I am working hard and not seeing results?

[mbuckner]

Hello everyone!

I have been trying to lose weight for some time now and I am not seeing the results that I would like. I am currently a nursing student and know that the results are not smooth and you don't see the changes overnight, but I have been working at this for quite some time and haven't seen changes.

When I was in middle school, my family would go to the gym every day after school and work and I was extremely active. I did track and was put on the mile and a half because of my endurance. I was actually stuck at 97 pounds. However, in high school, I went through a lot of personal things that led to eating out a LOT and not exercising ever. I ended up hitting 247 pounds at my highest.

Since hitting my highest weight, I have been looking to lose weight and would ultimately like to get to 145 pounds. I originally started trying to lose weight by exercising again and went hiking quite a bit. I was not watching what I was eating, but I did manage to lose weight and I started to maintain my weight at about 220 pounds. I decided that I really wanted to dedicate my focus on weight loss since I am so young and I feel like now is that the time to prioritize it. 

Since starting my weight loss journey, I now go to the gym 6 days a week and do the elliptical for an hour. I hit 7 miles daily now and am burning 700-800 calories in that time (according to my Fitbit). I watch what I eat and track my calories on MyFitnessPal and have been trying to maintain a 1000 calorie deficit. In theory, I should be losing 2 pounds per week but after following all of this, I just managed to hit 209 pounds 4 months after my 220 weigh in. 11 pounds in 4 months doesn't seem like enough and I am fearful that I am going to give up. 

If anyone could help, I would greatly appreciate it.

[emili]

so first, congratulations on your accomplishment. It may seem small and slow, but you did it. and you should be proud of your results. second, and this is where you may stop reading... you are more than likely underestimating how much you are eating and overestimating how much you are expending in energy. that is usually, barring any medical issues, the reason why people don't lose weight. But.. you are losing, so I think for you it may just be a more accurate measurement of food. weighing and measuring to ensure the calories you are entering as your totals are as accurate as they can be.  accounting for every bite, snack and drink that isn't calorie free. I am more than sure, you will see results in the next few weeks.. regardless of what you decide.. good luck in your fitness journey- you can do this.

[mbuckner]

I really appreciate any advice! I read all the time about making sure you are counting calories correctly and I try my hardest to make sure I am, but it is possible that I could be making mistakes. How do you accurately count what you are eating?

[MVibe]

Just to echo the previous point about the possibility of surplus calories going unaccounted for: This was something I clamped down on and it was after that I started getting the results I was after.

Anyway, to your question, obviously I have no idea what your diet consists of but I bought some digital kitchen scales for like £6.99 or something and just set about weighing my food. ( Eating out and any fast food and one-pot meals I decided to miss for a while as it became cloudy and over-complicated but that's just me and my decision )

I simply weigh my food and enter it the data.

Here's a breakdown of yesterdays food as an example:

Breakfast: 20g whole earth peanut butter & 30g whey protein made with 250ml unsweetened almond milk. 53g kiwi fruit & 59g strawberries. = 344 cals

Afternoon: Cacao hike bar 190 cal

Dinner: 200g chicken breast ( no skin ) 180g broccoli, 180g fine green beans, sage & onion stuffing, 100mls instant gravy & 3 tsp english mustard. Can't remember what that was without looking but it's somewhere around 450 cals. I just chop weigh the amount I know I want and then cook it. I buy pre cooked boneless chicken ( and beef ) and weigh the raw chopped veg and count things like the stuffing, the gravy, mustard etc. All these little things add up.

In the Evening, I had another protein drink same as above, and a salad of mixed veg pickle, radish, celery cottage cheese and chopped apple & walnut in some mayo. Stuff like the celery & radish & veg pickle are hardly any cals at all and from my portion size, experience from previous weighs, I allocate 50 cals but for something like the apple & walnut salad with mayo, I get that right as it's pretty high. I also weigh cottage cheese and account for the milk in my tea & coffee throughout the day.

Personally, it's the way I found worked for me. When weighing, I just pop a cereal bowl ontop of the digital scales and turn it on ( it doesnt weigh the bowl ) then I just pop my ingredients in, enter it into fitbit and move on.

