Overwhelmed

neocatlove wrote: »

I have been using this app for around two weeks and been tracking every meal and I set it to loose 2 lbs per week and I have been doing pretty good at staying under most of what it tells me I am just seeing no results

What does ”tracking every meal” mean to you? Do you weigh every ingredient on a food scale and log them separately? Do you weigh and log every single snack and drink you put in your mouth?

Also, you’re not supposed to stay under what the app tells you. You’re supposed to hit that number. Think of it as a shooting target, where the number MFP gives you is the bullseye. The farther you go in either direction is less success. Sure, you won’t gain weight from undereating, but you’re risking your health and setting yourself up to failure because you’ll probably get just so damn hungry you give up or end up in a binge cycle. I know immediate results are tempting, but slow and steady really wins the race here.

You say you can't figure out how to start losing weight. Well, Congratulations on finding MFP. You're two weeks in and have already started. Also, you don't need to follow a specific 'diet' and nor do you actually need to exercise to lose weight; you just need to eat less than you are burning, per day. I eat the same foods that I ate before, just in smaller portions.

It's quite normal for weight loss to not be linear. It's also quite normal for your weight to go up a little and then down a little and then down a little bit more. Time of the month, new exercise, exercising harder, what you've eaten and so many other factors impact water retention. The chart above is really useful and so is the link that @kimny72 posted. There's a lot of other useful info in the posts at the top of the forum.

You know your weight when you started two weeks ago. You know how many calories you need to eat, per day, to lose 2lb a week. Do just that and, as @hipari says, don't undereat - MFP builds in a deficit based on the info you originally entered. Keep at it and see what your weight is after six weeks. Try to weigh at the same time of day (first thing in the morning is generally considered best). After six weeks, you'll have a better idea as to whether you're losing at your intended rate or not. If you are, you're doing just fine. If you're not, you may need to consider your logging - are you weighing everything? Are you logging every single thing you eat? Are you selecting correct / realistic entries from the database? Be aware that lots of the database entries are out of date or just plain wrong.

If you find yourself struggling, adjust the rate loss a little and go to 1.5lb a week as that'll give you more calories.