So I am frustrated and need a PEP talk or advice
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ladybug4233
Posts: 217 Member
This is my 3rd time in 4 years of using My Fitness Pal and this is the first time I have not seen the scale consistently go down. It has started really frustrating me. I am consistently eating in a 500-700 calorie deficit. I ride the bike 6 days a week, lift light weights for 4 days and the scale hasn't changed in 2 weeks. I will say the fist 3 weeks I dropped 4-5 pounds. But now the scale doesn't change at all. I have to use light weights due to a neck injury so I cant change that. On lower body days I use body weight. I am working hard and making good food choices. Fad diets, and giving up food groups does not work for me. I only need to loose 10 pounds. I will say I am in menopause but I desperately don't want to believe that this wont work and use it as an excuse. I kind of feel deflated but don't want to give up.
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Replies
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So are you saying you have lost 4 - 5 pounds total in three weeks while aiming for a just over 1lb/week weight loss goal?2
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Oh, this is so frustrating! What are your current stats, how often and when do you step on the scale, and is your exercise or intensity new?1
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You've lost 4-5 lbs over 5 weeks, that's a perfect rate, nothing wrong with that! At your weight, I wouldn't recommend much quicker anyway.
New strength training and a stall of only 2 weeks, combined with menopause: I vote for water retention issues as the most likely diagnosis, which simply requires more patience.
It's normal to not lose weight every week, you need to evaluate your weight trend over at least a month.3 -
ladybug4233 wrote: »
OK thanks that's much clearer, wasn't seeing that timeline.
Just about halfway to goal in five weeks.
Your recent resumption of strength training could well be responsible for some soreness/inflammation and resulting water weight retention/addition masking fat loss on the scales.
If you are confident you are in a deficit you can be equally confident you are losing fat.
Another question for you - if at the start of this process a magician had offered you two choices which one would you pick?
A/ Inconsistent weight loss but overall still on track at the halfway point.
B/ Consistent weight loss but slower than desired.
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Most of the weight you lost the first couple of weeks was water with a little fat loss included. Over the next couple of weeks your water retention leveled out and you continued to lose fat. I have found that, especially if I eat lower carb, my weight loss is really erratic, because any carbs after not eating them for a while would cause me to retain more water. The fact that you have changed your exercise level could also cause you to retain some water. Over time, it will even out. Keep doing what you're doing and you will see the numbers drop. It is frustrating, but if your logging is accurate, you will lose weight.1
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ladybug4233 wrote: »
OK thanks that's much clearer, wasn't seeing that timeline.
Just about halfway to goal in five weeks.
Your recent resumption of strength training could well be responsible for some soreness/inflammation and resulting water weight retention/addition masking fat loss on the scales.
If you are confident you are in a deficit you can be equally confident you are losing fat.
Another question for you - if at the start of this process a magician had offered you two choices which one would you pick?
A/ Inconsistent weight loss but overall still on track at the halfway point.
B/ Consistent weight loss but slower than desired.
Thanks for responding. I weigh and record everything so I know I am in a deficit. I am happy about the 5 pounds but I have 10 more to go. It was motivating when the scale was going down. Now I get frustrated. Thanks for listening. I love the questions you posed. Its funny I go back and forth. But I lean towards B.
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spiriteagle99 wrote: »Most of the weight you lost the first couple of weeks was water with a little fat loss included. Over the next couple of weeks your water retention leveled out and you continued to lose fat. I have found that, especially if I eat lower carb, my weight loss is really erratic, because any carbs after not eating them for a while would cause me to retain more water. The fact that you have changed your exercise level could also cause you to retain some water. Over time, it will even out. Keep doing what you're doing and you will see the numbers drop. It is frustrating, but if your logging is accurate, you will lose weight.
Thanks for posting. I weigh and record everything so I know I am accurate. I will keep the faith. I was so motivated when the scale dropped and now I get frustrated. Sometimes it's hard to trust the process. Especially when I keep hearing Menopause means you can't loose weight.0 -
ladybug4233 wrote: »ladybug4233 wrote: »
OK thanks that's much clearer, wasn't seeing that timeline.
Just about halfway to goal in five weeks.
Your recent resumption of strength training could well be responsible for some soreness/inflammation and resulting water weight retention/addition masking fat loss on the scales.
If you are confident you are in a deficit you can be equally confident you are losing fat.
Another question for you - if at the start of this process a magician had offered you two choices which one would you pick?
A/ Inconsistent weight loss but overall still on track at the halfway point.
B/ Consistent weight loss but slower than desired.
Thanks for responding. I weigh and record everything so I know I am in a deficit. I am happy about the 5 pounds but I have 10 more to go. It was motivating when the scale was going down. Now I get frustrated. Thanks for listening. I love the questions you posed. Its funny I go back and forth. But I lean towards B.
