Why oh why am I gaining not losing?!

[Bluesheep8]

Average day looks like this:

Either a couple of bananas OR a smoothie made with frozen fruit, fat free yoghurt, banana and skimmed milk.

Lunch is turkey or tuna salad OR weightwatchers soup or homemade soup with 4 ryvitas and laughing cow light.

Dinner is something like homemade chilli made with lean mince and lentils with cauli rice or homemade spag bol made the same way with spiralised bns. A weighed portion (40g) of reduced fat cheese.
At least 3l of water, a 20 min fast walk at lunchtime and 20 mins at least on the treadmill most nights. Yet I'm GAINING weight! How? Why? Help!!!

I often think that those of who struggle with weight often see slim people eating all sorts and think it's unfair.

In reality, I think very few people can eat what they want as often as they want and remain slim.

For example there is a woman at my work who is very slim. She has a breakfast at work everyday and a macdonalds 3 times a week. However, she never uses the lift, the nature of her job is that she is up and down from her desk all day, goes for walks after work and eat a very small portions of dinner and doesn't snack. Her macdonalds is a happy meal, that she never eats all of. Her breakfast is usually bacon, fat removed and 1 slice of whole meal toast and sometimes poached eggs. Not high in calories.

My ex mil was also one of these who could eat what she wanted. Or appeared to. But she did loads of walking everyday as she lived in the countryside, was retired and spent most of her days walking her dogs. She never had takeaways and maybe had one glass of wine every few weeks. Her son, my exh, also appeared to eat what he wanted. But he was always on the go too, they both naturally ate in cycles. They would eat loads for a few days, but then if they weren't hungry wouldn't. Missing meals wasn't a big deal for them. It was simply that they had always listened to their bodies, ate if they wanted to and didn't if they didn't.

Where I grew up in a house where you are wether you were hungry or not, had to clear your plate, had to have dessert if it was offered, or biscuits offered or whatever because it was rude not not. Exh family was totally different and all slim.

They were all active and and their calories intake could range from 500cal a day to 2500 a day. But over the space of say a month, it evened out.

Tennessee, yes that is how we ate at our home, we'd all happily eat cake in the afternoon but then in the evening maybe just some soup or a slice of bread. Also never any pressure to finish plate or eat puds.

And never was told that there were bad or good foods, just food. No panic about fat or carbs or whatever fad.

I remember being cross with the DC school when they taught him pizza is a bad food, DS was 5 at the time and tearful that his mum often gave him "bad food", my lovingly made home-made pizzas are not bad food! Still feel cross about that

@BlueSheep8 my suggestion is to stick at your healthy eating for 4 weeks, don't weight yourself, log onto MFP and weigh, measure and record EVERYTHING you put in your mouth. Do some exercise, drink plenty of water. Then see how you get on. My weight never went down for three weeks when I started a new 'diet' then it would drop 5lbs. But if I weighted myself every day/week it never went down I would just start eating again.

Also, check your scales are on a hard surface, weigh yourself first thing in the morning post-wee but before eating or drinking anything. You're looking for a general downward trend - to tout an often used MFP phrase - weight loss is not Linear!

Blooby I think that's good advice, but I'm not sure I could stick to it. The temptation to get on the scales every morning is too strong. All this week I've eat between 800 and 1,000 calories. Yesterday I found I'd lost 3lb (yay!!) Today I've put 2lb back on

violet just had a quick Google of the Blood Sugar diet and that sounds right up my street! Will combine that with MFP if I can ever get set up on there, and see what it brings. Thank you all for taking the time to think about what I've posted and make suggestions. I really appreciate it

blobby10 thanks for your post. I do weigh on a hard surface at that time in the morning. But I will try to leave it longer between weighing. I weigh once a week atm

@Bluesheep8 You need to do what works for you - weighing less often works for some people as, if they are aiming for a 0.5lb a week loss, they find it better to see a 2lb loss of a month than a piddly half pound a week! Maybe do random weighs? I know some people who claim they weigh more after a high salt meal such as Chinese - unless you are eating Chinese takeaway several times a week, one meal isn't going to make you gain 4lbs of fat!

Also suggest the measuring approach - on one diet i only lost 4lbs but lost several inches overall!

I do think you should definitely try MFP as it's, at the very least, interesting to see how food and exercise calories balance out over the week. Weirdly, I've found that I'm far better eating more, but also exercising more. I know it seems arse about tit (as the deficit is essentially the same), but it definitely works better for me than anything super restrictive. It seems to help speed up my otherwise sluggish metabolism.

I'm the same age as you are but aren't very active due to illness. I know exactly how many calories a day I need to maintain my weight because I'm tube fed. It's only 1300 a day. I'd put weight on massively if I ate and drank anywhere near 2,000 calories a day.

