Does your body get use to a diet?

katiehepp1
katiehepp1 Posts: 138 Member
edited November 13 in Health and Weight Loss
Somebody at work told me that after a month/3 months your body gets use to your diet and stops losing weigh. So for instance if you were losing 1lb a week and cut 500 calories a day and ate 1700 a day, that after a while your body would stop losing weight because it gets use to the lower calories and learns to function on that amount and no extra?

Replies

  • cwolfman13
    cwolfman13 Posts: 41,865 Member
    edited December 2016
    Adaptive thermogenesis is a thing which is why people take "diet breaks" to reset. I'd say it takes longer than a month though unless you're just crashing your diet, and it's not like you just stop losing...your metabolism dials back a bit, but it's not like that just becomes your new maintenance...that doesn't happen.

    Also, as you get smaller, your calorie requirements go down...so if you're eating at the same target you were in the beginning, it will not be the same kind of deficit...it'll be smaller.
  • crzycatlady1
    crzycatlady1 Posts: 1,930 Member
    No, though you do need to re-run your stats every few pounds lost, because as you lose weight you need to adjust your calorie intake. I did this every 5lbs lost.
  • peaceout_aly
    peaceout_aly Posts: 2,018 Member
    katiehepp1 wrote: »
    Somebody at work told me that after a month/3 months your body gets use to your diet and stops losing weigh. So for instance if you were losing 1lb a week and cut 500 calories a day and ate 1700 a day, that after a while your body would stop losing weight because it gets use to the lower calories and learns to function on that amount and no extra?

    Nope. So wrong. Look up TDEE. If you eat anything below that, you're gonna lose.
  • leanjogreen18
    leanjogreen18 Posts: 2,492 Member
    edited December 2016
    If that were true no one would ever reach their goal weight.

    ETA - So many diet myths out there that keep getting repeated.
  • JeromeBarry1
    JeromeBarry1 Posts: 10,179 Member
    As long as you live, you have a TDEE. Your TDEE varies depending on your weight, muscle mass, and recent feeding habits. If your deficit is consistently more than -500 calories, you will force your TDEE to decline, both because you're losing weight and because you're starving it.. Your weight loss is determined by the differential between your food intake and your TDEE. If your TDEE is falling, your food intake has to fall to maintain the differential that is necessary to maintain the rate of weight loss you want. Most of us don't want to live a life with steadily reducing the amount of food we eat, and instead choose to allow the rate of weight loss to diminish as the expression of our declining TDEE and our consistent level of food intake.
  • trigden1991
    trigden1991 Posts: 4,658 Member
    Your body does "adapt" but not in the way you have described.
  • Azdak
    Azdak Posts: 8,281 Member
    Not so much diet, but there can be longer-term adaptations to weight loss that decreases the thermic effect of food (Am J Clin Nutr 2008;88:906 –12).

    What usually happens over the longer term is that you "adjust" to your (new) habitual food intake and activity patterns, and so you go back into an energy balance.

    In addition, when one follows a "diet", it usually involves changes in eating habits that cannot be sustained long-term. There is usually a number of factors--behavioral, physical, genetic, lifestyle, psychological, etc--that contribute to weight gain. Focusing on the big two--diet and exercise--without addressing the others usually means that, over time, the old psychological/behavioral drives reassert themselves.

  • Renegade192015
    Renegade192015 Posts: 7 Member
    Yes. It's called metabolic adaptation. It's a survival tactic the body employs. It slows down the metabolism after prolonged calorie deficit.
  • irandra23
    irandra23 Posts: 35 Member
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.
  • singingflutelady
    singingflutelady Posts: 8,736 Member
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?
  • coleg04
    coleg04 Posts: 126 Member
    crzycatlady1 wrote: »
    No, though you do need to re-run your stats every few pounds lost, because as you lose weight you need to adjust your calorie intake. I did this every 5lbs lost.

    Can you do this on MFP??
  • crzycatlady1
    crzycatlady1 Posts: 1,930 Member
    coleg04 wrote: »
    crzycatlady1 wrote: »
    No, though you do need to re-run your stats every few pounds lost, because as you lose weight you need to adjust your calorie intake. I did this every 5lbs lost.

    Can you do this on MFP??

    I wasn't on MFP for my weight loss phase, but I think you need to manually re-enter your info here, for it to adjust your calories? I don't think it automatically does it.
  • annaskiski
    annaskiski Posts: 1,212 Member
    It automatically adjusts your calories when you update your weight.
  • ThatUserNameIsAllReadyTaken
    ThatUserNameIsAllReadyTaken Posts: 1,530 Member
    edited December 2016
    I have not adjusted my intake at all and I have lost 35 pounds so far and I still lose about a pound every week or week and a half. Your body eventually will get to a point that you are consuming about what you burn. That is when you stop losing weight. Also My Fitness Pal has never adjusted my calories after a certain amount of weight loss. People keep saying this happens but I have yet to see it.
  • irandra23
    irandra23 Posts: 35 Member
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?

