Why does it seem like the calorie deficit must be so large before the weight falls off (between 500 - 800 for me)?

I mean, I've heard stories of people who say, I just stopped drinking a soda a day and dropped 20 lbs in a year.

I, on the other hand, feel my body would compensate somehow and I wouldn't lose anything.

Just doing a quick calculation, cutting out ONE can of regular Coke a day will drop 16 pounds (and change) over the course of a year.

To loss 2 pounds a week, you have to cut 7000 calories out of your diet a week as one pound equals 3500 calories. To lose 1 pound a week, you must cut 3500 calories out of your diet a week.

So, to lose 2 pounds a week, you're looking at an average daily deficit of 1000 calories. 500 for losing 1 pound a week.

That's just it - if I cut out 120 calories a day - and only 120 calories a day, according to all the scientific info, I would STILL not lose 16 lbs in one year. My body would adjust and stay the same weight it is, it would stay at its comfort weight.

It is only with a large enough deficit that I can lose any weight at all. A 120 deficit would be a comfortable transition for my body. Now, a 500 calorie deficit means my body is FORCED to change.

Maybe I am not stating my point clearly.... hmmmm

Bonnnie, I feel the same way about my body. I feel like it adjusts too easily.

I gave up lattes last fall. I was drinking one a day and they have 280-400 (depending on if I had them flavored/with chocolate) calories in them. I didn't lose a pound from it in the last year. I never started drinking those flavored lattes again.

My body just adjusts...I suppose I am lucky as I don't gain weight easily either. I am not one of those people who pigs out all weekend and sees a huge gain.

These type of calculations are not worth the paper they are written on. The calculation can only hold true if a person eats EXACTLY the same number of calories per day and has the EXACT activity level each day, in order for the reduction of the calories in one soda pop per day would work.

Also, most people do not weigh and measure their food in order to count calories, so my bet is that overall "guestimates" really won't help in small to moderate calorie reduction either.

If you really want to know the amount to reduce to lose you really have to seriously count calories. Tedious at first, but becomes very second nature later.

you kno i've wondered the same thing, i kno many older women that say they jus cut out soda and lost about 20lbs but i'm sure they were not having the same over-eating problems as i had.

Elisaannh, I agree. Some people are able to lose weight by cutting out something like soda, but that means the soda was bumping them over the number of calories they need to lose or maintain. This is true for some people, but not everyone. I think for a lot of people, they have an excess of calories coming from other things as well, so just cutting out one thing will not change much.

When cutting something out, you also have to take into account the unconscious feeling that you can 'make up' for it a little with other things. I know some people find themselves gaining when they switch to diet soda cause they feel they can now eat a little more since they eliminated all those 'extra' calories. Of course, that may mean they end up taking in more calories then the had when they were drinking normal soda.

I always laugh at those calculation charts, too. Especially the ones coming out now that say something like, "If you eat a slice of pumpkin pie, you'd have to run for 2 hours to burn it off (something along those lines)." Yeah right! And what about the mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, turkey with gravy, green bean casserole, etc... that people eat on Thanksgiving? I could run a 26-mile marathon and not burn off all those calories. lol

This reminds me of when I quit smoking. I thought, "wow, I'm going to have SO much extra cash on hand - $4 per day!" Of course, my economic system found other ways to spend that $4, and in the end I never noticed that $4 daily gain.

I think both systems (calories-in-calories-out and money-in-money-out) are, as someone else stated, too complicated to be boiled down to a small action in a sea of daily decisions.

The calories out part of the equation isn't stagnant (and it's not very measurable outside of a lab). So while it's possible to lose a pound if you cut your calories by 500 calories (or whatever specific calorie amount you choose), it's also possible that you will not lose one pound per week (you could lose more, you could lose a lot less) What you eat and how much can affect how much you burn.

Cutting 500 calories to lose a pound per week assumes that you are burning exactly the same number of calories as you did before cutting the 500 calories. You can't make that assumption, you have to see your results and learn from them. You can only estimate the "burning" part. For example, if you cut too many calories, you may not have enough energy for your normal activities, or your body may start burning fewer calories on things you have little or no control over (such as temperature regulation or the depth of sleep....).

