Starvation Mode?

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Honeybunn
Honeybunn Posts: 39
in Food and Nutrition
When I finish logging all my Food & Exercise for the day, MFP always says that I'm eating too few calories and could be putting my body into "Starvation Mode". But I don't feel like I'm "starving" at all. I eat 3 meals a day, plus 2 snacks (usually). What, am I supposed to make myself eat MORE even though I'm not even hungry? Could it be that I am less hungry BECAUSE I'm in "starvation mode"? I'm to the point now where I don't even want to log my exercise because I'm sick of seeing that message.

Replies

  • Skinnytime
    Skinnytime Posts: 279
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    If you are eating nutrient dense foods, getting all the vitamins, minerals and oils your body needs and losing weight then just keep doing what you are doing. I still don't buy into the 1200 one size fits all calorie policy, but others will differ strongly ... If you are not losing, then tweak your calorie intake a bit with more nutrition - not junk with empty calories.
    You don't have to log out at the end of the day. I rarely do. I just log all my stuff in.
    Good luck.
  • MrRon
    MrRon Posts: 7
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    I agree with Skinnytime on starvation mode. I have found that my starvation mode point is around 900 calories, not the 1200 that I have read in many diet memos. You may want to contact your doctor to discuss this further. Important thing is maintaining good health.

    Keep up the good work.

    Mrb

    PS I've lost 83 lbs since January 1st 2008. This 61 year guy feels like a teen again.
  • marm1962
    marm1962 Posts: 950 Member
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    Starvation Mode does not mean you are hungry or starving....it's the point in which your body will perceives that there is a shortage of food (because of the lack of calories). However, I agree that every "Body" is different and the "starvation" point varies. Also, if you think about it the "starvation mode" does not last forever, I've never seen a fat person that died from starvation........lol. Your body will first burn what ever fuel (fat) it has stored and then will go after the fuel that you eat.

    You do have to make sure you are not eating too few of the vitamins and minerals that you need, a good suppliment would help and couldn't hurt. And I would never suggest that you or anyone go to extremes and eat less than what would be healthy.
  • kenne
    kenne Posts: 13
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    Starvation Mode does not mean you are hungry or starving....it's the point in which your body will perceives that there is a shortage of food (because of the lack of calories). However, I agree that every "Body" is different and the "starvation" point varies. Also, if you think about it the "starvation mode" does not last forever, I've never seen a fat person that died from starvation........lol. Your body will first burn what ever fuel (fat) it has stored and then will go after the fuel that you eat.

    You do have to make sure you are not eating too few of the vitamins and minerals that you need, a good suppliment would help and couldn't hurt. And I would never suggest that you or anyone go to extremes and eat less than what would be healthy.

    I have to disagree slightly, the starvation point is where your body begins to burn other fuels than fat. Your body believes that you are going starve so it preserves your fat to burn last . Your body is most efficient at burning fat. It is a self preservation tactic, expending the least amount of energy when your energy stores are most depleted.
  • Honeybunn
    Honeybunn Posts: 39
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    Thanks for the input everyone! I do take Women's One Daily Multivitamin/Multimineral Supplement, exercise daily, drink plenty of water and have a pretty balanced diet (except for the occasional hot fudge sunday or slice of pizza). I think I'm making progress so far. I'm losing both inches and weight and have A LOT more energy now. Thanks again for the support!
  • marm1962
    marm1962 Posts: 950 Member
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    You are quite right, it does burn the stored fuel last. Sorry lost my head.....lol
  • ivykivy
    ivykivy Posts: 2,970 Member
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    You're confusing a starvation diet with starvation mode or the technical term of "famine response" they are two different things.

    You are correct in your statement of a starvation diet being defined as 50% of your maintenance calories, But the famine response can start at far higher then that. When the body perceives there to be few calories coming in then it needs to sustain healthy metabolic activity, the body starts the systemic slow down of enzyme production, hormone release (except for a couple of fat storage hormones like cortisol), and organ function. This lowers the amount of fuel we need, and it also increases the storage of fat. The body will normally start seeing this type of deficiency at around 75% of maintenance calories (which, ironically, is around where your BMR is).

    You are also correct in the statement that there's no point where the body will STOP losing weight when we are at caloric deficit, even in famine mode. The problem is, when we are in a high deficit mode, our body looks for ways to trim off excess calorie burn, the first thing to go in this situation is muscle and lean tissue, as they are both active calorie users (as opposed to fat, which really doesn't burn any calories, like 1 per day per lb). Losing weight by extreme malnutrition just makes us lose muscle, which gives us a higher body fat %, which makes it harder to lose weight, which lowers our metabolic rate, which adds more fat...etc. vicious cycle.