    Because I need to lose 4 pounds a week to hit my goal. I cant do that if i eat 2500 a day.
  • deannalfisher
    deannalfisher Posts: 5,600 Member
    4lbs a week isn't a healthy recommendation for weight loss rate...why so much? MFP recommends 2lbs unless under the supervision of a professional
  • singingflutelady
    singingflutelady Posts: 8,736 Member
    irandra23 wrote: »
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?

    Because I need to lose 4 pounds a week to hit my goal. I cant do that if i eat 2500 a day.

    Are you morbidly obese? 4 lbs a week is super aggressive and not recommended unless you are under doctor supervision.
  • singingflutelady
    singingflutelady Posts: 8,736 Member
    daniip_la wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?

    Because I need to lose 4 pounds a week to hit my goal. I cant do that if i eat 2500 a day.

    You don't need to lose 4lbs a week. You're under eating.

    I just looked and on another thread you said you want to lose 55 lbs by August which is achievable without starving yourself and "needing" to lose 4 lbs a week.
  • irandra23
    irandra23 Posts: 35 Member
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?

    Because I need to lose 4 pounds a week to hit my goal. I cant do that if i eat 2500 a day.

    Are you morbidly obese? 4 lbs a week is super aggressive and not recommended unless you are under doctor supervision.

    I am 198 pounds... dont think that puts me in the morbidly obese catergory but my goal is to reach 143. Yeah i guess im over doing it by aiming for 4 lbs a week but i want to aim for that and mayb settle for less. MFP even adjusts my calorie intake whenever i log in my food and exercise for the day. Today it said i should do 1650 calories a day.
    I guess im worried about failing so much that i want to give it all i can hence the ' Under eating'... mayb i am thinking about it all wrong.
  • JaydedMiss
    JaydedMiss Posts: 4,286 Member
    If this were true id be screwed iv been at 1200 since i began. Nowhere lower to go safely :D and no plateaus
  • psuLemon
    psuLemon Posts: 38,428 MFP Moderator
    irandra23 wrote: »
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?

    Because I need to lose 4 pounds a week to hit my goal. I cant do that if i eat 2500 a day.

    If you aim for something crazy like that, you will end up losing a ton of muscle (which means you aren't losing fat) and you will have a good chance that you will get malnourished and/or potentially hospitalized. You didn't get fat over night, you can't expect to lose it over night.
  • ThatUserNameIsAllReadyTaken
    ThatUserNameIsAllReadyTaken Posts: 1,530 Member
    edited December 2016
    irandra23 wrote: »
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?

    Because I need to lose 4 pounds a week to hit my goal. I cant do that if i eat 2500 a day.

    You will hit your goal losing less than 4 lbs a week. It is dangerous to try and lose weight so quickly. Why not aim for 2 lbs a week? You will meet your goal in time. Patience will be your friend in this endeavor. You don't have to eat 2,500 calories each day, but you also don't have to eat a meager 1,000 regularly. There is a good medium which you will lose weight while being able to eat a normal and healthy amount of food.

    MFP set my goal at 1,400 for a 1 lb a week loss for my activity level when my weight was 187 lbs. I normally meet that, sometimes I fall a little under, occasionally I hit just 1,000 on days when I'm just not hungry. Those days are the exception rather than the rule. Some days I go way over. I am now at 152 lbs. I have lost 35 lbs with out malnourishing my body and endangering my health. You can do it too. I promise.
  • not_a_runner
    not_a_runner Posts: 1,343 Member
    JaydedMiss wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    singingflutelady wrote: »
    irandra23 wrote: »
    Hmmmm am doing 1000 calories per day i hope my body doesn't adapt to this.

    Why are you undereating?

    Because I need to lose 4 pounds a week to hit my goal. I cant do that if i eat 2500 a day.

    Are you morbidly obese? 4 lbs a week is super aggressive and not recommended unless you are under doctor supervision.

    I am 198 pounds... dont think that puts me in the morbidly obese catergory but my goal is to reach 143. Yeah i guess im over doing it by aiming for 4 lbs a week but i want to aim for that and mayb settle for less. MFP even adjusts my calorie intake whenever i log in my food and exercise for the day. Today it said i should do 1650 calories a day.
    I guess im worried about failing so much that i want to give it all i can hence the ' Under eating'... mayb i am thinking about it all wrong.

    Overdoing it like this is how you fail Cut that *kitten* out. Put in your stats eat what it says undereating is just going to lead to binges and health issues

    Not to hijack this thread even further but...
    I started at 198 lbs (5'1'') and was losing about 3 lbs per week until I was down to the 130's. Just because you *could* lose this quickly doesn't mean you should. It's not sustainable.
    After I was "done losing" and started to be less strict (I had to be extremely strict to manage those big losses), I started binge eating like crazy, completely stopped exercising. It wasn't long before I was up to 215 lbs and had an even worse relationship with food than before.
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