Sab's thread

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  • SabAteNine
    SabAteNine Posts: 1,866 Member
    Thanks for the update OP :smile: I've only glanced at your spreadsheet, I'm having one of those busy busy days.

    You seem to be doing just fine, give it time and and do trust the process. Goodness even I doubt myself and I've been at maintenance for years (5). but the majority of the time I KNOW I'm doing just fine :smile:
    Give yourself a +/-5lb weight range, or a little bit less. And go by your month on month figures. You will start to relax over time. But while you have the data, you really can trust the process. Keep going with that mantra :smile:

    Ruth

    Thanks so much for the encouragement, Ruth! You've been great to have in this thread :smiley:

    And congratulations for the lengthy period of maintenance. This is indeed impressive to me. But yes, I don't think doubts really ever go away for anyone who's ridden the weight gain-weight loss rollercoaster.

    I was awfully bad at keeping records consistently in the past. My MFP chart has settled for the most part into a „yearly mountains” pattern of recording a higher weight and then losing again over a couple of months, stop, repeat next year. This is the first time I am actually monitoring things closely and the insights are fantastic.
  • LivingtheLeanDream
    LivingtheLeanDream Posts: 13,345 Member
    AnvilHead wrote: »
    Just a suggestion - you may want to try using a weight trending app such as Happy Scale (iOS), Libra (Android) or Trendweight.com (web). I see you have the weight graph on your spreadsheet, but the trending app smooths out the daily fluctuations and gives you a good idea of what's actually going on in the "big picture".

    Agreed! :smile: , a weight trending app is a great idea and use one myself.
  • CarvedTones
    CarvedTones Posts: 2,340 Member
    I didn't woo, but I don't use a trending app because for whatever reason my spikes are rarely even 2 pounds. For example, I have been within a pound of 160 every time I have weighed for over 2 weeks.
  • jjpptt2
    jjpptt2 Posts: 5,650 Member
    I certainly think you're on the right track. A little more patience, and more focus on trends rather than point-in-time numbers can never hurt.

    As for the deficit vs maintenance... don't forget that there is a certain degree/margin for error that, even with the most careful measuring/logging, we can't completely eliminate.
  • SabAteNine
    SabAteNine Posts: 1,866 Member
    @SabAteNine a lot of Woo'ers (usually newbies) actually think woo is a positive thing...

    That makes sense. I know I struggled with its meaning as well in the beginning.

    @CarvedTones That sounds very lucky! My readings are much more volatile :smile:
  • RadishEater
    RadishEater Posts: 470 Member
    Hello,
    I have similar stats to you 27yr old female, 5'7-5'8 maintenance weight 127-130. I've been in maintanance for 5months now and I'm still trying to figure out how much calories to eat and what ratio of fats/fiber/protein works best for me, and then events like weeklong trips, family in town can throw data into wack. mzkl843bjlbd.jpg

    I- was a week of no logging due to being on a ski trip (and I think the number is superficially low to me being dehydrated from a night out of partying the day before)
    II- was having chocolate and peanut butter cravings go out of control
    III- dad visited, ate lots of sodium from eating out ate back all my calories and more

    But you can see at first a downward trend, then slightly upward, and now back downward, idk what's going on with this week. Those sharp peaks can really be hard to deal with but I leave my report set to have my view at least 3+ months so that it gives me a more trend view than what has happened in the past couple days.
  • RadishEater
    RadishEater Posts: 470 Member
    Yeah except from dec-early feb I was eating at a lower calorie allotment but was losing still so I upped my calories in february and then got a hold of my UNLOGGED extra chocolate/pb habit right after that #2 spike, so the 1.5 -2 month trends make sense to me in my head. I feel like 4 months is a long time to see a trend, but that is what I feel with no sci. resources to back that up.
  • SabAteNine
    SabAteNine Posts: 1,866 Member
    kballsocc wrote: »
    Hello,
    I have similar stats to you 27yr old female, 5'7-5'8 maintenance weight 127-130. I've been in maintanance for 5months now and I'm still trying to figure out how much calories to eat and what ratio of fats/fiber/protein works best for me, and then events like weeklong trips, family in town can throw data into wack. mzkl843bjlbd.jpg

    I- was a week of no logging due to being on a ski trip (and I think the number is superficially low to me being dehydrated from a night out of partying the day before)
    II- was having chocolate and peanut butter cravings go out of control
    III- dad visited, ate lots of sodium from eating out ate back all my calories and more

    But you can see at first a downward trend, then slightly upward, and now back downward, idk what's going on with this week. Those sharp peaks can really be hard to deal with but I leave my report set to have my view at least 3+ months so that it gives me a more trend view than what has happened in the past couple days.

