Struggling with Plateau

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takuan0351
takuan0351 Posts: 2 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hey all, I am struggling with a stall in my weight loss and I'm confused how to proceed and hoping to get some advice and learn from everyone!

Quick background, I went on a general diet and did weight lifting for 3 months and didn't lose any weight (though I'm sure there was some muscle/fat trade off). Then about 2 months ago I switched to a low-carb diet and dusted off my P90X and lost an average of 2lb a week for about 6 weeks, some of which I'm sure was water from lack of glucose. However as of about 2.5 weeks ago my steady losses slowed down and than stopped at 208 lb where they have held steady for about a week and a half now, in fact today I'm up to 209 again. I'm a computer guy and have an excel sheet where I track my statistics based on daily weigh in's first thing in the morning, as well as one for daily food consumed broken down into overall calories and fat/protein/carbs. I eat the same 3 meals every day, no cheat days and consume 1~2 gallons of water a day (normally closer to 1 then 2), about half of which is made up for tea, mainly green tea.

My question is this, am I eating to many calories, aka eating at maintenance or slightly above, or am I not eating enough and my metabolism has slowed down and is now trying to store fat?

I'm 31, 209 lb, 6ft even and I work a desk job (but my desk is adjustable allowing me to stand 50% of the time). I walk my dog 1.3~1.5 miles a day at a decent pace followed by a 60~90 min P90X workout 5 days a week. My calculated BMR is roughly 2000 and my calculated TDEE is roughly 2900~3100. However my Fitbit Charge HR says I'm burning 3500~4000+ (normally around 4000) per day. My daily meals put me at 2400~2600 per day, depending on uncontrollable serving size variation). I upped it from 2100 per day recently due to my high readings from my fitbit, but haven't seen any changes other than about a .3 lb gain per day.

If I go off my fitbit I should eat more to get to a 20% caloric deficit, but they can be inaccurate while my TDEE says I should maintain this caloric intake or even decrease it a little. Any suggestions from anyone? Any way I can be more sure what I should do? Any thoughts or advice is greatly welcome!

Replies

  • lorrpb
    lorrpb Posts: 11,464 Member
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    A week is not a plateau, it is normal. I ususlly go more than a week between losses, and I've lost 138 lbs. weight loss is not linear and that's more true the more you lose. Just keep with your program and make sure you're weighing food & logging accurately. Good job so far.
  • Equus5374
    Equus5374 Posts: 462 Member
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    Read ALL the sticky posts on the MFP forum. There seem to be 20 questions like this posted every day. The majority of the time it's just impatience and unrealistic expectations (brought on by fad diets that make it sound normal to lose 10 pounds a week). Just go read those stickies now. And when someone posts the flow chart, read that too, about 5 times.
  • amynicole4104
    amynicole4104 Posts: 26 Member
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    That happens to me sometimes. I will not lose for a few weeks and sometimes even gain a pound or two. I start to panic a little. Lol. But then, all of a sudden my weight will go down several pounds over the course of a couple days. Give it a little more time and if nothing happens maybe reevaluate your intake? Maybe try decreasing a little. Dont increase. Eating too little will not cause weight gain.
    Congrats on your progress so far and good luck!
  • lemonychild
    lemonychild Posts: 654 Member
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    You need more time and u need to be patient
  • rainysunshine2k2
    rainysunshine2k2 Posts: 2 Member
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    I seem to have just gotten out of a 6 week plateua. SIX WEEKS! I was gettinger super frustrated. My weight, like yours, got to a point, went back up, got down to that point, went back up. Wouldn't get past that one point! And i do daily weights in the AM, too. Finally I stopped eating back my fitbit/exercise calories and did a Little more cardio (I only exercise 3 - 4 days per week) and finally got below that "no pass" weight. I hope I keep going down now! For you I would give it time and yes, stick with the strict calorie intake that MFP recommends
  • TheRiceLord
    TheRiceLord Posts: 24 Member
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    I lost weight from 78 kilos to 75.5 kilos. Eating at a 700 calorie deficit and I ate lots of sodium 3 dsys ago for 2 days straight, and clean the next day. Now i weigh "77-78 kilos" today.
    It's water weight for sure because I stayed on a 700 calorie deficit for sure through these days. Plus I can feel the fat burned off my stomach, and face. It'll go down in the next 2 or 3 days of clean eating and lots of water. Most likely with the scale marked, 75 kilos!
  • takuan0351
    takuan0351 Posts: 2 Member
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    Thank you all for the encouragement, I'll just stick with working out and eating a for sure deficit and see what keeps happening. I really appreciate it!
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,777 Member
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    Connect trendweight.com to your fitbit account and use averaged weight trends/

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