Bummed

[SunsetRunner]

I am a 39 year mom of 2 little ones and we are always in motion. I bought my Charge 2 to get to move even more to help shed 10lbs and feel better day to day (do something for me for a change). I have had my FitBit for about 2 weeks and I've been moving like crazy. I've started running at LEAST 3 miles 5x a week, I do weight training a few times a week, I park far away from everything, I take stairs even when it's just to get to the top and then come back down, I cut out a majority of my snacking and sodas and upped my water. I introduced a lot more fruit in my diet and cut out fast food almost completely. I'm trying hard here. I've lost no weight at all. I used to be able to lose weight by thinking about it and now I feel completely stuck. Have I just not given myself enough time? SO bummed.

[A_Lurker]

Have you given yourself enough time, possibly not.  Your monthly cycle can play havoc with water retention.  Actually, lots of things can affect you this way.  You mentioned increasing your exercise and doing weight training.  If you weight training (or running) is enough that you have sore muscles you can also be retaining water this way.  I would suggest continuing what you're doing, and start using a free account at trendweight.com if you normally weigh in daily.  You might bounce up and down, but it can often give you a better idea of overall progress.  If you look at my trend, it started quite steep and has slowed down (this is on purpose). You can see in the middle of the slope (when I did weigh daily for a while) the grey line would bounce all over the place, but the overall movement was down.

Now, the truth of it is - most people can't out train a bad diet.  Cutting out most of your vices may work, if you don't replace them with the equivalent calories of healthier foods.  Look at your overall steps as well.  There isn't enough emphasis put on the every day moving around stuff.  This is often referred to as NEAT.  This is the every day moving around. 

My mother (aging now) was the perfect example of it.  She would go to weed the garden.  She would take a bucket and a digger.  On her way she would see something that needed tying up.  Back she would go for the string and scissors... oops forgot a stake, now back for a hammer and post.  Then she would go back to the original task... found thistles, back for gloves.  We would both weed for an hour, I would get my task accomplished, she wouldn't stop moving for that hour, and wondered why her original task wasn't done.  She has a built in inefficiency in her daily routines, where I plan and execute them.  She weighs much less, but likely burns as much or more.

Weekly aerobic exercise is good for your heart.  However, a 30 minute run, followed by an evening of relaxation may burn fewer calories.  Also watch that you don't do the exercise/reward cycle I've seen some people do. 

[Bill_k]

Need more information like numbers of calories burned vs how much calories and what you  eat every day. As well as how much you weigh now and your height.

Without the numbers it makes no sense that you see no change at all. 

2 weeks isn't terribly long either it's true.

[DavidSchneier]

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@Bill_k wrote:

Need more information like numbers of calories burned vs how much calories and what you  eat every day. As well as how much you weigh now and your height.

Without the numbers it makes no sense that you see no change at all. 

2 weeks isn't terribly long either it's true.

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I can almost always hear the collective groan of those who like to dive into the deep sciences of weight loss (i.e., special foods, detoxes, cleanses) when us calorie counters speak up, but the only way anyone ever loses weight is by creating a calorie deficit (see Bill's note about).

You mentioned that you swapped out junk food for fruit, but in doing so there's a reasonable chance you've also upped your calorie intake without realizing it. And while your body may be happier for the better quality fuel, it still needs to do something with the excess calories it may be introducing into the system.

You are definitely on the right path, because increased activity results in more calories burned, which is the best way to create the aforementioned deficit. But track your calories including those consumed and those burned and see where you are.

[SunsetRunner]

 I'm between 115 - 120lbs depending on the scale and time of day.

There have been a few days that I haven't been able to move a lot due to traveling and events.

[Dave001]

Hi! Welcome. 

Give it time, be consistent, be disciplined, but be happy. 

And decide whether you're a calorie counter or not. 

Some are. Some aren't. Some from each group have success.

On a slight tangent, thanks for the giggle. I'm in the UK :united_kingdom:. Bummed means something very different over here! 😳

[SunsetRunner]

Ooooh no. Don't tell me what it means. So embarrassing. 

[G_K]

I think you should have lost weight, at least 2 lbs.

Here's what I do and recommend:

1. make sure every meal has a good amount of protein, more than carbs

2. have a breakfast that is primarily protein

3. look at sugar in foods -- do not drink fruit juice -- WAY too much sugar 

(I try to keep g of sugar less than protein for each meal)

**4**. if possible, take a fast 30 minute walk after dinner -- not before.

And not running -- running is very efficient, it takes more work to walk at a very fast pace.

**5**. find a site that talks about fat burn vs. carb burn and how to compute your optimum heart rate for fat burn.   You want to aim for fat burn. If you are too efficient (such as in running) you burn carbs, not fat. The HR fitbit is great for watching your heart rate so that you stay in the fat burn zone. With all your running, I bet you are continually in the carb zone.  Check your fitbit stats online and you'll see where you are. 