    @kballsocc, thanks so much for sharing. We have similar stats indeed! This is really insightful for me, including the details regarding what changed and how that translated into those small periods going up and down. Congratulations on your maintenance, you seem to be doing great. As @jjpptt2, your last months look like solid maintenance at a little under 130.

    And I totally feel (and anticipate) the problem with work trips, organized meals and family dinners. But I've been through those before, so I'll just carry on doing what worked in the past.

  • maybe1pe
    maybe1pe Posts: 529 Member
    SabAteNine wrote: »
    AnvilHead wrote: »
    Just a suggestion - you may want to try using a weight trending app such as Happy Scale (iOS), Libra (Android) or Trendweight.com (web). I see you have the weight graph on your spreadsheet, but the trending app smooths out the daily fluctuations and gives you a good idea of what's actually going on in the "big picture".

    Apparently you got yourself a gaggle of Woo'ers for a very pertinent advice. I will not pretend to understand why.

    I could use an app, but I prefer to custom-tailor what I record. I work with statistics in my daily job among other things so assessing trends based on the data will not be a problem :smile:

    Have you considered setting up your spreadsheet to average your weight for the week? I use one that looks like this

    ytswyhf1irv3.png

    It's set up that at the top I can select if I'm trying to lose or maintain. It takes into account my daily weigh ins, or however often weigh ins and averages them for the week and then further averages them from one week to the next. it records my calories in and averages over a selected number of weeks (mine is set to 12) so that I can see the differences. I also make notes next to certain weeks if I know I'm experiencing an uptrend in weight because of where I am in my cycle or a vacation or whatever else.

    Typically when I eat at or above maintenance I might see a spike for a week, sometimes two, and then evens itself back out.

    If I eat at the level it says my TDEE is I maintain. because this is real world accurate data for myself. There are also weeks like can be seen on April 30, where it looks like I eat at a deficit and my weight goes up. but if you look at my average TDEE number for that week it's still higher than my average calorie intake, not by much in this example, but there are other weeks that I have documented where it's off by 200-300 calories. because weight fluctuates.

    It might be something to consider trying to alter your spreedsheet to make it more accurate.
  • collectingblues
    collectingblues Posts: 2,541 Member
    I didn't woo, but I don't use a trending app because for whatever reason my spikes are rarely even 2 pounds. For example, I have been within a pound of 160 every time I have weighed for over 2 weeks.

    Men have it so easy. :D
  • SabAteNine
    SabAteNine Posts: 1,866 Member
    maybe1pe wrote: »
    SabAteNine wrote: »
    AnvilHead wrote: »
    Just a suggestion - you may want to try using a weight trending app such as Happy Scale (iOS), Libra (Android) or Trendweight.com (web). I see you have the weight graph on your spreadsheet, but the trending app smooths out the daily fluctuations and gives you a good idea of what's actually going on in the "big picture".

    Apparently you got yourself a gaggle of Woo'ers for a very pertinent advice. I will not pretend to understand why.

    I could use an app, but I prefer to custom-tailor what I record. I work with statistics in my daily job among other things so assessing trends based on the data will not be a problem :smile:

    Have you considered setting up your spreadsheet to average your weight for the week? I use one that looks like this

    ytswyhf1irv3.png

    It's set up that at the top I can select if I'm trying to lose or maintain. It takes into account my daily weigh ins, or however often weigh ins and averages them for the week and then further averages them from one week to the next. it records my calories in and averages over a selected number of weeks (mine is set to 12) so that I can see the differences. I also make notes next to certain weeks if I know I'm experiencing an uptrend in weight because of where I am in my cycle or a vacation or whatever else.

    Typically when I eat at or above maintenance I might see a spike for a week, sometimes two, and then evens itself back out.

    If I eat at the level it says my TDEE is I maintain. because this is real world accurate data for myself. There are also weeks like can be seen on April 30, where it looks like I eat at a deficit and my weight goes up. but if you look at my average TDEE number for that week it's still higher than my average calorie intake, not by much in this example, but there are other weeks that I have documented where it's off by 200-300 calories. because weight fluctuates.