However, I don't think you can tell whether your body is compensating or not without many months of data. I also didn't think that my body responded to small changes, but I think there's "a watched pot never boils" phenomenon also going on. When you make small changes, it takes months to see any effect, because the effects are also small. It seems like there's no weight loss, because every time you check (daily or weekly) there seems to be "no change." Do you really stick with small changes for six to eight months before deciding there's "no change?"

Also, unless you're counting calories, you don't really know whether or not you're compensating in other ways. If you're not drinking your normal can of soda, but you start eating a large apple instead, or a few extra bites of something at dinner, or having one more bad-eating day per month, going to bed an hour earlier, walking five minutes per day less (or all sorts of changes you might not notice) you might be adding those calories right back in. Unless you're counting them, you can't really determine whether you're cutting calories at all (when you're talking about small amounts. You may not have to count calories if you're drastically cutting your calories, as you'll have a sense of eating much less).

Also where the calories come from can matter. When I started low-carb dieting, I could barely believe my own food journals. I found that I can lose more weight on far more calories when I reduce carbs. On a very, very low calorie diet I can eat more than 500 calories more than on a high carb diet (and still lose weight more rapidly). I lose more on 2000 calories of very low carb (really too low for me to be comfortable on) than I do on 1200 calories of high carb. If I eat too low carb, I get headaches and other issues, so I usually compare a more moderate low-carb diet to my "old" way of high-carb eating. On 1800 calories of moderately low carb, I lose more consistently than on 1200 calories of high carb.

Only good food/activity journal documentation can tell you the whole story. Unless you're writing down all of your foods, moods, activity and energy levels... (things that can affect your food intake and energy output) you can miss patterns.

I think the people who stop drinking soda and lose weight are drinking gallons of it. and they may be eating lots of other things to compensate for the blood sugar roller coaster that they didn't factor in.

Here's an article in the NY Times that talks about a variety of weight-loss challenges, including the "small things just don't add up like I thought they would" issue.

And here's an excerpt:
The body’s determination to maintain its composition is why a person can skip a meal, or even fast for short periods, without losing weight. It’s also why burning an extra 100 calories a day will not alter the verdict on the bathroom scales. Struggling against the brain’s innate calorie counters, even strong-willed dieters make up for calories lost on one day with a few extra bites on the next. And they never realize it. “The system operates with 99.6 percent precision,” Dr. Friedman said.

The same 7lbs - thank you for the article, it was an interesting read. I can believe my body fights to keep its composition and that abstaining from 100 cal. a day does not change anything.

5 years ago I lost ~70lbs, from low 250's down to mid 181's. I kept the weight off for about 18 months. Then slowly gained back up to low 240's. Now I am losing again, but it seems that at right around 220-230 I stop gaining weight quickly and just maintain for the most part. I find that odd, because how can my body possibly be happy at that weight? I was a fat baby up til I was 5 or so, then a SKINNY kid up til I was probably 17 when I evened out to "normal", I gained some weight in college (20-30lbs maybe) but lost it again, back down to the 140s in my 20's. I never get below a size 12 since I've been an adult, part of its my body shape, part of its weight.
The body is a weird and confusing thing.

Hmm. I think I disagree with some of the premises of the article.

I agree that moderate exercise *alone* is not enough to lose a significant amount of weight. However, I think moderate exercise in conjunction with a reduced calorie diet is important for weight loss and maintenance.

I walk about a mile and a half a day, six times a week. Pretty moderate. I have also been eating 1400 calories a day. What I think the exercise does for me is (1) tell my body that everything is OK, there isn't a famine, it's OK to release fat, and (2) help me lose mainly fat, where reducing calories without any exercise would lose less fat and more muscle.

I agree that exercising might lead people to, consciously or unconsciously, eat more than they would otherwise. Calorie counting helps me avoid falling into this trap.

On the forums here, I've seen several people say that weight management is 80% diet, 20% exercise, and I think I agree with that. I've also read that the metabolism of a formerly obese person is permanently different from someone with the same vital statistics who has never been obese. I expect to maintain at 1700-1750 calories, which is much lower than most calorie calculators would predict. But I'm prepared to do that, because it's worth it and I'm worth it.

I think the picture painted by the article gives the false impression that small changes don't make any difference, so there's no sense in doing them. When small changes in diet and exercise become habits, they can eventually add up to major changes and success. And I don't care what the New York Times says.