Plateau or final weight?

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ToffeeApple71
ToffeeApple71 Posts: 117 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
I've lost 62kg over the last two years. I had a target weight I was aiming for, and I'm 8kg away from that. I have been the same weight now for three months, fluctuating by around a kg up or down. I weigh weekly. My app is set to lose 500g a week. I weigh everything, and eat back part of my exercise calories. it's obviously worked for the last two years, but these last three months has been frustrating. Just wondering if I've reached the limit of weight loss, and should accept the weight I'm at. I don't want to go below my current calorie allowance (approx 1300) as that would leave me hungry. I've tried a range of plateau-breaking ideas....changed what I'm eating, done a week of maintenance, increased and decreased exercise. Nothing has changed. Wondering if I should just go into maintenance now or keep trying to lose?

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  • FinntheVeggie
    FinntheVeggie Posts: 74 Member
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    First of all, that's awesome! It sounds like you've come really far.
    Have you tried going back to maintenance for a few months and then giving it another try? Or if you're comfortable where you are, it's okay to change your goals. If you change your mind again after maintaining for a while, that's fine too.
  • russellholtslander1
    russellholtslander1 Posts: 285 Member
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    I would try maintenance.. you may be surprised and see some weight loss when you up your calories a little.. sometimes our metabolism slows down over time on a low calorie weight loss diet, and adding 200 calories a day, might actually be what works.

    One thing to consider is that you add back in exercise calories, but as you have lost, you might be thinking you need maybe less calories, but at 1300, you haven't done that yet.. good.. 1300 is pretty low.. BUT, have you considered the possibility that as you got leaner, you became a lot more active in your daily life? If you do a lot more every hour, when you weren't very active before.. it isn't " exercise ", but over an entire day, you may burn more than what you do in a workout, without even realizing it.

    What you know, is 1300 calories is NOT doing anything, and you can't go lower.. that leaves higher.. and you have a maintenance number to try.. so try it, and see what happens.. in theory, you should stay the same weight, while enjoying a few more calories, but you might be surprised what happens.

    If you do maintain, then Finn's point is excellent.. maintain for 3 months, and then when your body gets used to higher calories.. go back on weight loss levels, and you might lose that last 8 kg. Sometimes just changing things up works. Good Luck!
  • wunderkindking
    wunderkindking Posts: 1,615 Member
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    ^ This.

    Up your calories to maintenance (don't be surprised if you have a small initial jump from glycogen stores and amount of food in your belly) for a little bit. Maybe reverse diet up some, even.

    Then see if you want to go back to lose the rest.
  • Jthanmyfitnesspal
    Jthanmyfitnesspal Posts: 3,521 Member
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    Congratulations on your success. I hope you feel great! B)

    I would say "you should try maintenance," but you already are in maintenance. So, welcome to maintenance! It's a great place to be! Just keep logging, exercising, and watching your weight. Whenever you bump up a bit, you have to hold back and lose it. It's no time to let up or your weight will come right back! :#

    Plateau's can be caused, in part, by a reduction in activity level. Increasing your activity doesn't require anything particularly hard: walking, gardening, light biking, fun exercise class, fun stuff like that. If you already have workouts on certain days, then add some easy walks in between to get your metabolism going. All of this gets so much easier when you are lighter, so your hard work will pay off.
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
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    Stress induced cortisol increase can cause slowing retaining up wards of 20 lbs of water weight.

    How many months of scale weight could that hide?
    How fast were you losing when it was still the normal rate you'd seen?

    If we don't back weight loss off slower purposely - the body will usually adapt and cause it anyway.
    Obviously if body is that stressed to increase cortisol - not great state to be in.

    Ditto's to slowly eating more each day for a week at a time - get up to potential maintenance level, not suppressed maintenance level.

    Then take what would be considered a reasonable deficit for amount left now.

    This is assuming your food logging didn't all of a sudden get really sloppy to wipe out a deficit after so long being accurate with it.
    Or your activity level didn't suddenly change in a big way.
  • kshama2001
    kshama2001 Posts: 27,897 Member
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    ToffeeApple71 wrote: »
    I've lost 62kg over the last two years. I had a target weight I was aiming for, and I'm 8kg away from that. I have been the same weight now for three months, fluctuating by around a kg up or down. I weigh weekly. My app is set to lose 500g a week. I weigh everything, and eat back part of my exercise calories. it's obviously worked for the last two years, but these last three months has been frustrating. Just wondering if I've reached the limit of weight loss, and should accept the weight I'm at. I don't want to go below my current calorie allowance (approx 1300) as that would leave me hungry. I've tried a range of plateau-breaking ideas....changed what I'm eating, done a week of maintenance, increased and decreased exercise. Nothing has changed. Wondering if I should just go into maintenance now or keep trying to lose?

    Congrats on the 62kg loss - that's quite an acheivement!

