Is my real TDEE now almost 1000 less than calculated?
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My SO is your height, almost the same age, currently weighs 246, does NO formal exercise, and recently lost 10 -12 lbs over about 4 - 6 weeks (going from memory here, neither of us track his stats, just what he has casually told me) merely by cutting his sugar consumption (candy) significantly. You probably have greater lean body mass as his job doesn't involve a lot of physical activity.
Looking back at a few days when we ate exactly the same meals/portions (mine are logged), he is eating between 2000 and 2500 cals daily.
In other words -- he is considerably less active, eating more, and losing weight quite effectively.
Like I said, I'm in the same neighborhood as my goal (loss) weight, so I'm looking to get a grip on figuring out my maintenance calories as I start adding calories to level off. Also, I'm about to the point where I think I need to switch to lifting four days instead of three, which may well lead to cutting down a bit on the "cardio."
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I keep going back to the puzzle. 13 1/2 minutes for walking is quite fast; and for 6 miles it is really fast. But you're tall so quite possible. I think the calculations you are doing and trying to consume 1,000 calories less and not counting exercise calories is the puzzling thing too. So CI is an issue which is 'chicken' and changing to lifting will help because I get the feeling you dumped some LBM along the way and your body is telling you enough. The fun is getting to maintenance and the struggle will be lifting more, so more water retention, and a round you go. I'd probably recommend a range and be content with a slow progression of muscle growth over the next year. 51 isn't 21 so muscle gain is going to be a little longer. Good luck.0
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DeguelloTex wrote: »My SO is your height, almost the same age, currently weighs 246, does NO formal exercise, and recently lost 10 -12 lbs over about 4 - 6 weeks (going from memory here, neither of us track his stats, just what he has casually told me) merely by cutting his sugar consumption (candy) significantly. You probably have greater lean body mass as his job doesn't involve a lot of physical activity.
Looking back at a few days when we ate exactly the same meals/portions (mine are logged), he is eating between 2000 and 2500 cals daily.
In other words -- he is considerably less active, eating more, and losing weight quite effectively.
Like I said, I'm in the same neighborhood as my goal (loss) weight, so I'm looking to get a grip on figuring out my maintenance calories as I start adding calories to level off. Also, I'm about to the point where I think I need to switch to lifting four days instead of three, which may well lead to cutting down a bit on the "cardio."
I remember your success story because of your height and I do recall thinking at the time that your weight loss was quite rapid. Logically, if you have been consistently making the same logging errors all along, that's not a new impediment to weight loss now.
Can't comment on the chicken issue because I don't eat it, lol.
Probably worth having your doctor do a blood panel... weight loss may have shifted some level of something (although hard to imagine that anything would have become worse rather than improved). But my guy, who has been a lifelong consumer of ridiculous amounts of sweets, just got the news that his blood sugar is getting too high, hence the recent dietary change. So you never know what alterations are going on inside there. I have a male coworker, worked out daily and ate quite "healthy", suddenly diagnosed with metabolic syndrome in middle age.
And it wouldn't hurt to review your numbers (particularly given the chicken controversy) and make sure your logging is tight.
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Okay, not touching on CICO as loads of other people seem to have that covered.
This might be a stupid question, but have you taken your measurements? As a regular lifter, you could have more muscle mass. The scale can be a poor measurement for someone who does weight training.0 -
Have you tried doing a ketogenic diet at this point to help you get down to your goal weight? Even if only to break this plateau you have seem to hit recently.
Just eat enough protein to either maintain your muscle mass with no exercise, a bit extra to maintain with some addition, enough fat to satiate your hunger (and to not be at a extreme deficit), and less the 20g carbs a day. You do go through what is like a "keto-flu" for about 3-5 days but if you stay hydrated and supplement in magnesium, potassium, and extra sodium you will be alright.
Just a thought since you are looking for something to break this plateau and a change in diet composition might do it for you.0 -
Are you varying your exercise routine? That may be important for maintaining your caloric burn rate as it was in the beginning.
