Am I going about weight loss the wrong way?
3701kmathis
Posts: 5 Member
I am a 23-year-old female, 5’7”. The app gave me the guideline of 1580 calories to bring my starting weight of 237 down to my (goal) weight of 165 losing 1.5lbs a week. I am rather sedentary, but have picked up 20-30 minute inclined (I live on many steep hills) walks, and swimming at my gym. My question is... is my calorie amount set too low? I weighed in this morning and came in just shy of 232. I have flabby arms, a tummy that hangs a little, and gobby thighs to start. My loved ones seem to think I am “starving myself”, “dieting the wrong way”, and will “only increase my excess skin.” Is this true? I want to pick up weight lifting to increase my muscle and loose skin. But I wonder because I am not even close to my goal weight yet. Is it too early to begin lifting and “bulking”? (unsure of terms) I do not know how to go about this correctly and not be starving my body or indirectly sabotaging my own success. How can I go about this healthy and properly to go from “flabby” to more toned and uniform? Thank you guys!
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Replies
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You can try it out for a while and see what works for you. Remember that mfp will give you extra calories for working out(if you log your exercise) so you shouldn't be starving.
You can definitely start lifting/strength training now. It will not be "bulking" because you are in a calorie deficit, but you can still build strength. Keeping your protein up and strength training will help you keep more muscle while you lose weight. Not sure about excess skin. It takes a while to see how your skin will bounce back.6 -
We're here to support you through the process.
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Thank you, I suppose I will try to add more protein in my meals and do more strength exercises while at the gym. I do not log my exercises because I didn’t want it to increase my calories and me not to see results, but I can see how this could be counterproductive. My highest was about 260 a couple years ago, and unfortunately it left a little bit of skin in places, and genetics has not been very fair to me on my paternal side. I would love to keep this up and see what comes of it. I do not have much family support so I am glad to have stumbled into this side of MFP. Thank you for your reply!
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Tdeecalculator.net
Input your stats accurately and go off the figure they give you for cutting. (This is what I do)
Or use what mfp tells you (if you input your activity level accurately) and eat back about half your excercise calories.
Both of those are a good start and you can adjust if needed.
Get a food scale and Weigh everything. Literally everything. Be consistent. Be patient. Trust the process and feel accomplished by your discipline, not your results. Results will come.
I’m not sure why they would say you are doing something wrong, tracking your food works for thousands of people. As far as loose skin goes, that depends on age, elasticity, etc. my Husband lost over 100 lbs and has stretch marks but never did really have loose skin. Even if you do, loose skin is far better for you than excess body fat, and in time should not be as noticeable.
Listen to your own inner voice and what you want for yourself. Ignore everyone else. Sometimes people mean well and sometimes they really don’t want you to succeed, because your success feels like a spotlight on their insecurities.
Family can be horrible about this.
Don’t talk about what you’re doing with ANYONE who is not supportive. It’s a waste of your time and can be demotivating. Find like minded people, use MFP socially, and talk about your journey here if you feel like you need support.
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I think the main way to go about any new endeavor wrong is to think you have all the answers. You are questioning which is good.
The initial 5 pounds of weight lost probably contains some water weight. If 1.5 is your goal then you will want to verify that is what you are losing when pass 6 weeks or so. You will want to use 232 as your starting number to determine your rate of loss not 237.
Here is a good educational thread to read:
https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/1080242/a-guide-to-get-you-started-on-your-path-to-sexypants/p16 -
Thank you guys for being so helpful and kind ❤️ I feel better about continuing already. I battle frequent bouts of depression and binging, and I can see this community being very helpful in my progress. You guys are awesome.10
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3701kmathis wrote: »I am a 23-year-old female, 5’7”. The app gave me the guideline of 1580 calories to bring my starting weight of 237 down to my (goal) weight of 165 losing 1.5lbs a week. I am rather sedentary, but have picked up 20-30 minute inclined (I live on many steep hills) walks, and swimming at my gym. My question is... is my calorie amount set too low? I weighed in this morning and came in just shy of 232. I have flabby arms, a tummy that hangs a little, and gobby thighs to start. My loved ones seem to think I am “starving myself”, “dieting the wrong way”, and will “only increase my excess skin.” Is this true? I want to pick up weight lifting to increase my muscle and loose skin. But I wonder because I am not even close to my goal weight yet. Is it too early to begin lifting and “bulking”? (unsure of terms) I do not know how to go about this correctly and not be starving my body or indirectly sabotaging my own success. How can I go about this healthy and properly to go from “flabby” to more toned and uniform? Thank you guys!
