How long was your plateau? What changes did you make to keep dropping?

IsETHome wrote: »

I wouldn't really call it a "plateau" for me, because it never really lasts very long, but every ten or so pounds I'll put on a good five pounds of water weight and just stay stuck there for a good two weeks before finally dropping again. I just keep at it and know it'll drop off soon enough. If it bugs me that much I just won't weigh in for a while and instead rely on new measurements and how my clothes fit/how my body looks and feels to me. Especially being a lady it can be tedious to do this kind of thing, so I try to look on the bright side. Then again, I've been called "Little Miss Sunshine" for the greater portion of my life because of how optimistic I am, so that could just be me.

I also give myself what I call a "fat person day" every time a holiday comes around and allow myself to eat up to maintenance if I can. It doesn't always work out that way because my stomach has shrank considerably but it's still nice to indulge, and then hitting your diet hard again after that can really step up your next weigh-in to drop some mad poundage.

My plateau lasted 8 weeks. These are the things I wish someone had told me at the time:

1. If it's been less than 3 weeks or so, don't sweat it! Normal fluctuations happen and unfortunately sometimes we stall for a week or two even when we're doing everything right.

2. If you aren't already, be sure that you're logging everything. Sometimes people forget about things like veggies, drinks, cooking oils, and condiments. For some people these can add up to enough to halt your weight loss progress.

3. Consider buying a food scale if you don't already have one and use it for everything. Everything. For a couple of weeks to see what kind of discrepancies you're running into. They're about $10-$20 dollars in the US and easily found at places like Amazon, Target, and Walmart. Measuring cups and spoons are great, but they do come with some degree of inaccuracy. A food scale will be more accurate, and for some people it makes a big difference.

4. Logging accurately also means choosing accurate entries in the database. There are a lot of user-entered entries that are off. Double-check that you're using good entries and/or using the recipe builder instead of someone else's homemade entries. Don't trust the barcode scanner or restaurant entries 100%.

5. Recalculate your goals if you haven't lately. As you lose weight your body requires fewer calories to run. Be sure you update your goals every ten pounds or so.

6. If you're eating back your exercise calories and you're relying on gym machine readouts or MFP's estimates, it might be best to eat back just 50-75% of those. Certain activities tend to be overestimated. If you're using an HRM or activity tracker, it might be a good idea to look into their accuracy and be sure that yours is calibrated properly.

7. If you're taking any cheat days that go over your calorie limits, it might be best to cut them out for a few weeks and see what happens. Some people go way over their calorie needs without realizing it when they don't track.

8. If you weigh yourself frequently, consider using a program like trendweight, happy scale, or libra to even out the fluctuations. You could be losing weight but just don't see it because of the daily ups and downs.

9. Some people just burn fewer calories than the calculators predict. If you continue to have problems after 4-6 weeks, then it might be worth a trip to the doctor or a registered dietitian who can give you more specific advice.