Losing 20 pounds or less

You go to bed, sleep and get up tomorrow to do it all over again. For months and months and months. And then pretty soon, you realize it is for the rest of your life if you like your weight loss. Congrats on the four pounds!

4 pounds in 7 weeks is awesome ...I'm a numbers person, so in my mind, I put it this way....

that's more than .5 a pound per week - which is about as much as you want to lose per week when you have less than 25 or so pounds left to lose...

My suggestion - trust the math - be honest and carefully track how many calories you consume and how many calories you burn - If you want to lose 15 pounds, I'd suggest aiming for .5 lbs per week...that means burning an EXTRA 1750 calories than you consume...break that down for the whole week - that's only a 250 calorie deficit per day (which means, as I imagine you already know, that if you burn 1800 calories just living life, you can eat 1550 calories a day) Just be careful and honest about the numbers, and trust the math. And don't flip out if you weigh yourself and you're off by a pound or two every now and then...salt retains water for a while, etc, etc, - but in general you should never be far from your goal each week if you track everything.

And have grace with yourself, like you said, it takes time I know another 30 weeks seems long, but in 30 weeks, you'll be really glad you stuck with it, and a lot of the healthy changes you made will be easier habits by then Good luck!

This is normal progress for someone who has 20 pounds or less to lose.

It took me 4 and half months to lose 9 pounds. As frustrating as it can be its completely normal. Like someone else said, what you need to do is get up tomorrow and do the same thing all over again.
You need to accept that this extra weight has been sitting there for a while, so its not going to come off instantly.

Keep working. You're on the right track.

You're doing great! If you're working out a lot and you haven't been doing it recently I'm sure some of it is water weight, your muscles retain more water when you start a new exercise routine. Honestly, don't get too hung up on the weight, especially if you're looking better! Drink more water, that could help. It will also just help your muscles in general. I refill my water bottle at least 4 times each day at work.

The biggest thing to do is KEEP GOING. You may stall a bit on the scale but you'll lose inches and that's where you can really see and feel the difference. 7 weeks is not a lot of time, give it at least another 5 weeks and I bet if you keep doing exactly what you're doing, you'll start seeing a bigger loss. Plus, best of all is you're not gaining!

I did the same as you, lost 30 pounds over 6 months, gained 10 back in 7 weeks, then lost it over 2 months, and now I'm evening out because I'm trying to gain muscle. I've basically only lost 25 pounds in a year, but my clothes fit better and I'm stronger than I've ever been in my life!

You can do it, just stick to it!