Metabolism Suffering With Low Cal Diet - Need Info..

What you heard was untrue. While your body will adjust to lower calorie intake, this doesn't happen in a couple of weeks. It isn't a quick process.

How much are you planning on cutting your calories?

How much have you lost so far? How much are you eating daily?

I think you are going to stress yourself out worrying about these kinds of things. If you are using MFP, here is what works (and what I see with most successful people here):

Focus on eating the MOST amount of calories that you can that will allow you to lose weight at a steady rate. MFP's suggested calorie amount works for most people. If you have 75-100 lbs or more to lose, 2lbs a week is reasonable, but otherwise you are looking for slower weight loss. Weigh regularly, but use a site like trendweight or happy weight to help you focus on the trend rather than the specific ups and downs. If after a few weeks you find you are losing too much and/or are feeling bad effects of dieting, you can boost up your calorie goal, if after a few weeks you are losing too slowly or not losing, you can cut down your calorie goal.

Experiment with what types of foods and balance of carb, fat, and protein helps you feel best, most people find that it is helpful to include more whole foods and especially foods with a lot of fiber. But in general, the main thing is to stick to your calorie counts. Using a food scale will help you immensely in being accurate.

jsuh1993 wrote: »

jgnatca wrote: »

How much have you lost so far? How much are you eating daily?

Male, 6ft tall, 101kg initial weight, Extremely sedentary (no workout)

I started with 101kg. It's been 3 weeks or so and I am at 93kg. So around 8kg in 3 weeks but I assume a big part of that is water weight.

My daily calorie intakes have been up and down.. There were couple of days I went and had 2200-2400 cal and other days around 1200-1400 and some below 1000 cal.. So it's not been very consistent in the past 3 weeks. My overall plan is to lose weight ASAP.

It looks like general feedback is that couple of weeks is not going to significantly affect metabolism rate.

As a tall male, 1800 kcals/day should be the absolute basement for you. You are currently consuming fewer calories than your body needs for basic functions, which is very hard on you and unsustainable. I hope you'll consider increasing your daily goals. Good luck.

Get up to 1800 calories daily. "Unintended side effects" include muscle wasting. Like the heart muscle. Other "unintended side effects" include insomnia, dizziness, fainting, and hair loss.

You want to lose a lot of weight and I understand the desire that it happen quickly. But slow it down a little and you might just get a whole new life. It's worth it to do this right.

jsuh1993 wrote: »

girlviernes wrote: »

jsuh1993 wrote: »

jgnatca wrote: »

How much have you lost so far? How much are you eating daily?

Male, 6ft tall, 101kg initial weight, Extremely sedentary (no workout)

I started with 101kg. It's been 3 weeks or so and I am at 93kg. So around 8kg in 3 weeks but I assume a big part of that is water weight.

My daily calorie intakes have been up and down.. There were couple of days I went and had 2200-2400 cal and other days around 1200-1400 and some below 1000 cal.. So it's not been very consistent in the past 3 weeks. My overall plan is to lose weight ASAP.

It looks like general feedback is that couple of weeks is not going to significantly affect metabolism rate.

As a tall male, 1800 kcals/day should be the absolute basement for you. You are currently consuming fewer calories than your body needs for basic functions, which is very hard on you and unsustainable. I hope you'll consider increasing your daily goals. Good luck.

With 2lbs/week goal, MFP is giving me around 1400 cal or so in avg to consume.

The overall purpose of this thread was me trying to look ahead to see what kind of water weight I had lost (and no longer expect to lose so fast) and see if metabolism slow down has any real effect..

Really? Does it know you are male? Are you eating back exercise calories?

girlviernes wrote: »

jsuh1993 wrote: »

jgnatca wrote: »

How much have you lost so far? How much are you eating daily?

Male, 6ft tall, 101kg initial weight, Extremely sedentary (no workout)

I started with 101kg. It's been 3 weeks or so and I am at 93kg. So around 8kg in 3 weeks but I assume a big part of that is water weight.

My daily calorie intakes have been up and down.. There were couple of days I went and had 2200-2400 cal and other days around 1200-1400 and some below 1000 cal.. So it's not been very consistent in the past 3 weeks. My overall plan is to lose weight ASAP.

It looks like general feedback is that couple of weeks is not going to significantly affect metabolism rate.

As a tall male, 1800 kcals/day should be the absolute basement for you. You are currently consuming fewer calories than your body needs for basic functions, which is very hard on you and unsustainable. I hope you'll consider increasing your daily goals. Good luck.

I have to reiterate girlviernes feedback here -- for a day or so, being well below 1500 calories isn't going to hurt anything (I actually try to budget a day a week, when I know I will be less active than usual, where I'll fall in around 1500 calories -- but I should note that I'm a tall male who is looking to maintain after losing about 25kg). But the practice, day after day, is FAR from sustainable. Doing it super regularly, I'd worry about "bounce back" in what you're eating the day after a day when you consume less than what your body needs just to function.

But from the original question -- there is little-to-no worry about a short term caloric deficit messing up your metabolism.

You really should do some research on the metabolism. I am in the middle of reading Lose Weight Here by Jade and Keoni Teta. It is groundbreaking stuff. The "diet" cycles you through an eat less/exercise less phase and an eat more/exercise more phase. It is geared to "reboot" your metabolism, so to speak, and allow your hormones to get back into sync, so your body will want to burn fat. The whole eat less, exercise more dieting rule is so wrong. Your body views low calories in conjunction with higher intensity/longer exercise as a reason to feel stressed, and therefore not burn fat stores.