It wouldn't be my answer but I did suspect that you really crave consistency.
Of course this time next year it will only matter that you got to goal and maintained there, it really won't matter if you lost in a series of stalls and whooshes or a nice regular pattern.
BTW - my wife had a very sudden menopause 30 years ago (surgery) she has lost, gained, lost again and successfully maintained weight.
Keep the faith, you will get there.1 -
ladybug4233 wrote: »spiriteagle99 wrote: »Especially when I keep hearing Menopause means you can't loose weight.
Yaaaaaaaaaaah, don't listen to people who say that. While I personally haven't had the untold pleasure of going through it (yet), it's utter nonsense for anyone to claim that you CAN'T lose weight during menopause. If someone tells you that, ask for a concise explanation of the mechanism that allows women of a certain age (or age range, you know what I'm saying here) to defy the laws of thermodynamics.
THAT SAID, human metabolism does change (not for the better, unfortunately), at ~age 60 (reference: Pontzer et al. Daily energy expenditure through the human life course. Science. 373(6556):808-812, 2021)0 -
This all sounds normal. Keep it up. Weight doesn’t come off every week.1
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ladybug4233 wrote: »spiriteagle99 wrote: »Most of the weight you lost the first couple of weeks was water with a little fat loss included. Over the next couple of weeks your water retention leveled out and you continued to lose fat. I have found that, especially if I eat lower carb, my weight loss is really erratic, because any carbs after not eating them for a while would cause me to retain more water. The fact that you have changed your exercise level could also cause you to retain some water. Over time, it will even out. Keep doing what you're doing and you will see the numbers drop. It is frustrating, but if your logging is accurate, you will lose weight.
Thanks for posting. I weigh and record everything so I know I am accurate. I will keep the faith. I was so motivated when the scale dropped and now I get frustrated. Sometimes it's hard to trust the process. Especially when I keep hearing Menopause means you can't loose weight.
Suspect you keep hearing it from people who desperately want an excuse, and are probably believing other myths that are the actual roadblocks to their progress (stuff like: can't eat X or Y food, all you need to do is use ABC eating rules and you don't need to care about calories, intense/punitive exercise is essential for weight loss, blah blah blah - i.e., plain wrong stuff).
To disprove a thesis (like "menopause means you can't lose weight"), all you need is one counterexample.
I went into menopause at age 45 (triggered by chemotherapy), then took anti-estrogen drugs for 7.5 years that create sort of a hyper-menopause state after that.
At 59-60, over 20 years into menopause, I lost 50+ pounds, class 1 obese to a healthy weight, in less than a year, and have kept my weight in a healthy range ever since.
There's your one counter-example that disproves "can't lose weight in menopause". And I'm far from the only woman around here who's done that.
Just to make it more fun, I was (and am still) also severely hypothyroid (but properly medicated for it); didn't materially increase my exercise (was already active while obese); didn't change the range of foods I ate (just changed portion sizes, proportions on the plate, frequencies, in order to hit a calorie goal).
Don't believe myths, no matter how widespread and popular they are. You're doing the right thing by checking them out.
Hang in there, keep asking questions, have patience and persistence . . . you can succeed.
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I would be another counter-example to disprove the theory that you cannot lose weight after menopause. I will be 70 years old 2 months from today. Since Aug 1, 2021, just a little over a year, I have lost 80 lbs. It is doable so long as you are in a calorie deficit.4
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ladybug4233 wrote: »spiriteagle99 wrote: »Most of the weight you lost the first couple of weeks was water with a little fat loss included. Over the next couple of weeks your water retention leveled out and you continued to lose fat. I have found that, especially if I eat lower carb, my weight loss is really erratic, because any carbs after not eating them for a while would cause me to retain more water. The fact that you have changed your exercise level could also cause you to retain some water. Over time, it will even out. Keep doing what you're doing and you will see the numbers drop. It is frustrating, but if your logging is accurate, you will lose weight.
Thanks for posting. I weigh and record everything so I know I am accurate. I will keep the faith. I was so motivated when the scale dropped and now I get frustrated. Sometimes it's hard to trust the process. Especially when I keep hearing Menopause means you can't loose weight.
My 84 yo mother has a hard time staying above Underweight because she is super active and eats a lot of bulky, lower calorie foods.
You are active too - I suspect you are retaining water from some of the new exercise.
I GAINED 7 pounds when I started lifting weights again.2 -
By the way, as other people have said here, your rate of loss is really very good. You are only 10 lbs away from your goal and rate loss is slow at that point. Someone 100 lbs over weight can lose 2 lbs a week, but it would not be a good idea at only 10 lbs over. Even without TOM to deal with, water fluctuations easily mask fat loss when you are losing slowly.2
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You may want to increase your deficit if to much your body will retain fat. Increase protein intake for more energy. Just a thought0
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