How can I reboot my metabolism?

I am having the same issues. I started reading "Master Your Metabolism". I am determined to win!

Eat more! Have a "cheat" day. I *swear* it works. If my weigh-loss becomes stagnant, I just eat whatever I want for a couple of days and I start to lose again. It's a win-win situation!

Its extremely unlikely that your metabolism is the cause. There are SOOO many factors that can be in play. If you just started exercise, you can be just converting fat to muscle. New exercise routines can also cause muscles to retain more water as well. Also.. as a woman, as your monthly cycle progresses your body will release and hold on to water making your weight fluctuate throughout the month. Beyond these things, its also a good idea to make sure you are properly measuring your food. I use a scale and measure everything i eat. Even doing this.. i've had 2-3 week periods where the numbers didin't move. I didn't change anything i was doing and just kept the routine up. Eventually the weight just started falling off without me changing a thing. Sometimes our bodies just need to readjust after losses and it seems to come in spurts.

Restart.

Balanced diet, mild deficit, excersize. It's really not difficult. Unless you make it difficult by overloading the system with various cleanses, detoxes, miracle cures, magic pills, food phobias, etc.etc...

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Hi,
I'm not an expert on anything, but what I do know is you are NOW doing the right thing. What's done is done. Start fresh now. Eat your allotted calories and eat at least half or most of your exercise calories PERIOD. I think you already understand that part. So bite the bullet, and do that for sure.

Next is your exercise. Whatever is your exercise be sure to do it every day. Even if it is just a 30 minute walk some days. EXERCISE DAILY.

Your food content is the big controversy. You have to do what feels right to you. My 2 cents? I am all about whole foods. They fuel your body. Cut out as much "junk" food as you can (junk is preservatives, refined carbs, empty calories, salt, sugar, chemicals). Read labels. If your food doesn't contain ingredients that you can buy at the store to make the product yourself, don't buy it and DON'T EAT it. Your body will function and run more smoothly if you eat REAL food. In the past few months I've gone to 80% fresh veggies and fruit. I eat them raw, steamed, or frozen. Salt and sugar are your enemies here. They cause a cascade of chemical reactions in your body that only hold onto fluids (your weight loss enemy!)

Also be sure to drink enough WATER. My advice, which is my own opinion is to NOT drink chemically sweetened drinks. I like stevia as it is a natural product that doesn't cause an insulin spike.

These are just things that have worked for me. And my latest gold mine in the diet and health department was reading EAT TO LIVE by Dr. Joel Fuhrman. you can check out his website to see if it makes any sense to you. www.drfuhrman.com. I am all about healthy eating and this is what works for me. I have chosen it as a lifestyle choice. I totally believe in feeding my body what it wants. It is surprising that eating the most nutritious food is the most satisfying to my body. Such as the more junk food I eat, the more I want. And 1 cookie or 100 cookies will not satisfy me.

My background is I have had hypothyroid disease since age 19 (I'm 54 today). I've always been heavy, 205 was my heaviest. Always was a slave to sugar and junk food. Always hated and never exercised. Today I am 136.6 pounds and wear a size 4. I came late to learning how to take care of myself, but even this old gal can do it and so can you. The number one secret is NEVER GIVE UP. NEVER GIVE UP in searching for what WORKS FOR YOU. This worked for me, you may not like it, approve of it, or want to do it. THe program that will work for you is one that you can follow.

Best of luck to you!
Susan

Eat 6 small meals..about every 2-3 hrs. Make sure you eat enough protein, carbs and fats.

Also lift weights.

Add in spices like cayenne and cinnamon to your foods.

Without seeing your diary its hard to be specific. Here are a couple of thoughts. I don't think you can mess up your metabolism that fast. I thnk that happens from long term bad eating. I am going to guess that its something else. I went through about a month platuea so I feel your pain. Here are some things to keep in mind as you work though this. Its what helped for me.

1. Are you measuring things or just eyeballing them. At least for a while you should try to weight and measure everything. If I log 1/4 cup of a food and its actually 1/2 Cup that all adds up.
2. Are you acurately counting excercise? HRM=acurate, MFP DB=not always accurate. If you like me count on this I assume that I am burning less than it gives me.
3. Are you eating healthy real food vs stuff in boxes. I truely believe that the preservatives in foods cause you to retain excess weight. The less packages stuff I eat the better I am able to loose.
Are you drinking all of your water? pop=issue above. If I stay to one diet pop a day things are better.
Are you eating adequate whole grains (fiber) so you don't need that liquid clean myself out stuff?
I have a friend who is a professional nutritionist that works at one of the local hospitals. Here are some things that she has advised me. She said to try to even your daily food out throughout the day. Try to eat something and get some movement multipple times per day. The actual medical research really does say it is better for peak performance of our body to keep our sugar levels level throughout the day. (I tend to eat a good breakfast and a small lunch to give myself a lot of calories for dinner and she fussed at me for this). She also said 1200 calorie minimum per day but she did not advise eating back all of the excercise calories. ( I started working to my daily goal knowing if I go a bit over I am OK but not eating when I was not hungry to get those calories in.)
If your not doing some weight training with cardio that is supposed to really help your body burn calories. We started doing 30 day shred and another core kind of workout at work 3 times per week and that may have also made a difference.
I adjusteed some of this and started losing a half a pound a week and last week it went back up to a pound.

Eat more! Have a "cheat" day. I *swear* it works. If my weigh-loss becomes stagnant, I just eat whatever I want for a couple of days and I start to lose again. It's a win-win situation!

I've thrown in a cheat day here and there and it works, but I'm not strict on everything I have. This is my lifestyle change and if I want for example some chips, I'll have some. Moderations is key for everything, watch portions and get plenty of exercise and water!

If you are close to your ideal weight (which from your picture, it seems like you are), weight loss happens much more slowly. At 1200 calories, MY predicted weight loss is 0.3 pounds a week!

Be patient. Keep building up your fitness and throw some strength training in there, keep eating healthy. Take your measurements with a measuring tape (I got one at Walmart for $3) and if your waist size hasn't changed in a couple of months, then switch things up with High Intensity Interval Training or Lifting Heavy. This is my plan for myself.

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I actually said that out loud before opening the topic ~~~~~hilarious

I was thinking push the on button and hold it for a while. Sure, it takes longer, but you want it to really work, right?

I lost 10 lbs the first week then gained 3 back for 2 weeks. I had to mess around with my calories befor I found out that just adding 50 calories daily plus eating my exercise calories back was my magic#

I have done two Very Low Calorie Diets(VLCD's) and have a slight metabolisim issue too. Don't worry. Just try something different for 2 weeks and if it doesn't work try something else. Put your scale away for that duration and only weigh once a week. My sister(Who is doing this with me) had the same plateau issue. I told her to up her calories from 1200 to 1500 and it made a huge differance for her.