[kvb]

Greetings. I wanted to get some feedback and hear from others who may have had this happen to them. I've been monitoring my caloric intake (about 1500/day) now since early October and exercizing regularly with cardio 4-5 times a week and lost some pounds. However, I've stalled in the last few weeks.

Before mentioning that humans are notoriously bad at counting calories, I'm not and use a food scale, know how to read labels for serving size, include calories from condiments, etc. I am punctilious.

My preferred cardio is lap swimming (45 min. to an hour) and I joined a Masters swim practice. I also do the elliptical on days when I'm not swimming and also take a day or two to rest.

I've gained muscle, am down a size in clothing, etc. And yes I know that muscle burns more, weighs more, clothing should be an indicator rather than the scale and so on, but I'm wondering about the idea that because I'm burning more and restricting calories that maybe I'm not eating enough. I've done some reading on the subject and am wondering what others have to say regarding restricting calories, calories burned from exercize, and then total calories for the day?

[krampus]

I think the exact science of it all varies widely between people with identical body composition and weight, so there is no absolute answer anyone else can give you.

I'm a big proponent of the "keep it simple, stupid" methodology - if you feel crappy and hungry and brain-foggy, you need to eat more. If your weight loss stalls and your clothes stop getting loose, you might want to consider calorie cycling or some other way of switching up eating. 1500 on workout days might be unnecessarily low for a 5'5 person, but that could depend on age, genetics, all that.

[geoblewis]

I think you're doing beautifully! Congrats on all the fitness efforts!

The stall in weight loss rate can be for a number of reasons and I'm not going to attempt to telepathically figure things out with regards to what's going on with your body. For my body, I haven't noticed any weight loss due to exercise. It's all been about cutting calories and macronutrient ratios. Plus, eating as little processed foods as possible. I have health issues that require me to eat that way. And I still stall.

I think the stalls are part of the process for my body. I'm 51 and menopausal. The weight loss rate is going to be very slow for me. Took me quite some time and a lot of ridiculous troubleshooting to figure that out and come to accept it. (And I'm still struggling with the acceptance part.)

[JohnP]

Using weight as an indicator is foolish. I doubt you need more calories at this point.

The idea that fat loss stops due to "starvation mode" is a complete myth.

Your body can only slow it's metabolism down so much...

What you're dealing with is the difference between fat loss and weight loss. Sounds like you're doing great and should continue what you're doing.

[SerenityDiva]

My thought is MEASURE versus scale. I *do* and will continue to use the scale, but it's only one thing. For example when I was in high school I weighed 117 and wore this size 5 pair of Britanca (spelling) jeans...which I still have. They are from around 1985. I fit into them after EACH of my kids. The thing is--I weighed around 127 pounds but was working out AND I'm petite so 10 pounds on me IS different than if I was say 5'9".

That said as far as exercise and calories, I don't count the calories burned during exercise. I've actually participated in studies at Cooper Aerobics Center and had everything used to monitor. The calorie counts burned were pretty darn close to what my Polar HRM said too, but honestly I don't find that deficit valuable enough to worry about minusing it from the day's eaten calories. I can be VERY type A and when I was super anal with measuring each and every calorie from exercise it made me super tense to be around. YMMV though. I do measure food though generally, i.e., I don't measure my salads I make at home, I kind of know what 2 cups of lettuce is by now, as well as a cucumber, etc., etc. However, rice, pasta, starch I measure and weigh for sure.

[EagleRiverDee]

I would go by my energy levels, to determine if I was eating enough. I'm super sensitive to low blood sugar, so I can tell pretty quick if I need to eat something. I try to ignore calories burned by exercise because the estimates vary so widely and it's too easy to overeat if one takes the exercise calories into account.

[Arctic Mama]

With that amount of lap swim, if you are finding yourself hungry a nice 150-200 calorie snack would not be a bad thing. I burn a ton of calories lap swimming, especially with breast or crawl stroke. It's difficult to calculate, but your body's feedback is a good indicator. If you're feeling overly fatigued or weak, upping post workout calories a bit may help (especially protein and fat).