Deficit Breaks

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Replies

  • hansep0012
    hansep0012 Posts: 385 Member
    @NovusDies Appreciate your input and the thread links!

    Yes, I have (and use) a food scale and I am thinking of getting another to keep at my office. The "eyeball postulate" for measurements is more often wrong than right, lol. That being said when I said tighten up my food entries I intend to actually weigh an apple, not enter "medium, 2 1/2" diameter" as the entry. I typically weigh things like meat, cheese, etc. due it's calorie dense nature. I rely on measuring cups for liquids (milk, wine, etc.) but am proficient in utilizing the fl oz setting on my scale, so I will switch that up, too.

    Bottom line: The math doesn't lie, I need to troubleshoot where my CICO logging is not accurate, including using the food scale and ensuring that I am truly logging everything.
  • @hansep0012 Don’t underestimate the value of increasing your consumption of high quality foods, such as nutrient dense raw foods like spinach, kale, asparagus, broccoli, chard, cauliflower, zucchini, yellow squash, bok choy, cabbage, carrots, beets, and sweet potatoes.
  • hansep0012
    hansep0012 Posts: 385 Member
    @Satisfiedwithbetter Good tip about raw foods, I have a tendency to think I eat a lot of fruit and vegetables but the logging doesn't lie, I could use a few more entries each and every day!
  • ConfidentRaven
    ConfidentRaven Posts: 1,428 Member
    @hansep0012 I asked a few of the questions to try to pinpoint a few things to try to dial in what may be the source of the stall. At this point I'm inclined to think it's a varity of issues, one being the measuring, that was addressed. I noticed you had some high days each week, which is why I asked when you weigh, those in combination with loose measuring could be enough to stall progress without realizing it. The last is that the stall started at about four months in, which would be consistant with when there starts to be the first signs of trouble with eating at a calorie deficit. Again this doesn't happen to everyone, but that's the common time for a stall to occur.

    If you can really get the weighing/logging tightened I think you'll see some progress again once your break is done. If not we're here to try to help figure it out. Hang in there.
  • hansep0012
    hansep0012 Posts: 385 Member
    Thank you, @ConfidentRaven for your observations, they make sense to me (which is really, really helpful!). I'm going to go for the most obvious path, as I mentioned in my reply to @NovusDies to really tighten up that tracking and keep at it.

    I also will keep reminding myself it literally took me ten years to gain 100 pounds, yup, just ten a year, year after year after year. This current situation is a blip on my health journey and I'll push through - no giving up!
  • ConfidentRaven
    ConfidentRaven Posts: 1,428 Member
    hansep0012 wrote: »
    Thank you, @ConfidentRaven for your observations, they make sense to me (which is really, really helpful!). I'm going to go for the most obvious path, as I mentioned in my reply to @NovusDies to really tighten up that tracking and keep at it.

    I also will keep reminding myself it literally took me ten years to gain 100 pounds, yup, just ten a year, year after year after year. This current situation is a blip on my health journey and I'll push through - no giving up!

    You're welcome.

    I know all about the ten pound creep, it's what I did for years, minus of course the occasional half *kitten* try at losing a little along the way.
  • merph518
    merph518 Posts: 702 Member
    September has been a pretty frustrating month for me, weight-wise. I'm starting to consider one of these breaks. If I don't see some downward momentum by the end of the month, I'll likely give it a try.

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  • NovusDies
    NovusDies Posts: 8,940 Member
    merph518 wrote: »
    September has been a pretty frustrating month for me, weight-wise. I'm starting to consider one of these breaks. If I don't see some downward momentum by the end of the month, I'll likely give it a try.


    Your results may be influenced by your new running program. It can make you retain water and mask results.
  • merph518
    merph518 Posts: 702 Member
    I wouldn't doubt that's true. I really haven't changed much diet-wise. I think in the whole month I've only gone over budget once, and that's only by 100ish calories.

    I'll try to take some solace in the fact that I've made some major strides (heh) in my running over the past month.
  • NovusDies
    NovusDies Posts: 8,940 Member
    merph518 wrote: »
    I wouldn't doubt that's true. I really haven't changed much diet-wise. I think in the whole month I've only gone over budget once, and that's only by 100ish calories.

    I'll try to take some solace in the fact that I've made some major strides (heh) in my running over the past month.

    You may be in for quite a number of trips to a restroom in the near future. Watch those electrolytes. I lost over 17 pounds in 9 days... NO FUN!
  • Satisfiedwithbetter
    Satisfiedwithbetter Posts: 970 Member
    edited September 2019
    @merph518 It looks like a plateau to me, but I have been lulled into thinking this before by my primal brain (old habit brain), and in reality, it was a slow creep in not following MY actions and MY plan. Once I recognized it by answering the following questions, I was able to correct the process and start losing again. However, it could mean small changes are necessary.

    Questions...
    1. Is YOUR plan clearly defined?
    2. Are you 100% committed to YOUR plan?
    3. Are you following YOUR plan 100% of the time?

    If you answered yes, a small change may be needed. I would try to eat more variety of nutrient rich non-starchy vegetables for a couple weeks before I went back to eating at maintenance, or taking a diet break. Sometimes just increasing the quality/nutrients in your food can correct an imbalance in your body and put you back on the path to losing weight.

