Totally fed up. 57 and can't lose weight on 1000 cals a day! Is there any point dieting if you don't want injections!

[Suenami]

I am feeling totally miserable about my weight and wondering what the point of trying to diet is when everyone seems to be on the injections and losing tons of weight.

At Christmas I was about 2 stone overweight. I'm 57 and menopausal. Since then I've lost 10lbs through calorie counting and upping my exercise - I broke my shoulder last year and then cracked a bone in my foot, so I've been limited in what I can do.

For the last 2 months I have - as evidenced by MFP - eaten between 800 and 1200 calories a day and I've started walking briskly for 30 mins a day. I've lost 1lb.

I keep gaining and losing the same pound, I'm eating very little and not eating until 12.30pm. I don't drink during the week and often not at the weekend.

And I've just seen photos of myself and I look huge.

My friend is on Wegovy and has lost nearly 3 stone in the last few months. I dont want and can't afford injections but feel totally miserable.

Why is my body doing this??? I've kept a log of MFP and about 8 years ago I did a few months at 1400 cals a day and lost a stone! If I ate 1400 calories a day now I would put on weight. I'm on HRT.

I eat healthily, loads of green veg, protein etc. Ironically I am happier and more energetic than I've been for ages, until I think about my weight!

Yeah maybe I'm delulu. Seriously I guess I must be eating more than I think.

Maybe dh is pouring milkshakes down me in my sleep

It sounds like no way to live, OP.

I am able to eat 2,000-2,200 calories a day now I have lost the weight I needed to.

I still exercise about 700-800 active calories a day on top of my TDEE of about 1500.

How do you use MFP? That might sound patronising but are you picking other people's entries or are you entering everything in yourself? Are you scanning packet codes etc? Do you list every ingredient and calorie that you put into a family meal i.e. family shepherds pie and then portion it correctly?

@Suenami I cannot speak for you, but I KNOW that I have a bad habit of consumnig calories without noticing. eg finishing off that last spoonful in the pan when I'm cleaning up. Or cutting off a piece of fat that the DC don't like and popping it in my mouth. Or using more oil when I'm cooking. Not fully accounting for the calories in a flat white with 2 sugars etc.

Well funnily enough I haven't felt this healthy in a long time, so clearly the mountains of veg and the homemade kefir are doing something! But yes, a nicer way to live would be to be able to have a few glasses of wine and some cake a few times a week without piling on the pounds.

Yeah maybe. Ill keep a strict eye on myself

It is very common, we all do it and as we know they all bloomin well add up!

I eat absolutely everything and anything I want, cake, crisps, sourdough bread with peanut butter, chocolate, ice cream - you name it I eat it and on a daily basis BUT I account for everything and log it into MFP, even when I am not dieting I still log to see how much I am eating and what I have to stick to to ensure I don't put on the weight again.

I am not slim, 5'7" and 11 stone, size 12-14 but I am happy enough at this weight and don't want to go up to nearly 15 stone again so I just monitor it to make sure it doesn't go over my TDEE.

read "why we eat too much" by Andrew Jenkinson. I mentioned it up thread. He explains very clearly why you are struggling to lose weight, and what to do about it. And this is all up to date peer reviewed mainstream science, not faddy diets or anything

Apologies if this has already been asked, I haven't read every post, but all of yours.

What are you cooking your omelette and mushroom in? Any oil or fat? Do you weight the few berries and the yoghurt. You say you make and have your own kefir, but it's not on your list? Are you actually weighing and measuring your food every time or do you think you know what 25g cheese looks like and just eyeball it?

At any point during your weight loss journey, have you taken your body measurements and not just weighed yourself?

Are you drinking plenty of water?

Which is what? Can you summarise please?

That isn't what Fast 800 is. You start on 800 calories a day to kick start things then go onto 5:2 which is basically a Mediterranean diet with two restricted calories days. How long you stay on 800 calories a day depends on how overweight you are. 800 calories is proven to be the lowest you can go and still get sufficient nutrients and it has real health benefits.

Suggest to revisit your calorie counting and weighing food portions.

1000 calories a day is too low are you burning muscle rather than fat? Or are our building muscle (which is denser) rather than reduce fat?

I made up a spreadsheet to monitor my calories but also includes fibre protein sigar etc (everything you see on the side of food boxes). Once I had found what combinations of food equaled my 1500 calories a day target, the weight dropped off albeit slow and steady.

I think a session with a personal trainer where you can go over your injuries and figure out weight training exercises that will help with long term rehab and improve your strength would be REALLY beneficial to you. I am one of those annoying people who will tell you that doing weight training has changed my body and my relationship with it - I used to struggle to lose weight at 1200 calories, now I eat probably 1800 - 2000 a day on average.
What I will say is, when I was at 1200 calories and I had plateaued in weight loss for a few weeks, I ate maintenance calories for a week then went back to 1200 and it always helped. No idea if the science holds up on this one!

I tried absolutely everything to lose weight for over 6 years. Wegovy has done it, but it's taken me over a year to lose 3 and a half stone.

You are eating very little- about 900 calories in the example you gave. I think maybe go to the GP if you are eating that amount every day.

@Suenami switch to nutricheck or better yet cronometer. Both much more accurate than MFP.
i’ve spotted so many inconsistent entries in mfp I found their count unreliable.
packaged food labels are legally allowed to be off by 10% and with the diet culture I can guarantee you the 10% isn’t going to be on the higher value side.
pizza is salt, salt will have you retain water for up to 3 days.

