Weightloss Frustrations

[lunatotem]

Hello everyone,

It feels like I'm hitting a rock wall before I have gained any progress.  I've always struggled with my weight and I've always been in the habit of counting calories and writing everything down.  I thought that when I got my fitbit, things might improve, even just a little.  I had managed to drop 5-10lbs but now it's slowly coming back.  My energy levels are at an all time low and my depression is making things even worse.

Any suggestions that I can use towards my meals, workouts and motivations?  Starting to run off of fumes and feeling hopeless of obtaining a healthy me.

- Luna

[ter50]

It'd be nice if we could lose weight as easily as it seems to show up on us. After reading your post, here are a few thoughts I have:

Drink lots of water - especially before you eat.

Don't eat processed foods. It becomes really easy after a couple of weeks. Trust me.

Eat lots of vegetables and some fruits.

Get up and move! It'll improve your mood.

Keep plugging away. Soon your good eating and moving more will become habits and the weight will come off.

[Maxit]

In addition to that above, get outside for natural light as much as possible - even if it is cold (dress for it :)) 

[HelenaFitbit]

Hey there @lunatotem I know that feeling! I've been battling with depression since a couple years now, I am attempting a different approach with walking, dancing and focusing on my cooking; it's been great so far but you always encounter hiccups. 

My 2 cents, go out, dance, cook, try new things. You will be finding a new you after you step out of your comfort zone. Make a goal board and prepare for the bad days on the good days 

[fpontes]

hi, i know how you feel.  I have also battled with depression for years.  Walking/working out and getting fresh air is very important but so is support from friends and family.  Good luck to you.

[HelenaFitbit]

Let's do this! We can do it! 

[LauraSB]

Have you had your thryoid checked along with your calcium levels in your blood?  I felt like you do now, couldn't lose weight no matter what, depressed.  I found out after some major research that I had a thyroid issued and a bad parathyroid. These two things affect weight loss and depression. I would get checked out if you can.

Another symthoms is heart palpitaions.

[Heybales]

So creating an unhealthy body by eating way too little is not going to work with you to lose fat weight.

How big a deficit are you supposedly taking from what Fitbit is suggesting you burn, like to drop that 5-10 lbs?

And some of that was initial water weight unless already in a diet.

And it's only going to come up if your exercise is causing known expected water weight gain.

Or your food logging leaves a lot to be desired for accuracy, and you are eating way more than you think, and eating over what you burn.

But even there, to see a 1 lb weight gain in say 1 week - you would have to be eating 500 calories daily over what you burn.

So unless you are manually logging some exercise with a greatly inflated calorie burn, and/or food logging is higher, you could just be dealing with a stressed body.

Reasonable weight loss is not the same for everyone. If body is already stressed out with disease or sickness, then more is just bigger stress.

[lunatotem]

I had lost the 5-10lb over the course of a month and a half.  I was only aiming to lose 1lb or less a week.  I was going to the gym every day and was working out after work.  I generally did not put in exercises that I was doing, and I figured that the treadmill was tracking my steps.  When it comes to the food, when I entered it, if there wasn't an exact reference for it in the log, then I would enter in all the numbers manually.  I don't believe I was eating too little because I was listening to what my body was saying and if it said it was hungry I got a small snack lol.

[Heybales]

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@lunatotem wrote:

I had lost the 5-10lb over the course of a month and a half.  I was only aiming to lose 1lb or less a week.  I was going to the gym every day and was working out after work.  I generally did not put in exercises that I was doing, and I figured that the treadmill was tracking my steps.  When it comes to the food, when I entered it, if there wasn't an exact reference for it in the log, then I would enter in all the numbers manually.  I don't believe I was eating too little because I was listening to what my body was saying and if it said it was hungry I got a small snack lol.

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Well, you feeling full and your body being fully fed are 2 entirely different things.

You can screw up your hormones enough to not feel hungry, as well as water tricks and what not.

But just as being vitamin or mineral deficient eventually show up down the road, so also does being calorically deficient more than body desires.

Sounds like you reached that point. So while losing maybe 8 lbs in 6 weeks is close (not counting initial water weight, though you didn't mention if already in a diet to not cause that), your body may be stressed about other things, and that much diet was too much.

Was the gym every day a mix of workouts, or what?

And how long, big difference between 30 min and 3 hrs - which yes, some people do, thinking they need to.

Also, you said treadmill, so I'm guessing walking or running which Fitbit could be decent estimate at - if level and flat. Did you have some big incline to make it harder?

And that's good you log the food - but accuracy is weighing the food.

Calories is per gram, not per cup or spoon, which is volume.

You weigh the food in a package, and you either weigh out a serving size as stated, or do the math for how many servings you are about to eat. Because "about 2" can easily mean 2.5. And with decent calorie item, that can be decent amount of calories.

So if all you did was walking, you can be assured that probably 20% of the non-water weight lost was muscle mass - just a fact of a diet unless you do the resistance training and enough protein to keep it.

Unless you did this sort of routine on the treadmill.

And how much left to lose, too?

1 lb weekly may or may not be reasonable.

Any diseases your body deals with? Or chronic lack of sleep?

[lunatotem]

I've been trying to eat healthier over the past few months, more fruits, veggies, meats, etc.  I'm not a big meat eater though.  I also take vitamins to help out where I may be lacking, and last night I picked up some new ones, just in case.

When I go to the gym, I generally walk up 3 flights of stairs to get to the workout equipment that I want.  Then I do 30-60 min on the treadmill (usually just walking with slight incline).  If I do a small amount on the treadmill, then I will do a few miles on a stationary bike.  And then I do some rowing exercises.  When I get home, if I haven't done a full 90 or if I decided to not go to the gym that day, I will do some at home exercises.  And I usually end the day with yoga and stretching.

I don't sleep very well and I am chronically stressed and depressed.  I have some appointments next week to see how I can allieviate those problems.  And when it comes to how much more that I need to lose, it's roughly 95lbs before I'm a "healthy" weight.

[Heybales]

So 95 lbs with a healthy body, should allow 2 lbs weekly easy.

You may not have healthy body if dealing with emotional stress and lack of sleep, and deficit to what your body could potentially be burning could be bigger than you think.

Were you doing a diet prior to Fitbit?

Do you manually log rowing and bike and yoga on Fitbit as workouts?

Because the steps that are seen with those activities are not step-based, the calorie burn is all wrong based on walking/running, and way too low.

You need to manually log those, and I'm betting with increased daily burn, you'll find your deficit to what you eat is even bigger.

But that means you are losing even less than you should - indicating a stressed out body, that isn't really burning it's potential.

In which case I'd stick with the 500 cal deficit or 1 lb weekly, and really hit the target eating goal to keep that 500 deficit off corrected daily burn.

Do you get about 1 grams of protein per pound of goal bodyweight? That would be best.

And about 0.45 gram fat per lb of GBW too.

Carbs should make up rest of the calories. And try to do that for each meal if possible, whatever that % works out to be.

So once you see what totals you need for the day of grams of everything, see what the ratio is for carbs to protein to fat. Maybe it'll be simple, carbs is 2 x protein grams, and 1/2 fat grams. usually no one is that lucky though, but that makes it simple.

Because indeed, if you play out the end game trying to get down to goal weight, the fact you must eat even less as you lose weight, what kind of calorie level would you be at then?

Most who start with huge deficits discover it would be very unreasonable, they'd never adhere to such a low eating level, and or requirement to exercise so much.

And then maintenance would suck too, hence the reason success keeping off weight is so hard.