Nonetheless, I know that when I am very disciplined about my exercise program (I'm a runner; so, most of my exercise is cardio-type), my caloric burn per unit of time and per mile will decrease; e.g., from ~11 kcal/min to ~8 kcal/min. (about 27% decrease). The decrease in caloric burn starts to happen after about 6-8 weeks, or whenever my weekly exercise (running/walking) program gets above 3.5-4 hrs/wk. [I do not track, or account for, any other exercising or activities; e.g., weight training with body weight or dumb bells.] For example: last Thursday (2015-04-02), I walked 6.22 miles in 1:23:07 (~13:20/mile); and, last Wednesday (2015-04-04), I walked 5.14 miles in 1:10:21 (~13:38/mile).
I'm only 5'8" tall; but, I walk at about 13:30-14:30/mile and jog at about 9:50-10:20/mile. I do consider the walking pace quite fast (cadence: ~140spm - ~130 spm). [spm = steps/min, steps = left & right foot strikes or right & left foot strikes (of course, one might just count left foot strikes, or right foot strikes, times two )]
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_Terrapin_ wrote: »I keep going back to the puzzle. 13 1/2 minutes for walking is quite fast; and for 6 miles it is really fast. But you're tall so quite possible. I think the calculations you are doing and trying to consume 1,000 calories less and not counting exercise calories is the puzzling thing too. So CI is an issue which is 'chicken' and changing to lifting will help because I get the feeling you dumped some LBM along the way and your body is telling you enough. The fun is getting to maintenance and the struggle will be lifting more, so more water retention, and a round you go. I'd probably recommend a range and be content with a slow progression of muscle growth over the next year. 51 isn't 21 so muscle gain is going to be a little longer. Good luck.
No doubt I lost some LBM, but I was going to lose LBM no matter what. I don't really know my ratio, but I do know that I've lost about 17.5 inches off my waist, so at least there's that. I'm eating about 240g of protein and day and lifting, so I think I'm preserving as much muscle as I can under the circumstances. My lifting progression is much more about more reps in my target range as opposed to jumping up in weight as often as I was earlier, but there are a lot of factors going into that. Caloric intake is definitely one of those factors.
Once I get to maintenance, I expect some water weight gain, etc. which I'll count as maintaining as long as it stays within a reasonable range. Once I know what that reasonable range is, I'll start adding some calories, but not before then.
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Have you tried doing a ketogenic diet at this point to help you get down to your goal weight? Even if only to break this plateau you have seem to hit recently.
Just eat enough protein to either maintain your muscle mass with no exercise, a bit extra to maintain with some addition, enough fat to satiate your hunger (and to not be at a extreme deficit), and less the 20g carbs a day. You do go through what is like a "keto-flu" for about 3-5 days but if you stay hydrated and supplement in magnesium, potassium, and extra sodium you will be alright.
Just a thought since you are looking for something to break this plateau and a change in diet composition might do it for you.
Thanks for the suggestion.
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Are you varying your exercise routine? That may be important for maintaining your caloric burn rate as it was in the beginning.
Nonetheless, I know that when I am very disciplined about my exercise program (I'm a runner; so, most of my exercise is cardio-type), my caloric burn per unit of time and per mile will decrease; e.g., from ~11 kcal/min to ~8 kcal/min. (about 27% decrease). The decrease in caloric burn starts to happen after about 6-8 weeks, or whenever my weekly exercise (running/walking) program gets above 3.5-4 hrs/wk. [I do not track, or account for, any other exercising or activities; e.g., weight training with body weight or dumb bells.]
I'm only 5'8" tall; but, I walk at about 13:30-14:30/mile and jog at about 9:50-10:20/mile. I do consider the walking pace quite fast (cadence: ~140spm - ~130 spm). [spm = steps/min, steps = left & right foot strikes or right & left foot strikes (of course, one might just count left foot strikes, or right foot strikes, times two )]
I walk 4.5 miles first thing in the morning every day. I walk 1.5 miles after dinner every day. MWF I lift 3 sets of 8x10 on three exercises.
