My weight loss has slowed to a crawl and lately I've been wondering about upping my calories to eat at just under what my bmr would be at my goal weight so that I don't have to worry about maintnance transition and I train myself to do it now.
Has anyone done this and had success? Should I keep trucking at my 1200 calories?
There are posters in these forums who are eating at their maintenance level while losing. I think it makes a lot of sense, I didn't do it because I didn't know about it until I was almost at goal. Google Eucalorics and you can find much more written about it.
Do you eat 1200 calories everyday? No "cheat" days?
If so, I would definitely try switching things up. You could also try calorie-cycling or intermittent fasting or playing around with your macro nutrients.
Pretty close to the way I did it. I was training myself for my new weight, not "dieting" to get there. For one thing, I personally would not have been able to eat only 1200 calories for the years it would have taken to get to goal weight.
It's turned out to be a very successful way for me to maintain. Have kept the 100 lbs. lost off for more than 2 years now, despite the fact that I no longer even log what I eat or get on scale more than a few times/year. It appears during the 72 weeks I did track my calories, I really learned how much to eat to be a 165 lb. person.
I'm definately upping my calories to train myself. I have to learn right?
1200 seems fine most days because I'm working on computers, but the days I run around all day, exercise, and do all my chores, it takes so much willpower.
And there have been no cheat days. I might go over by 100 calories on a holiday, but I'm always -very- mindful of my goal and how badly I want this.
I'm new to these fancy calculations but from what I have read getting too few calories with an active lifestyle can cause weight gain/maintenance. I don't know but in my calculation app it told me to minus 30% from my totla bmr to get weightloss success. I am cluless. Now I have to toy with this too. Sorry I'm no help.
I eat around what should be my eventual maintenance calories. 1200 calories isn't the least bit sustainable for me. My current BMR is around 1800. After factoring in all activity, I burn around 3000 calories per day, more on long run days. Even eating 1800-2000 calories, I'm losing 2-3 lbs per week.
When you say, "slowed to a crawl" what exactly is that?
I'm a 1200-1500 calorie person and can tell you I went from losing like 5lbs a week at the start to 1lb a week now, if I'm lucky. I've read from other people on this forum as well that's it's common to lose very quickly in the beginning especially at higher weights.
A little rotation did seem to help me along the way - one day at 2000 or something, but that doesn't work for everyone.
What's your activity/exercise level like? Do you have room there to up it a bit to increase your calorie deficit? For me I found that I could only go so low with my calories... I tried 1200... But always seemed to come in at around 1500 which was OK because I was still losing, although not as fast as i liked... So I increased my activity which got the scale moving in the right direction...
Now I'm maintaining at 1800- 2000 calories a day... with running 5x a week... I still would like to lose some more weight while eating at this maintenance level, so I'm going to have to increase my distance and intensity of my workouts to accomplish that... Which I much rather do than trying to go too low with my calories, especially since I already know that doesn't work very well for me...
My weight has been exactly the same for a week and a half now
And I work out as often as I can with work and house/home things, which is 30-90 minutes 5 days a week. I walk on the treadmill (jogging hurts tremendously) at the highest incline at 2.0 mph and I also use a bowflex for 2 days a week. In between I do kinect sports seasons 1&2 and Dance Central. Unless I'm up in the middle of the night, there's just no room to fit much else in.
So I thought maybe upping my calories a tiny bit would maybe be a catalyst. And I tried calorie cycling over the summer, it didn't work out very well for me. It was just a bit too complicated to keep track when I'm already overwhelmed some days.
My weight has been exactly the same for a week and a half now
Two things - first, after the initial losses, weight loss is not linear! My weight "stalled" at the same weight for between 8 and 14 days EVERY MONTH when I was losing. My body likes to retain water during the time leading up to ovulation. Once I had ovulated - I'd lose 3-4 lbs in a few days (the "whoosh"). It's key to stick to your plan during the stall, even though it seems pointless!
Second, your calories are too low for your activity level. Do you eat 1200 regardless of activity, or do you add more? When I was around your weight, I was eating 1400 on non-exercise days, and about half of whatever calories I burned during any workout. I continued to lose an average of 2 lb a week until I got closer to 200.
I eat 1200 regardless of activity. I feel kinda guilty and as if I'm defeating the point if I go over. And I don't trust MFP's calculations of what I burned at all.
I eat 1200 regardless of activity. I feel kinda guilty and as if I'm defeating the point if I go over. And I don't trust MFP's calculations of what I burned at all.
Oh dear god, please eat more. You should be eating more like like 1750-1850'ish a day if you're working out just 3 times a week.
I went the whole 1200 calories a day, tons of exercise and yes I lost weight, but I destroyed my metabolism and now I really struggle with losing weight because my body is so confused. 1200 calories a day is not sustainable for the rest of your life. You are looking to change your lifestyle, because if you just diet and hit your goal weight - then what?
Slow and steady. If you're not losing pounds - check your measurements. It's normal to plateau. Be kind to yourself and be patient.
Eating for goal weight?
