Slow weight loss stories

pink_mint
pink_mint Posts: 103 Member
edited June 2020 in Health and Weight Loss
I'm hoping for a bit of encouragement and perspective. Have you lost weight slowly?

My weight loss is roughly 1/2 lb per week. I thought that being 55 lbs above the healthy weight range was enough to warrant faster weight loss but it's really slow going. Currently I've clocked in between 10-12 lbs (scale fluctuations) lost in 3 months.

I have the largest calorie deficit I can stand without getting emotionally unstable... Being hungry all the time does that to me. Trying to get as much protein as possible. Also carbs, fat, veg etc.

I'm trying not to get discouraged but I do sometimes.

Replies

  • cmentis182
    cmentis182 Posts: 36 Member
    It took me about a year to lose 7kg (about 16lbs). Like SuzySunshine, my deficit was so small that when I switched to maintenance, earlier this year, I gained 140 calories a day.

    How are you tracking your intake? Are you weighing everything you eat and measuring every liquid? Your diary in MFP doesn't show any entries. If you're not losing as fast as you think you should be with your current calories, it's possible that you're not tracking accurately.

    I am trying to lose exactly that amount 16 pounds/7kgs by the end of this year. Meaning, in six and a half months. Reading your comment makes me think I will probably do it slower to build sustainable habits. That's much better for me, building lifestyle/lifelong changes. I know it will be easier for me to stick to it then.
  • pink_mint
    pink_mint Posts: 103 Member
    About my diary, I actually hand track my calories on paper. I'm old school and low budget. My phone is cheap and can't handle many apps, so I don't have the MFP app and don't track that way. I just check in here for the forums in my web browser. 🙂
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 33,905 Member
    Are you getting any exercise? Exercise helps with anxiety and also allows you to eat a little more while still losing.

    I don't do well on deficits either, the last 15 pounds I lost took me nine months because I had to keep eating over my goal, even with exercise.

    Keep going. You'll get there!
  • pink_mint
    pink_mint Posts: 103 Member
    Thanks everyone!

    I am figuring out exercise. I was doing a strenuous bodyweight workout and found that it made me hungry enough to eat probably twice the calories it burned. So I'm trying walking now and it's been better so far.

    It's been trial and error to figure out what helps me stay in a deficit that I can handle without ending up snapping at people, crying or having stomach pains.
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 31,717 Member
    pink_mint wrote: »
    Thanks everyone!

    I am figuring out exercise. I was doing a strenuous bodyweight workout and found that it made me hungry enough to eat probably twice the calories it burned. So I'm trying walking now and it's been better so far.

    It's been trial and error to figure out what helps me stay in a deficit that I can handle without ending up snapping at people, crying or having stomach pains.

    For many/most people, I think intense and strenuous exercise is over-rated. It's more fatiguing, it can have more injury risk, beginners tend to find it less enjoyable, and duration is self-limited to a much greater extent than duration of moderate steady-state or other less-strenuous work.

    Intensity or strenuousness are physical stressors, so I think perhaps even less suitable for people in a calorie deficit than for others, and the duration limitations and fatigue can be counter-productive if calorie expenditure is a goal.

    I'm not totally against intense/strenuous exercise - it has its important place in development of well-rounded fitness/athleticism, some people enjoy it, and it does have physiological benefits somewhat distinct from moderate exercise - but it seems like the current touting of intense/strenuous exercise (especially HIIT, AMRAP, etc.) just reinforces the idea that we need to be exhausted and miserable in order to gain any fitness or calorie-burn benefits, as if weight gain or lack of fitness were sins to be expiated. That's just not true.

    Ooop, sorry for the rant! ;)

    Main point: Here again, I think you're being very sensible, and paying attention to what works best and is sustainable for you. Good show! :)
  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 33,905 Member
    I didn't read Ann's posts, so she may have said this; for me exercise also blunts my hunger. So if I take an hour walk it helps me stay within my calories far better than if I don't take that walk and it's more than just the couple hundred calories I "earn" with a walk. It seems to just make the whole thing so much easier.