It is typical to lose a lot your first and sometimes second week, it's water weight. Considering your stats, 1.5lbs per week is perfectly acceptable. If you continue to lose an average of a lot more than that over weeks, eat a bit more.
Having said that, you can aim for slower if you want. The typical recommendation to avoid unnecessary muscle loss is to lose less than 1% of your body weight per week. As you lose, it should slow down. You also want to make sure you are getting a reasonable amount of protein and are doing some kind of resistance/strength/weight training to further protect your current muscle mass.
Loose skin is kind of a crap shoot. The faster you lose, the better chance you'll have loose skin, but whether you will have a problem with it or not, and how much it will tighten up over time, has a lot to do with genetics. The fact that you're young is a definite plus! Regardless, a healthy weight with loose skin is better for your health than carrying around that extra weight.
Remember that you don't need to react to one week's results at any time. Weight loss is not linear. Even if you are 100% perfect, some weeks you'll lose a lot, some you'll lose a little, some weeks you might even gain a lb or two. You are looking for a trend and an average over time.
Log your exercise when you do it and eat back at least some of those calories.
Sometimes when the people who see us everyday are used to us being overweight, we look "wrong" as we lose. It's also true that some people think they look worse while they are losing weight, and it takes some time for everything to even out for our own and others perceptions to catch up.
Congrats on getting started :drinker:7 -
Well done on the good start OP !1
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It would be worth you taking your measurements as well as your weight, and doing them again every so often.
It might also be helpful to set a fitness goal, a trail walk or couch to 5 k run program for example.
I go to the gym and swim a lot, my shape can change a lot (in good ways!) with very little change in my weight.
I find fitness goals motivating for the same reason, it keeps the momentum going in a positive direction.0 -
May I ask what will happen if you do not eat back a portion of the calories you burn? When I input my leisure hour of swimming into the app, it added over 600 calories to my daily allowance... and something in me is just fighting that increase. I deleted it and am pretending like I didn’t even swim, I guess. I feel like my ideas of weight loss are warped. I come from an obese home. And adding more calories when you worked hard to burn them just seems.. I don’t know!
I guess I misunderstood the phrase “calorie deficit”... to me it seemed you needed to burn more than you all ate. But that seems very difficult, looking at it in retrospect. I am sorry for my ignorance on all of this.0 -
Your MFP calorie goal already includes the deficit to lose at the pace you chose. If you do not eat your exercise calories back, you will lose faster than you intended. Now if the pace you chose is conservative and the calories you are eating are providing proper nutrition and macros, and you are okay losing a bit faster, then there's no actual harm. But since you are already concerned that you might be losing too fast, I figured you wanted to stay on the more conservative side.
Exercise calories are an estimate, so many people start out eating just some of them and adjust if needed based on their progress.
Personally, even if you choose not to eat them, or to eat just some, I would log the exercise. Having accurate data in your log can really help as you move forward if you need to troubleshoot or understand your results.
Many people choose the most aggressive pace possible, and for those people, not eating their exercise calories and losing even faster can be risky and uncomfortable.5 -
3701kmathis wrote: »May I ask what will happen if you do not eat back a portion of the calories you burn? When I input my leisure hour of swimming into the app, it added over 600 calories to my daily allowance... and something in me is just fighting that increase. I deleted it and am pretending like I didn’t even swim, I guess. I feel like my ideas of weight loss are warped. I come from an obese home. And adding more calories when you worked hard to burn them just seems.. I don’t know!