    Remember our primal brain at difficult times like these, is telling us, “it’s not working, you should quit.” The primal brain motive is to go back to your old habits.

    If you do take a diet break, make sure to define the differences between your maintenance eating and your old bad habits to keep the primal brain under control.

    Also, increases in physical activity causes a surge in water retention.

    You got this!
  • merph518
    merph518 Posts: 702 Member
    Yes/Yes/Yes.

    My diet hasn't changed this month. Running for longer distances has been a new thing this month though, graduating from August's 1-3 minute jogging intervals up to 5, 8 and now 20 minute intervals in September. Likely Novus has the right of it, and I'm seeing water retention due to exercise and maybe some muscle added in there somewhere too.

    While it does get frustrating not seeing the results my brain would like to see, mainly the scale number dropping, there's no danger of me quitting. :)
  • Satisfiedwithbetter
    Satisfiedwithbetter Posts: 970 Member
    edited September 2019
    Excellent! Your muscles will retain water when you tear the muscle fibers as you exercise and workout. You could easily see 3-4% swing in typical water weight.
  • NovusDies
    NovusDies Posts: 8,940 Member
    edited September 2019
    @merph518 It looks like a plateau to me, but I have been lulled into thinking this before by my primal brain (old habit brain), and in reality, it was a slow creep in not following MY actions and MY plan. Once I recognized it by answering the following questions, I was able to correct the process and start losing again. However, it could mean small changes are necessary.

    Questions...
    1. Is YOUR plan clearly defined?
    2. Are you 100% committed to YOUR plan?
    3. Are you following YOUR plan 100% of the time?

    If you answered yes, a small change may be needed. I would try to eat more variety of nutrient rich non-starchy vegetables for a couple weeks before I went back to eating at maintenance, or taking a diet break. Sometimes just increasing the quality/nutrients in your food can correct an imbalance in your body and put you back on the path to losing weight.

    Remember our primal brain at difficult times like these, is telling us, “it’s not working, you should quit.” The primal brain motive is to go back to your old habits.

    If you do take a diet break, make sure to define the differences between your maintenance eating and your old bad habits to keep the primal brain under control.

    You got this!


    I am not aware of any imbalance other than potassium deficiency that actually causes water retention. Fat weight loss cannot be stopped because of a deficiency. If it did no one would ever starve to death.

    Eating a different way, and especially a way that reduces carbs, could hurt his running performance. He needs his glycogen.

    ETA: Also a starchy vegetable - potato - is one of the better sources of potassium. :wink:

  • @NovusDies who says I’m talking about water retention with regard to nutrient deficiencies? I’m talking purely about weight loss resistance and related deficiencies! Sorry for confusing you.
  • NovusDies
    NovusDies Posts: 8,940 Member
    @NovusDies who says I’m talking about water retention with regard to nutrient deficiencies? I’m talking purely about weight loss resistance and related deficiencies! Sorry for confusing you.

    Can you clarify this further? How would it ever be possible to resist weight loss if you were in a calorie deficit?
  • Satisfiedwithbetter
    Satisfiedwithbetter Posts: 970 Member
    edited September 2019
    IMHO, First, foremost and unfortunately - CICO is a empirical theory, not unlike almost everything else in life, except Math, Death & Taxes. Not all calories in the human body are created equal. Not all humans utilize the calories in food the same either. Again, it’s my understanding that nutrient deficiencies can actually cause your body to go into a pseudo starvation mode, where hormones that regulate our ability to digest and utilize food are adversely affected. Our guts ability to accept the nutrients can play a huge role in the efficiency or inefficiency of the effort. Anyway, don’t take my word for it, do your own research.
  • NovusDies
    NovusDies Posts: 8,940 Member
    IMHO, First, foremost and unfortunately - CICO is a empirical theory, not unlike almost everything else in life, except Math, Death & Taxes. Not all calories in the human body are created equal. Not all humans utilize the calories in food the same either. Again, it’s my understanding that nutrient deficiencies can actually cause your body to go into a pseudo starvation mode, where hormones that regulate our ability to digest and utilize food are adversely affected. Our guts ability to accept the nutrients can play a huge role in the efficiency or inefficiency of the effort. Anyway, don’t take my word it, do your own research.

    If someone starves to death they are in very bad need of nutrients. There is no starvation mode other than starving. While TEF can mean that the cost of processing things like protein can be higher than carbs that is majoring in the minors. Also despite what the internet might have us believe the human body is quite good at adapting to get what it needs from a variety of sources.

    A calorie deficit must end with stored fuel in the body being consumed to make up the difference. When that stops we die.

    The bodily process of weight loss is simple and it is best to keep it that way because losing weight has enough other challenges without muddying the waters.

    You might want to take the theory to the main MFP Diet and Fitness section. There are people there smarter than me that can discuss this with you and help get to the bottom of it.
  • We live and learn. I wish it all were simple math, unfortunately it’s not.
  • NovusDies
    NovusDies Posts: 8,940 Member
    We live and learn. I wish it all were simple math, unfortunately it’s not.

    Until I see peer-reviewed human studies that says otherwise I will stick to simple math and science. There are plenty of internet blogs that make good sounding arguments but they are there to sell advertising.