Struggling to lose fat and tone up

svcardolino
svcardolino Posts: 5 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hi everyone,

Just wanted some advice really on how to lose unwanted fat and tone up!

I go to the gym 4-5 times a week || boxercise, kettlebells twice, spinning three times and sometimes gym! I try to do ab work outs also!

However, I've recently rejoined slimming world to lose fat (but whenever I've joined before whilst doing the gym I lose it completely as the scales tells me I've either maintained or gained

Replies

  • Yi5hedr3
    Yi5hedr3 Posts: 2,696 Member
    Remember, fat loss is 90% diet. :)
  • SueInAz
    SueInAz Posts: 6,592 Member
    So you're working out hard but how's your food diary look? Do you have a calorie goal which will allow you to lose a small amount of weight each week and are you hitting that goal? As @Yi5hedr3 said, fat loss is mostly about what you're eating, not about how hard you're working in the gym.
  • svcardolino
    svcardolino Posts: 5 Member
    Yeah I'm not too bad with my diet, although I do allow myself a small treat! I feel like because I have lost the bulk of what I need to lose already, maybe I should try cutting down portion sizes and not so much of a treat? Thanks :)
  • svcardolino
    svcardolino Posts: 5 Member
    Well I've started my fitness pal again and following my calorie intake....its just not showing on the scales so much which sucks because that then puts a downer on all the hard work I feel I do regarding gym & diet! I'm going to try portion sizes, less carbs and less of a treat and hope for the best.
    Do you suggest I continue with the gym and my classes though? I love going so much and it really ups my mood! I've always dropped one or the other (gym or dieting seriously) when attempting to tone and lose because one always screws up the other :)
  • ambrospa
    ambrospa Posts: 5 Member
    If you love going to the gym, then keep going! Maybe cut down on the frequency a little if you say it screws up the diet part. Good luck!
  • Hornsby
    Hornsby Posts: 10,322 Member
    How many calories are you eating per day? Are you weighing all solids? And measuring all liquids?
  • SueInAz
    SueInAz Posts: 6,592 Member
    edited April 2016
    svcardolino wrote: »
    Yeah I'm not too bad with my diet, although I do allow myself a small treat! I feel like because I have lost the bulk of what I need to lose already, maybe I should try cutting down portion sizes and not so much of a treat? Thanks :)

    You're missing the point a bit. How accurately are you logging what you eat? Do you have a goal and are you sticking to it? If you're eating "whatever" your results are going to be "whatever", too. You can't "think" and "hope" you're eating few enough calories to lose weight. Studies have been done which show that even people who think they are logging everything they eat are usually off by as much as 40%. In other words, a woman who thinks she is eating 1200 calories per day is really eating as many as 1680 calories. That's a difference of nearly a pound per week in fat not lost or even gained.

    The easiest way to lose weight and keep it off is to log what you're eating and stay under a calorie goal every day. Isn't that why you're on MFP in the first place? If you aren't doing that yet, start. Go into your food diary on this web site and start tracking everything. If you don't own a food scale, buy one and use it. Weigh as much of your solid food as you can, even the packaged stuff that is supposedly a specific weight (but often isn't). Once you have a good grasp of how many calories per day you are really eating you can start to make the changes you need to make to get the results you want.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 28,052 Member
    svcardolino wrote: »
    Well I've started my fitness pal again and following my calorie intake....its just not showing on the scales so much which sucks because that then puts a downer on all the hard work I feel I do regarding gym & diet! I'm going to try portion sizes, less carbs and less of a treat and hope for the best.
    Do you suggest I continue with the gym and my classes though? I love going so much and it really ups my mood! I've always dropped one or the other (gym or dieting seriously) when attempting to tone and lose because one always screws up the other :)

    I don't understand why diet and exercise would interfere with each other. Are you eating back the calories you earn from exercise? That's how MFP is designed, so if you're not, you'd get hungry because you're not properly fueling your workouts.