It may be that I'm burning even fewer calories by exercise than the answer I get when I figure I'm really burning more like 40-50% of what my exercise apps say I am.
I agree that 13:30-14:30 is a substantially brisk pace for waking. Basically, I really can't walk any faster without it turning into a pseudo-run. At this point, what I try to do is maintain that pace as consistently as I can, rather than try to make my pace any faster.
I go back on forth on whether I should start jogging/running, either to burn the calories in less time or burn more in the time I already allocate.
Do you suggest varying my routine? What works for you?
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DeguelloTex wrote: »If all you've seen is my refuting every answer, you haven't been reading very well.
IMO you've been totally cool about everything - you asked for input, and you seem to be actively considering the input you're getting.
I'm confident you'll get this sorted out.
:drinker:
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Nonetheless, I know that when I am very disciplined about my exercise program (I'm a runner; so, most of my exercise is cardio-type), my caloric burn per unit of time and per mile will decrease; e.g., from ~11 kcal/min to ~8 kcal/min. (about 27% decrease). The decrease in caloric burn starts to happen after about 6-8 weeks, or whenever my weekly exercise (running/walking) program gets above 3.5-4 hrs/wk.
How are you establishing that?
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You're 6, 9? and 230 lbs now, after losing 100 ? time to stop worrying about BMI. You're sweating another 10lbs....which is an arbitrary number. Remember your body doesn't care what you want to look like. It's trying to survive and protect your DNA for another day. plus your metabolism is going to slow down anyways, up to 15% or so, just from prolonged deficits. If you were paying me as a client, I'd say it's time to reinvent your approach. The walks and lower calories are probably fluctuating cortisol, thus water retention. I would start doing more serious weight/resistance training and less walking. Less long duration work. More short higher intensity stuff, (not necessarily HIIT though) I would also stop swapping out fats for carbs in your situation. I would get consistent fats while keep ing them low(ish) 60grams or so, and fluctuate the carbs up and down. Your body is not going to convert carbs to fat too readily. Make sure you're getting your omega 3, a good 500 mg between EHA and DPA combined, close to a 50% split between the two. (200's for each one) I used Kirkland/Costco. Forget Superred or whatever.0
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DeguelloTex wrote: »If all you've seen is my refuting every answer, you haven't been reading very well.
IMO you've been totally cool about everything - you asked for input, and you seem to be actively considering the input you're getting.
I'm confident you'll get this sorted out.
:drinker:
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I feel like you aren't eating enough as well, and your body has hit the point where it thinks it needs to start holding onto fat to preserve itself. I am 5'3, 132lbs and eat 2300cals a day and am losing fat with 1 CrossFit WOD 5 days a week.0
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TheFitnessTutor wrote: »You're 6, 9? and 230 lbs now, after losing 100 ? time to stop worrying about BMI. You're sweating another 10lbs....which is an arbitrary number. Remember your body doesn't care what you want to look like. It's trying to survive and protect your DNA for another day. plus your metabolism is going to slow down anyways, up to 15% or so, just from prolonged deficits. If you were paying me, I'd say it's time to reinvent your approach. The walks and lower calories are probably fluctuating cortisol, thus water retention. I would start doing more serious weight/resistance training and less walking. Less long duration work. More short higher intensity stuff, (not necessarily HIIT though) I would also stop swapping out fats for carbs in your situation. Make sure you're getting your omega 3, a good 500 mg between EHA and DPA combined, close to a 50% split between the two. (200's for each one) I used Kirkland/Costco. Forget Superred or whatever.
I'm not worrying about BMI, though. Even when I mentioned it, I said "I know" in parenthesis to indicate I know the issues with it, including being skewed for abnormally tall (or short) people. I'm more concerned with body fat, but I don't have a good answer for that other than to try to compare to online photos of various body fat levels.
