Trying to lose 1 pound a week

arlington21
arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
edited November 14 in Health and Weight Loss
I am getting back on track with losing weight after a month of yoyoing. I'm trying to lose around 1 pound a week, and no more than 1 pound. I've been weighing myself every day and calculating the average. I am losing more than 1 pound per week and I'm not sure if it's just water weight or if my calorie deficit is just too big. Should I do something about this? I don't want to lose weight too fast because i'm trying to not lose a lot of muscle. I'm not currently doing any strength training but I am doing some resistance.

I'm 121 pounds, 5'3, female with a 30% body fat
I currently eat 1150 calories a day give or take.
I exercise almost every day but I only do cardio currently and my activity level is lightly active.

Thank you for your help

Replies

  • atypicalsmith
    atypicalsmith Posts: 2,742 Member
    There is no way to accurately calculate losing one pound a week. There will be times that you lose two pounds, and other times that you gain a pound. At 5'3", 121 pounds sounds about right for your height. Why are you trying to lose weight?
  • FoxyLifter
    FoxyLifter Posts: 965 Member
    edited March 2015
    That calorie goal sounds aggressive to me. And it doesn't sound like your plan fits your goals. If you're trying not to lose muscle, you'll want to eat more calories (10-15% below TDEE), eat a minimum of 1g of protein per pound of LBM and lift some weights. Heavy is relative. Start off light and slowly increase with each workout. This will maximize fat loss and minimize muscle loss. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if anyone recommends a recomp. That is eating at or near maintenance coupled with a lifting program. If you're going for a "toned" look, these would be my suggestions.
  • futuremanda
    futuremanda Posts: 816 Member
    The first 1-3 weeks maybe can show faster losses. A lot of it is water. Have you been losing at this rate for awhile?

    Are you eating back your cardio calories so that you net 1150, or eating 1150 and then burning a lot more? (It's not usually recommended to net less than 1200, though I know you're somewhat short)

    If you don't feel comfortable eating back some of your exercise cals, which MFP is designed to have you eat back, then set your goal to 0.5 lb per week, eat what MFP tells you for that, and don't bother eating back exercise. You'll lose faster than 0.5 lb because you'd get that much without exercise, and then on top of that, you're exercising.

    Also, if you're concerned about maintaining muscle, then strength training would be a great thing to add! (Depending on what you mean by "but I am doing some resistance" because I'm pretty sure resistance training IS strength training.)
  • malibu927
    malibu927 Posts: 17,562 Member
    Is your ticker accurate? According to that, your goal is 104 pounds, which would put you underweight.

    If you really do want to lose, only do it at a rate of .5 pounds per week, since you're already at a healthy weight (as well, 1150 calories is going to be too low). However, you'd probably be better off doing a body recomposition.
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    atypicalsmith wrote: »
    There is no way to accurately calculate losing one pound a week. There will be times that you lose two pounds, and other times that you gain a pound. At 5'3", 121 pounds sounds about right for your height. Why are you trying to lose weight?

    I'm trying to decrease my body fat since it's quite high
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    FoxyLifter wrote: »
    That calorie goal sounds aggressive to me. And it doesn't sound like your plan fits your goals. If you're trying not to lose muscle, you'll want to eat more calories (10-15% below TDEE), eat a minimum of 1g of protein per pound of LBM and lift some weights. Heavy is relative. Start off light and slowly increase with each workout. This will maximize fat loss and minimize muscle loss. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if anyone recommends a recomp. That is eating at or near maintenance coupled with a lifting program. If you're going for a "toned" look, these would be my suggestions.

    Okay thank you for your suggestion
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    futuremanda wrote: »
    The first 1-3 weeks maybe can show faster losses. A lot of it is water. Have you been losing at this rate for awhile?

    Are you eating back your cardio calories so that you net 1150, or eating 1150 and then burning a lot more? (It's not usually recommended to net less than 1200, though I know you're somewhat short)

    If you don't feel comfortable eating back some of your exercise cals, which MFP is designed to have you eat back, then set your goal to 0.5 lb per week, eat what MFP tells you for that, and don't bother eating back exercise. You'll lose faster than 0.5 lb because you'd get that much without exercise, and then on top of that, you're exercising.

    Also, if you're concerned about maintaining muscle, then strength training would be a great thing to add! (Depending on what you mean by "but I am doing some resistance" because I'm pretty sure resistance training IS strength training.)

    Thank you for your feedback
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    malibu927 wrote: »
    Is your ticker accurate? According to that, your goal is 104 pounds, which would put you underweight.