    Side note (added after), you MUST realize that this is true for people who ARE NOT in the obese and morbidly obese category, its a whole different set of calorie rules for them. People who have lots and lots of fat stores, don't have the same body responses to extreme calorie deficits as others. Which is why someone who has a BMI of say ...35 can eat 1100 calories a day NET (after exercise) and still lose 2 to 4 lbs a week without significant muscle loss. But eventually, once they drop enough fat, these rules WILL start to apply for them. You need to be concious of this, and know that as you approach the "overweight" range, you need to decrease your deficit and start adding in muscle building activity to your cardio workouts (best to have them in there from the start as it will make the transition less dramatic for the body).
    Edited by SHBoss1673 on Fri 05/29/09 04:01 AM
    from the thread.
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/54392-another-calorie-intake-question?page=2#posts-622491
    I hope he doesn't mind my posting this. If so my apologies:flowerforyou:
  • JoyousMaximus
    JoyousMaximus Posts: 9,285 Member
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    I read on the website at the bottom of my post that you generally should eat a minimum of 8 calories for each pound you weigh but you should really eat more if you are exercise.

    http://www.freedieting.com/calorie_needs.html
  • SHBoss1673
    SHBoss1673 Posts: 7,161 Member
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    You're confusing a starvation diet with starvation mode or the technical term of "famine response" they are two different things.

    You are correct in your statement of a starvation diet being defined as 50% of your maintenance calories, But the famine response can start at far higher then that. When the body perceives there to be few calories coming in then it needs to sustain healthy metabolic activity, the body starts the systemic slow down of enzyme production, hormone release (except for a couple of fat storage hormones like cortisol), and organ function. This lowers the amount of fuel we need, and it also increases the storage of fat. The body will normally start seeing this type of deficiency at around 75% of maintenance calories (which, ironically, is around where your BMR is).

    You are also correct in the statement that there's no point where the body will STOP losing weight when we are at caloric deficit, even in famine mode. The problem is, when we are in a high deficit mode, our body looks for ways to trim off excess calorie burn, the first thing to go in this situation is muscle and lean tissue, as they are both active calorie users (as opposed to fat, which really doesn't burn any calories, like 1 per day per lb). Losing weight by extreme malnutrition just makes us lose muscle, which gives us a higher body fat %, which makes it harder to lose weight, which lowers our metabolic rate, which adds more fat...etc. vicious cycle.

    Side note (added after), you MUST realize that this is true for people who ARE NOT in the obese and morbidly obese category, its a whole different set of calorie rules for them. People who have lots and lots of fat stores, don't have the same body responses to extreme calorie deficits as others. Which is why someone who has a BMI of say ...35 can eat 1100 calories a day NET (after exercise) and still lose 2 to 4 lbs a week without significant muscle loss. But eventually, once they drop enough fat, these rules WILL start to apply for them. You need to be concious of this, and know that as you approach the "overweight" range, you need to decrease your deficit and start adding in muscle building activity to your cardio workouts (best to have them in there from the start as it will make the transition less dramatic for the body).
    Edited by SHBoss1673 on Fri 05/29/09 04:01 AM
    from the thread.
    http://www.myfitnesspal.com/topics/show/54392-another-calorie-intake-question?page=2#posts-622491
    I hope he doesn't mind my posting this. If so my apologies:flowerforyou:

    no problem lady! :flowerforyou:
  • nikii14
    nikii14 Posts: 403 Member
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    I read on the website at the bottom of my post that you generally should eat a minimum of 8 calories for each pound you weigh but you should really eat more if you are exercise.

    http://www.freedieting.com/calorie_needs.html

    Not sure how accurate that is....I would be eating less than 1000 calories..
  • SHBoss1673
    SHBoss1673 Posts: 7,161 Member
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    OK I'm addressing the original poster here.

    Here's the thing, when we abuse our bodies by eating badly for a long time, it screws up the chemical processes in our body, so we can't rely on our bodies telling us when to eat. For obese people not at a caloric deficit, this usually comes in the form of ghrelin being overly abundant (ghrelin is the hormone that the stomach produces to tell us we are hungry) when we eat, causing us to not "feel full" even though we should. It also causes us to feel hungry more often.

    Then there's the other side of the coin, people who start "dieting" often find that they are no longer hungry after a while of eating below what they really should be. This is caused by the body producing more leptin (the opposite hormone of ghrelin). When we eat too little food for a period of weeks or months, our bodies become normalized to the amount of food we intake. THIS IS BAD! Because even though the body is normalized, it's normalized at a lower amount of energy, which means less muscle function, less organ function, less energy, and MORE FAT STORAGE!