I agree with you about the weights. What precipitated this whole fiasco is being close enough to a goal weight to start looking into maintenance calories. Once I had a handle on maintenance, the plan is to bump the calories a bit and go to a four-day weight schedule instead of three and cutting down on the walking miles (which also factored in to figuring real-world maintenance, since that burn would mostly go away).
I've been using Nutrigold omega-3, but I can also take a look at the Costco ones. We have a card around here somewhere.
Why would you suggest not swapping (some) fat for the carbs on off-days? Would you just keep protein constant and maybe cycle carbs up and down and stay steady on all seven days?
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My MapMyFitness weekly report just came in. If only those calories bore any relation to reality.
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DeguelloTex wrote: »My MapMyFitness weekly report just came in. If only those calories bore any relation to reality.
If that's just walking then 800+ calories burned per hour of walking seems way too high.0 -
stevencloser wrote: »DeguelloTex wrote: »My MapMyFitness weekly report just came in. If only those calories bore any relation to reality.
If that's just walking then 800+ calories burned per hour of walking seems way too high.
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Approx 202 calorie burned per mile. Calorie burn is off by possible 70 - 80 calories and this is if the miles were consistent 2.5 to 3.0 mph..0
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Approx 202 calorie burned per mile. Calorie burn is off by possible 70 - 80 calories and this is if the miles were consistent 2.5 to 3.0 mph..
But, again, this burn, whatever it is, isn't part of the 1000 daily dietary deficit that would result in around two pounds of loss per week.
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Nonetheless, I know that when I am very disciplined about my exercise program (I'm a runner; so, most of my exercise is cardio-type), my caloric burn per unit of time and per mile will decrease; e.g., from ~11 kcal/min to ~8 kcal/min. (about 27% decrease). The decrease in caloric burn starts to happen after about 6-8 weeks, or whenever my weekly exercise (running/walking) program gets above 3.5-4 hrs/wk.
How are you establishing that?
Actually, I just go by my Garmin Forerunner 620 w/HRM, which provides that information based upon recent exercise history. However, I used to use a Suunto watch/HRM/GPS and had very similar results--as I began getting more fit, based upon HR and duration of exercise over recent history (several weeks), the calories burned per unit of time decreases.
I'm too lazy to read the studies upon which the science is based; so, I just accept that it's close enough for my recreational/training use. Besides, the algorithm will yield consistent results, regardless whether it's accurate or not; so, I should be able to depend upon the recordings for trending.0 -
Frankly... I'd take a diet break. Eat at TDEE for a month. See what happens. Then cut again.
Heck, you could try to eat a bit over your TDEE and try to bulk for a month, so it's not totally wasted, lol.
Agreed. Have you legit eaten at TDEE since you started? Your November to January break - were you logging or true you just ignore the process for a minute? You're so tall and have such a high TDEE, without trying, you still could have been eating well below it on average. Read the naturally skinny people thread for details...
I like this suggestion because it could help cover the angle where eating at a prolonged deficit might increase the stress hormone cortisol in your body and temporarily mask your weight loss. Do the TDEE thing legitimately for I don't know, a week, resume your regularly scheduled programming (or not, your deficit is really quite sharp), and see what happens?
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Couldn't it just be a plateau? 6 weeks isn't thaaat long, plus you lost so much in the last year. The last 10 lbs is usually pretty resistant to come off, too (or maybe 20 in your case, you're bigger). You are still losing over 1/2 lb a week.0
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Frankly... I'd take a diet break. Eat at TDEE for a month. See what happens. Then cut again.
Heck, you could try to eat a bit over your TDEE and try to bulk for a month, so it's not totally wasted, lol.
Agreed. Have you legit eaten at TDEE since you started? Your November to January break - were you logging or true you just ignore the process for a minute? You're so tall and have such a high TDEE, without trying, you still could have been eating well below it on average. Read the naturally skinny people thread for details...
