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!

This is a good read re diet and weight loss, aimed at Type 2 diabetes but apples to simple weight loss

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/1916093779/ref=pe_27063361_485629781_TE_item

I really am never hungry so sometimes I find I’ve forgotten lunch (more calories for dinner ie call me three steak Pam) which never used to happen before, I was always starving.

I have noticed this since stopping eating rubbish carbs, after a week avoiding them my appetite was much more normal, no longer ravenous, more peckish by lunchtime

I lose weight on 1500 cals. If you were losing at 1400 why did you reduce that? It just doesn't make sense unless you are really short. Are you truly putting every morel on MDP? And ignore eating back exercise calories - MFP hugely over estimates calories burned

I could have written this post OP. In 2020, for health reasons I decided to overhaul my diet and lifestyle. Whole foods, more vegetables, greater variety, quality meals. I added exercise, cardio and strength training several times a week plus active recovery with yoga.
My weight started slowing creeping up, but I blamed it on being over 40, everyone says it’s so much harder to lose weight over 40, right?

Finally in 2023 I had enough. I put on 10 kilos (I’m small so it showed a lot) just by eating healthy and doing exercise, I figured out I must have been doing something wrong.
I started counting calories and I’m very, very honest with myself. I log absolutely everything, I measure oil with a spoon, I measure milk for my coffee with a 100 ml ikea cup and I weigh absolutely everything. I don’t snack by just grabbing stuff from the fridge anymore because it’s hard to control, I make a small snack meal and eat it at the table. When eating out I exercise damage control, always assuming the worst case scenario in my app (I use Yazio). I have treats and I have not given up sugar completely but I don’t have cheat days and I don’t stuff myself during weekends.
My extra kilograms just disappeared. It was the easiest thing to do. I have been maintaining my weight loss since December and with my activity level I have to eat a bit over 2000 kcal otherwise I keep losing weight. I am not on any specific diet, no low carb, just healthy meals full of seasonal vegetables. I eat many more than 30 plants a week.

I’ve lost my weight on a very small deficit, usually 100-300 a day, but I kept logging absolutely everything.

Well that's great for you. Well.done.

I ate 1400 calories 8 years ago, pre menopause. Eating 1400 calories now makes me gain weight, as I explained.

If a 5’7” female at 13 stone gains weight eating 1400 calories a day whilst feeling great and walking 10,000 steps a day then there is a very serious underlying medical condition. I’d get that checked out if I were you.

Nope. I do not have a serious underlying condition. I know that because last year I had absolutely everything tested after breaking bones easily. Apart from the beginnings of osteopenia there is absolutely nothing wrong with me.

It's Friday. I weigh 13.1 this morning despite sticking to 1000 calories a day this week and upping my walking. So that's just maintained my existing weight. Even if I ate a bit more than a 1000 cals by mistake once or twice, because of not weighing properly I can't possibly have ever eaten more than at the very most 1400 cals maybe once.

I am actually beginning to think that my scales are broken!

Did you find any underlying medical reason for your low bone density? I am wondering if this could also cause the weight gain e.g poor absorption of nutrients through something like caeliacs?

No just age. Vit D was a bit low. Thyroid normal. Bloods normal.

I don't have any symptoms of coeliac disease.

There are not always any symptoms at all.

https://www.nhs.uk/conditions/coeliac-disease/symptoms/#:~:text=Symptoms%20of%20coeliac%20disease%20can,because%20complications%20can%20still%20occur.

Low bone density however can be a symptom of it.
https://www.coeliac.org.uk/information-and-support/coeliac-disease/conditions-linked-to-coeliac-disease/osteoporosis/#:~:text=People%20with%20coeliac%20disease%20may,coeliac%20disease%20at%20any%20age.

Do you weigh your food? What are you eating?

Usually takes me 10-14 days before I see any loss on the scales. Keep going as it looks like you’ve only ber. Doing the 1,000 a day since Monday - you should see some loss by about week 2 plus make sure you’re moving to at the very least 10k steps a day.

It IS true. The slowing down and others factors help you eat less so you consume less calories.

I’m older than you and find it hard to lose. But, I’ve lost over four pounds in a week with the 5:2 fast. Exercise will not help you lose weight in the short term. I do not exercise on fasting days, it just makes me Hungry. Obviously exercise is good for fitness but I don’t prioritise it while trying to shift some pounds.

Of course exercise helps you lose weight. True you can’t outrun a bad diet but if you’re reducing your calorie deficit with food intake and increasing your calorie burn with exercise you’ll lose more weight than doing no exercise.

it really is simple maths 👌

I'm sure exercise will help. It's important whatever, so I will continue my walking

I mean, I can only go by my home country where obeisty is only at about 20% of the female population over a certain age as opposed to over 40% in the UK for the same sex/age. Older women tend not to do any gymming/exercise aside from walking either back home - it's purely down to diet. I would entirely put it down to the ingredients and quality of ingredients available to buy. Over here in the UK, we simply don't have access to the same extraordinarily healthy foods at the same low level of cost. It;s also very, very easy to make extremely low fat/low calorie foods back home. We tradiionally eat far less fried foods, and almost no "oven foods" (because we don't have ovens like the West does, we tend to have little countertop mini "oven" units that only do tiny portions of things). It's literally fish, soups, vegetables, tofu, pickles and the occasionally fried meat item. I put on so much weight living in the UK, even trying to cook foods like I do back home.

Yup, I understand simple maths. What I said was that on very low cal days of 500 calories, exercise makes me hungry and so is counter productive. I hit the gym in the other days.

OP i am so sorry you are struggling like this.

I'm 5ft6 and i've been eating around 1200-1400 cals a day for the past fortnight and have lost two kg. I really want to lose another two in the next fortnight.

I can only see that the difference is that I have been lifting weights (not super heavy, usually 5-8kg dumbells) for the past ten years. I am therefore very toned and dense and perhaps use more cals that you due to the existing muscle.

I can also walk further as I don't have broken bones healing. I try to do at least 10000 FAST steps a day plus a weights workout such as bodyfit by amy on youtube.

My diet includes a lot of fat free Greek yoghurt, very very dark chocolate, milk for coffee, tons of salad, fruit, eggs and chicken breast. I do sometimes hit the wafer thin ham.

I don't count veg generally, though I did count the edemame beans I had for breakfast, who knew they were so calorific?!?

I appreciate you are healing, could you get some dumbells and do some chair workouts? There are loads on YouTube, I tried them when I had a bad achilles problem.

I always exercise when dieting, even if I'm doing the 5:2, it kills hours when you are just trying to get through the day so you can sleep and stop thinking about food 😂

I should have said, I started at 10.7 st and I am 46 and on HRT. Peri meno hasnt affected my ability to lose weight at all.

Just going on your statement of "exercise will not help you lose weight in the short term"

I agree that on low calorie days it can be counterproductive and I have to be careful not to do too much exercise when I am restricting calories as it just makes me hungry.

However getting the balance right which after 4 years I know now exactly what I have to do, it is absolutely key for me when trying to lose weight.

I lost weight pretty easily at 46 and then again at 51. A few years of menopause seems to have made it more difficult.

But yes, weights would be good. I used to do them.