    It might be something to consider trying to alter your spreedsheet to make it more accurate.

    I like this a lot. This is exactly the kind of extensive sheet I was aiming to „produce” on the longer term. Started in the simplest way possible though so that my procrastinating self can get accustomed to logging and know what to look for in the data.

    It looks like you are going to reach your goal soon, so congratulations to you! And by what I see, you're doing it slow and consistent, with a small deficit that's really sustainable, and are very active. I don't think I've ever eaten your TDEE amount in the last 7 years except for when I went to the occasional wedding, lol. :smiley:
  • maybe1pe
    maybe1pe Posts: 529 Member
    SabAteNine wrote: »
    maybe1pe wrote: »
    SabAteNine wrote: »
    AnvilHead wrote: »
    Just a suggestion - you may want to try using a weight trending app such as Happy Scale (iOS), Libra (Android) or Trendweight.com (web). I see you have the weight graph on your spreadsheet, but the trending app smooths out the daily fluctuations and gives you a good idea of what's actually going on in the "big picture".

    Apparently you got yourself a gaggle of Woo'ers for a very pertinent advice. I will not pretend to understand why.

    I could use an app, but I prefer to custom-tailor what I record. I work with statistics in my daily job among other things so assessing trends based on the data will not be a problem :smile:

    Have you considered setting up your spreadsheet to average your weight for the week? I use one that looks like this

    ytswyhf1irv3.png

    It's set up that at the top I can select if I'm trying to lose or maintain. It takes into account my daily weigh ins, or however often weigh ins and averages them for the week and then further averages them from one week to the next. it records my calories in and averages over a selected number of weeks (mine is set to 12) so that I can see the differences. I also make notes next to certain weeks if I know I'm experiencing an uptrend in weight because of where I am in my cycle or a vacation or whatever else.

    Typically when I eat at or above maintenance I might see a spike for a week, sometimes two, and then evens itself back out.

    If I eat at the level it says my TDEE is I maintain. because this is real world accurate data for myself. There are also weeks like can be seen on April 30, where it looks like I eat at a deficit and my weight goes up. but if you look at my average TDEE number for that week it's still higher than my average calorie intake, not by much in this example, but there are other weeks that I have documented where it's off by 200-300 calories. because weight fluctuates.

    It might be something to consider trying to alter your spreedsheet to make it more accurate.

    I like this a lot. This is exactly the kind of extensive sheet I was aiming to „produce” on the longer term. Started in the simplest way possible though so that my procrastinating self can get accustomed to logging and know what to look for in the data.

    It looks like you are going to reach your goal soon, so congratulations to you! And by what I see, you're doing it slow and consistent, with a small deficit that's really sustainable, and are very active. I don't think I've ever eaten your TDEE amount in the last 7 years except for when I went to the occasional wedding, lol. :smiley:

    Thanks! I am very active, I get too antsy if I sit around.

    I like data and I have lost over the last almost 3.5 years. (with long stretches of maintenance in there). I track this way because I want to know what my TDEE is and I've noticed MFP is way off for me and I don't plan on regaining the 115+ lbs I've lost.

    I will also say that my TDEE shifts up after I have been maintaining for a period of a couple of months. It will start out say 2000 (for easy numbers) and then I'll start losing again. So I have to bump up another 100 or so calories periodically until my weight balances out. I assume it has to do with hormone regulation after coming out of a deficit but I've never looked into the science behind it.

    You can always friend me or message me if you have questions about how I set mine up. I tried to just attach it to the comment but excel is not an accepted file type on the forums....

    Good luck!
  • SabAteNine
    SabAteNine Posts: 1,866 Member
    maybe1pe wrote: »
    SabAteNine wrote: »
    maybe1pe wrote: »
    SabAteNine wrote: »
    AnvilHead wrote: »
    Just a suggestion - you may want to try using a weight trending app such as Happy Scale (iOS), Libra (Android) or Trendweight.com (web). I see you have the weight graph on your spreadsheet, but the trending app smooths out the daily fluctuations and gives you a good idea of what's actually going on in the "big picture".

    Apparently you got yourself a gaggle of Woo'ers for a very pertinent advice. I will not pretend to understand why.