I like this suggestion because it could help cover the angle where eating at a prolonged deficit might increase the stress hormone cortisol in your body and temporarily mask your weight loss. Do the TDEE thing legitimately for I don't know, a week, resume your regularly scheduled programming (or not, your deficit is really quite sharp), and see what happens?
I was actually pretty encouraged by that because I managed sane portion control at a time of the year when it's not easy to do that, even with measuring.
Without that break, I'd almost certainly have hit my target and started the road to gaining some muscle by now.
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Couldn't it just be a plateau? 6 weeks isn't thaaat long, plus you lost so much in the last year. The last 10 lbs is usually pretty resistant to come off, too (or maybe 20 in your case, you're bigger). You are still losing over 1/2 lb a week.
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DeguelloTex wrote: »Frankly... I'd take a diet break. Eat at TDEE for a month. See what happens. Then cut again.
Heck, you could try to eat a bit over your TDEE and try to bulk for a month, so it's not totally wasted, lol.
Agreed. Have you legit eaten at TDEE since you started? Your November to January break - were you logging or true you just ignore the process for a minute? You're so tall and have such a high TDEE, without trying, you still could have been eating well below it on average. Read the naturally skinny people thread for details...
I like this suggestion because it could help cover the angle where eating at a prolonged deficit might increase the stress hormone cortisol in your body and temporarily mask your weight loss. Do the TDEE thing legitimately for I don't know, a week, resume your regularly scheduled programming (or not, your deficit is really quite sharp), and see what happens?
I was actually pretty encouraged by that because I managed sane portion control at a time of the year when it's not easy to do that, even with measuring.
Without that break, I'd almost certainly have hit my target and started the road to gaining some muscle by now.
My point is, without measuring, you may not know if you were at a deficit, maintenance, or surplusCouldn't it just be a plateau? 6 weeks isn't thaaat long, plus you lost so much in the last year. The last 10 lbs is usually pretty resistant to come off, too (or maybe 20 in your case, you're bigger). You are still losing over 1/2 lb a week.
I also somewhat agree with this because eight weeks is when we can legit start to scream plateau... But then, he's potentially been doing this without a break for much, much longer
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DeguelloTex wrote: »Frankly... I'd take a diet break. Eat at TDEE for a month. See what happens. Then cut again.
Heck, you could try to eat a bit over your TDEE and try to bulk for a month, so it's not totally wasted, lol.
Agreed. Have you legit eaten at TDEE since you started? Your November to January break - were you logging or true you just ignore the process for a minute? You're so tall and have such a high TDEE, without trying, you still could have been eating well below it on average. Read the naturally skinny people thread for details...
I like this suggestion because it could help cover the angle where eating at a prolonged deficit might increase the stress hormone cortisol in your body and temporarily mask your weight loss. Do the TDEE thing legitimately for I don't know, a week, resume your regularly scheduled programming (or not, your deficit is really quite sharp), and see what happens?
I was actually pretty encouraged by that because I managed sane portion control at a time of the year when it's not easy to do that, even with measuring.
Without that break, I'd almost certainly have hit my target and started the road to gaining some muscle by now.
My point is, without measuring, you may not know if you were at a deficit, maintenance, or surplusCouldn't it just be a plateau? 6 weeks isn't thaaat long, plus you lost so much in the last year. The last 10 lbs is usually pretty resistant to come off, too (or maybe 20 in your case, you're bigger). You are still losing over 1/2 lb a week.
I also somewhat agree with this because eight weeks is when we can legit start to scream plateau... But then, he's potentially been doing this without a break for much, much longer
At my age and effort level, absent steroids, muscle growth isn't much of a confounding factor.
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DeguelloTex wrote: »DeguelloTex wrote: »Frankly... I'd take a diet break. Eat at TDEE for a month. See what happens. Then cut again.
Heck, you could try to eat a bit over your TDEE and try to bulk for a month, so it's not totally wasted, lol.
