I'm so deflated with no weight loss

[YellowBlueDaisy]

I'm working so hard with my diet and exercise since March. Back in March I was at my heaviest at 16 stone 12 pounds. The news of the virus came then and I decided it was time. My weight issues come from a bad history on food and a bad place about exercise. I grew up on a high carb and high sugar diet since I was a small girl. I don't know why my parents fed me rubbish. You don't drop them bad habits over night. About 2 years ago I did begin to change my diet by reducing bad carbs and reducing sugars as much as possible. My job over the past few years was a huge obstacle and barrier to exercise. I can remember regular working days going in, in the morning and there I was still working at 8 or 9 at night.

All of that changed with the lock down. I got more free time. I cleaned up my diet and I went back to nature so to speak. I don't hunt for my food but my meals re planned like them old hunting days for example eggs or meat with vegetables.

A typical day for me would be

Breakfast
2 poached eggs or 1 salmon
Vegetables - mushrooms and onions, or courgettes, or ratatouille or cabbage or broccoli

Breakfast fils me til lunch with no crashes. I might have a cup of coffee about 11 or 12 with se milk no sugar.

Lunch is different every day:
Sliced cucumber with a small tin of tuna
Or sliced cucumber with cheese and a steamed chicken breast
Or beetroot dip with sliced cucumber and cheese.

Or ratatouille or home made soup with cheese.

That's at about 2 O clock.

In the evening time at 5 or 6, I might have a yogurt, a nutri grain bar and a cup of coffee.

I never hungry for a big meal in the evening time. I very rarely have dinners. If I get hungry I might have a yoghurt or a vegetable burger on the George grill. I might have a cup of tea. With no sugar.

I'm exercising every day.

I started back in March using the health app on my phone and I started walking more and more. I eventually bought a home exercise piece of equipment. I bought a rebounder. I do a lot of walking and jogging and jumping on that. I also do sit ups. 30 minutes every morning.

I have a fitness band where I can further track my progress.

I weighed myself this morning and I weighed 15 stone 4 lbs.

I'm so so so disappointed. I stalled on the scales a few weeks ago but I did see a drop in some pounds eventually. I am stalled now again with no movement down on the scales since June.

I've been trying so hard over the past few months at losing weight and it's just not happening for me. My diet was cleaned up and I'm moving more and more and still nothing. I'm not even gone below the 15 stone mark and I'm so so so sick of it.

Apparently I'm building muscle from the rebounding exercising because it's a form of resistance training but still you would think I would show some loss in pounds at some stage or another.

Im so deflated.

Also back in March I was able to walk 1km is 15 to 20 minutes. I now able to do 1km in 10/11/12 minutes. So I'm definitely making progress with fitness.
My clothes ar getting bigger too for me and I'm gone down in size now too. Still no loss on the scales though.

So according to that, you have lost 22 pounds in just over 3 months? How does that equal no weight loss? I don’t know what you were expecting but normal healthy weight loss is around a pound or two a week which is seems you are hitting. It sounds like you’re doing good things with your diet and exercise too so I would say keep going. If anything, your diet seems a bit low as both the lunch and dinner seem quite light and insubstantial. At your weight you can eat quite a lot of calories and still lose weight. Find a TDEE and BMR calculator and log your food to make sure it’s lower than your TDEE. If you go too low you are more likely to fall off the wagon and your body also gets more fuel efficient and the weight loss slows down. If you start higher, you can then drop down a bit if the losses slow down.
In another three months you will have lost over 40 pounds if you carry on at the same rate. If you start at a high weight, it’s totally unrealistic that it will drop off immediately, especially if you have been heavy for a long time. Any quick fix or crash diet is likely to lead to regain whereas a lifestyle change like you have implemented will yield good results.
Well done and keep it up.

Also, if you’re fed up, that’s not a great sign of sustainability. You need a way of eating you can do for life which is why I suggest doing a proper calorie calculation and eating a sensible amount. If you have cucumber and a dip for lunch and then just a nutrigrain bar for tea, of course you’ll feel sick of eating like that after three months.

I don't know what you mean when you say you've had no weight loss - you've done brilliantly and lost 1.5 stone in 3 months? That's great weight loss, any more than that would be a crash diet which are proven to be really unhealthy and not lead to sustained weight loss in the long term.

