Don't Starve! The Eat More to Weigh Less Group

[ShirleyKnot]

Hello!

OK, stemming from this thread I promised to start a thread to explain a little bit more about eating well and still losing weight.

I'll start by telling you about me because I love to talk about me

About 5 years ago (when I was 34) I went back to work full time, this time locally, in a sedentiary desk job. I drive to work everyday and was often far too busy lazy to do any exercise at all. My weight remained fairly static (At about 11 stones, I'm 5ft 7.5 and fairly chunky) for a good couple of years and then it started creeping up.

For the past two years I have skipped on and off WW, SW and I have tried low calorie diets, the lot. My weight has gone up to 12 stone 11 lbs at it's highest and I'm carrying it pretty much all over. My gut though TERRIBLE - It hangs over my knickers and in January my size 16 clothes were starting to strain.

Miserable ain't the word. It has affected my confidence (yes, honestly) and I know that at my age (39) it is only going to get harder to lose.

So, in January I started back on WW. I watched everything I ate, I thought about food compulsively, I went for walks in my lunch hour, and every weekend I fell off the wagon and stuffed my face. WHY? It makes no sense! I gobbled bread and cakes and biscuits and sweets like mad.

In April, after having lost and gained the same 7lbs over and over again I joined BIWI's Low Carb Bootcamp, and started upping my exercise at the gym (Doing classes mainly and swimming and I also started the Couch 2 5K) this is where it got weird...I stuck to the diet, it was pretty easy! I loved the food and didn't feel hungry at all - my endurance during exercise was affected but I thought I'd break through that barrier sooner or later. I watched as people on the thread lost masses of weight and I was completely stalled out. What? WHY IS THIS HAPPENING? I believe that during this time I was eating a good couple of thousand calories per day, plus exercising almost every day.

I left the group as I felt so fed up with not losing and limped back to my fitness pal, but decided to stick with the no crap (no white bread/pasta/rice, easy on the white potatoes, easy on the fruit) WOE. MFP gave me a calorie limit of 1,200 cals per day and I did this for a a few days before starting to feel rotten. I started looking around the MFP community pages and found the Eat More To Weigh Less Group and read every link, and lots of the discussion boards.

It was a lightbulb moment - WHY was I expecting my body to cope on less calories than it needs just to exist? WHYYYYY?

I started EMTWL on 16th May and have lost 1 lb. That doesn't really mean very much though, as the scales are FILTHY liars - but I have eaten very well and am losing inches consistently. Since I started eating more calories (I include BIWI's brilliant Bootcamp in this calculation) I have lost 4.5 inches from my waist and a good couple of inches from my hips, arse and bust. I have dropped a dress size.

OK. I'm going to post this essay and then I'm going to talk a bit about metabolic rate calculations and the sciency bits.

Thanks for answering my q about exercise calories - I get it now.

Can we talk about how we're getting on with balancing the meals so you get the right about of carbs, protein and fat? I love love love carbs. I'll be buying some of those protein shakes- sounds like a good snack to have when I'm working from home. Almond milk sounds yummy too.

Shotgun - that sounds a bit low, what activity level did you put?

STEP. AWAY. FROM. THE. SCALES.

Please, please, please remember that to gain 1lb of fat you have to eat 3,500 calories over your BMR. Have you eaten 17,500 extra calories in the last few days? I doubt it so it's water fluctuations.

Go back to the top of the thread and read my posts again. No point measuring (quirky im looking at you!)and weighing in the first few weeks. Honestly, it will make you feel shit.

As to eating at maintenance? On the MFP group there are people who are eating at maintenance, this is called a "metabolic reset" and it's great for people who are just coming off a 1200 cal diet and who have been at plateau for a while...it's like a break from thinking about it all for a while, and I think it can help you break the starve/binge metabolism damage, but it does mean even more patience, as 6 x weeks at maintenance before you start even thinking about losing any weight is quite a brave thing to do I think.

I haven't had any wine (did have about half a pint of cider though) or chocolate, and I'm on 2,120 today. I'm not really counting but I went and did it so I could tell you that.

