Calorie deficit

[LeeEd89]

Hi I have been trying to lose some weight for quite some time now. 

I have a fairly active life style and really physical job. On a daily basis I consume around 2000-2200 calories and burn between 4000-5000 calories, which usually means I have a deficit of 2000-2500 calories.

I do a fair amount of exercising during the week on top of my work as well. However I have found that the weight isn't coming off, I am more maintaining the weight. I eat relatively good, have cut out a lot of junk food and chocolate bars and fizzy drinks. 

Can any body recommend anything to help me 

Thanks

Lee

[WavyDavey]

Hi @LeeEd89,

Judging from your post, there's likely one of two things going on.

1. Your numbers for calories in or calories burned are incorrect, or both are incorrect. From here, I have no way of verifying that statement. A 2000 calories per day deficit would equal 4 pounds of weight loss per week. If you are still eating junk food, it's likely your calories in per day is higher than 2000.

2. You've created such a huge caloric deficit that your body went into "starvation mode", and refuses to lose weight.

I would recommend a program of strength training, to add muscle and help increase your metabolism. I do strength training 4 times a week, and have to eat  around 3500 calories per day to maintain weight. Getting more calories burned each day will buy you some time to work out the dietary issues. Make sure and log everything you eat, no exceptions.

Just my opinion. Stay tuned for other ones to come.

[LeeEd89]

Hi @WavyDavey

Thanks for this is info, I will give this a try to see if helps over the next few weeks, will update then to tell results.

Thanks 

Lee

[Baltoscott]

I agree with @WavyDavey‘s the something is off with the numbers and his suggestions regarding adding weight lifting.  

I would also suggest really drilling down on what, when, and how much you are eating.   Log it, and eat only at meal times.  Zero snacks in between.  Maybe add more lower calorie foods at each meal (more veggies) to help you feel fuller so you can make it from meal to meal without too much hunger at 2000 calories.

[LeeEd89]

Hi @Baltoscott

Thanks for this information. Just to give you guys a bit more information. I use the fitbit surge as my tracking device and have all the auto sports tracking off due to my job, as to which I work in a warehouse for food distribution, I am constantly either moving or stacking pallets or loading vans which most of my calories are burned from. I go running 2/3 times a week and 1/2 circuit training a week as well. Not sure if this will give you more of a clue as to help with my situation.

Thanks for the advice so far 

Lee 

[Baltoscott]

Hi @LeeEd89

Part of the issue is that fitbit calorie burn estimates and what you put in as calories consumed estimates are just that, estimates.  You need to make adjustments if you aren't getting the desired weight loss ...

A couple more thoughts ...

1. I used to have job like you about 30 years ago -- post military and shortly after college ... I was a sort supervisor for Roadway Package Systems, which later became FedEx Ground. We used to unload 8 to 12 trailers into about 30 package delivery vans during a sort which involved me running around the dock for 3 or 4 hours clearing package jams on the conveyor belts, helping loaders who got backed up, switching empty trailers with loaded ones, followed by several hours of dock clean up after the vans went out for delivery.  I used to lift weights and bike commute as well.  I've often wondered how many steps I generated in those days.  It was a crazy amount of activity.  And yet, even with all that, I was overweight at various points.  During hotter times of the year I drank lots of lemonade while working, I usually drank beer every time I ate out, and I ate out a lot (burgers, fries, pizza, cheesesteaks etc.) because I was too tired to prepare food at home, or for social reasons.  What I learned?  You can't out exercise a bad diet.

2. These days my fitbit calculated activity is around 3500 calories/day.  It consists mostly of bike commuting, 4-5 hours of weight lifting though 4 sessions/week (total exercise time for weight lifting is probably close to 1.5 hours/week as my rest period between most heavy sets is around 3 minutes).  With all that plus walking a lot, I average around 20K steps/day.  Although fitbit says I burn 3500 calories/day, I only consume -- according to what I track on MyFitnessPal between around 3000-3200 calories/day.  If both sides of the equation were accurate and my metabolism was average, I would be losing weight because 3500 is more than 3000-3200.  And yet, over the past 24 weeks, I gained about 10 lbs at the rate of 1/2 lb/wk.  In fact, from August - December last year, I maintained my weight at 160 lbs while eating around 2800 calories/day and burning around 3400 calories/day.  The lesson here?  The numbers are just a starting point.  Make adjustments based on your weigh-ins.  (Side note - weigh in daily and compare weight averages from week to week.  Daily weight change is mostly water).

3.  Even with all your activity, your fitbit burn numbers seem pretty high, at least compared to me.  That may be because you move more than me, or because you are bigger than me (around 70% of daily burn for most people is simply the daily overhead of staying alive -- breathing, pumping blood, etc).  You might want to compare fitbit's calculation to a TDEE calculator like this one.  For me it seems a little more accurate than fitbit in that it says that even if I were doing athlete level activity at my weight/age/sex (I am not), that my daily burn rate would only be around 3200 calories/day as compared to fitbit's 3500 calorie calculation.  

[GershonSurge]

@LeeEd89,

I have a Surge which I only use once in awhile. Mostly I use my Charge 2.

I've done experiments with the Surge where I meticulously tracked the calorie deficit and the weight lost. I can tell you that with light activity, the calorie estimate is 10-15% high. This gets higher the more calories you burn because the influence of the Basic Metabolic Rate (BMR) calories disappears. It's likely you are burning more like about 20% fewer calories than the Surge indicates. This makes your burn far lower than you think.