    I could use an app, but I prefer to custom-tailor what I record. I work with statistics in my daily job among other things so assessing trends based on the data will not be a problem :smile:

    Have you considered setting up your spreadsheet to average your weight for the week? I use one that looks like this

    ytswyhf1irv3.png

    It's set up that at the top I can select if I'm trying to lose or maintain. It takes into account my daily weigh ins, or however often weigh ins and averages them for the week and then further averages them from one week to the next. it records my calories in and averages over a selected number of weeks (mine is set to 12) so that I can see the differences. I also make notes next to certain weeks if I know I'm experiencing an uptrend in weight because of where I am in my cycle or a vacation or whatever else.

    Typically when I eat at or above maintenance I might see a spike for a week, sometimes two, and then evens itself back out.

    If I eat at the level it says my TDEE is I maintain. because this is real world accurate data for myself. There are also weeks like can be seen on April 30, where it looks like I eat at a deficit and my weight goes up. but if you look at my average TDEE number for that week it's still higher than my average calorie intake, not by much in this example, but there are other weeks that I have documented where it's off by 200-300 calories. because weight fluctuates.

    It might be something to consider trying to alter your spreedsheet to make it more accurate.

    I like this a lot. This is exactly the kind of extensive sheet I was aiming to „produce” on the longer term. Started in the simplest way possible though so that my procrastinating self can get accustomed to logging and know what to look for in the data.

    It looks like you are going to reach your goal soon, so congratulations to you! And by what I see, you're doing it slow and consistent, with a small deficit that's really sustainable, and are very active. I don't think I've ever eaten your TDEE amount in the last 7 years except for when I went to the occasional wedding, lol. :smiley:

    Thanks! I am very active, I get too antsy if I sit around.

    I like data and I have lost over the last almost 3.5 years. (with long stretches of maintenance in there). I track this way because I want to know what my TDEE is and I've noticed MFP is way off for me and I don't plan on regaining the 115+ lbs I've lost.

    I will also say that my TDEE shifts up after I have been maintaining for a period of a couple of months. It will start out say 2000 (for easy numbers) and then I'll start losing again. So I have to bump up another 100 or so calories periodically until my weight balances out. I assume it has to do with hormone regulation after coming out of a deficit but I've never looked into the science behind it.

    You can always friend me or message me if you have questions about how I set mine up. I tried to just attach it to the comment but excel is not an accepted file type on the forums....

    Good luck!

    I just friend-requested you. :smile:

    I'm getting nervous too now if I carry on with the office day without walking and stairs breaks. There is definitely more energy firing through, more than my time or running break (knee problem) can unfortunately manage at this moment.

    It makes sense to me that, in the long and steady run, the TDEE would increase a bit. I'm expecting mine to do the same, it would be nice to have more rope.

    Did a revamp of my daily GSheets Excel file (give it a bit of time, graphs take forever to load). At the moment it checks all my boxes, but there's always the possibility of adding more insights as needed. I love data as well, really like to dig into any kind of dataset.

    Thanks a lot! And again, way to go to you for the massive (and determined, and consistent) loss.

    Sab
  • jjpptt2
    jjpptt2 Posts: 5,650 Member
    Just a couple of ideas that I, personally, have found to be helpful.

    I setup my spreadsheet to run rolling averages for my net cals. I currently have it run 3, 5 and 10 day averages, but will be pushing that out to 7, 14, and 30 day averages once I'm fully into recomp mode. I then graph those averages to compare to my trend weight numbers. Works well for me.
  • SabAteNine
    SabAteNine Posts: 1,866 Member
    That's actually a great idea, @jjpptt2. Thank you. I will steal it. :smile:

    7, 14 and 30 days does make more sense to me, but that's because I think in weeks (like most of us do, I believe) - guess it could be any set of time stretches provided they're relevant to a specific purpose.
  • rimir74
    rimir74 Posts: 29 Member
    My spreadsheet is very basic. I just look at overall data movement for calories in 4 week sets and overall for the year. I'm not tracking weight since it seems to be stable. I have a net calorie listed just to make myself feel like I have some leeway. Since my weight is pretty much maintaining, I'm likely not in the lower calorie column

    https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1x-U5_S1FOLICblo3jzexdgYx7f34SiKsqk1Tg0kTTHo/edit?usp=sharing