@JRBW wrote:
Thank you both so much for your response. I joke that I would be the only overweight starving African! I do understand the concept of starvation mode but also dont see a lot of hungry people with an extra 10 pounds around their hips. That said, if 1400 calories is supposed to maintain my current weight according to all the charts and I am eating 1200 (which seems reasonable albeit not fun) than how much should I eat to lose weight? What exactly would that calculation be?
I also have been able to maintain muscle mass and build muscle. I have not experienced "wasting" of the muscles as would also be indicative of starving. Not trying to be trite but as you can see I am very discouraged as "calories in, calories out," "necessary caloric intake," and all the other numbers, math and energy put into this havent worked out. Ugh. Would def be interested to hear how many MORE calories you think I should eat a day in order to lose weight. Math be damned! While the rest of the world has to burn 3,500 extra calories in order to lose a pound how awesome would it be if I could eat more calories than I burn and lose weight. I mean I got to my elevated weight by eating more than I burned to begin with so reason would follow that by doing the same thing would only continue to pack on the pounds. 😞
You are confusing starving, with starvation mode, better known as adaptive thermogenesis, or as the one study calls is, metabolic efficiency.
Been seen even in morbidly obese, the 600-700 lb person that can't move much at all. They can run the whole day calorimetry room measurement, and they accept the fact they'll be suppressing them about the max 20%. So what was a measured 6000 calorie TDEE soon becomes 4800 TDEE, but since that is still so huge, no problem for them eating at 1500 calories. So what was a 4500 calorie deficit becomes 2300, and even less as weight is lost. But still eating enough.
So are you 25, 5 ft, 100 lbs female that is sedentary lifestyle with no exercise?
That would give you a 1400 TDEE, and indeed would mean going down to 1200 to eat and lose weight.
Or did you read the tables wrong, because you are not sedentary by long shot.
I'm not sure why you are guessing at TDEE levels though from a chart, when I'm assuming you have Fitbit since you are on here asking questions.
What does the Fitbit say your TDEE is on average daily looking at typical week?
And do you manually log all exercise the Fitbit is underestimating, like lifting and spin/biking, rowing, swimming?
If you don't, your TDEE is even higher yet.
That is the figure to take a deficit from.
And you must not have read the links and understood where you are at. Might reread what I wrote, and read the link. The numbers do workout, except you've lowered the calories out side of the equation because of the calories in side.
Do you really want to go down the road of trying to lose weight and then hopefully be able to maintain with a system that is suppressed up to 20% slower than a healthy you could be at?
And the recovery is eating more, not to lose weight short term right then, but to allow you to do it long term and actually succeed and maintain. If genetically your body responds fast and hasn't been abused too long it may respond short term too.
Even though your current results indicate you are not in a diet right now, because you are maintaining, I'll bet 2 weeks it is suppressed maintenance. 2 weeks of increased performance in your exercise and feeling better than you know because you've forgotten.
Eat 250 calories more than you eat right now, daily, for 2 weeks.
If your current eating level truly is your potential maintenance, then you would gain one, 1, whole lb slowly over 2 weeks.
Reread that and let it sink in.
If it is potential, then you take a deficit from 1200. Betting that poor food logging means it's actually more you are eating.
If it is suppressed, the first thing your body is going to do is fill up very depleted glycogen stores with attached water.
You would gain fast and/or more water weight in your muscles, just proving you were NOT already eating at maintenance. At least this type of water weight gain is increased LBM, and increased metabolism.
If the first week is fast water weight gain, you start the 2 weeks again, with 250 more than the first week.
So depending on how much you have starved your metabolism down, it could go longer than 2 weeks.
And the hope is at the end your system has recovered to true potential maintenance and metabolism.
Meaning at that point you could then take a reasonable deficit for amount to lose and have a positive effect of fat loss - not scaring your body to death.
Reasonable at this point is indeed 250 cal deficit. Off potential maintenance, likely around what Fitbit is saying.
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