Loser by name, not by weight

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Katestar07
Katestar07 Posts: 6 Member
edited October 2022 in Health and Weight Loss
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I'm consuming 1,200 cals per day (got about 25kg to lose), exercising 3x week (burning around 1,000 cals per week through exercise) and drinking 1.5L water per day. My clothes are loose and wedding ring now fits so I know I'm losing but the scales are not budging (in fact I gained 0.3 this week). Is this normal? What am I doing wrong? Time to buy new scales? Ive attached last week's calorie summary. Am I not eating enough? #confused #help

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  • Retroguy2000
    Retroguy2000 Posts: 1,515 Member
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    Those are dangerously low calorie inputs for a few days.

    The 0.3 gain, is that based on a multi-day average of daily weight checks, or a single day snapshot? If the latter, it's meaningless. Water retention from exercise, or after recent salt and carb intake, period related, etc.

    It sounds like you are making progress. How much have you lost, over how long? If your progress is stalling, might be time for a maintenance break, maybe go back to maintenance for a couple of weeks to let your body recharge.
  • Katestar07
    Katestar07 Posts: 6 Member
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    Thanks! But I'm definitely eating 1,200 cals every day (you might have been looking at my net graph which subtracts exercise burned from exercise from the total). Sometimes I eat some of my exercise calories, sometimes I don't. Weigh in day tomorrow so will see how I go.
  • Lietchi
    Lietchi Posts: 6,126 Member
    edited October 2022
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    Your net calories should be 1200 at a minimum, not way below as you are doing now. This is extreme stress you are putting your body under: that alone can cause water retention masking fat loss on the scale.

    Second likely candidate for water retention is your exercise. You say you burn 1000 calories per week exercising, but your net calorie intake suggests you're exercising/being active quite a bit more, at least 500 calories per day (more if you're actually eating back some exercise calories).

    This is not a good road you are on, as the posters above me have already stated. You are basically starving yourself.
  • SuzySunshine99
    SuzySunshine99 Posts: 2,984 Member
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    Lietchi wrote: »
    Your net calories should be 1200 at a minimum, not way below as you are doing now. This is extreme stress you are putting your body under: that alone can cause water retention masking fat loss on the scale.

    Second likely candidate for water retention is your exercise. You say you burn 1000 calories per week exercising, but your net calorie intake suggests you're exercising/being active quite a bit more, at least 500 calories per day (more if you're actually eating back some exercise calories).

    This is not a good road you are on, as the posters above me have already stated. You are basically starving yourself.

    Exactly this....if 1,200 is your goal, then you need to eat back your exercise calories. This is how MFP is designed to work. 1,200 NET.
  • Katestar07
    Katestar07 Posts: 6 Member
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    Wow thanks everyone I'm so glad I came here for advice! I googled eating back exercise calories and everything I read said not to unless I was a hard core athlete (which I'm not!). I've unlinked my fitbit from MFP and will just manually enter my exercise and make sure I eat whatever I burn to achieve 1,200 net. Thanks again!
  • PAV8888
    PAV8888 Posts: 13,649 Member
    edited October 2022
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    If you've linked your Fitbit to MFP, your "exercise" calories are not actually reflecting any actual exercise estimate.

    They are just an accounting adjustment that, at midnight, makes your MFP TDEE equal to what your Fitbit estimated your TDEE to be.

    This doesn't make the Fitbit TDEE "accurate" but neither does it make anything else a better initial estimate.

    -- input food and drinks as "accurately" as you can on MFP and collect good data about your Caloric intake.
    -- let Fitbit and Mfp do their thing.
    -- eat anywhere from 10% to 25% less than your (actual) TDEE depending on how much stored fat you have available to lose.
    -- monitor your weight change using a trending weight app or website.

    After a bit of time (at least one full menstrual cycle for those so afflicted), estimate how closely your tracking and your devices predict your weight changes and make adjustments based on your results....

  • Caralarma
    Caralarma Posts: 174 Member
    edited October 2022
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    I'm not sure if you already do this but I find what works best is to link fitbit to MFP and set up a food plan. What it does, is it will tell you how much to eat each day in order to be in a calorie deficit, depending on your activity (output) for each day. For example, on a day where I am sedentary my output is usually around 1400 so I need to eat 1200 to be in a deficit. But on days I exercise, my output will be around 2000 which means I can eat around 1400/1500 and still be in a deficit. I think this works well because it makes you want to move more and is more accurate than just eating the same calorie amount every day.

    I don't believe in 'eating exercise calories back' the way MFP tells you to. Like if you burn 400 I don't believe you need to eat 400 back but using the fitbit tool makes it more accurate in terms of what to eat back. I use MFP purely to log food.

    Also don't worry about the scale- rather look for weight downward trend instead of exact number. I recommend following syattfitness on Instagram:) he talks a lot about the scale.

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