    If you really do want to lose, only do it at a rate of .5 pounds per week, since you're already at a healthy weight (as well, 1150 calories is going to be too low). However, you'd probably be better off doing a body recomposition.

    No my ticker is not accurate, I don't know how to change it so I just left it like that
  • sheldonklein
    sheldonklein Posts: 854 Member
    How did you determine your bf%? 30% is hard to believe with your stats.
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    sheldonklein wrote: »
    How did you determine your bf%? 30% is hard to believe with your stats.

    I measured myself and input my measurements in various websites. I don't know how accurate the websites are but its around 30%. I look heavier than I weigh
  • Liftng4Lis
    Liftng4Lis Posts: 15,151 Member
    With that little to lose, a pound a week is ridiculous.
  • Sued0nim
    Sued0nim Posts: 17,456 Member
    Get to the gym and start a heavy lifting programme

    Eat at a small defecit. 250 cals a day to lose 0.5lb a week

    Appreciate that people don't have set weights we have weight ranges and there are natural fluctuations of quite a few pounds (my range is 5lbs) ...if you can't buy into these natural fluctuations then only weigh weekly or monthly

    Use an app like happy scale or trendweight.com to give you trend lines

    And I seriously doubt 30% BF at your stats
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    Liftng4Lis wrote: »
    With that little to lose, a pound a week is ridiculous.

    I'll take that into consideration
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    rabbitjb wrote: »
    Get to the gym and start a heavy lifting programme

    Eat at a small defecit. 250 cals a day to lose 0.5lb a week

    Appreciate that people don't have set weights we have weight ranges and there are natural fluctuations of quite a few pounds (my range is 5lbs) ...if you can't buy into these natural fluctuations then only weigh weekly or monthly

    Use an app like happy scale or trendweight.com to give you trend lines

    And I seriously doubt 30% BF at your stats

    Okay thank you for your feedback. I calculated my body fat from various websites and got 30%. I might be doing it wrong, but I do have a lot of body fat
  • pollypocket1021
    pollypocket1021 Posts: 533 Member
    I'm in the same boat. 5'0 and currently 121. My goal was 1/2ppw, because I want sustained change, not a crash diet. But the weight came off at closer to 2ppw. I'm a little concerned that losing that fast will make me more vulnerable to regaining. I probably need to adjust my daily calorie allowance.

    Right now I'm trying to maintain to give my body a break since I'm about half way to my goal of 113lbs. My diary is open, feel free to friend me.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    edited March 2015
    That way of calculating your body fat doesn't work that accurately for everyone, and the particular shape of your body may make it work less well. I tend to get weird results on those (I had a DEXA about 5 lbs ago, so can say that they aren't accurate for me). I seriously doubt you are at 30%.

    However, I'm 5'3 and 125, and would like to get down to 120 or a bit less, and reduce my body fat more. Having too high a deficit is counterproductive at this stage, as if you lose too much muscle mass you won't necessarily improve your BF%. After my DEXA I decided that I needed to reduce my deficit at my current BF% and weight since I'd lost more muscle mass than I wanted since my last one.

    As others have said, if how your body looks is important to you, you'd probably want a much lower deficit and to focus more on fitness and less on the scale. Heavy lifting is great.
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    pollypocket1021 wrote: »
    I'm in the same boat. 5'0 and currently 121. My goal was 1/2ppw, because I want sustained change, not a crash diet. But the weight came off at closer to 2ppw. I'm a little concerned that losing that fast will make me more vulnerable to regaining. I probably need to adjust my daily calorie allowance.

    Right now I'm trying to maintain to give my body a break since I'm about half way to my goal of 113lbs. My diary is open, feel free to friend me.

    How much do you eat a day? I'm not very tech savvy so I don't know how to friend people lol
  • arlington21
    arlington21 Posts: 34 Member
    lemurcat12 wrote: »
    That way of calculating your body fat doesn't work that accurately for everyone, and the particular shape of your body may make it work less well. I tend to get weird results on those (I had a DEXA about 5 lbs ago, so can say that they aren't accurate for me). I seriously doubt you are at 30%.

    However, I'm 5'3 and 125, and would like to get down to 120 or a bit less, and reduce my body fat more. Having too high a deficit is counterproductive at this stage, as if you lose too much muscle mass you won't necessarily improve your BF%. After my DEXA I decided that I needed to reduce my deficit at my current BF% and weight since I'd lost more muscle mass than I wanted since my last one.

    As others have said, if how your body looks is important to you, you'd probably want a much lower deficit and to focus more on fitness and less on the scale. Heavy lifting is great.

    I also looked at the body fat picture chart and the 30% looked the most like me so I would think my body fat percentage is around there. Thank you for your suggestion
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