I've hit a weight loss plateau..help

[heatherm414]

I have about 14 lbs left to go on my weight loss journey and I've hit a plateau. I can't seem to intake as much calories as Fitbit says I should. I don't eat a lot of junk or side items (breakfast, lunch & dinner and an evening snack). I eat until I feel full and do not starve myself and at the end of the day, i'm still under my calorie intake. I do light to moderate walking most days and not a lot of heavy exercise. I don't want to eat more if i'm not hungry but I also don't want my body to think it's "starving" so to speak. Does anyone have any suggestions on what to do? Thanks -H

[SunsetRunner]

I'm on my last 5lbs and it's sloooow going. With only little left to lose, we have to be meticulous in our food logging.

Do you weigh and log everything you eat, do you log it honestly and accurately?

When someone stalls or gains weight, the first place i look at is their food logging.. Having said this, are you losing anything at all? How long has it been since you last saw a loss? If it's less than 3 weeks don't panic just yet.

[heatherm414]

Now, more than ever, I'm being extremely honest in my calorie logging.  So much so, that I might be adding more calories in my food intake portions than I should.  I'm so frustrated at the under budget score that i'm pulling at straws.  It has been about 14 days since i've seen any difference in my weight (give or take a few oz.) I have also been weighing daily.  I hear that is not the best as one (like myself) can get easily discouraged.  Thanks for the reply! 🙂

[FitBeforeFifty]

2 weeks isn't a plateau or anything to be worried about. It's very common to go 2 and even 3 weeks without a loss and all of the sudden get a bigger than normal drop. Weight loss isn't linear, so you can't expect to lose every week.  If it's only been 14 days since you logged a loss, I wouldn't really worry about it. During my 9 months of weight loss, this happened several times. It's only once you've been stuck for over a month that I would consider it a real plateau and something that warrants adjustment.

[Marcy]

Hi @heatherm414. This is a Fitbit chart of my 50lb weight loss so maybe something here might give you some ideas or encouragement on how to deal with a plateau.

First an explanation that this chart. I only logged my weight if it was lower than my previous weight, otherwise my chart looked like a discouraging scatter diagram. This really helped me to see that I was in fact progressing. I became very motivated to log a new low weight. Seeing the trend was encouraging.

The initial drop was the usual loss that includes water loss. But more importantly, the lines are where I reached a plateau. In the first half of the chart, you can see that I was struggling with the plateaus. In the second half, you can see that I found a rhythm, cycling through weight loss with short plateaus. I began basing my food intake on how my body responded rather than Fitbit or other algorithms. 

Plateaus seem to be a normal part of the weigh-loss process, as though the body is regrouping. For me, when I hit a plateau, I decreased food intake and increased steps(to boost metabolism). I adjusted just enough as I saw progress. Ultimately, I went from 7.5k steps a day to 25+k steps during that time. 

In the chart you can see that I plateau'd at the holidays. 😞  I lost the rest early the next year. 

So, I would say don't get discouraged about a plateau. Rely a little more on how your body is responding rather than on algorithms. Keep thinking about how much better you will look and feel.

Weight loss comes with lots of tries before you figure out works for you. 

[Dominique]

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@Marcy wrote:

First an explanation that this chart. I only logged my weight if it was lower than my previous weight, otherwise my chart looked like a discouraging scatter diagram. 

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It’s one way to do it. Another way (which I wish I had found out earlier) is to use TrendWeight (zero effort needed if you have a Fitbit Aria).

As the author explains: "TrendWeight uses the methodology described by John Walker in his online book, The Hacker's Diet. The idea is pretty simple. You weigh yourself each day and TrendWeight will plot a moving average from your daily weight alongside your daily scale weight. This gives you a better idea of your weight trend by masking most of the day to day noise that variances in water weight introduce."

The individual daily values from the scale (black spots) can indeed turn into a "discouraging" scatter diagram, but the red curve (moving average plotted by TrendWeight) help you see where things are really going:

The nice thing is that if some daily values are missing (in grey on the chart, for instance on three days in late April/early May, when I was away on a trip), TrendWeight will extrapolate them from the last and next known values.

