New User with no results

I agree with what has been said… especially if you don’t have that much to lose. Patience and accuracy logging are key. I’ve been back on MFP for about a year and lost 25 pounds. It comes off it just takes time to do it right.

I disagree with what has been said. I think MFP uses the dietary guidelines handed out by the govt. and since we adopted those suggestions, we have an obesity epidemic, and huge increases in cancer, heart disease, and diabetes.

The question is.. are you doing exactly what they tell you to, and it is NOT working, how would doing MORE of it, yield different results? It won't.

So you might want to consider that the advice being handed out, though well-intentioned by your doctor, or MFP.. similar sources, is simply being repeated, because somewhere way up, someone powerful was convinced to support this way of eating.. likely to support American agriculture. We eat, what our farmers grow.. wheat corn etc. We don't grow these crops because we determined they are healthy.. the govt. decided we would be healthy eating these foods, because that is what we had in abundance.

A politician chooses what is healthy, and all the health agencies, are PAID by those politicians. If an agency supported a different diet, they would no longer be funded, and their scientists would be unemployed, and unable to find work, in other agencies. This is because scientists are very smart people. If their lives are endangered by doing something, they avoid it.. so they make epidemiological studies, tailored to yield the results the people who PAY for them want.. and that is big agriculture groups, or the govt., who are working together, to make farming profitable. This noble idea, helping our farmers, has led to this obesity epidemic, because health wasn't WHY they made the current guidelines.

So start by acknowledging that MFP, and most experts, simply repeat what they have been taught, even if the result of that teaching, is being more unhealthy than at any time in our history. The other option is to believe that we are eating a great diet, and it's simply a coincidence that we are almost ALL getting fatter & sicker by the year.

Once you do that, start doing something else. Look at people having success, and study what they are doing. If the advice MFP gave you, was working, then I would say, just stick to it, and it will add up.. but it isn't.

I cut carbs.. if you aren't gaining much, then cutting a little carbs, which adds a reciprocating amount of fat, could be enough. I cut them drastically, because I wanted to lose weight.. and lost 51 lbs. so far, in 105 days.. since Sept. 11th. I wasn't perfect, and had a few high carb days, but overall, it is working.

You do not need to be drastic. I am not suggest you eat my way. What I am suggesting is that you tried this way, and aren't just not losing, but are GAINING. You may want to give it a little more time, but I doubt it will yield different results. So try anything else.. Mediterranean diet, South Beach, vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, anything else, and in 10-14 days, if you follow these, you should be able to see result in 2 weeks, or they aren't working.

I doubt your calories are the issue.. most recommendations suggest low calories. So you aren't having many calories in, which means, you are having LESS calories OUT.. we don't all burn calories at the same rate. So you are eating less calories, but burning less calories as well.

You also have water weight from eating carbs.. they form glycogen, which bonds with water.. that adds weight, beyond the whole 3500 a lb. thing... this has nothing to do with calories.. so more glycogen, will result in water weight gain, and if you keep your cells provided with glycogen, you keep the water. What about excess glucose, after your cells have all the glycogen they can store? Well, glucose is toxic, so the body continues releasing Insulin, and Insulin stores it... in triglycerides.. that is bodyfat, and each fat cell stores water. That weight isn't going anywhere, until you burn off the fat, or glycogen.

Carbs create the glucose, and form glycogen or bodyfat, to get excess out of the blood.. so the opposite is to not eat the carbs, and have less excess glucose.. you might still have enough to get plenty of glycogen, BUT, you won't have excess to ADD bodyfat.. you gain water weight, when you store glycogen, and burn it off through exercise, daily activities.. this is normal. We gain or lose a few lbs. as we burn off the energy we ate. If you eat excess carbs though, you produce excess glucose, and it has to be stored as bodyfat.. which only goes away, when you break down fat.. if you keep eating excess glucose, the bodyfat accumulates over the years. If you are adding fat, you are gaining more water weight than you burn off.. weight goes up.

Low carb simply manipulates this.. with lower carbs, we have less glucose, so less glycogen, and NO excess glucose in the blood, so no more bodyfat accumulation. If you go low enough in carbs, you burn off the glycogen, and start burning ketones instead of glycogen. Ketones are created when you break down fat. Guess what.. the water in those cells are released to, and you pee off a bunch of weight, as you burn off your own bodyfat, which has calories too.. so you feel full all the time, because you are " consuming " bodyfat.. 3500 calories a lb.! So when you eat 1850 calories, you are not starving yourself on 1500 calories. If we are honest, we do 1500 calories for very short amounts of time. We do it so much, we all believe 1500 is normal. If we don't lie to ourselves though.. when we were gaining a few lbs. a year.. think 5 x 3,500.. just 17.500 calories extra per YEAR, or 48 extra calories a day.. we probably ate closer to 3,500 a day.. but if you admit that, everyone else looks at you in disgust, even if they do the SAME thing.

