Stress affecting weight loss

[pumpkintits]

I've never really given it much thought, but since January I have been trying to lose weight and not been successful (I'm actually heavier) and I'm starting to think stress may have some hand in it.

I've tried Slimpod, calorie counting, OMAD, 16:8 + exercise and nothing seems to work.

Has anyone experienced this where they were doing everything right on paper but they were stressed and couldn't lose weight? I feel like I'm making excuses for myself but when I track what I eat, I know I am not eating enough to gain the amount of weight I have.

I'm also struggling with how I can reduce stress when I cannot quit my job/sell the kids/afford a cleaner. And I'm so obsessed with my weight, hating myself and thinking about how awful I look that it makes me MORE stressed.

I know I need to chuck the scales out and start from scratch, but I feel so pissed off that I have been doing everything I can for over 10 months and I'm still fat.

Would love to hear other people's opinions/experiences around stress and weight loss.

Scientifically you cannot gain weight without consuming enough to gain it from, you’re effectively saying you can get fat on fresh air. You cannot. If you consume less than you expend then you cannot gain weight.

There is a wealth of evidence out there if you can be bothered to look,

to what end? To justify that second biscuit?

Track everything and be disciplined OP. It can really help to forward plan with calories tracked. You could well not be in a calorie deficit. The only way you'll lose weight is by taking in fewer calories than you expend. How you achieve that might take some trial and error to find what you can deal with.

Weight loss is around 90% down to diet. Do you get outside every day for fresh air? Can you go for a walk? 10 to 15 minutes a day will be beneficial for your mental and physical health if you're not doing any exercise at the moment. You can build up to more activity. It's really beneficial to health.

My own experience of the effect of stress has been that I just wasn't able to handle achieving weight loss on top of everything I was dealing with. My sleep was disrupted, I was having lots of migraines (more than usual) and although I was regularly going to the gym, I wasn't effectively tracking my calories and macros and my willpower was shot when it came to resisting eating too much. I put on the weight I had lost two years earlier and was back where I started.

If you can do something to mitigate the stress you are under it will be a lot easier. My stress went overnight due to an external change and I was back to being able to change my eating habits. I've lost a stone and have at least another to go, depending on how my gym works go as I do weight training - I'll look at inch loss on the tape measure too.

I suggest you set yourself smaller goals. Can you lose 7lbs and keep that off for a few weeks. Then lose another 7lbs. Then build in more exercise, etc. Don't put the pressure of losing all the weight at once on yourself.

Are you getting enough sleep. Lack of sleep hinders weight loss.

Try to up your water intake, up your protein as it keeps you feeling full longer, lower your fat and carbs. If you persist it will go. I'm on a diet but also using Ozempic and I've found buying skinny burgers and sausages instead of normal burgers and sausages, using fry light to cook scrambled egg instead of a knob of butter, switching to skimmed milk, low fat cheese and smaller portion sizes especially less spaghetti have all made a difference. You know you can do it because you've done it before but remember it gets harder as you get older. You need less calories as you age. I bought myself a smaller plate because I found it hard to have a normal size plate and it had to be half empty. A smaller plate that looks fuller is better. I'm a fussy eater and I don't like salad or many different vegetables so I just eat lots of peas, carrots and swede.

There’s always one… 🙄 The whole point is not reaching for any biscuits and still not losing weight.

But that’s not the point, you don’t loose weight just because you stopped eating biscuits, you lose weight when in calorie deficit.

geneuinly, think of some of the most stressful times in history where people were not able to access food. Surely you know they didn’t get fat?

think about how illogical what you’re posting is, you cannot get fat or stay fat without consuming more calories than your expend. Your body cannot turn air to fat.

I'm so appreciative of all your replies, some really practical advice here I will take onboard.

I'm early 30s with 2 children. I used to do over 10,000 steps nearly everyday easily when my youngest was a baby as I would take her out in the pram to nap and walk everywhere.

Now we have a car, kids are in school, I work more I barely move at all. Looking at my phone steps I had one day last week where I walked over 8000 steps.

My first promise to myself is to walk more. I'm not making this a target for weight loss but for mental health as I really think it will help. On day so far and we are in the car to somewhere new, took a packed lunch so I can't go off kilter in a cafe and we are going to explore and get the steps in.

Went out for a walk last night and oldest DD asked if she could come as loves walking in the dark. We walked for over an hour, chatted and were very silly and it was just so nice to get some fresh air and spend time with her without any screens around.

Well you explain then how it was I was consuming 1200 or lower cals a day, religiously logged and weighed, and exercising and yet still gained weight? When the only other factor was acute stress?

The only humanly possible explanation is you under estimated your calorie intake or had a physical medical problem that was significant.

Def didn’t underestimate - have nine months’ worth of sodding cal counting app data to prove it! No underlying health issue apart from acute stress.

If you didn't lose weight but didn't put weight on when eating 1200 calories a day that suggests 1200 calories a day is your maintenance calories. If you've been completely honest with yourself and logged everything you've eaten or drunk then that's the explanation. You then need to move more to increase your calorie expenditure and drink more water too as that helps with bodily functions.

If you used MFP and ate back your exercise calories expended that's another explanation. Never eat back exercise calories as they are wildly overestimated by devices and far more personalised.

@QueenieMe but you’re on another thread in the summer saying you’ve lost almost a stone on this diet.

Yes the way an individual may respond to stress may involve wanting more calorie laden foods but if there was no change to their diet and only an increase in stress then no… this will not lead to weight gain

By saying

it literally does not matter how well I eat or exercise, if I’m stressed I will put on weight is nonsense and an excuse

thankfully the op doesn’t seem to have been sucked in by that notion going by her last post

good luck op. It’s a good start not resigning yourself to the idea that stress somehow means it’s hopeless to make dietary changes

Also as you lose weight, your TDEE goes down. Therefore you need to drop your calorie intake to keep losing.

The stress will affect the composition of your gut microbiome which will in turn affect your weight.

You need to focus on a gut healthy diet - lots of fermented food, low/no ultra processed food, plenty of fibre.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41380-022-01817-y