Like PP, I also think you could tweak your diet to make it a bit more enjoyable/liveable with and continue to lose weight. Paleo' / 'caveman' diets are very popular and superficially seem to make sense, but from everything science/anthropology tells is (a) cavemen or people who live in hunter/gatherer would absolutely not have eaten lots of meat and eggs, these things would not have been available in abundance and hunting requires a really high energy output to catch a bird, fish or animal compared to the energy gained, so 'caveman' diets were probably actually quite low in protein and high in sugar/carb albeit unrefined carb (b) cavemen were really, really unhealthy compared to modern man! They had a super low life expectancy - so why would you try to replicate that - compared to your parents generation's sooo unhealthy diet which will probably mean they are the healthiest, longest lived generation ever! I really wouldn't pay any credence to online stuff that recommends paleo or clean eating as a healthy diet. I do agree that lots of refined carbohydrates and sugars are not the healthiest but nor are they the devil, a healthy diet should mean you can eat everything in moderation...

Personally I think the 'best'/healthiest diet to follow is a Mediterranean diet which has lots of fish, vegetables, fruits, beans, pulses, unsaturated fats and wholegrain carbs, perhaps combined with some intermittent fasting for weight loss. Check out the 5:2 board for more information - or, alternatively, if you do want to stick with the low-carb, there is the long running 'bootcamp' which is a more moderate, sensible way of doing low carb for weight loss.

I've been doing this since the middle of March, so that's a 15 week journey. Since May, I'm up at 6am in the morning to get exercise in because I can't rely on free time in the evening. My diet hs been cleaned up big time. My weight loss is more like 20 pounds.

I stepped on the scales this morning and the reading was 98kg. That's 15 stone 4 pounds.

I'm so disappointed. I'm putting in so much work and effort into clean eating and exercise and I don't even have a 2 stone weight loss in the 4 months since I started. Seeing 15 stone on the scales would have been epic and a huge boost for me but no - 15 stone 4 pounds.

Honestly, you need to not fixate so much on the scales. Weight loss is a marathon not a sprint and you can't hit a fixed target like 15 stone to order and get so demoralised when you don't, it's just a random number at the end of the day. What matters is whether you feel healthier and happier, and that your overall trend line is downwards.

You honestly cannot expect to lose more than 1-2 lbs a week on average and sustain it, and the key word there is 'average', next week you might lose 4lbs but the week after lose nothing. Does this mean you were really 'good' one week and 'bad' the next, no of course not, food is food and even with the strictest calorie counting your body won't process it like a machine, you can't attach moral value or beat yourself up over it. What you do need to do is form healthy habits you can stick with for the rest of your life! Chin up and stick with it!

You are losing weight at a rate of more than a pound a week on average and keeping this up for several months. This is most peoples idea of a huge success! You should congratulate yourself that you are doing so well.

That's a really good weight loss. I wouldn't be unhappy with that. I'd be thinking how well I'd done 😊

Are you drinking plenty of water and sleeping ok? Both key parts of weight loss.

Honestly I can shit 4lb OP. I also retain water before my period and lose it afterwards. Time of day and time of month make a difference to your weight. You’ve probably gained some muscle too because you’re exercising. Reset your expectations - a pound a week is good progress and you’ve lost 20lb in 15 weeks.

You are absolutely killing it! You should be so happy, the rate you are losing weight is sustainable and healthy. Seriously, well done. Weigh yourself each week then forget about it. You’ll be toning up loads and have probably gone down a few dress sizes.keep it up!

I more fluid in my body movements. I feel stronger in my thighs. I'm waking quicker. I feel fantastic and it shows too.

I've noticed over the past few months, the weight loss creeps up one. There might be no movement in the scales then it all shows together with 4/5/6 pounds down.

I'm drinking loads of water. Before meals and after meals.

Sleep is OK. Not the best. The problem is, I may not be t my goal step count towards the end of the day and I go out walking later. I think it's this habit of walking later that has me not sleeping well.

So 15 stone would be great but 15 stone 4 lb is a disaster? Don't let 4lb be the make or break of your happiness and resolve.

OP how much did you think you would lose? There are some diets where you lose more, like Cambridge. I don’t know many who have done them and haven’t put the weight back on. Slow and steady is the only one likely to be sustainable. Eat some proper food, don’t eat nutrigrain bars for your dinner, be consistent and you will continue to get good results.

It’s great that you’ve noticed physical changes too. They are what matters, not the number on the scale.

Measuring yourself daily might show more peaks and troughs? Water retention, salt, muscles, hormones - all these things show huge fluctuations on my charts. It's the overall change that matters. 4lb could easily be too much salt the other day.

Are you measuring yourself with a tape measure too?

I echo the pp's suggestion of Mediterranean diet, its healthy as well as a way of losing weight.