2000 Calorie deficit a day, is it too much?

[tsteele]

Hi all, 

I have a bit of a long story so I'll try to keep it short. 

I have been on Medication which a side effect was large amounts of weight gain and making it impossible to lose weight. (approx. 6 years) 

I gained around 60 pounds over the time I was on the medication and for the last 3 years I have managed to stop the gain by watching my diet VERY closely. 

Around 8 months ago I was also diagnosed with Insulin resistance (another issue from the Medication) 

I was put on Metformin and told that it will help and will also reduce weight. (That dint happen) 

So I came off my original medication. It’s taken around 3 months for it to leave my system but it is working. 

In 7 weeks I’ve dropped around 14 pounds. 

The question I have though is, am I eating too few calories? 

I get in around 15000-20000 steps per day and burn 3000 calories everyday but don’t normally eat over 1000-1200 calories. 

I'm happy with the weight loss but I have a pretty long ways to go and don’t want to ruin my body by starving myself (I don’t literally starve myself) I have a mostly paleo diet, so very few carbs. 

[LewWagner]

tsteele,

Don't get discouraged.  I find I'm burning about 1,800 more calories a day than I take in.  I'm getting in around 21K steps a day.  That's helping me to lose on the average a little over 3 pounds a week.  But, I now have the last 10 pounds to go and I'm dreading the slow down of weight loss.

Make sure you are accurately counting your calorie intake. I use a electronic scale to measure my food and then go to the web to find nutrition info for that food.  I find I can pretty much figure out that I'm eating the right food (not processed, little if no starch), staying hydrated, and figuring out ways to keep in motion (like calisthenics during commercials).  Good luck on your continuing weight loss and wellnes campaign!

Lew

[LewWagner]

Don't get discouraged.  I find I'm burning about 1,800 more calories a day than I take in.  I'm getting in around 21K steps a day.  That's helping me to lose on the average a little over 3 pounds a week.  But, I now have the last 10 pounds to go and I'm dreading the slow down of weight loss.

[LewWagner]

Make sure you are accurately counting your calorie intake. I use a electronic scale to measure my food and then go to the web to find nutrition info for that food.  I find I can pretty much figure out that I'm eating the right food (not processed, little if no starch), staying hydrated, and figuring out ways to keep in motion (like calisthenics during commercials).  Good luck on your continuing weight loss and wellnes campaign!

[LewWagner]

Lew

[Mistijuel]

Hi tsteele,

It might be? I'm going through something similar myself, and I've gotten a bit concerned that it might be too much too. I average about 35k steps per day (though I was everaging closer to 42k in the last few weeks before i told myself I needed to cut down), burn 3500-4900 calories (I do HIIT workouts 4 days a week, so it's a large range) and tend to eat around 1500-2200 calories per day, for me a lot of it has to do with sometimes being so active that I don't often have the time or desire to eat much. Anyway, I've lost so far 89 lbs, and have another 17 to go and in the last few weeks I've struggled. My fitbit has been set to 2lb weightloss since I started using it a year and a half ago, and it worked quite well until about the last month or two where it's been far more sporatic. Incidentally, the last 3-4 months, I've not only had the 1000 deficit from Fitbit, but then on a lot of days I'd look at my food plan tile, and it would say you still have 800+ calories (sometime  up to 1500 cals) left to eat when in the earlier days I would usually have the tile saying no more than 300 cals left to eat. I think part of it is incredulity (how can I possibly be expected to eat 2-3000 cals a day and still lose weight) but having read a lot of the comments here, some of the great articles, I'm working on trying to fill that gap, because clearly it isn't working as it stands, and it's better to try and fix it before things get worse.

That said, everyone is different, but it is possible that it could work for a while and then slowly cease.

Best of luck though 🙂 and don't let it worry you too much!

Bee

[Heybales]

If you have 300 lbs to lose, sure that's fine.

But are you actually losing 4lb weekly - that's what it should be if it's just fat.

But you are losing muscle mass too, no way around that.

Keep it up, and you'll have the fun of doing this again next year or sooner.

Only it'll be easier to gain the weight, and harder to lose it, because of having less muscle.

And despite the easy quips people throw out that they have no clue about "muscle weighs more than fat so probably gaining muscle" - it takes women 6-8 weeks eating in SURPLUS and doing aggressive progressive weight lifting to gain 1 lb of muscle mass along with some fat.

Meaning - you likely won't get back what you lost in muscle.

So actually already, 14 lbs in 7 weeks is 2 lbs weekly, and considering start of diet is always some water weight, actually less than that.

You likely already shocked your metabolism and body by eating less than half what it wants to function.

So now the Fitbit estimate of what you are burning is totally wrong.

You would appear to have less than a 1000 cal deficit from what you burn.