I'm going to talk a bit about hitting the macros properly when I've worked it out myself next week.

I find it hard myself to be honest - my fat is pretty much always higher than it should be, but I think that's a by product of eating oily fish almost every day.

Nope, I very rarely have roast dinners.

I did have bacon and egg and toast for breakfast, and I had lunch. Normally on a weekend I'd just get up late and have a brunchy thing.

Apparently I am low on protein and high on carbs. Not very surprising. I am surprised that my fat isn't higher than it should be though.

Oh my post has disappeared! I think it's trying to eat low carb/clean as well.

I had gallstones and went on a low (bad) fat diet and lost a stone in weight as well as the symptoms. I then restarted low carbing but lost no more weight. I've just been on antibiotics/steroids so my appetite is shot. I sound so healthy... I also thought you just needed to eat less as you get old(er).

I really didn't realise I'd been starving myself at all. I think it's hard to get your head round eating more and "dieting"/being healthy.

Ooh! Ooh! Have you tried celeriac Mary? You can make wonderful crisps with it.

If you are after breaking your bread and sweet addiction then there isn't much of an alternative other than to go through it!

There are some recipes for muffin in mugs (these use flaxseed rather than flour) and other lw carb alternatives on BIWI's bootcamp recipe thread.

confused again sorry. Are we low carbing??

I think some people are low carbing, but not everyone.

Shirley, you reckon my figures are low? I put in the moderate acivity level (ie not sedentary). I assumed it's because I'm old (49), and don't have much to 'lose.'
(Am 5'7 and 10st 4 - 7). I like being a stone lighter and think of that as my 'real' weight.

But it's mainly about how my clothes fit, if I'm honest. I wouldn't care (ish) what weight I was if I could get rid of the wobbly mid-section, and get the nice summer clothes down from the loft.

Im trying to good carb-small amounts of brown rice/pasta occasional wholegrain bread.

Has anyone tried the graze boxes?They are really good and have measured portions with cals counted for you.

Oh bleugh - I can't bear cottage cheese!

I promised myself some while ago that I would never eat anything again just because I thought I should - what a waste of calories!

I will try a protein shake - it seems really counterintuitive though, to eat something that in my mind is associated with trying to gain weight!! And I need to eat more eggs, I hardly eat any atm.

I did a bodyscan on my scales today. Visceral fat down (I'm well into normal range on that now), muscle percentage up and body fat percentage down by 3%. Still way, way, way too high, but heading in the right direction.

Xbat, as kind as you are to offer us the opportunity to er buy your stuff, your post is breaking guidelines and I've reported it. There's a whole other section on here for spamming advertising. Hth.

I have set mfp up but still had loads yeaterday left and it seemed like a bad day too. I need to shop too and get in some good food,its so expensive now though isnt it? Grub i mean

We had friends round yesterday which wasn't the best start to logging everything in MFP so I had what DD would describe as an epic fail. So am going to start properly today.

I haven't had a chance to read all of this thread yet but I am very interested in the principles of it.

However, I have put my details into the calorie calculator and it says I have a net calorie value of 2300 per day. I have just logged my meals on MFP and I have still only used just over half my calories for the day - is that right??

Also, I haven't exercised today but I usually do 4 or 5 hardcore gym sessions each week so surely I can't add the calories which I burn at the gym on top of the 2300 aswell (it is around the 700 calories burnt mark)?

Sorry if these questions have been answered already and I will read the thread when I have more time.

Okay, I'm having a massive mild wibble.
Stood on scales this morning and I've gained 3.5 kilos since Friday .

So Friday was my birthday and we went away for the weekend - even so, I definitely didn't eat the 26 million cals it would take to put on 7lbs.

Is it water then? I'm thinking best start starving now unless someone can convince me otherwise.

Also, everyone seems to be talking about massive calorie burns through exercise. If that can't be done (dodgy back), does that mean the whole thing's doomed to failure anyway?

Oh crapola.