Calculate your calorie need & macro nutrient need, & carb cycle (so carbs one day no carbs the next) Cutting out carbs & fat is not good for weighloss, nor is eating too few calories. Fruit is better replaced with veg on a diet. & go high protein, protein is a dieters best friend, quark is cheap & delicious, add a bit of honey (no more than a teaspoon, chop 10 almonds or hazelnuts, mix together & have as a snack, so tasty & great way to increase protein. So are protein shakes.

Thank you all for your considered responses. I'm grateful to you for taking the time to properly consider my situation and offer advice and our own experiences to help.

You need to track everything and ensure you're in a calorie deficit. That is the only way you know you'll be losing weight. A calorie deficit of 3500 is equivalent to a pound of weight loss. MFP is amazing for this.

You also need to work out your BMR, which is the amount of energy your body burns in a day naturally.

I would also suggest upping your exercise. 1000 steps is approximately a 40 calorie burn. I can walk nearly 5000 steps in a 40-60 minute walk (depending how fast I go).

So if your BMR is say 1500 and you walk 5000 steps a day (200 calorie burn), you can eat 1200 calories per day to have a 500 calorie per day deficit. This will be a pound a week weight loss. Tbh, as your not very overweight by the sounds of it, this will be fine.

Don't restrict your foods as this will lead you to feel deprived and lead to binging. Try and stick to 80% good food, 20% crap and you'll be fine. High protein foods tend to be good for you as they'll be naturally lower in fat and calories (e.g. Chicken.)

If you want a real kick up the arse, I'd look up Team RH. I've been following them for a while now and have lost 17 pounds and it's been really quite easy. The above is what they teach and it's a complete overhaul on your relationship with food rather than a diet.

Hope this helps!

Ahh ffs. There was paragraphs in that...

Thank you for your detailed advice crazyfrog I wonder what the deleted post said?!

Probably a magical weight loss cure!

I know all the advice above is right and good but omg I’m so tired and bored and I just want chocolate and cake. How do I snap out of it and get a grip? Every day I aim to do well and just fail- and it never used to be like this! Is it menopause?

I'm guessing it must be menopause, or the start of. As nothing else about what I eat has changed. The way I've eaten for the last 15 years has kept my weight absolutely stable but it's no longer working so it must be the menopause.

Well, I got on the scales on Saturday morning and discovered I'd lost a couple of lbs by starving sticking to 1,000 calories all week. Ate normally over the weekend, plus one bottle of wine. Monday morning - 7lb has gone on. WTF?

Thenightsky, I guess it depends what your normal is?! If it's 3000 cals then you'd undo all the starving (this is why diets fail)

Babygrey… yes that makes sense. But I honestly didn't go that mega crazy. I had a friend coming over and we planned Chinese takeaway. So Saturday I had no breakfast, one satsuma for lunch. Then chicken friend rice for dinner. Sunday I had one slice of toast with butter and marmite for breakfast. Lunch was out... a chicken and salad wrap with a dollop of coleslaw on the side and some giant jenga style chips (about 10). No dinner. One bottle of wine split over two nights.

I’d say it was the wine. Alcohol dehydrates you, so your body then holds on to every scrap of water. Do you think you could ditch the booze?

We're all in the same boat, it seems! Don't know if any of you know anything about thyroid test results, but I had a phone consultation with a gp last night about mine. I asked him to explain what "normal" means and what the normal same was. He said the range is between 0 and 4 and that my level was 2.1 the 1st time it was tested and 2.4 a year later. He said he is now going to do a blood test to see if it's menopause...any wisdom/advice/experience? Tia.

What the normal RANGE was

Menopause is a killer for the weight
It all goes on like a tyre around the middle! Metabolism is hugely different at this age.

The way you are eating sounds fine for maintenance when younger but won’t cause a loss and is probably too much now you are mid 40s

Reset it. It isn’t working. And stop obsessing over what your work colleagues eat!!

You are barely moving. Weight is mainly about food but exercise helps in other ways and you need to do some. Walk. Much more. Get up early and start the day with a very brisk walk- arm swinging and makes you sweaty speed. You have to consciously try to walk that fast.
Try a class or so some dvds to get your heart rate up and a sweat on. Sitting all day at work and then in front of the tv makes weight loss so much harder. Do not eat back any perceived calories you burn doing exercise- just see it as a bonus.

Reduce all the added extras like the sprinkle of cheese.

Eat lean protein, no snacks and loads of water. The snacks is really important.

Whilst you are wanting to lose weight the treats have to go. You might get some back when you are at target. But wine is pure sugary calories.

I’m on the ‘stone to lose’ thread if you want to join us. We dont have all the answers and are all doing different things to try and make sustainable changes so come and join us!

whereareyouspot thank you for your observations and suggestions. And yes, the extra weight is visible to me round my middle (waist is less defined) and on my thighs, it seems. See you on the other thread