Weight lose and gain

[AG4L]

I first started with fitbit several weeks back. Lost 2 lbs. Doing good. I walk 3 -4 miles daily. I have been underbudget every day except 1. Todays weigh in was back to where I started. So Im not eating enough? I read where if you don't eat enough calories your body goes into starving mode to save fat. Are you suppose to eat your budget? Looks to me under budget would add to the defecit. Thanks in advance.

[alexthecat · Accepted solution]

@AG4L 2 pounds is a small amount and there are a lot of things that can cause fluctuations like that. That's why it's not recommended to weigh yourself every day. It's easy to get distracted by these small changes. As long as you remain in a deficit, you should continue to lose weight but these fluctuations will also happen. It may be better to focus on other things (such as how your clothes are fitting) in addition to your weight.

Starvation mode is an adaptation to severe, long-term calorie restriction. It is not something that happens after a few weeks of dieting. Here is some information about that, if you would like to learn more.

[AG4L]

Thanks for the info.  I have another question. My food plan is set for loosing 1 lbs a week. I am under budget every day but hardly loosing. The  last 2 weekly email from fitbit showing stats only record loosing .2 lbs. So I need adjust something. Should we be eating to stay in the green zone? Not eating enough? We walk 2-3 miles every day. There is always a calorie defict. But not much progress. 

Thanks in advance. 

[alexthecat]

@AG4L if you are in or below the green zone, you should be losing weight. Fitbit's algorithms aren't perfect though. It's possible that Fitbit is not calculating your calorie burn accurately. 

It's also possible that there are errors in the calculations of what you are eating. Unless you are weighing everything you eat on a kitchen scale and only eating foods that you cook from scratch, it's hard to know exactly how many calories you are eating.

Another problem is that in the US the FDA allows a 20% margin of error for the calories on food labels. That means that a food could have 20% more or 20% less calories than it says on the label. 

When I was losing weight, I tried not to get too hung up on the math. The Fitbit app said I could eat 2000 calories per day. I tried that and it didn't work. I switched to 1700 and that worked for me, so that was what I stuck with. At 1700 calories, the errors in calculations of food intake and calorie burn came together just right for me to lose weight. 

My recommendation would be to decrease your food by 200 calories per day for a couple of weeks and see if that gets things moving for you. 

[AG4L]

Thanks for replay. I was thinking along the same lines. Will see what happens.