    So how do you combat this? You map out a food plan. Plan your meals, and over the course of a few weeks, GRADUALLY up your calories say maybe 50 calories every 3 days or so, get to where MFP says you should be. If you don't see results after being there for a few months, then slowly (very slowly) come down about 100 calories at a time, stopping for a few weeks at every 100 to see if it's enough to put you in the right place.

    does this sound slow and painful, sure probably, but hey, it probably took a long time of abuse to get your body chemistry so screwed up, it's only natural that it will take a little time to fix it.
  • hiddensecant
    hiddensecant Posts: 2,446 Member
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    Tagging for future use. Thanks Banks! :flowerforyou:
  • marm1962
    marm1962 Posts: 950 Member
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    "You're confusing a starvation diet with starvation mode or the technical term of "famine response" they are two different things."

    I must have missed the post about the "STARVATION DIET"

    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with famine response)

    Starvation mode is a state in which the body is responding to prolonged periods of low caloric intake levels. During short periods of caloric abstinence, the human body will burn primarily free fatty acids from body fat stores. After prolonged periods of starvation the body has depleted it's body fat and becomes begins to burn lean tissue and muscle as a fuel source.

    [1] Ordinarily, the body responds to reduced caloric intake by burning fat reserves first, and only consumes muscle and other tissues when those reserves are exhausted.[

    2] Specifically, the body burns fat after first exhausting the contents of the digestive tract along with glycogen reserves stored in muscle and liver cells.

    [3] After prolonged periods of starvation, the body will utilize the proteins within muscle tissue as a fuel source. People who practice fasting on a regular basis, such as those adhering to caloric restricted diets, can prime their bodies to abstain from food without burning lean tissue.
    [4]. Resistance training (such as weight lifting) can also prevent the loss of muscle mass while a person is caloric restricted.
  • SHBoss1673
    SHBoss1673 Posts: 7,161 Member
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    "You're confusing a starvation diet with starvation mode or the technical term of "famine response" they are two different things."

    I must have missed the post about the "STARVATION DIET"

    From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia (It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with famine response)

    Starvation mode is a state in which the body is responding to prolonged periods of low caloric intake levels. During short periods of caloric abstinence, the human body will burn primarily free fatty acids from body fat stores. After prolonged periods of starvation the body has depleted it's body fat and becomes begins to burn lean tissue and muscle as a fuel source.

    [1] Ordinarily, the body responds to reduced caloric intake by burning fat reserves first, and only consumes muscle and other tissues when those reserves are exhausted.[

    2] Specifically, the body burns fat after first exhausting the contents of the digestive tract along with glycogen reserves stored in muscle and liver cells.

    [3] After prolonged periods of starvation, the body will utilize the proteins within muscle tissue as a fuel source. People who practice fasting on a regular basis, such as those adhering to caloric restricted diets, can prime their bodies to abstain from food without burning lean tissue.
    [4]. Resistance training (such as weight lifting) can also prevent the loss of muscle mass while a person is caloric restricted.

    Well, the startvation diet reference was from another post, check back to that ivyivy's quote, you'll see the link to the original post if you're interested.

    that wiki entry was nice, but it covered very little of the actual process we go through during the transition from normal metabolism to a body famine response. It's a lot more involved with that.
    look at the link in my banner, it has all that info laid out for people to read.
  • marm1962
    marm1962 Posts: 950 Member
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    Thank you, yes I missed it.

    I'm not really interested in the mechanics of how it happens, I just know it does.
  • SHBoss1673
    SHBoss1673 Posts: 7,161 Member
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    Thank you, yes I missed it.

    I'm not really interested in the mechanics of how it happens, I just know it does.

    Granted, but without knowing how, it's very hard to recognize the symptoms of being in it, and keep yourself out of it.
  • gc2052
    gc2052 Posts: 183
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    Where on mFP do you get the message of starvation mode?
  • keppick
    keppick Posts: 36 Member
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    Never seen that message myself. Lie one day and see what happens.:happy:
  • pannellkat
    pannellkat Posts: 709 Member
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    Where on mFP do you get the message of starvation mode?

    on your home page where it says "Complete todays entry" if you click on that and lets say your goal is 1200 calories and you only ate 1150 or 950, that is where the message shows in very small print, right underneath "If everyday were like today, you would lose...etc etc. etc."
  • BrendaLee
    BrendaLee Posts: 4,463 Member
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    Our bodies need a certain amount of fuel to function properly. Just give it what it wants- eat. :tongue: I guarantee I will never have a problem eating 1200 calories/day. lol

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