my exercise calories. Just looked at my BMR on another site and it says 1335. Maybe I should eat more? Since I am done with 30DS I am starting cardio 3 days a week by jogging some trails at my local botanical gardens and 2 days a week strength training. Or should I do it the other way, 3 days strength and 2 days cardio?
  • Live4theLift
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    Your looking at your BMR and not your TDEE, because your eating 1200 anyway and your TDEE may be way higher your body may be trying to cope.
  • KenosFeoh
    KenosFeoh Posts: 1,837 Member
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    I think the easiest thing would be to go to the fat2fitradio.com site and use their calculators to find out things like your body fat %.

    Then you can enter the statistics into a calculator to find out how many calories someone at your goal weight, activity level, and fat % should eat to maintain. (I always put in sedentary as the activity level because I have a desk job.) Start eating at that calorie level now. If that doesn't result in weight loss, you can slowly cut back from that by about 100 calories every couple of weeks to a maximum of around -200 calories.

    Your goal weight may be unrealistic for your body type. It's never a good idea to lose lean body mass just to reach a certain weight.
  • MinnieInMaine
    MinnieInMaine Posts: 6,400 Member
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    With the amount of weight you have to lose, 2 pounds a month (1/2 pound per week) is actually right on target!! Congrats!

    Stop comparing yourself to others. They may have more changes to make than you or have more weight to lose than you and therefore will likely lose faster, especially initially.

    You can either go with the TDEE minus 15% method or set your goal at your BMR and eat back any exercise calories earned. Either way, it should come out to about the same consumed calories per day.

    Best of luck!
  • Cajunmalakai
    Cajunmalakai Posts: 59 Member
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    As the others said. If your already built small, losing weight can be tough. A smaller person can generally carry less lean muscle mass relative to their size than a larger person. That being said, your muscles are your fat burners. Out of all the structures in your body, your muscles require far more calories to maintain than practically any others.
    This means that a good foundation of lean muscle will burn more calories when your NOT exercising.

    Its hard to judge how much cardio your actually doing based on your posts, however, switching your strength and cardio around might be a good change. When it comes to fat loss many people do far more cardio than they actually need to as well as the wrong kind.
    How do you structure your jogs, and about how long is the typical session?

    As for your diet, burning for than you take in is called a calorie deficit. Basically, if you consume fewer calories than you burn, you will lose weight since you body will tear into fat reserves and other sources to power and repair your body.
    That being said, it is just as important to be aware of WHAT your eating and well as WHEN your eating it to go along with creating a deficit.
  • 007FatSlayer
    007FatSlayer Posts: 132 Member
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    Fitness:

    Bodybuilding.com is a great site to find fitness programs (weight lifting will not bulk you up). There are programs on there that women do-- you can see successful women and it will tell you what they did to get the physiques that they have. Most I've seen are bikini competetors. It will also have a snapshot of their diets.

    Diet:

    Ensure to cosume a good amount of protein and enough calories. The calculators online are estimates-- they're not accurate. Also, the machine "calorie burn" reading is inaccurate. It usually overestimates the calorie burn.
  • MEWedel
    MEWedel Posts: 1
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    Remember muscle weighs more then fat and try weighing yourself just once a week. And as stated already you are doing great, I only wish that I weighed 130 pounds
  • flitabout
    flitabout Posts: 200 Member
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    Well from what I can see you are not eating near enough! Your BMR is 1308 with a sedentary lifestyle and with your a activity level it is 1563 Your TDEE is 2056 and with a -15% TDEE you should be getting around 1748. So I would say you need to eat more for a couple of weeks with that activity level and then see where you are before you start adjusting to much.
  • jessilyn76
    jessilyn76 Posts: 532 Member
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    Remember muscle weighs more then fat and try weighing yourself just once a week. And as stated already you are doing great, I only wish that I weighed 130 pounds

    UUUUUggggghhhhhhh, not this ^^...........
  • thebigcb
    thebigcb Posts: 2,210 Member
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    I try to eat a minimum of 1200, eating my exercise calories. Just looked at my BMR on another site and it says 1335. Maybe I should eat more? Since I am done with 30DS I am starting cardio 3 days a week by jogging some trails at my local botanical gardens and 2 days a week strength training. Or should I do it the other way, 3 days strength and 2 days cardio?

    What is your normal breakfast lunch dinner? What times do you eat? How much sleep do you get?
  • Cajunmalakai
    Cajunmalakai Posts: 59 Member
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    Just to clarify, because I once touched off a lengthy argument about this very thing and its best to avoid confusion. Technically, muscle does not weigh more than fat. a lb is an lb. However, muscle tissue is much denser if fat and muscle tissue fill the same VOLUME, the muscle tissue will be heavier.

    So, if we look at in terms of liquid measurement, if we filled two equal size measuring cups, one with fat, and one with lean tissue, the cup containing lean tissue will be heavier, even though the volume is the same.
  • chas0128
    chas0128 Posts: 4
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    Thank you all for the feedback. I guess I am just a little (and when I say a little, I mean a lot) impatient. After I posted I lost another 2.5lbs. I weighed 118.6 this morning!! I am just going to stick with what I'm doing until I hit that dreaded plateau (hopefully that doesn't happen). Good luck with all of your progress! :)