Frustrated
jackimartin1973
Posts: 10 Member
I am in week 2 of this diet and working out. I am doing the couch to 5 k workouts and walking on off days. I am putting in the commitment but this body apparently doesn’t want to cooperate. I dropped 4 lbs on week one only to gain 3 of it back. I feel better and proud of my excercise but I was hoping to see the scale go in the other direction. With all the excercise, I am still leaving abt 500 calories on the table. I am eating around 1200 calories a day. Any guidance?
2
Replies
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Relax. You don't lose and gain 3 or 4 pounds of fat in a week. You can't measure fat loss week by week like that. It's mostly water weight fluctuations. If you have enough fat on your body, you can lose up to 2 pounds of fat per week, if you do everything right, all the time.6
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Thanks for that. Maybe just need to stop weighing myself. It’s depressing.6
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More patience is needed. Those big swings in weight are water fluctuations. Exercise, salt, TOM all have an effect. I weigh daily and have a weight trending app that smooths it all out. Maybe consider something like that.4
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jackimartin1973 wrote: »Thanks for that. Maybe just need to stop weighing myself. It’s depressing.
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Patience and Persistence is key. Weight loss is not linear, it will come3
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jackimartin1973 wrote: »Thanks for that. Maybe just need to stop weighing myself. It’s depressing.
That works best for some people. For others, weighing daily (same time, same conditions) helps them - over time - understand the daily weight fluctuations and their causes, and not be so stressed by them. We each have to figure out which personality type we are.
Personally, I have a theory that we don't have a true weight, just a current range and a long-term trend.
Over the course of a day or few days, our weight goes up with food and drink consumption, down with elimination and sweating, up from water weight retention (due to women's monthly hormone cycling, water needed in the muscle maintenance process after exercise, water tied up in metabolizing more than normal sodium or carbs we've eaten (even if a perfectly healthy amount), and lots more). In the very short run, all of that fluctuation masks our slow, gradual fat loss . . . and fat loss is the thing we really care about, right?
Beyond that short term weight range, over a period of weeks to months, we have a long-term weight trend: The fluctuations gradually average downward (weight loss), upward (weight gain) or stay in about the same boundaries (weight maintenance). If you graphed it, you'd see a bumpy set of ups and downs that are part of a long-term downhill slope (weight loss), uphill slope (gain), or just bumpy horizontal (maintenance). It's that trend we really care about, when we're trying to lose weight.
Some of us use a weight trending app (Happy Scale for iOS, Libra for Android, Trendweight, Weightgrapher, others) to help us monitor not just the short term ups and downs, but the long-term trend.
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Hello everyone. I have been frustrated as well. When I saw my number on my scale, I was upset and depressed I said "f*** it!" I was feeling the inner self saying "you can't lose the weight". I've recently learned that you can't beat yourself up for not loosing the weight. Don't let the scale control you. I may rose to 236 lbs, but I refuse to quit this time. You can do this. I hope this helps...3
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It helps immensely! I was so mad I walked an extra mile and pushed myself double hard. My husband says if I don’t lose anything, not to worry, because I will be healthier with exercise and healthy eating. I am going to stop weighing myself.6
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I feel ya!!!!! I'm a month in and the only decrease in my numbers was my bust size- dropped an inch. So not cool. The idea of working hard with a pear shaped body as the reward is not enticing. I'm hoping that I've been building muscle while losing a little fat. Muscles are sore. I feel better at my core, but it's still frustrating not dropping lbs on a regular basis.
I don't see a difference, but hubby says he sees a change.0 -
I feel ya!!!!! I'm a month in and the only decrease in my numbers was my bust size- dropped an inch. So not cool. The idea of working hard with a pear shaped body as the reward is not enticing. I'm hoping that I've been building muscle while losing a little fat. Muscles are sore. I feel better at my core, but it's still frustrating not dropping lbs on a regular basis.
I don't see a difference, but hubby says he sees a change.
I see change far slower than anyone else around me (probably because I am standing there staring at myself going, "HAVE YOU CHANGED YET BODY?!"). What I've found is that I see change better in pictures. So I take a lot of pictures over time. I build up this folder that has pictures tagged with the date and my weight at the time. I then make side-by-side collages of 3 or more pictures and usually I can see change.
If I can't, I'll throw my collage at my bestie and she'll tell me if she sees change. Normally she does. XD
Over six years, I've built up quite a bucket. A month is hard, but give it time! You'll see change.
As far as the scale goes, I weigh myself every day (primarily a) because I want to go back in time and tag a picture with my weight, b) it gives me helpful information about my body and c) it lets me predict water fluctuations based on situational data -- Ie, I know that after my birthday I gained a fair amount of water, but I ate so much more sugar than I normally consume, etc, etc). But, even when the number goes up (and no one likes that!), I don't stress it. It's not like I grew out of my pants overnight. I know that number will go back down!
I use Happy Scale to measure the trend! It's awesome!2 -
I feel ya. Now in week three. Busting my butt, again, NADA. It sucks.0
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Most likely there you need to fine tune how to track your intake, you could be eating more than you think you are. You mention being in a "diet" but nothing else. Read the sticky posts at the top of each forum. Get a food scale to weigh all your food and log accurately. There are a million posts on here giving instructions and tips how to do that.2
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