I guess I misunderstood the phrase “calorie deficit”... to me it seemed you needed to burn more than you all ate. But that seems very difficult, looking at it in retrospect. I am sorry for my ignorance on all of this.
No need to apologize. We all started somewhere and you are asking really good questions. 600 calories for that hour of leisurely swimming sounds high to me. Eat back maybe 1/2 that amount. You don't want to just ignore exercise calories because you may not get adequate nutrients. Not a problem occaisionally, but over time can have some unwanted results like hair loss, soft nails, fatigue etc.
Spend the first 6 weeks eating back some portion of your exercise calories and adjust from there based in the trend of actual results. Some of the exercise burns in the database are overstated. Try eating back 1/2 or 2/3 to start and adjust based on real world results after 6 weeks. Nothing harmful is going to happen in that short a period.4 -
Are you swimming laps? If so the below will help as it incorporates pace into the equation making your effort more objective rather than subjective (leisurely, moderate, etc). I find it to be pretty accurate for me. To get pace if you don't have a tracker you would just need to time yourself swimming 100yds (or equivalent). Also make sure you are only counting the time you are swimming vs resting as this could inflate your calories as well.
http://www.swimmingcalculator.com/swim_calories_calculator.php0 -
3701kmathis wrote: »I am a 23-year-old female, 5’7”. The app gave me the guideline of 1580 calories to bring my starting weight of 237 down to my (goal) weight of 165 losing 1.5lbs a week. I am rather sedentary, but have picked up 20-30 minute inclined (I live on many steep hills) walks, and swimming at my gym. My question is... is my calorie amount set too low? I weighed in this morning and came in just shy of 232. I have flabby arms, a tummy that hangs a little, and gobby thighs to start. My loved ones seem to think I am “starving myself”, “dieting the wrong way”, and will “only increase my excess skin.” Is this true? I want to pick up weight lifting to increase my muscle and loose skin. But I wonder because I am not even close to my goal weight yet. Is it too early to begin lifting and “bulking”? (unsure of terms) I do not know how to go about this correctly and not be starving my body or indirectly sabotaging my own success. How can I go about this healthy and properly to go from “flabby” to more toned and uniform? Thank you guys!
Hey there!
I'm 24 year old female so I for sure understand the hard goals it can be when people can be not be supportive of the goals you are trying to achieve. Loose skin is a tricky subject when it comes to weightloss because if you are going at a moderate rate your skin can adapt to the changes, however, when you loss a drastic amount of weight (i.e. - contestants of The Biggest Loser) your body cannot adapt to the changes as quickly.
I will say buying a good fitness tracker is important. I love my Polar watch (with the heart rate strap) because I find that it is more accurate than a Fitbit tracker.
Another important thing to note is that - "do not get obsessed with the number on the scale" I know that can be easier said than done, but there are other ways to measure progress besides a scale.
Even see if you can speak to a nutritionist or your doctor about your journey to help calculate a healthy caloric goal. I say that because everybody has a different journey and no two bodies function the same or react the same what food we put in our bodies.
I do agree with some other posters though - try to add more protein into your diet because protein is lean and can help suppress appetite.
Hope this helps, and congrats on starting your journey OP!1 -
The starting number doesn't matter. What matters is determining your target daily caloric deficit. It could be that 1580 is too low, too high, or just right. The only way to know is to accurately track your caloric intake each day and check how the scale responds. If you eat at a daily deficit of 500 calories (which translates to a 3500 calorie weekly deficit), you will lose about one pound a week. My suggestion to you is to track your calories and add up the total at the end of the week. Weigh yourself at the end of the week, and repeat the process the following week. Adjust your intake on what the scale does. If you haven't lost any weight, subtract 3500 from your weekly total and divide that number by seven. This will give you your new daily caloric target. Keep repeating this process until you arrive at your preferred rate of weight loss. Don't expect to get a final number for several weeks though. Good luck!0
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RE the loose skin - it makes no odds how fast or slow you lose weight as to whether you have loose skin. It is your skin quality, whether you have stretch marks which have broken the elasticity of the skin, thickness of the skin and genetics which determine this. If you only have a couple of stone to lose it is very unlikely you will have loose skin. The younger you are the more collagen you have so the more elasticity of course.0
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Plug your weigh-ins into trendweight.com/weightgrapher.com/happy scale/or libra, and MFP, of course.
