I can't seem to lose weight this time around....

[andrea41876]

I lost 30 lbs about 4 years ago and gained most of it back. I was doing Weight Watchers and it worked. I tried again last year and it wasn't working. Now I make sure the get to the gym 3-4 days a week and I'm doing Herbalife shakes. I lose weight and then have one cheat meal on Saturday nights (as most plans say to) and I spend the whole following week trying to lose the 3 lbs I gained agian. I think that now I have to be perfect and never ever cheat. It makes sense but I can't believe how active I am and I'm not losing and when I lost 30 lbs before I wasn't even excercisint. I'm feeling a littel frustrated. I did just get the Fitbit Flex yesterday and I'm hoping that helps as well. Although my classes are Metabolic Effect classes and the Fitbit doesn't really track that well. I do go for walks at lunch if work permits. Any tips?

[WendyB]

Its more about what you eat than exercise. What else are you eating besides the shakes?

You do need a well balanced diet

[EricD]

First off, if you only "cheat" once a week you probably aren't gaining 3 pounds. If I eat out I time in a week it's takes 3-4 days to drop back to my previous weight. I believe this is because of water retention due to salt. Doing things like Herbalife, Weight Watchers is ok but just eating healthy and in moderation is the key. Have fresh fruit or veggies as a snack. I would write down everything you eat and drink for a week. Catagorize it into protiens, carbs, fats etc. Get rid of the bad calories/empty calories and try again. I have done this many times and have suprised myself at what I eat. Even at eating healthy I have gone into the 4000-5000 calorie range not even realizing it. There are a lot of foods out there under the "natural" or "healthy" catagory that in my oppinion is garbage. For instance, "energy bars". I think it's assumed they are good for you but they can be loaded with sugar, salt etc. If you aren't careful you can drink to many calories too. I love starbucks coffee, but I see people get these high calorie coffee drinks and forget how fast it adds up. If you only burn 2000 calories a day, thats at least 1/4 of your daily intake. For you to gain 3 lbs from one meal you would have to eat at least 10,000 calories more than you burn. This is why diet companies can boast about clients losing 10lbs the first week. It's mostly water and food weight, not fat. My weight can fluctuate as much as 7 lbs in a day. Maybe you can replace with a better alternative for "cheat" days. For instance, I use plain greek yogurt in place of sour cream, honey for sweetening, almond milk for milk. I always scan labels to avoid anything with HFCS,  eat lots of fiber, fresh stuff etc. and avoid highly salted products.

[Mary]

I think it's smarter to have small indulgences daily rather than one giant 'cheat meal' (or worse, 'cheat day') once a week.  I only know of one plan that recommends going off it once a week (Body For Life) and even that says 'don't go waaayy off, just loosen the noose a bit one day'.  It's pretty easy to erase a week of deficits with one meal, which you've seen.  

I wouldn't use shakes much, either, because you're going to miss real food and need 'cheat meals'.  And you don't want to be using shakes forever, right?  So why not learn now which foods in which portions get your to your goal and keep you there.  Paying for high-priced shakes probably makes you even more impatient to see scale results, too, if you're like me. 

Good luck!  

[Heybales]

In addition to the above excellent comments as to the water weight you are gaining and losing each weekend, I think more of it is probably carbs, since increased sodium can usually be lost in 1-2 days if you drink enough water, but you said it takes all week.

The fact you can even gain that much in glycogen stores with attached water means you finally reach a very depleted state by the end of the week.

But those fluctuations would not cancel out losing fat if you were truly eating at a deficit to what you burn.

But you mention a workout that is going to be very under-estimated unless you manually log it.

That means you have an even bigger deficit than you think to what you could potentially burn - and that's not good either.

I say potential though, because Fitbit is based on averages if healthy bodies and what they can burn. If you eat too little, you no longer have a healthy body that fits that math. You no longer burn that much.

As shown by you think you have a deficit, but you must not or you would be losing weight despite the fluctuations.

If you weren't exercising during last weight loss - you guaranteed lost some muscle mass, likely the normal 20% easy.

Hence the reason it was easy to gain back, with less muscle mass, smaller metabolism, maintenance was lower.

Also shows why harder this time around to lose again.

Want to lose more muscle mass on this go around? Make it even easier to regain because maintenance would have to be even lower and harder to adhere to? And make it ever harder next loss attempt?

That's the direction it sounds like you are headed - you aren't alone, many do it that way. Lifetime of yo-yo dieting and having terrible relationship with food and their body. Each time making it worse.

That cheat meal thing works when you have a reasonable deficit and full burning metabolism. Otherwise it just increases the amount of fat you slowly gain each time eating in excess.

Because I'd suggest right now your maintenance is your average weekly eating level minus the Sat meal splurge.

So 2 directions

Repair what has happened as best you can for what you can control?

Or start eating even less, knowing that studies have shown max suppression of 20-25% to maintenance when you undereat too much for too long. So eventually you can keep cutting calories and you will start losing again. Wrong exercise though and you will lose more muscle mass again.

Will you be successful eating that little, can you adhere to that lower eating level than current level?

And when you reach maintenance, can you eat what you eat now, with level of exercise you do now, as your new maintenance level every day on average?

That's the future if currently eating at suppressed maintenance.