Agreed. Have you legit eaten at TDEE since you started? Your November to January break - were you logging or true you just ignore the process for a minute? You're so tall and have such a high TDEE, without trying, you still could have been eating well below it on average. Read the naturally skinny people thread for details...
I like this suggestion because it could help cover the angle where eating at a prolonged deficit might increase the stress hormone cortisol in your body and temporarily mask your weight loss. Do the TDEE thing legitimately for I don't know, a week, resume your regularly scheduled programming (or not, your deficit is really quite sharp), and see what happens?
I was actually pretty encouraged by that because I managed sane portion control at a time of the year when it's not easy to do that, even with measuring.
Without that break, I'd almost certainly have hit my target and started the road to gaining some muscle by now.
My point is, without measuring, you may not know if you were at a deficit, maintenance, or surplusCouldn't it just be a plateau? 6 weeks isn't thaaat long, plus you lost so much in the last year. The last 10 lbs is usually pretty resistant to come off, too (or maybe 20 in your case, you're bigger). You are still losing over 1/2 lb a week.
I also somewhat agree with this because eight weeks is when we can legit start to scream plateau... But then, he's potentially been doing this without a break for much, much longer
At my age and effort level, absent steroids, muscle growth isn't much of a confounding factor.
And right now you should only be eating some ~300 cals above maintenance, which just seems unlikely to me
Here, this is what I was thinking about, though the author freely admits it's his speculation, and [at the time of his writing] there wasn't much research available [that he knew of] in that space
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/why-big-caloric-deficits-and-lots-of-activity-can-hurt-fat-loss.html/0 -
Op just want to commend your patience on this thread. You have patiently responded to everyone even when repeating yourself multiple times.
I'm really perplexed why your math is not working out! I really hope you can solve it.0 -
DeguelloTex wrote: »DeguelloTex wrote: »Frankly... I'd take a diet break. Eat at TDEE for a month. See what happens. Then cut again.
Heck, you could try to eat a bit over your TDEE and try to bulk for a month, so it's not totally wasted, lol.
Agreed. Have you legit eaten at TDEE since you started? Your November to January break - were you logging or true you just ignore the process for a minute? You're so tall and have such a high TDEE, without trying, you still could have been eating well below it on average. Read the naturally skinny people thread for details...
I like this suggestion because it could help cover the angle where eating at a prolonged deficit might increase the stress hormone cortisol in your body and temporarily mask your weight loss. Do the TDEE thing legitimately for I don't know, a week, resume your regularly scheduled programming (or not, your deficit is really quite sharp), and see what happens?
I was actually pretty encouraged by that because I managed sane portion control at a time of the year when it's not easy to do that, even with measuring.
Without that break, I'd almost certainly have hit my target and started the road to gaining some muscle by now.
My point is, without measuring, you may not know if you were at a deficit, maintenance, or surplusCouldn't it just be a plateau? 6 weeks isn't thaaat long, plus you lost so much in the last year. The last 10 lbs is usually pretty resistant to come off, too (or maybe 20 in your case, you're bigger). You are still losing over 1/2 lb a week.
I also somewhat agree with this because eight weeks is when we can legit start to scream plateau... But then, he's potentially been doing this without a break for much, much longer
At my age and effort level, absent steroids, muscle growth isn't much of a confounding factor.
And right now you should only be eating some ~300 cals above maintenance, which just seems unlikely to me
Here, this is what I was thinking about, though the author freely admits it's his speculation, and [at the time of his writing] there wasn't much research available [that he knew of] in that space
http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/why-big-caloric-deficits-and-lots-of-activity-can-hurt-fat-loss.html/
He is discussing the well documented well meaning several people have mentioned this in the past) and I used to have the link to the study done showing how she gained 15 pounds training for a period of a year and eating at a drastic reduction. If people read it in the context provided they'd understand how much training she was doing and what her body was reacting to; good luck with people taking the time to understand either.
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