over training

I would love to know the answer to this!! I do not know why the last is the hardest to lose but I am right there with you! I can't lose the last 30lbs for the life of me!

well, i hope your diary for the last few days is wrong. you aren't eating enough to facilitate the weight loss (i know, it sounds weird).

if you are as active as you say you are, you probably be needing to eat somewhere about 3,000 calories.

I hear you, I am there myself. Right now I joined the "Eat more, weigh less" group here. I am trying to reset my metabolism. I think the body just gets so used to what we are doing, what we are eating, how much exercise we are doing, it needs a change. I have upped my calories a lot and have not gained. I see you are staying low carb, can't do better than that, unless you want to slowly put some carbs back in your diet through fruit, veggies, something healthy.

good carb, bad carb......cardio vs. weight training. calorie in vs calorie out. i have heard it all. what i do understand is a pound of body fat is about 3500 calories. so why is it that with given caloric deficit, weight dont just roll off? especially for those like me who do cardio and weights. i run 3-5 hrs a week and lift 4-6 days a week. but i hit plateaus that are difficult to overcome. is it in nutrition? cuz im working at it hard. i know i spent 10 yrs getting fat, but the first 60 lbs came off pretty easy with diet change...so why is the last 40lbs so tough to loose?

complex carbs(good) > simple carbs(not bad, but not as good as complex)

a nice combo of cardio & weight training is the best option. Weights first, cardio last.

plateaus could be anything, not a good lifting routine, not using the muscles properly throughout the lift, diet could be lacking. If you are trying to lose weight it is very difficult (after n00b gains) to gain strength and lose weight at the same time. You are lifting to preserve the muscle you already have but to also aid in the fat burning process

hope that clears up at least one of the things you asked

I read this in a newsletter from Burn the Fat, Tom Venuto... it may be of some help!

Is it possible to not lose body fat because you're eating too little?

ANSWER:

Yes and no. This gets a little complicated so let me explain both sides.

Part one of my answer: I say NO, because if you are in a calorie deficit you
WILL lose weight.

Most people have heard anecdotes of the dieter who claims to be eating
800 calories a day or some starvation diet level of intake that is clearly in
a deficit and yet is not losing fat. Like the mythical unicorn, such an animal
does not exist.

Every time you take a person like that and put them in a hospital research
center or metabolic ward where their food can be counted, weighed, measured
and almost literally "spoon fed" to them, a calorie deficit always produces weight loss.

There are no exceptions, except possibly in rare diseases or mutations. Even
then metabolic or hormonal defects or diseases merely lead to energy imbalance
via increases in appetite, decreases in energy expenditure or changes in energy
partitioning. So at the end of the day it's STILL calories in versus calories out.

In other words, NO - it's NOT your thyroid (unless you've got a confirmed
diagnosis as such...and then guess what... it's STILL calories in vs calories out,
you're just not burning as many as someone should at your height and weight).

One famous study that was published in the New England Journal of Medicine
years ago proved this point rather dramatically. After studying obese people -
selected specifically because they swore they were eating less than 1200 calories
but could not lose weight - Steven Lichtman and his colleages at St. Luke's
Roosevent Hospital in New York came to the following conclusion:

"The failure of some obese subjects to lose weight while eating a diet they
report as low in calories is due to an energy intake substantially higher than
reported and an overestimation of physical activity, not to an abnormality
in thermogenesis."

That's right - the so-called "diet-resistant" subjects were eating more than they
thought and moving less than they thought. This was probably the single best
study ever published that debunks the "I'm in a calorie deficit but I can't lose
weight" myth:

Part two of my answer, YES, because:

1) Energy intake increases.

Eating too little causes major increases in appetite. With hunger raging out of
control, you lose your deficit by overeating. This happens in many ways, such
as giving in to cravings, binge eating, eating more on weekends or simply being
inconsistent, so some days you're on your prescribed 1600 calories a day or
whatever is your target amount, but on others you're taking in 2200, 2500,
3000 etc and you don't realize it or remember it. The overeating days wipe
out the deficit days.

2) Metabolism decreases due to smaller body mass.

Any time at all when you're losing weight, your metabolism is slowly decreasing
due to your reduced body mass. The smaller and lighter you get, especially if
there's a large drop in skeletal muscle mass, the fewer calories you need. So
your calorie deficit slowly shrinks over time as your diet progresses. As a result,
your progress slows down even though you haven't changed how much you eat.

