Not losing weight since linking my fitbit - HELP!

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Happymelz
Happymelz Posts: 536 Member
edited May 2015 in Health and Weight Loss
I've been using MFP or 2 years, lost down to my goal and failed at maintaining.
Last year I lost with my goals on MFP set to sedentary and logging all exercise and most of my exercise calories back.
I have a desk job but some days walk a lot at work but I didn't change it to the "lightly active" setting.Since I sometimes went over my weekly calorie goal I figured it balance out. It was working, and I lost the weight.

But, since I failed at maintaining and gained most of the weight back I thought it might be better to have a more accurate account of my activity during the day.

AND since a lot of people here love their fitbits and I've been "scolded" for not having an accurate picture of my actual burn for the day I figured it couldn't hurt.

I shelled out $100 for the Fitbit Flex (a big splurged for me) and I've been wearing it every day for 3 weeks.

It shows that I am way more active during the work day than I thought and way less active than I thought on the weekends.

I have mfp set to sedentary and allowed for the negative calorie adjust and I've been eating what MFP tells me to eat.

MFP gives me 1320 but with the Fitbit sometimes it says I have to eat closer to 1700 to be at a -500 deficit for the day.
BUT, I'm eating close to what I was trying to eat at maintenance.

Problem is, I've only been walking for exercise just to see how Fitbit does on its own. If I had been at 1330 with just adding walking I would be losing.

I've gained about 2 lbs in the last 3 weeks.
I have tried weight once per week and I've tried weighing daily to track trends. but the fact is I'm up 2 lbs. 2 real lbs. Ugh.

Any advise?

*I log everything that I eat. I obsess over being accurate because I want to get this right and lose.

Replies

  • SherryTeach
    SherryTeach Posts: 2,836 Member
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    Linking my fitbit to MFP has not affected my weight. I eat the same calories I ate before. The only weigh a fitbit would make you gain weight would be to think you get to eat more.
  • shonda_gonzalez
    shonda_gonzalez Posts: 14 Member
    edited May 2015
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    My best guess is that you are doing all the same things as before, but eating more because your fitbit is giving you more calories burned. I felt like this same thing was happening to me, so I kept my mfp deficit at 500 calories, but set my fitbit deficit to 1000. I look at both and try to stay closer to "in the zone" on my fitbit. -just advice, not a pro here by any means.
    Good luck to you!
  • Juliane_
    Juliane_ Posts: 373 Member
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    Shonda,

    Can you please share how you set that deficit in both MFP and Fitibit? I'm also trying to figure out the math here.
  • Happymelz
    Happymelz Posts: 536 Member
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    SherryTeach wrote: »
    Linking my fitbit to MFP has not affected my weight. I eat the same calories I ate before. The only weigh a fitbit would make you gain weight would be to think you get to eat more.

    But that is just it, I have been eating more but I've been told to "trust fitbit for a few weeks". I know that eating more causes gain but then there is that whole "eat more to lose" mentality so I was trusting the fitbit.


    shonda_gonzalez wrote: »
    My best guess is that you are doing all the same things as before, but eating more because your fitbit is giving you more calories burned. I felt like this same thing was happening to me, so I kept my mfp deficit at 500 calories, but set my fitbit deficit to 1000. I look at both and try to stay closer to "in the zone" on my fitbit. -just advice, not a pro here by any means.
    Good luck to you!

    I was contemplating doing that. Did it work for you?
  • StaciMarie1974
    StaciMarie1974 Posts: 4,138 Member
    edited May 2015
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    Give it more time. 2-3 weeks is not enough to know if you're actually gaining weight, or if its fluctuation from sodium, stress, TOM, etc.

    Personally for maintenance the only thing that works for my sanity is to have an acceptable range. It would drive me crazy to always try to stay exactly at 125.5 for example. So I have 123-128. If I'm at the top end, I cut back 100-200 calories a day. If I'm on the low end, I feel free to endulge more often.

    Otherwise, if you're needing to lose now: Until you know otherwise I'd suggest you build in a margin of error for Fitbit. So if you're aiming for a 500/day deficit, plan to leave an extra 100-200 calories 'on the table'. This will make up for it if Fitbit is giving you too much credit. So if Fitbit says you burned 2100, eat 1500 instead of 1600. But you'll still need 2-3 months to go over your data & see the trend.
  • Happymelz
    Happymelz Posts: 536 Member
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    StaciMarie1974 wrote: »
    Give it more time. 2-3 weeks is not enough to know if you're actually gaining weight, or if its fluctuation from sodium, stress, TOM, etc.

    Otherwise, if you're needing to lose now: Until you know otherwise I'd suggest you build in a margin of error for Fitbit. So if you're aiming for a 500/day deficit, plan to leave an extra 100-200 calories 'on the table'. This will make up for it if Fitbit is giving you too much credit. So if Fitbit says you burned 2100, eat 1500 instead of 1600. But you'll still need 2-3 months to go over your data & see the trend.

    Ok, thank you. It just took me soooo long to lose last time that I'm dreading it taking a long time to see results.

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