You say you eat well, and I'll take your word for it. But unless you track actual calorie count from nutrition labels, you will never know what you are truly eating. You will also have to weigh everything you eat. This is time-consuming and most people won't do it. If you are estimating, you are likely up to 50% off in your estimated consumption. 

It helps to make your profile public so others with experience can give you better advice. Often, I find my charts are better than my memory. The saying for me goes, "The older I get, the better I was." 

The average meal at a restaurant or fast food place is about 1,300 calories including a soda with sugar and no refills. It's easy to convert a salad bar into a 1300 calorie salad by adding salad dressing, bacon bits, cheese, croutons, cole slaw, potato salad, etc. Then people move on to the main course. 

I can give you some more information if you start a workout for about an hour while you are at work and then post your age and the heart rate plot. I won't need anything else. There is a way to drive your body into a place where it will shed fat with ease while eating as many calories as you want. 

[LeeEd89]

Hi guys,

Thanks for the advice so far it's much appreciated.

@Baltoscott I have tried  TDEE calculator and it came out with 3000 calories, am assuming that this is what it says I should burn. 

@GershonSurge like in my earlier post I mentioned that I have cut out a lot of junk food  chocolate bars and fizzy drinks. I do occasionally have one bar which is usually on a cheat day. Also have been weighing and measuring the food that I eat, to get my calorie in take more accurate. I don'tuuse fitbit to track my calories, I use my fitness pal, as I find it hasa wider range of foods on to choose from. I believe that I have made the my account public for other to very, if not I'll check my settings again.

Also not sure if this is what you are asking for, however this is from yesterday while at work, were it auto tracked me doing sport (which I have now turned off don't know if it will make a difference). 

Thanks 

Lee

[GershonSurge]

@LeeEd89,

I spent the last hour and a half eating about 1,000 calories of food and having an internal debate about how I should present this information to you. That puts me right at 3,000 calories for the day and I'll eat about 500 more. You won't see some of this on my food log because I don't log free food. :). My son gave me half of his burrito from Chipotles. 

I'm an ethical vegan. This means I don't want to kill myself with my food. It is possible to include animal products and be healthy if it's limited to no more than 10% of your calories a day. No saving up for a cheat day. I also stuff my face constantly, and yet I maintain my weight. In fact, it's difficult to gain weight if I drop. You see, it's easy to design a way of eating that makes it impossible to gain weight. 

The key is creating a fat shortage in your food. The reason I wanted to see your heart rate was to see if you stay in fat burn. Another phrase for this is Maximum Aerobic Function. When you are in this area, about 70% of the calories you burn are from fat and 30% are from carbohydrates. The ratio reverses within about 10 beats above this. The upper limit is 180 minus your age. It works out to about 70% of your theoretical maximum heart rate. 

There is one concept you are going to have to accept before you believe me. The human body does not have the physiology to convert carbs to fat except in tiny amounts in laboratory setting induced starvation. If you like, I'll copy the section out of a book and give you a reference for 10 different interventional studies where the calorie equation is seemingly violated.

There is a caveat though. If your diet contains more than 10% fat (20% with your activity level) if you add an extra for or five potatoes to your steak dinner your body will retain the fat from the steak and burn the calories from the potatoes. It will appear the carbs made you gain weight, but that's not what happened. The fat in your steak turned to fat in your body in close to its original form. You burned the calories from carbs.

What happens to excess carbs is they are either burned for work energy releasing carbon dioxide and air and probably a few million other little things we don't know about. If you don't work, the muscles will vibrate at the cellular level generating heat. The excess carbs will also inhibit your appetite so you don't eat more. 

Excess proteins, which means anything above 13% of the diet for an extremely active person are excreted through the kidneys. In the long term, this will result in loss of kidney function. Excess proteins from animals causes heart problems, cancer, and a host of other issues.

It's virtually impossible to limit your fat to 20% by eating packaged products of any kind. The food industry adds salt, sugar, and fat to most everything because they are addictive. 

Well, you aren't going to change everything at once. I know that. One small change may tip the scales for you towards weight loss. I suggest giving up all dairy products including so-called low-fat ones. They aren't. There is not cheating on this item. That cheese you eat on a pizza may be enough to create a fat surplus for a whole week. 

If you can't stomach that change, try having a huge bowl of oatmeal for breakfast. Not that crap that comes in the little envelopes. Add a layer of bananas on the top and bottom and maybe some strawberries for blueberries for sweetness. If you need to, put however much sugar in it you like. Sugar can't turn to fat. 

If you are successful in reducing your fat intake to a maximum of 20%, it will be virtually impossible to gain weight. Remember, you are burning 70% fat and 30% carbs during your day. (Don't take this to mean you can go above 20% fat.)

You will be able to eat whenever you feel the slightest bit hungry and not worry about calories. True hunger-- not cravings. You will also have high energy. 

[GershonSurge]

@LeeEd89,

I have another tip that might help. I'm only suggesting you choose one of the tips I made and see if it helps.

Make yourself a few snack bags of raisins and peanuts for work. Put 45 grams of raisins and six grams of peanuts. Use unsalted peanuts. If you insist, salted is fine.

If you buy a 1 lb jar of store brand peanuts and the 640-gram size of Sunkist raisins, this will cost about $0.36 for 166 calories. It will only have 14% fat, so it can't make you fat at your activity level. 166 calories should last about  2 3/4 hours at your burn rate before you get hungry. Compare this to the so-called power bars. With your activity level, you can have about six of these a day. 

[LeeEd89]

@GershonSurge

Thanks for this information, I have taken both tips on board and will choose one to follow over the next couple of weeks. I will let you know how I have gotten on with the advice.

Thanks

Lee