[JohnRi]

Hello, I've been losing weight for 8 months.  Actually yesterday was the end of my eighth month...  During that time I've lost 63 lbs.  But there were many weeks I lost nothing, or even gained.  I've been stuck around 219-220 for 2-3 weeks now.  I had to put a monumental amount of exercise in the last week to finally get under 219.  Well over 100,000 steps, something like 80 miles walking.  I eat around 1800 calories a day, everyday.  My Fitbit says I was burning around 3500-4000 calories a day. 

But as I looked at my weight, and fat %, I noticed something I already knew.  I was losing fat the whole time and adding muscle.  I recently strained/partially tore about 5 of my nine calf musles.  Yeah who new our calf "muscle" is actually 9 muscles?  I was down for 3 weeks.  I managed to use my diet to lose a tiny amount of weight during the 3 weeks.  Something under a pound. 

But after I recovered, I had to rebuild my muscles in my legs.  3 weeks of not walking everyday doesn't sound like a long time.  But I struggled for the last 2 weeks to get my strength, stamina, and speed back. 

When I started walking, the first thing I noticed was I could not walk my normal distance.  2-3 miles was all I could do at first.  Compared to my normal 5-6 miles.  My speed was very poor.  2.5 mph compared to 3.5 mph.  And my legs were sore.  I haven't had sore legs in 6 months.  Yesterday, I managed 3.4 mph.  And I did 5 miles in 90:04 minutes.  4 seconds over 90 minutes.  Still slower than my normal time. 

So over the last 3 weeks, I gained about 3 lbs of muscle.  And I lost about 4 lbs of fat.  I knew this was the case, as my waist had dropped about 1/2 an inch allowing me to fit 34x30 jeans again.  Yet that dang scale showed only a lbs lost.  Those 34x30 jeans I bought 10 days ago, were tight when I got them, now are comfortable. So clearly I've lost weight that the scale did not show.

I mentioned all of this because as you get to your goal, you might have to either cut your calories, or increase your exercise, or both.  I suggest increasing your exercise.  I'm currently walking 5-6 miles at around 17-18 minutes a mile.  I'm considering pushing for 7 miles. 

I would suggest that you consider changing up your exercise.  Walking, running, hiking, biking, swimming, cardio class...  Sometimes changing gears to something knew will jumpstart your weight loss.  Often we get stuck in a rut, and our bodies get used to "same" exercise we do day after day.  Changing things up, and stressing different muscles, will often cause weight loss. I wasn't losing much about 2 months ago, so I swapped out every other day to riding my bike.  I haven't riden my bike in a few weeks, but only because I'm still rebuilding my muscle strenght.  I'll return to riding my bike soon.

I'm still 35 pounds from my goal of 183.  Everyone hits periods where the weight does not come off. 

The only thing you can do is keep at it!  You can get there, but you just might have to push a little harder to do it.

[Marcy]

 @Dominique you always have informative posts. Since I have an Aria, I set up a TrendWeight account to try it outwhile I'm in maintenance mode.

[A_Lurker]

14 days isn't likely something to worrry about.  I'm pretty much past that point now in my life, but your monthly cycle can affect you as well.  When I used to weigh daily I could pretty much predict my period.  I would stop losing completely for well over a week, then about 2 days before it started I would have a drop in weight.  I was much futher away from my goal than you are, but consider waiting 4 weeks before you try changing things up.

[emili]

one other question which is going to probably sound silly, but you made adjustments for calories in/out based on your current weight, not any previous one? you need less in and it takes more out to get the same results you had in the past. the only other thing you can try and I would read up on it first, is to eat more than you have been and then revert back to it. shock the system so to speak. Its not for everyone - one can easily fall back into poor eating habits because the mind will "remember" how much those foods are enjoyed. As with anything there are many for and many against this- which is why I would recommend reading both points and deciding for yourself. Here is one to get you started http://www.jillianmichaels.com/fit/lose-weight/break-through-weight-loss-plateau