Set yourself for 1.5lbs for now and lower it towards 1lb when you move into the mid overweight BMI range.
Do use a scale, verify your database entries, eat more good bargains than bad. Do remember that a large deficit often triggers binges, so let go of the occasional high day without going out of your way to compensate for it!
Don't worry too much about skin right now. It takes a good 2 years to bounce back as far as it will.
And I will take droopy skin and normal weight any day over being obese!
And it sure doesn't sound as if you're doing anything wrong--other than not eating bsck most of your exercise calories!!!2 -
Exercise is for fitness. A calorie deficit is for weight loss. It doesn't matter how much of your calorie burn is from breathing or sitting or walking to your car or exercise. Exercise increases your calorie burn which can enable you to eat more while maintaining your deficit which making dieting easier. When I am exercising a lot, I don't even feel like I am dieting. I really struggle to maintain my deficit without it.1
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3701kmathis wrote: »May I ask what will happen if you do not eat back a portion of the calories you burn? When I input my leisure hour of swimming into the app, it added over 600 calories to my daily allowance... and something in me is just fighting that increase. I deleted it and am pretending like I didn’t even swim, I guess. I feel like my ideas of weight loss are warped. I come from an obese home. And adding more calories when you worked hard to burn them just seems.. I don’t know!
I guess I misunderstood the phrase “calorie deficit”... to me it seemed you needed to burn more than you all ate. But that seems very difficult, looking at it in retrospect. I am sorry for my ignorance on all of this.
It might be helpful for you to learn the various numbers:
1) Maintenance calories - This is how much you would need to eat in a day's time to neither gain nor lose weight. This includes the energy expenditure of just living, your normal daily routines, and any exercise you perform.
2) Deficit calories - This is any number that is lower than your maintenance calories. If you are in a caloric deficit you are losing weight.
3) Daily Calorie Goal - This is what you are trying to hit to lose weight at a specific pace. Since you selected 1.5 pounds a week your daily calorie goal is your maintenance calories minus 750 calories. Since you use MFP your maintenance will increase with exercise. If you go over your goal but less than your maintenance you will still lose some weight. If you go under your goal you will lose weight at a faster pace than you selected.
Sometimes the validity of exercise numbers is hard to judge initially. In your situation I would probably not eat any of the exercise calories back for the first 6 weeks because there is no harm in losing a little faster than you selected for a short time if that even happens. We all get better at logging the longer we do it and I am sure most of us made a lot of errors initially until we got a firm grasp. If you do lose more than 1.5 pounds per week you can use that to increase how much you eat going forward. If you need help with that please ask. I think by I can safely speak for many people when I say that your success is important to us.
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3701kmathis wrote: »My loved ones seem to think I am “starving myself”, “dieting the wrong way”, and will “only increase my excess skin.”
I would avoid getting into the nitty gritty about your weight loss with your loved ones. Many people just don't understand this method and are highly resistant to it.0 -
Regarding your question about eating back exercise calories, I think it’s important to eat back some of them. The additional calories will help you get all the nutrients that you need, but more importantly, it will help you from getting burnt out.
With stats you posted (losing 72lbs at a rate of 1.5lbs/week), you are looking at 48 weeks of a calorie deficit. That’s almost a year. Don’t over exert yourself in the first two weeks—take a balanced approach where you are gradually increasing your activity and having a modest calorie reduction. It’s not the fastest way to lose weight, but it’s healthy and sustainable.
Good luck!0 -
Regarding your question about eating back exercise calories, I think it’s important to eat back some of them. The additional calories will help you get all the nutrients that you need, but more importantly, it will help you from getting burnt out.