Since you have to eat less when you weigh less to keep losing weight - where exactly do you think you'll be going with that 1000 calorie eating level?

Your TDEE goes down about 75 calories for every 10 lbs.

Start with observation it appears your TDEE is only about 1000 more than you eat.

2100 say. With the level of exercise you do now.

Do the math for 75 calories less per 10 lbs gone.

Now what is the TDEE?

Now how much do you have to eat to keep losing right to goal weight?

And is that TDEE at goal weight how much you want to eat with the required level of exercise you are doing now? Actually, you'll have to do more as you move less weight around to burn the same amount.

You get sick for a week, go on vacation, get injured - now how much are you going to have to eat to not gain fat eating in surplus?

Just some things to think about since most don't play the end game out very well, and hence fail in maintenance.

[josephz2va]

Drugs like Metformin don't help you with weight loss. 99% of drugs are useless if you're not following the right plan. I would recommend a nutritionist that would supply you with a list of 'right foods' based on your medical requirements.

High Protein Diet grocery lists are readily accessible. Like making an Egg and Cheese sandwich on wholegrain bread.

[Lightsinger]

---

@josephz2va wrote:

Drugs like Metformin don't help you with weight loss. 99% of drugs are useless if you're not following the right plan. I would recommend a nutritionist that would supply you with a list of 'right foods' based on your medical requirements.

High Protein Diet grocery lists are readily accessible. Like making an Egg and Cheese sandwich on wholegrain bread.

---

Do you know what metformin is and why it's perscribed?  As a diabetic, I have a long history with this particular medication which I have taken in treatment of the condition.  Yes, it can lead to an initial weight loss, but that's not what it's perscribed for. 

[LewWagner]

I've been on Metaform since I was diagnosed with Type II Diabetes back in late Oct 2013.   Since then, I've lost 120 lbs, but I my doc at that time never told me that Metaformin was for anything other than controlling my glucose level.  I'd be interested in hearing more about Metaformin as a weight loss drug....

Lew

[Maxit]

I know about medication-induced weight gain and medication-induced insulin resistance and it is great that you have been working with your doctor to find another med that works for you.

In terms of sustainable weight loss (and health maintenance), slow and steady wins the race.  Losing muscle is part of most people's weight loss journey.  You want to minimize that for all the reasons already given.  

Figuring out TDEE (total daily energy expenditure) is not an exact science despite all the formulas.  Plan on eating 1200-1500 calories/day, and look for a weight loss average of a pound or two a week.  Keep walking, and as you get closer to your goal, add in some strength training if you can.  Think of this as building a healthy life style that you can sustain.

[LewWagner]

---

@Maxit wrote:

I know about medication-induced weight gain and medication-induced insulin resistance and it is great that you have been working with your doctor to find another med that works for you.

In terms of sustainable weight loss (and health maintenance), slow and steady wins the race.  Losing muscle is part of most people's weight loss journey.  You want to minimize that for all the reasons already given.  

Figuring out TDEE (total daily energy expenditure) is not an exact science despite all the formulas.  Plan on eating 1200-1500 calories/day, and look for a weight loss average of a pound or two a week.  Keep walking, and as you get closer to your goal, add in some strength training if you can.  Think of this as building a healthy life style that you can sustain.

---

Maxit,

Thanks for the info, above.  I too understand it's not an exact science to calculate how much to burn each day.  So, I started out slow and recorded each day's efforts and how many calories I burned.  Then, over time, I was able to predict that I was expending about 2,700 to 3,000 calories a day.  I've also experienced the muscle loss as well, so I'm now folding in calisthenics to rebuild that lost mass.

Lew

[lost45]

Be careful.Talk to your doctor. A 2000 calorie difference is huge! Weight loss is only one measure of health. Nutrients are important too. 

I maintained a difference of 500 calories for 6 months and my doctor began to worry about me overdoing it. When I got down to a 24 body mass index she said stop there. Don't lose more! I think she was worried about anorexia. But everybody is different. That's why talking to your doctor is essential.

[Heybales]

---

@lost45 wrote:

Be careful.Talk to your doctor. A 2000 calorie difference is huge! Weight loss is only one measure of health. Nutrients are important too. 

I maintained a difference of 500 calories for 6 months and my doctor began to worry about me overdoing it. When I got down to a 24 body mass index she said stop there. Don't lose more! I think she was worried about anorexia. But everybody is different. That's why talking to your doctor is essential.

---

And in the US, talking to a Dr (Dietician) that has gotten more than 6 month course on nutrition. Primary won't be a specialist, but can make refer and order blood tests to confirm nutrition aspect.

Some of the recent research on just how negative of results can be heaped on a body by extreme diets just likely isn't to be known by your busy GP.