    I took an unscheduled maintenance break this summer. I was intending to keep my 1 pound per week goal but was actually eating more, mostly in the middle of the night. Despite posting the below graphic all the time, it finally dawned on my that since I am within 20 pounds of my goal, it's time for me to slow my loss to a half pound per week. I did that, and am starting to lose again. It's slow, yes, but my Happy Scale Moving Average is indeed moving in the right direction.

    6vpreiz0pk4u.png

    That said, what's your height and goal weight? You don't sound like one of them, but we do get people on here who want to be back at a teenage weight that is no longer appropriate for them.
  • tiptoethruthetulips
    tiptoethruthetulips Posts: 3,360 Member
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    Well done on the weight loss. Just wondering if you have a lot of excess skin? If so, I wonder how much of that contributes to the last 8kilos you want to lose.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    "I've lost 62kg over the last two years."
    Well done, impressive.

    "Just wondering if I've reached the limit of weight loss, and should accept the weight I'm at."
    Long term no, short term - probably yes.

    "Wondering if I should just go into maintenance now or keep trying to lose?"
    I would try a month at estimated maintenance rather than a week (I'd ramp up calories rather than jump up), note estimated maintenance rather than current calorie intake.

    PS - when / if you return to weight loss reassess your new activity level and what would be a suitable and sustainable deficit for someone exercising a lot with not much weight to lose - you clearly aren't the same person as when you started out.
  • ToffeeApple71
    ToffeeApple71 Posts: 117 Member
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    tiptoethruthetulips wrote: »
    Well done on the weight loss. Just wondering if you have a lot of excess skin? If so, I wonder how much of that contributes to the last 8kilos you want to lose.

    There's a bit of excess skin. I can't actually work out how much is skin and whether there is still fat there to lose. Not sure the skin weighs 8kg though!
  • ToffeeApple71
    ToffeeApple71 Posts: 117 Member
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    sijomial wrote: »
    "I've lost 62kg over the last two years."
    Well done, impressive.

    Yeah....just got to keep it off now! That's the hard part.

    "Wondering if I should just go into maintenance now or keep trying to lose?"
    I would try a month at estimated maintenance rather than a week (I'd ramp up calories rather than jump up), note estimated maintenance rather than current calorie intake.


    So I need to work out what my maintenance calories are, and do it for a week. If I put anything on, then reduce the calories until I work out my equilibrium?
    The whole maintenance thing is quite scary. I'm terrified of putting the weight back on.
  • Lietchi
    Lietchi Posts: 6,109 Member
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    I would suggest building up gradually, instead of jumping to theoretical maintenance and then backtracking if you start gaining weight.
    For example increasing your daily intake by 50 or 100 calories for a week, same again the week after, etc. Reverse dieting is what it's called, I think.
  • sijomial
    sijomial Posts: 19,811 Member
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    ToffeeApple71 wrote: »
    sijomial wrote: »
    "I've lost 62kg over the last two years."
    Well done, impressive.

    Yeah....just got to keep it off now! That's the hard part.

    "Wondering if I should just go into maintenance now or keep trying to lose?"
    I would try a month at estimated maintenance rather than a week (I'd ramp up calories rather than jump up), note estimated maintenance rather than current calorie intake.


    So I need to work out what my maintenance calories are, and do it for a week. If I put anything on, then reduce the calories until I work out my equilibrium?
    The whole maintenance thing is quite scary. I'm terrified of putting the weight back on.

    "Terror" isn't an appropriate level of emotion for eating at an estimated maintenance level for a month.
    It really is time both physically and emotionally for a diet break to let the stress go.

    Maybe falling back on maths helps with perspective when you have lost so much weight?
    62kg of loss is roughly 477,400 calories deficit over that timescale!!!
    Just think how long it would take to undo that and how many chances you would have to nip in the bud any real slide in weight before it got out of hand. Nothing significant in the long term happens from a month long experiment.

    Work out your estimated calories and ramp up to that level, you can't currently trust your weight follows your intake (hence the 3 month stall) so have to trust the numbers instead.
  • ToffeeApple71
    ToffeeApple71 Posts: 117 Member
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    Lietchi wrote: »
    I would suggest building up gradually, instead of jumping to theoretical maintenance and then backtracking if you start gaining weight.
    For example increasing your daily intake by 50 or 100 calories for a week, same again the week after, etc. Reverse dieting is what it's called, I think.

    Thanks. I'll increase slowly. Hadn't thought about doing it this way...just assumed I went straight up to maintenance. This will help with my mindset too.
  • ToffeeApple71
    ToffeeApple71 Posts: 117 Member
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    sijomial wrote: »



    Maybe falling back on maths helps with perspective when you have lost so much weight?
    62kg of loss is roughly 477,400 calories deficit over that timescale!!!
    Just think how long it would take to undo that and how many chances you would have to nip in the bud any real slide in weight before it got out of hand. Nothing significant in the long term happens from a month long experiment.

    Work out your estimated calories and ramp up to that level, you can't currently trust your weight follows your intake (hence the 3 month stall) so have to trust the numbers instead.

    Those numbers are awesome! Hadn't looked at it from that perspective. Thank you. Definitely makes me feel a bit more relaxed about upping calories.

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