Well. So. Then there was this. I lost about 20 lbs earlier this year, got off the wagon but didn't gain any back for about a month, and now I'm back on the wagon again for the last 2 weeks. I lost 4 lbs. the first week with a reasonable diet- 1200-1600 cal/day range. This week, I was OP every day. I didn't go over 1460/day, in fact- which is a good calorie deficit but in no way starvation level. I weighed in today and I have not lost one SINGLE ounce this week. Not. One. I'm so frustrated. I'm 1 lb away from losing 25 lbs. I feel like I'm stuck in this fat body. I haven't really plateaued before. I guess I didn't really believe in them- I thought that the times I wasn't losing also coincided with the times I was cheating/lying to myself about what I was eating. I lost (and then re-gained) 40 lbs a couple years ago, so I feel like I've been down this road before and this hasn't happened except when I was consuming too much. That's not what happened this week at all. I'm not eating too much sodium (I track that, too), it's not TOM, I just don't understand how I didn't burn more calories this week than I consumed, and I feel like eating less is unreasonable.

I know there are a lot of posts on here about this. I've responded to several of them saying things like, "Are you being honest with yourself about calories?" and "It could just be water retention or your body just not being on the same schedule as you." But now I'm realizing that those words are really cold comfort and that after a week of trying so hard, working so hard, and seeing absolutely no results after feeling like you were really in to see a loss, it is just totally crushing. I'm a law student in the middle of final exams, so you can imagine that I'm under a lot of stress this week already, and pretty sleep deprived, so perhaps I'm being overly emotional.

I think I am going to stay OP, not change anything, and weigh tomorrow again to see if I have had a down tick (I'm usually a weekly weigher). Short of that, what should I do? Just stick it out? Thanks so much for this community, you guys. I feel like this is the only place I can talk openly about this and people understand. Oh, it doesn't help much that DH is dieting, too, and eating about 2200 cal/day and seeing a loss of several lbs a week.

One week isn't a plateau. You said you're under stress and you're sleeping poorly. Both of those things impact weight loss. Just stay on plan. The scale will drop sooner or later. Good luck on your finals!

Hey Dezzie. Hugs to you! I completely understand. It's so frustrating when our body doesn't work the way we expect or want it to work. Let me ask you this --- Have you been exercising more lately or being more active than normal? Perhaps your using muscles you haven't used for a long time? I know that I have found that my body retains water that way too to help me heal the soreness.

When I started I lost consistently each week. At least 1.5-2 lbs. This went on for a couple months and then all of a sudden.... NOTHING in one week. But the next week I saw a 3 pound loss. I didn't change my diet, it wasn't my TOM, it wasn't sodium, etc. Just no explanation. But my weight loss eventually caught up.

The scale is a catch 22, isn't it? We need/want to weigh to keep accountable and most of the time it makes us smile but then there are times you just want to flush it down the toilet if it were to fit!

Hang in there because I promise you there IS light (pun intended) at the end of this journey!

When I'm losing, if I have a stressful week, I'll plateau like that. But the next week (or whenever the stress releases, provided it does soon, which it should in this case), I'll have a jump that will make up for the "lost" week.

Courage!

While it is frustrating, you probably won't lose every week even if you stick to plan. It may not even be water weight or anything like that. Some weeks you might see a loss, and some weeks you won't.

I'm a daily weigher and if I tracked my weight weekly there would have been MANY weeks where I didn't see any loss and other weeks where I saw bigger losses. My body just doesn't follow the "create a deficit of 3500, lose a pound" rule and lets go of the weight when it feels like it. Some weeks I've lost 4 or 5 pounds which was usually preceded by a week or two of no losses.

Stick it out. Stick to plan. If you go over a month without a loss then you might want to examine your habits.

Stress is ROUGH on weight loss....trust me....I'm right there with you, but my plateau has been the last 3 weeks.....I've been stressed since thanksgiving...but it will all work out in the end....just give it a little more time, and get past those finals!! Good Luck!!

My first thought when I read your post was, probably the first week you didn't legitimately lose four pounds. It's pretty tough at your size to create a deficit of 14,000 calories in a single week. More likely, you lost a couple of pounds of fat, but were slightly dehydrated on your weigh in day, so weighed less a couple of pounds. THen you rehydrated and 'put on' those 2 pounds again, which you lost in the past week. So if you think of it that way, 2 pounds a week lost for the past 2 weeks, you're doing AWESOME!

I'm envious - I've been at a plateau (I think!) for about 5 weeks now.