A 5'4 140 lb. woman of 40, doing moderate exercise, has a TDEE of 2,062.. meaning they WOULD be 562 calories below needs.. and lose 1 lb a week at least. So if you are not, then you are either eating extra calories, which I trust you.. that you are NOT... OR, burning less, and gaining water weight.

I believe in calories in/out.. but it is FAR too complicated for anyone to actually measure.. thousands of variables in calories consumed, which is very inaccurate, and calories out, which varies due to so many variables, we can't measure. So we sort of pick some numbers by assuming we all have the same bodyfat, muscle mass, metabolism, water retention.. and that is fine.. IF it works.. sometimes we guess right, which is great for THEM.. but if it isn't working, you need changes.

I don't think you need to do low carb. I eat 5-8 grams of carbs a day. However, there is a lot of room between what I eat, and MFP suggests.. you can move up and down to cause weight loss/gain.

There are many diets in between as well, and by eating better carbs, better food overall, and other variations.. not just focusing on the numbers, you can be succonly 5'6"essful.

You only need to get to where it is working. I chose to cut carbs, because it is easiest. I can eat 1850 calories of meat, eggs, fats, and water.. and burn a 1/2 a lb. of fat a day.. another 1,750 calories.. 3,600 calories, which I think is good for a 232 lb. guy. I have plenty of bodyfat still.. down from 283, but still only 5'6" tall.

So I should lose that 1/2 a lb. of bodyfat/weight. I've lost .486 lbs. a day, for 105 days.. pretty close, and explainable by my 4-5 cheat meals. I gained water weight temporarily.. it went away, but prevented weight LOSS. If I don't count those 4-5 days, it is right at .5-.51 lbs. per day.

My math works out.. you eat less than you supposedly burn, and are gaining weight. Your math is wrong.. I suggest that the numbers you are adding up are wrong.. you probably eat a few extra calories, because labels are not exact, and burn less than you think, and if you are gaining weight, you are gaining some bodyfat, which holds water. This will continue to accumulate, even if you only eat low cal, low fat.

So try something else.. I am suggesting dropping carbs 10%, and see if that helps, then 10% more if that doesn't work.. not to drastic, but SHOULD help if you give 10 days to each level, like you did to the MFP recommendations.. if you stick to that, and see no loss or weight gain, I won't recommend continuing eating that way. If you do start losing, and are at 30% carbs, 50% fat ( ex. ), then simply keep at it, as long as it WORKS. Eat real whole food, you cook yourself.. eating food prepared by others is a mistake.. their goal is making you happy, not healthy. Happy people PAY more.

That would be as low as you NEED to go, if you can lose weight steadily, and reach a healthy weight.. not too drastic.. or maybe a different plan works.. high protein, vegan with more veggies, eggs and cheese, less grains.. or something else entirely. I am biased by what worked for me.. I think ANY diet which reduces carbs will help you, but find a diet you like, and can stick with, if it works. Success is simply progress multiplied by time.

Good Luck!

Please do not be tempted to make things more complicated than they need be at the start of getting to know how your body works best.

I'm wondering how you set up your goals, are you logging exercise as a separate item or including your activity in your activity level, separating the two might be helpful to your understanding of you. Have you by any chance tried logging an average day from how you used to eat into the programme, its possible you may find some interesting information, a better understanding of yourself by doing this.

I'm sorry, I do not understand the idea of drinking large quantity of water particularly if its in addition to other fluids. I did well using the fluid/water calculator at the bottom of the page where you enter your food intake, I think its 8 glasses a day, I'm not sure it mentioned the size of glass.

It can take a while to understand the basics of calorific restriction. As mentioned above, women can experience a significant swing through their cycle. I wonder if you might find it helpful to take your measurements and log those there is a page where you can monitor your various statistics. Sometimes weight may not seem to move but a tape-measure can show differences.

Wishing you all the very best, please don't stress.

Drop the conspiracies and keep on reading and learning. Some things you seem to understand. Some you're factually wrong. Some of your advice is actually not bad.

You got a disagree from me because of the factual errors and the conspiracy theory... which bury the bits of good advice. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Best of luck and check on the relative cost of storing energy as body fat based on input macros (and what gets stored at zero cost bringing to mind why there exists no net storage of fat when eating at a deficit). You may be surprised. And surprised as to why you burn more fat on keto (hint: it is not more of your previously stored fat)

As to why we store fat ask yourself how much you move and burn in a day driving to your office and how many calories a box of chocolates costing 20 minutes of your labor has. (Hint: carbs are 4 Cal a gr. And all food has some water which would bring the average lower. Yet chocolate is more than 5 Cal a gram... how can that be???🙀)

sorry, the last bit got cut off. So continuing...

The implication of slower loss is that targeting large losses that require large deficits becomes counterproductive. And more importantly a slow loss often gets buried in normal day to day weight fluctuations and takes a while to be seen requiring one to take sufficient samples (weigh ins) and allow for enough time to pass to be able to separate signal (weight trend change) from noise (explained and unexplained non fat related weight fluctuations).