[RynKay]

I have been stuck at the same weight for a good 4 weeks now. I eat 1200 calories a day and workout 4-5 days a week, yet nothing is happening. I want to try zig zagging my calories! I use the lose it app for my iphone, and love it, but i want to be able to write in a certain amount of calories for each day of the week. Does anyone know of an app that does this? Or do i need just to stick to the good ol' fashion pen and paper

[ncuneo]

You can do that on the lose app. You just go to goals, then modify program and then to daily calorie budget and then add an adjustment. I do this everyday (I'm a zig zagger too). I used freedieting to get my zig zagging schedule and just wrote it down in my notes and refer to it from time to time to remember what calories I'm supposed to be doing on a certain day. But it's pretty simple so I have it memorized now.

[RynKay]

So you just change the amount every morning for that day? I guess that does make sense haha I knew I could change it, but I think it was making it far more complicated then it actually was. Thank you!

[ncuneo]

You're very welcome. I wasn't sure about it in the begining either, but it seems to work great. You can actually change the allowance all day long if you want, you just can't change it after the day has past and when you look back at each day it will have a different allowance in the budget column. I like that because within my zig zag I actually have a 100 cal range, so like today my budget is 1650-1750 (depends on how hard I exercise and how hungry I am, I always try to stay to the low side, but sometimes I just need that extra 100 cals). Have fun!

[RynKay]

ncuneo, since I am new to this zig zaggins stuff, can you give me an example of what your typical week looks like. Do I have to make each day 100's of calories different, or does even a 50/75 calorie change make a difference?

[ncuneo]

I think the idea is to make the calorie difference pretty significant. Here's mine, I got it from freedieting.com

m 1650-1750
t 1350-1400
w 1800-1900
th 1650-1750
f 1400-1500
s 1900-2100
su 1640-1750

The range comes from going between picking 3xs a week exercise and 5xs a week. I usually exercise 5-6xs a week, but I had a hard enough time using the 3xs a week numbers because they just seemed so high, but they are really working and I'm losing faster than I was at 1400-1500. So I'm just going with it. You have to play with it to find out what works for you and what you are comfortable with. Good luck!