    However, since exercise burns are often considered to be inflated, many posters suggest you just eat back around 50% of the calories you earn from exercise.
  • SueInAz
    SueInAz Posts: 6,592 Member
    svcardolino wrote: »
    Well I've started my fitness pal again and following my calorie intake....its just not showing on the scales so much which sucks because that then puts a downer on all the hard work I feel I do regarding gym & diet! I'm going to try portion sizes, less carbs and less of a treat and hope for the best.
    Do you suggest I continue with the gym and my classes though? I love going so much and it really ups my mood! I've always dropped one or the other (gym or dieting seriously) when attempting to tone and lose because one always screws up the other :)

    I started my other reply was before I saw this one posted. :smile:

    Definitely do not stop the classes and weight lifting. Those things are great for you. Lifting heavy will help you retain muscle mass and might actually do more than that.

    Here's something to think about. I started MFP 5 years ago just trying to "lose weight". I logged my food, I did my cardio workouts and I reached my goal weight. I wasn't really happy with how I looked, though, and it was really hard for me to maintain my goal weight without having to really cut back on how much I ate. 2 years ago I started weight lifting and lifting heavy, as much weight as I could lift 5 times in a row. At this point, I weigh 10 pounds more than I did when I was at my original goal weight but I'm still wearing the same clothes I did then. My body fat percentage has dropped about 10%. In other words, I'm the size I originally wanted to be but my body is firmer and I no longer really care what the scale says because I've learned it doesn't define my goals. I've lost the "old lady jiggle" under my arms. I have nice definition in my legs. I can eat more and still maintain my size and weight.

    If that sounds more like what you had in mind than simply dropping a few more pounds, get more serious about weight lifting. Eat at a slight deficit (250 pounds under maintenance) and hit the gym every other day. You can still do cardio on the days between lifting but lifting should be your primary focus.
  • svcardolino
    svcardolino Posts: 5 Member
    Ok let me rephrase it, my diet is good. However I don't weigh all my foods out, tend to only weigh/measure milk & cheese and a mug of a pasta.
    I don't know what it is, whether it's because I've been following slimming world & maybe not a different food program, but whenever I gym a lot & eat what I'm allowed to which is pretty much a really good diet anyway! The scales seems to show a maintain or a gain and if I lose its like 0.5-1lb a go!
    I've narrowed it down to possible portion sizes, too much carbs, muscle gain or maybe the fact that I've lost the bull of fat that I needed to lose and now it's getting harder to shift unwanted fat. I do have a daily food diary, so will continue with that. At the moment my calorie intake is 1400-1500 but I'm going to lower this now to try and get more a result!
    I don't know a great deal about how to gym & what to eat to achieve various goals. It's difficult when this is the case, and it's not always easy to find someone to explain or help shed light on the situation either....appreciate you all trying though!
  • Hornsby
    Hornsby Posts: 10,322 Member
    You should weigh and measure all of your foods.
  • svcardolino
    svcardolino Posts: 5 Member
    Maybe that's where I'm going wrong. I thought that there would be an easier way to get around it than going to that extreme....it would literally start to take over my life if I had to weigh out each and every thing I put in my mouth, 3 times a day. I think I will be more cautious over more things than others though. Thank you
  • ClosetBayesian
    ClosetBayesian Posts: 836 Member
    svcardolino wrote: »
    Maybe that's where I'm going wrong. I thought that there would be an easier way to get around it than going to that extreme....it would literally start to take over my life if I had to weigh out each and every thing I put in my mouth, 3 times a day. I think I will be more cautious over more things than others though. Thank you

    It takes maybe five minutes in the morning for me to weigh out breakfast, lunch, and two snacks. It just doesn't take that much time.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 28,052 Member
    svcardolino wrote: »
    Maybe that's where I'm going wrong. I thought that there would be an easier way to get around it than going to that extreme....it would literally start to take over my life if I had to weigh out each and every thing I put in my mouth, 3 times a day. I think I will be more cautious over more things than others though. Thank you

    I don't consider weighing foods extreme. I just make it part of meal prep. Now that all my frequently used foods are in my food diary, weighing and logging takes less than 10 minutes per day (on days I'm not adding a new recipe.)
  • Hornsby
    Hornsby Posts: 10,322 Member
    svcardolino wrote: »
    Maybe that's where I'm going wrong. I thought that there would be an easier way to get around it than going to that extreme....it would literally start to take over my life if I had to weigh out each and every thing I put in my mouth, 3 times a day. I think I will be more cautious over more things than others though. Thank you

    Well this is a calorie counting website. Not sure what the point is if you aren't going to be accurate in the counting.

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