Breaking through weight plateau

[Breakthrough7]

Hi,

I'm new to fitbit. I just bought it last night. I'm trying to slim down. I have a bit of a muscular frame (muscular calves from swimming, dancing, biking, sprinting on the treadmill). I work in film and am required to slim down a bit. I currently weigh 130lbs and need to get down to110lbs. I am 5ft 4 inches. I want to do this in a healthy way as to why I invested in the fit bit and would greatly appreciate eating and exercising tips. I've done low carb and it's increased my muscle. Probably because of the emphasis on protein/fat. I just want don't want to get fatigued/foggy amidst this process. Thank you!

[jamesparent]

Here is my experience.  I am an engineer so this works for me.  I was at 310 pounds.  Consensus is that about 3500 calories is a pound.  Eat that much more than you need based on your physiology and lifestyle over some period of time (week, month, etc.) and you will add a pound of bodyweight by the end of that time period.

The reverse is true too.  Figure out what your body needs based on your activitity level (walking, running, dancing, spinning for some period of time so many times per week) and eat less than that and you will lose.

Want to lose a pound a week?  3500 calories or 500 per day defict.  Pound and a half; 750 per day.  Don't guess what you are eating.  Weigh and measure everything (doesn't take long to know what you eat and how much).  Beer?  Bud 55=55 calories; corona regular=148 calories, eat 10 grapes, about 35 calories.  Don't guess, weigh that quarter pound hamburger, weigh that 6 ounce steak and that baked potato.  Do the math (or let the fitbit site or myfitnesspal apps do it for you).

I walk two and a half miles about three times a week.  I shoot for that 750 calorie a day defict.  I was 310 pound on 1 May 2013 and today, on 25 July 2014 I weigh 204.  That is 444 days and 106 pounds so I have averaged a weekly weight loss of 1.67 a week for 63 weeks.  I have had a plateau every two months or so for a week or two but then my body changes and I catch up to my schedule.

Eat less than you burn.  Tweak your diet based on your own health issues.  I WAS diabetic so I keep my carbs low.  I have no cholesterol issues so I make up the calories with protien and fat.  YMMV  Stick to it.  Good luck.

[Heybales]

20 lbs.

Be reasonable with weight loss amount and select 1 lb weekly or 500 deficit until you get to 10 lbs left, then switch to 250 deficit.

Reasonable means you are fighting your body less, and putting it through less stress.

Correct Fitbit estimate of calorie burn on all non-step based activities, like swimming, biking, sprinting too actually since so much more intense then it'll know.

That's the burn and deficit side of the equation.

For the intake side - log accurately by weighing all food that goes in your mouth. Measure only liquids.

Calories is per weight, grams. Not volume, cups and spoons.

And sadly just eating more protein doesn't increase muscle, especially in a diet. Body never builds what it doesn't need.

You can easily lose fat and expose the muscle that's already there.

You can strengthen the muscle a lot with needing more of it.

You can pack more glycogen with water in it for endurance with need for more.

You would need to progressively overload the muscle with lifting for it to feel the need to build more, once existing is tapped out.

Now, enough protein with a reasonable deficit can maintain muscle mass indeed, backed up with resistance training too.

And with keeping muscle, perhaps your goal wouldn't have to be underweight actually if you looked thin enough. Because do they really want scale weight, or how you look?

Needing lifting for that, not all the cardio, which actually has tendency to cause some muscle burnoff in a diet.