**These last two items are key.

[G_K]

me again, sorry, I meant CARDIO zone (not carb zone).  

[Bill_k]

Forgive me if you know all this already and i'm being redundant.

Ok so make sure you have gone into the setup for individuals and told the app your information ie weight,height,age,stride for walking or running etc and it will use this and see your heart rate and decide your base calorific usage per hour and it will tick those off by itself during the day and night so you might see about 2000 calories even if you do nothing.

It starts and ends each day at midnight.

Then it increases the number of calories/hr according to your heart rate while you are walking or whatever  and you'll see the increase on the screen.

So at the end of the day you might have 3000 calories burned.

If you eat 2000 calories that day you have a deficit of 1000 calories and you should  lose weight unless there are extenuating factors like water retention.

So i figure out what calories i eat every day and try to keep a deficit of some kind.It can be 500 or 750 or whatever you decide.

There's a place in the app to add food eaten if you want to use it .You can set goals and the app will subtract for you.

Like i said though if you eat a lot of higher sodium containing foods  and go way above the 2ooo mg recommended limit  you will retain water likely and it's amazing how much weight that can be.

Also i've read that if you try to drop weight too fast your body will react to save its reserves . Not sure how that mechanism works entirely.

Anyways that's my concept of the basics and it of course gets way more complicated when you get into what you should eat for health for protein,fat,carbs,sugar .

If i made any mistakes maybe someone will correct me.

Fitbit is a fun device.

[SunsetRunner]

I traveled 11.67 miles, 127 active minutes an 29 floors with 23,789 steps yet I only burned a total of 2310 calories. I have put in my age, weight, gender, etc and this just seems off. Can this be right? I have friends who have burned 2000 calories by lunch! I'm killing myself to just get that by 10pm!

[A_Lurker]

@SunsetRunner- a couple of things.  You've posted a lot about how many steps you take and physical activity.  Looks like you've got that down pat.  Seriously, start looking at your food intake.  Healthy eating can still be too much (or too little).  Your weight is already low to start and you're only looking only lose around 10 pounds.  If you aren't particularly tall you might not have a high burn.  Likely the friends you mention that burn 2000 calories by lunch are likely heavier than you to start with.  Are you logging (or even tracking) your food intake.  Maybe you've gotten away with losing those last 10 pounds without it in the past, but this time you might need to pay more attention.  When you make lunch for the kids are you taking a bite of things here and there?  I bookmarked an article that probably every mother needs to read:  https://gunsnposesfitness.com/nibble-bite-lick/  You likely can't do an aggressive deficit, but you still need to make sure that your food intake is in line with your energy output.

You can use this calculator to get an idea of your BMR:  http://www.fat2fittools.com/tools/bmr/

Another observation - when you were showing your activity list there seem to be some duplicate entries.  May 7th and May 8th for examples show runs of almost the same duration (at the same time).  Oh, and be consistent with what time of day you are weighing yourself.  I also saw a comment about depending on the time of day.... most people find it easier to weigh in after getting out of bed, after making a bathroom trip.

[Grey843]

Sorry if you've already mentioned it. I was looking over your snapshot of your exercises. It appears some days you have duplicate workouts for the same time, or is this an error? If it's not an error, you could possibly be burning less in a day then what you think. It's always a good idea to review your stats for everything on your fitbit tracker to ensure everything is placed in correctly. So maybe your calorie deficit isn't as accurate as you think because of the duplicates..

[SunsetRunner]

I went back and deleted the duplicates. It was user error. I was tracking exercise on my phone and then also setting the Fitbit to start recording at the same time. It didn't seem to change any numbers though. All calorie burns are the same etc.

I'm not a snacker (anymore). I've been recording food as of recently. I end up not having enough calories at the end of the day (intake) and maybe that's hurting me? I've been fun shy to eat what I'd normally eat that I end up eating a bowl of cereal and some fruit/yogurt and avoiding much else.

Courtney Speight

[Mukluk4]

The other thing that is important to note is based on your activity you are in pretty decent shape to begin with.  10 lbs. is easy when you are 60 pounds overweight compared to being within a standard BMI range.

[Sparewife]

Hey! I was feeling kinda bummed too! Thanks for the "pick me up" thorough explanation!! 😉

[ReneeC99]

I agree with the others - give it more time. And get out the measuring tape - you don't have much weight to lose. If you gain muscle, the scale can stay the same!

[G_K]

Your heart rate zone is in the "Peak" which is not what you want if goal is to lose weight. Your heart rate zone should be in the "fat burn" if want to lose weight.  Try this for one week and see the difference.