With stats you posted (losing 72lbs at a rate of 1.5lbs/week), you are looking at 48 weeks of a calorie deficit. That’s almost a year. Don’t over exert yourself in the first two weeks—take a balanced approach where you are gradually increasing your activity and having a modest calorie reduction. It’s not the fastest way to lose weight, but it’s healthy and sustainable.
Good luck!
That is inaccurate. The OP is looking at over a year because she should not lose weight at 1.5 pounds per week for her entire weight loss and there should be allowances for vacations, holidays, and special occasions to eat more food so she doesn't feel deprived or resentful.
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Regarding your question about eating back exercise calories, I think it’s important to eat back some of them. The additional calories will help you get all the nutrients that you need, but more importantly, it will help you from getting burnt out.
With stats you posted (losing 72lbs at a rate of 1.5lbs/week), you are looking at 48 weeks of a calorie deficit. That’s almost a year. Don’t over exert yourself in the first two weeks—take a balanced approach where you are gradually increasing your activity and having a modest calorie reduction. It’s not the fastest way to lose weight, but it’s healthy and sustainable.
Good luck!
That is inaccurate. The OP is looking at over a year because she should not lose weight at 1.5 pounds per week for her entire weight loss and there should be allowances for vacations, holidays, and special occasions to eat more food so she doesn't feel deprived or resentful.
Yes, I agree with you — I should have clarified that I was only looking at raw numbers, and not the realities of real life (which includes vacations, holidays, and birthdays, not to mention bad days). The OP should absolutely plan on taking at least a year, and probably longer to achieve her weight loss goal. I was trying to show that she should look at her weight loss as a long term effort by doing quick math that assumed everything went perfectly.
When I decided it was time to lose weight, it took me a while to accept that it was going to take me 7+ months to lose 30lbs IF everything went perfectly. It wasn’t until I calculated that 30lbs at 1lb/week was going to take me at least 30 weeks, that I realized how long I needed to stay motivated and determined.
My point being, OP, eat your exercise calories, and look at your plan as a long term commitment.0 -
I completely agree with @msielbeck . The only way you will have permanent success is if you consider this a lifestyle change. It is better to make moderate changes that you can do forever than to overdo it, get burned out, and gain all of your weight back.0
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The important aspect of a lifestyle is being happy or as happy as possible most days. Being unnecessarily harsh with yourself on the amount of food, the type of food, or exercise is not helpful and probably not sustainable.
I mentioned various days off that I take and as @msielbeck mentioned that has included some bad days that I just chose to eat maintenance. I credit some of my sustainability to knowing when to take my foot off the gas. I don't have to lose weight everyday I just have to lose weight most days.3 -
Thank you guys for all of your advice. I am nervous about the long term of this endeavor because I feel like out of anyone, I would be one to just give up by not seeing what I want fast enough out of the scale. I get discouraged easily and am very hard on myself for not being the “ideal” woman. I have noticed changes in the mirror that I haven’t noticed yet on the scale, and that has made me feel good.. I am going to put the scale away for right now and follow the advice of continuing the MFP calorie deficit without including exercise calories “just” yet. I am going to do it for another couple weeks, until I see assurance in my appearance benefiting from my changes. I picked up a multivitamin to take daily, and honestly I haven’t had many days where I felt too hungry even with my deficit. But I come from a life of butter and cheese on everything, a very aggressive salt tooth for chips and gravies. So I know this is something I could probably not keep up with strictly for too long, so after that few short weeks, I will be kinder with myself and eat back exercise calories, and allow myself an occasional day at my maintenance calories to reward myself for this lifestyle change. Thank all of you for taking the time to help me out. I appreciate it more than you guys will ever know! I’m so glad I stumbled upon this side of the app, and I can’t wait to show you guys in the longterm what I’m starting has changed my life!5
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Just be careful with the mirror appearance thing. For one thing weight loss is weird and it can seem like there are no changes for a long time and then suddenly there are several. For another weight loss takes a long time and it is harder to judge ourselves correctly (taking pictures might be better for you). Lastly, you don't want to get addicted to changes and keep thinking that you can push yourself harder for a little longer until you get to the next one.
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