What am I doing wrong?!

[clarabellabunting]

I have been low carb for the whole of January along with my DH. I have stuck to it better than him as he insisted on having a cheat day each week on a Saturday when he had some toast with his breakfast and beer in the evening.

My average day consisted of having an espresso with double cream for breakfast, a couple of frittatas for lunch and a dinner that was mostly meat and a green veg or salad. If I wanted a snack I would mostly have a little bit of cheese. I would also drink espresso with cream in the evening but just water all day apart from that.

So... we weighed in today and low and behold he has lost about a stone and I am exactly the same weight I was on Jan 1st!

What have I been doing wrong?! I feel like throwing the scales out of the window .

My first instinct is that doesn't sound like a lot of food, but suppose it depends on the portion sizes. Is there enough fat in there?

Other things to consider are whether you have lost any inches/your clothes feel loser/you feel better in general. It's not all about weight loss!

Depending on what your diet was like before it might just take a while for the weight loss to start as maybe your body needs to heal in other ways first.

Well, blokes can lose weight really well on most plans if they set their mind to it. Its just a fact of nature! Weight is a poor indicator of success on a LC diet as your fluid balance will fluctuate wildly. Inches are a better guide or a piece of snug clothing. Lots of people are late starters too. Some lose a heap of water weight to kick them off whilst others don't see much scale progress for a few weeks. Do you feel any better? Have your energy levels improved? Do you feel its a plan you can live with?

Have you checked out the Boot Camp pages and the BC chat thread? The link is at the top of the page. You don't need to join in if you don't want to, although Biwi accepts late starters, but theres loads of good advice and info to be had over there that might help you. I agree with panevino that you don't seem to be eating much.

Have you been drinking enough water? I believe you need to drink gallons.

I also once read something about this WoE only working once, i.e. if you've ever tried it before it being much harder to shift weight a second time.

Also do you have much to lose? If its only a small amount you won't lose much quickly.

Sounds like you need a different approach (and if your body needs to "heal" this isn't the diet to choose IMO). Accepting slow loss - 1 lb per week - is healthy and sustainable, a stone in a month is not.

It's not true about low carbing only working once!

clarabella how much weight do you have to lose?

I'd say looking at what you've said you're eating, you haven't been eating enough fat. And it could be that you have an issue with dairy - if you're drinking cream in your coffee and eating cheese as a snack.

How much water are you drinking?

BIWI it was All Over those low carb boards at the one time I tried it. (worked that one time )

My first instinct says "drop dairy". Try for a week and see if you lose anything. Are you eating sugar? Have you dropped alcohol?

You could have had loads of cheese on low carb!

I don't know why you haven't lost weight as you've hardly eaten a thing.

How do you make frittatas? I thought they had potatoes in them?

Lots of reasons, Imperial:

• could be eating too much
• could be eating not enough
• may not have much weight to lose
• may not be eating enough fat
• may be eating too much dairy
• may not be drinking enough water
• may have cheated along the way

Without knowing more from the OP it's hard to say!

Well, she was talking about what she ate on a standard day.

I just don't believe that anyone can't lose weight because they don't eat enough.

Well, men typically lose weight considerably faster than women for one. Also, are your clothes looser? Better test than aimple weight loss. Are you exercising a lot, weight training? Muscle weighs more than fat.

Hi all, thanks for your responses. I posted this in a fit of horror after my weigh-in on Saturday and didn't return to it until this morning - so apologies for the delay in responding.

To answer some of your questions - I would really like to lose about a stone. That would put me comfortably inside my ideal weight bracket. So not a lot but it just won't seem to shift no matter what I try.

I'm not new to low-carbing - I have been doing it on and off for the past year with mixed results. Anything I have lost I always managed to put it all back on again as soon as I began to reintroduce carbs. So it isn't a new thing for my body so perhaps that's why the results have been disappointing. Whereas DH has never done anything like it before and the weight has just dropped off him.

I really haven't cheated at all in January and had just about got into the mind-set that this is a way of eating for life and not a temporary thing so me not losing anything is a bit of a blow. The only thing I've had as a treat is a small soya latte from Starbucks on some days (because they appear to be the lowest carb thing on the menu that I like).

In answer to the question about drinking water - maybe I'm not having a enough? I have a 1 litre water bottle on my desk at work. I fill it up in the morning when I arrive and refill it at lunch. So approx 2 litres/day. My frittatas are just egg, cheese, some shallots and some courgettes or ham, depending on my mood.

I think I would really struggle to cut out dairy altogether. Do you think I really have to? I have cut out my morning coffee today and will see what difference if any that makes.

Maybe you ought to try upping your fat first? See if that makes any difference.

If not, then try cutting out dairy just for a few days and see what happens then.

Sadly we all have different levels of carbs that we can tolerate, and it's not easy trying to work out what it is!

I would try putting a typical day's food intake into My Fitness Pal or a similar app to get an idea of how many calories you are eating and what are your proportions of carbs, protein and fat. There are a lot of reasons for not losing weight: you could be eating too many calories, not drinking enough water, eating too much protein, not eating enough fat, medicines could be interfering, dairy could be an issue. I know that when I was close to my goal weight I needed to up fat intake and I started intermittent fasting (basically just skipping breakfast) in order to lose the last few pounds.