My difficulty with this comes when I might want to do a one-pot meal, like chilli con carne for instance. I have had to just guess with that stuff. Don't eat out a lot anyway but that's been mostly guesses too.

But yeah, simple healthy meals are pretty easy to do, a lot of stuff gets stored in the app as well so it's not always tedious but then, I don't mind tedious if it equals results. 🙂

[Heather-S]

A food scale is how most people track everything they are eating it, by weighing it.  A serving of nuts is awfully small once you weigh it and easy to over indulge if you aren't careful, for example.

Personally, I think you'd benefit from less cardio and more weight training.  I'd cap the cardio at 30-45 minutes 3x a week unless you're training for a marathon or something, then add in sessions of weight training.  And, at least for me, I think 30-45 minutes of HIIT (high intensity interval training) is more beneficial than just straight cardio for an hour.  

[Heather-S]

And to add, 80% of weight loss is diet.  So you need to look at what you're eating and drinking more in-depth.  You don't need to burn 800 calories on an eliptical to lose weight, that just sounds miserable and obscene.  Food first, then work on a moderate activity plan.  Walk during the day.  You can see results with only 3-4 days a week at the gym.  Mix in HIIT and weight training.  If your food is on point, you'll see results.

[Esya]

The 700-800 calories deficit is according to FitBit. FitBit can only estimate this deficit. Every person is different, so our calories burned vary slightly. There is also differences reported in the calories burned between trackers (the one with a heart rate monitor tend to overestimate the amount of calories burned). And then not every calorie eaten is the same, for example 100 calories of vegetables will have a different impact compared to 100 calories of sugar.

I think you are doing great losing at a constant pace. If you want to increase the pace, you might want to increase the calories deficit reported by FitBit until you start losing at a somewhat higher pace. But to me the pace you are losing at is not as important as doing it constantly at a level you can sustain.

[Daves_Not_Here]

Hi @mbuckner - welcome, and congrats on your decision to take action.

Lots of good advice available in these forums.  I will reinforce what @Heather-S suggested:  losing weight is primarily about what you eat.  She put it at 80/20.  I think it's 95/5.

My opinion is that intense exercise is counterproductive to losing weight -- it increases your appetite, involves recovery, and requires discipline and mental energy.  And, exercising with a calorie deficit is even more stressful which further elevates your cortisol levels and promotes weight gain.

By the way, I'm in the minority here -- take what I say with a grain of salt.

[danielpatrik]

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@mbuckner wrote:

Hello everyone!

I have been trying to lose weight for some time now and I am not seeing the results that I would like. I am currently a nursing student and know that the results are not smooth and you don't see the changes overnight, but I have been working at this for quite some time and haven't seen changes.

When I was in middle school, my family would go to the gym every day after school and work and I was extremely active. I did track and was put on the mile and a half because of my endurance. I was actually stuck at 97 pounds. However, in high school, I went through a lot of personal things that led to eating out a LOT and not exercising ever. I ended up hitting 247 pounds at my highest.

Since hitting my highest weight, I have been looking to lose weight and would ultimately like to get to 145 pounds. I originally started trying to lose weight by exercising again and went hiking quite a bit. I was not watching what I was eating, but I did manage to lose weight and I started to maintain my weight at about 220 pounds. I decided that I really wanted to dedicate my focus on weight loss since I am so young and I feel like now is that the time to prioritize it. 

Since starting my weight loss journey, I now go to the gym 6 days a week and do the elliptical for an hour. I hit 7 miles daily now and am burning 700-800 calories in that time (according to my Fitbit). I watch what I eat and track my calories on MyFitnessPal and have been trying to maintain a 1000 calorie deficit. In theory, I should be losing 2 pounds per week but after following all of this, I just managed to hit 209 pounds 4 months after my 220 weigh in. 11 pounds in 4 months doesn't seem like enough and I am fearful that I am going to give up. 

If anyone could help, I would greatly appreciate it.

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If you really lose your weight. so, you should start the healthy weight loss diet and regularly do exercise. I suggest some tips read and follow them.