Don't get hung up on daily fluctuations, its just water weight that can go up and down depending on if you've eaten too much salt or are dehydrated you have to take the average loss for the week and month.

Make sure you measure absolutley everything, if it goes in your mouth in goes on the MFP diary. Don't guess, also I get tripped up when I nick a few of husbands crisps or finish my kids leftovers. It all adds up.

Be really accurate with drinks and condiments, make sure you properly measure milk for your coffee don't just put it down as "splash of milk" another of my problems was underestimating how much peanut butter I was putting on my toast, I thought I used a teaspoon it was 4 times as much when I actually weighed it.

You have done really well with your 10 pound loss OP please don't get put off by the daily fluctuations. Just measure, weigh and log absolutley everything and you'll do fine.

I would say you're eating too little, causing your body to hold onto stored fat.

Your basal metabolic rate is 1443. That's the minimum you need at total rest. For a sedentary lifestyle, you need 1732.

If you've been heavily restricting for a while (months), then your body will stop losing - it thinks there's a shortage of food, so hangs on to stored fat so you can stay alive until food is restored.

Try increasing up to 1700 but high protein - aim for 150g per day. Carbs and fats are less important than calories and protein.

Do you have a step counter? Take your average weekly steps and increase by 500. Then increase that every four weeks.

Final point is exercise and for this you want weight training. You can do things at home - I signed up for Henley Fitness Wiggle Your Bits which is free and I now do her paid gym programme which is 8 weeks for £160 gonlune group personal training. She's rather sweary so not for everyone but I find the advice really down to earth and accessible. I've heard Caroline Girvan on YouTube is good. Obviously with injuries, take it easy, do what you can. Are you seeing a physio for your shoulder? The weight training will build muscle, you WON'T end up looking like a body builder, but you will get slimmer plus muscle burns calories faster than fat which means you will slim without starving yourself.

I initially lost doing this, now my weight loss has stalled BUT I've lost a dress size on my bottom half and look a lot better. I look more 'toned' than I did at a lower weight without the strength training. And I'm eating at maintenance because I got fed up not being able to have a glass of wine now and again!

Before seeing a personal trainer, I would probably get the advice of a physiotherapist to discuss what exercises are 'safe' for your injury and fitness levels, and they will also tell you exercises that you should avoid to prevent you exacerbating your previous injuries.

I am a tiny bit younger than you, but I find if I don't drink enough water during the day, my weight loss slows right down, especially on busy stressful days, or if its warm ( fat chance of that at the moment ! ) I also get constipated quite quickly if I don't drink plenty, which again slows the weight loss. I find I am less hungry when well hydrated too.

Something I have noticed about weight loss as I have aged, it isn't as linear as it used to be, I can have a week or two where I don't lose actual pounds on the scales, but feel less bloated, clothes feel less snug and then whoosh I will wake up one morning and the scales say I have lost 5lbs !

It is, and expensive. I am weighing every ingredient that goes into my 2 small meals a day, I am 100% under 1200 calories every day, some days I'm.barely eating half that.

Mounjaro is suppressing my appetite and the delayed gastric emptying is real, I'm struggling with constipation so doubling laxatives I already take (prescribed)

I dispute the calories in/calories out argument where there is an undiagnosed medical issue which I belive to be a combination of thyroid and cortisol in my case.

In my early 30's I had a brief, acute eating disorder brought on by a traumatic event. I didn't eat for a month save for a few bits of water melon and coffee milkshakes. The weight fell off and I went into ketosis, my body was eating itself. I think from then on my metabolism was screwed leading to onward chronic weight issues, despite not eating huge amounts.

My family and friends that know me know I don't eat to match the weight I am, the weight loss Injections are purely desperation now.

Re Hashimotos if you have some of the symptoms I'd advise doing a private blood test to test for antibodies. GPs won't do this but it's really important. Untreated Thyroid issues will make weight loss extremely difficult.

OP, I sound similar to you, though a few years younger.

I’m having a lot of success with WeightWatchers - not groups, just doing the app. I’ve lost half a stone in four weeks having tried for years and not lost anything at all. DP (who is also a menopausal woman!) is finding the same.

I’m doing resistance training too and think finding a personal trainer is a great idea.

It does sound to me like you’re not eating enough.

You are actually not eating enough..Your body thinks it's starving itself and therefore storing fat for energy..
Then you loose some weight... then you continue on your low calories so it again your body thinks its being starved..Asked to see a nutritionist at your GPs

I’m currently a member of Rebelfit. His current hormonal challenge covers all this and the roles of hormones in weight management. Basically cortisol and lessening oestrogen is not a great combination, and this challenge is all about managing stress hormones that cause weight gain.

I don't have any thyroid symptoms.

I absolutely do not believe that my body is somehow miraculously 'holding onto fat' either.

I think I am probably eating more calories than I think, and that my hormones and age mean it's harder to lose weight.

I am not particularly stressed either, so don't really buy the cortisol thing, although that seems to be the latest obsession on social media.

Why would your body not adapt to the conditions it assesses itself to be in? ie - famine. Of course your metabolism will slow down, and your body will conserve calories, it is a survival mechanism.