Keep it up, it will work out in the end (at least that's what I'm telling myself!).

I tried everything, changing my exercise, reducing carbs to nearly zero, lowering my calories more and more and more until I was consistently at -500 a day. Still I would stall out. I finally discovered what worked for me:

JUDDD 'Johnson's Up Day, Down Day' plan

Even though it was terrifying after all my hard work to lose weight, I had to change something or I was going to be stuck at an overweight BMI, eating -500 calories a day, forever. On JUDDD, I ADDED calories to my daily average. The difference was that one day I'd eat a small amount and the next day I'd eat four times the down day calories. The magic occurs when the down day is 25% or less than the up day. It pulls you out of starvation mode and re-sets your metabolism so you start to burn fat again. Now I am losing weight again, almost without even trying.

When you start JUDDD, it takes a week or two to allow your body to adjust to the new plan. I had been a daily weigh-er, but when I started JUDDD, I stopped weighing for a week so I wouldn't get discouraged. After two weeks, my metabolism adjusted and I finally saw the scale start to go down again. ANd it works with pretty much any eating style: low-carb, WW, IP, Medifast. Just a little tweaking of the calories so they are distributed differently (but the average comes out the same) and *poof*! Weight loss starts back up again.

If you only weigh once a week, it takes a lot longer to see the overall pattern through the individual ups and downs of weight loss. A week's weight loss can be masked my many things: water retention (the poor sleep alone would be enough cause for that), frequency of bowel movements, muscle gain. Look at a graph for a daily weigher (mine's linked in my signature) and see how much there are normal ups and downs. I've had plenty of weeks where I lost nothing, and also plenty of weeks where I was still losing but if you weighed me on two consecutive Tuesdays (or whatever), the scale would happen to make it look as if I hadn't lost at all. Merely taking a painkiller will usually put my weight up by a pound the next day, for instance.

It sounds as if you know perfectly well that this isn't even close to a plateau, but you're stressed from the exams and transferring the stress to other things. That's perfectly normal. Stop fretting about your weight, keep going with your usual plan and don't waste more time thinking about it than is necessary to keep on plan, and just focus on getting through these exams. And if you have the time to spare, spend it on relaxation!

I've just looked up the JUDDD diet, and frankly it looks dangerous. The pattern it encourages is a binge-starve pattern, and the "down days" suggest a number of calories which are no higher than 500. When I inputted my height, age and activity level, it suggested around 300 for me even when I added about 50lb to my current weight. 3FC doesn't support VLCDs except for when medically supervised prior to weight loss surgery, so I'd be very cautious about this sort of thing.

I "swanee"!!!!

the most aggravating, frustrating, irritating, pissoffating thing is to do EVERYTHING RIGHT and STILL not lose ...not even an ounce! It makes me realize that our bodies DO fluctuate, that lack of sleep, stress, & other crazy factors DO make a difference. And that sometimes, no matter how "good" we are, the scale just doesn't cooperate! ARGH!

So while I may not have any "sound advice" for you - I can say that I FEEL YOUR PAIN! - and try to just "ride it out" and not stress over it. Because hey, stress doesn't help. Uh-huh. Nope, not one little bit.

Haha this cracked me up. Not laughing at you but laughing because I've been there.

You know logically what's happening but it still stinks.

I feel your frustration, its hard to put so much effort into something and have it yield no results. I am going through the same problem for 2 weeks I have been eating really well, I recently increased my work out intensity, added interval training and instead of losing like I thought? I gained 2lbs! I know how upsetting it can be!

However you explained that you are lacking in sleep and are stressed out. This can easily effect the scale and throw your body off rhythm. It's also possible that your body has not yet had a chance to respond the the calorie deficit you created and is simply lagging behind a little. Give your body some rest, relaxation and time, those pounds will start to melt off again

I am a HUGE fan of the biggest loser...huge fan...and EVERY SINGLE SEASON, without fail, several, if not all of the contestants have a week with NOT ONE OUNCE lost...same as you- these people work out at least 5 hours a day, have dieticians and trainers etc. etc in their pocket and they don't lose - and then they go on to have an awesome loss the next week.

If these people have weeks like you just had with all that help, then you shouldn't beat yourself up if you have one too. Your body is probably just adjusting [if you really are doing everything right]]. If the scale truly doesn't move for weeks, maybe you should look further into it, but I wouldn't freak out if you stay the same one week - even though it sucks, trust me I know!

You are NOT on a plateau. It takes 6 weeks of weighing the same for that. Be patient and learn how your body's weight loss cycle works.