With starvation, you always lose weight, but eventually you lose so much
weight/body mass that you can reach energy balance at the same caloric
intake you used to lose weight on. You might translate that as "I went into
starvation mode" which wouldn't be incorrect, but it would be more accurate
to say that your calorie needs decreased.

3) Metabolism decreases due to adaptive thermogenesis.

Eating too little also causes a starvation response (adaptive thermogenesis) where
metabolic rate can decrease above and beyond what can be accounted for from
the change in body mass (#2 above). This is "starvation response" in the truest
sense. It does exist and it is well documented. However, the latest research says
that the vast majority of the decrease in metabolism comes from reduced body
mass. The adaptive component of the reduced metabolic rate is fairly small,
perhaps 10% (ie, 220 calories for an average female with a 2200 TDEE). The
result is when you don't eat enough, your actual weight loss is less than
predicted on paper, but weight loss doesn't stop completely.

There is a BIG myth about starvation mode (adaptive thermogenesis) that
implies that if you don't eat enough, your metabolism will slow down so much
that you stop losing weight. That can't happen, it only appears that way
because weight loss stops for other reasons. What happens is the math
equation changes!

Energy balance is dynamic, so your weight loss slows down and eventually stops
over time if you fail to adjust your calories and activity levels in real time each
week.

I teach a system for how to adjust calories and activity weekly using a feedback
loop method in my Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle program (more info from
www.BurnTheFat.com)

So what can be done to stop this metabolic slowdown caused by low calorie
dieting and the dreaded fat loss plateau that follows? I recommend the
following 5 tips:

1) Lose the pounds slowly.

Slow and steady wins in long term fat loss and maintenance every time. Rapid
weight loss correlates strongly with weight relapse and loss of lean body mass.
Aim for one to two pounds per week, or no more than 1% of total body weight
(ie, 3 lbs per week if you weigh 300 lbs).

2) Use a higher energy flux program.

If you are physically capable of exercise, then use weight training AND cardio
to increase your calorie expenditure, so you can still have a calorie deficit, but
at a higher food intake (also known as a "high energy flux" program, or as we
like to say in Burn The Fat, "eat more, burn more.")

3) Use a conservative calorie deficit.

You must have a calorie deficit to lose fat, but your best bet is to keep the
deficit small. This helps you avoid triggering the starvation response, which
includes the increased appetite and potential to binge that comes along with
starvation diets. I recommend a 20% deficit below your maintenance calories
(TDEE), a 30% deficit at most for those with high body fat.

4) Refeed.

Increase your calories (re-feed) for a full day periodically (once a week or so if
you are heavy, twice a week if you are already lean), to restimulate metabolism.
On the higher calorie day, take your calories to maintenance or even 10, 15, 20%
above maintenance and add the extra calories in the form of carbs (carb cycling).
The leaner you get, and the longer you've been on reduced calories, the more
important the re-feeds will be. (You can learn more about this method in ch 12
of Burn The Fat, Feed The Muscle @ www.BurnTheFat.com)

5) Take periodic diet breaks.

Take 1 week off your calorie restricted diet approximately every 12 weeks or so.
During this period, take your calories back up to maintenance, but continue to
eat healthy, "clean" foods. Alternately, go into a muscle building phase if increasing
lean mass is one of your goals. This will bring metabolism and regulatory
hormones back up to normal and keep lean body mass stable.

There is much confusion about how your metabolism, hormones and appetite
mechanisms are affected when you're dieting, so this was really one of the
most important questions anyone could have asked.

Sounds like you are over training as well as not getting enough calories. Both prohibit efficient fat loss and lean muscle building. A meal replacement shake is ok to "replace a meal". A whey protein shake is not intended to replace a meal. Just add more protein to your diet. Hitting the iron 6 days a week is not giving your muscles time to recover. And since they are not getting enough calories to recover, they are in constant cannibalism (stealing protein from your own muscles to re-create the amino acids needed to feed the same muscles). Since there are very few carbs early in your day, your body will rob more protein from your muscles and convert them to glucose to replace the carbs that they are expecting. With this type of workout, you def have to eat more (often and calories balanced each meal) to burn fat.