Would any other slow losers like a half a pound a week solidarity thread?

[thenewaveragebear1983]

I am such a sloooooooow loser and peri menopause has pretty much killed it off. If I am left to my own devices I naturally eat exactly my maintenance calories, and to undercut by 500 a day feels like such a hardship. I exercise regularly, get my steps, cook from scratch and it’s not enough any more.

please don’t suggest weight loss meds. I’m not eligible and I couldn’t afford them anyway.

my strategy is 1500 cals a day, good quality food with as little UPF and sugar as possible, increase veg intake, get an extra walk in after dinner, and reduce my alcohol intake. It’s all very simple stuff really. A half pound a week will add up to 21lbs by the time I go on holiday next summer 👙

anyone else feel the same?

I had a rubbish night sleep last night, and I was up early and I have really tired all day, almost hungover but I didn’t actually drink this weekend! In the end I just leaned into it and decided not to push myself to do anything too strenuous. I’ve eaten probably my tdee and have done a couple of dog walks.

however I am going to try to start the week positively so to reflect on the positives: no alcohol this weekend! Did a run yesterday, and walked both days, I have meal prepped for next week’s breakfast and lunches and made soup. Even though I have had more calories I haven’t had as much as I normally would have due to no alcohol and I have also tracked everything.

my breakfast this week will be baked oats which I made today, with protein yoghurt, and lunches are chicken and brocolli which I also prepped today, will add salad and mayo. I have lentil soup for snack and some leftover chicken and sausages for protein snacks

@thenewaveragebear1983 that sounds like a super positive start to the week. I don’t know bout you but I’m starting to realised that sometimes I’m so hard on myself for not being perfect. If I’m not perfect I give in which then makes everything a billionty times worse.

I reset a bit yesterday and just ate normal healthy meals. Feel a lot better this morning and have weighed in at 10st12. That’s the same as last week so I’m actually really pleased with that.

Not sure about the Zoe app yet. Quite like the picture rather than typing and it’s quite clever. I’m going to use it this week to try and take a picture before I eat to work on the mindful eating thing.

@WhitegreeNcandle there was an interesting article in the guardian called Vegan plus bacon about this very idea, it’s something I actually read about a long time ago but apparently it’s becoming a social media trend; the idea that you don’t have to be 100% perfect and faultless all the time. I don’t know why this concept needs to be ‘trending’ but hey, 🤷‍♀️ I find the current narrative really hard sometimes, it’s like nothing is enough and it can be demoralising.

I had a good day today, stuck to my food plan 100% and ended up exactly on my goal , and 106g protein. 2 dog walks and bootcamp. It definitely helped prepping my meals in advance, I didn’t have to think about it at all. Tomorrow is my office day and I will take my lunch and fruit plus i like to leave a couple of apples in my car for the journey home

Sounds like a good day well done.

I ate really well yesterday and avoided the 9pm munchies so really pleased. Also did a new strength workout. Have started a 6 week programme and I’m aiming to do 3 per week. I’ve been doing 2 per week for the last bit of the last 6 week block and starting to notice some definition. Miniscule but there!

Today’s plan:
b - overnight oats with blueberries
L - super grain salad from the bbc website with smoked mackeral
tea - chicken poke bowl
plus a strength this evening.

Have a good day

Can I ask please, what do people think of having one day per week when you deliberately eat less than normal?

Obviously, I am eating a calorie deficit anyway when losing weight, but I have one week day when I am at home and less physically active and I thought of only eating one meal and one snack that day; say a main meal for lunch with protein and veg and a small serving of carbs , and some fruit at 5 pm and that’s it.

There’s a lot of emphasis on consistency atm so I’m worried it will cause me to fall off the wagon? At the same time, I really could do with kick starting this weight loss positively at the beginning while sticking to slow and steady overall, if that makes sense?

@Shavedfennel56789 i kind of do that when I do a fast on a Friday. The problem is I just eat extra calories when I’ve finished the fast, (which is totally not the point I know)

I think the old 5:2 method was widely accepted to be fairly successful (although I found it came with the caveat that you still have to calorie count the 5 days, and eating a Mediterranean diet overall was better) but that gave you 800 calories on 2 days and “eat normally” the rest. I have also heard of people doing a 24 hour fast so going from eg. Dinner at 6pm on day one to dinner at 6.30pm on day 2 then resuming normal eating on day 3 etc, with some success.

I just don’t get on with fasting really. It feels a bit ‘starvation diet’ for me but I can see that it works for some as a tool to increase your deficit over the week.

Tuesday is my office day and is typically a pretty challenging day, I don’t get a walk as my dog goes to daycare and I spend all day in meetings and leave feeling really frazzled and overwhelmed. Today none of that was different but I guess I just braced myself and when I got home i went for a walk to get some steps in. For dinner I had a lamb steak, merchant gourmet lentils, and salad, and a protein yogurt. I have gone over my calories allowance (more like my tdee of 2000) but everything I have eaten has been actual food and I’ve had 160g protein! I have a headache, I need some water and a nice hot bath I think.

Sounds like a good day @thenewaveragebear1983 I’m normally pretty active and when I have to do an office day I really feel lethargic

I’d love to join if I can? I’m in peri and weigh about a stone more than I did before. Same as OP, I just can’t lose anything even though I (mostly!) eat healthily and I exercise regularly.

I can eat 1600 a day calories for weeks and then one weekend break where I’m eating out and any loss is immediately undone. Anyway, I’m aiming for slow loss too - I want to lose 13 pounds and I reckon it could take 6 months to a year.

I'd love to join please!

It's taken me 5 weeks of very strict calorie counting to lose... 1.7kg. Sob.

Depressing.

I'm averaging 1450kcal a day and cannot cut more or I feel unwell.

I have a total of 1 stone to lose.

I'm not overweight technically but I am short and looking soft/chubby after gaining this weight after a hysterectomy 4 months ago, and being unable to exercise.

Am now determined to get toned, be fitter than before and lose fat!

Yes, that is exactly what I am worried about!
I can totally see myself doing that.

Perhaps best just to focus on building very slow and boring but consistent habits?

@Shavedfennel56789 if you are on nutracheck I think you can actually have a 5:2 set up and select your fast days/ lower calories days which could be helpful for tracking.

welcome @SeriouslyGotTheTshirt and @TakeTheDog. The slow lose/ fast gain cycle is so hard isn’t it? I weigh myself a couple of times a week and I can easily have bobbed up 6lbs on one weigh in. I sometimes wonder if it’s just that my scales are rubbish but I don’t think it is

I ache so much after Mondays fitness test that I think it’s unlikely I will run today because I’m too stiff. I will walk the dog a couple of times though, she’s enjoying the extra one after work, and I will try to get onto my home gym for a yoga session maybe. I am not sleeping well at the moment, really struggling to sleep and then awake multiple times with night sweats last night. They are awful, the worst part of peri I think. I am on HRT so maybe I need to adjust my oestrogen dose.

food today is planned- baked oats and yogurt, lunch is lentil soup and then chicken brocolli and salad, and dinner is a traybake with Schwartz seasoning mix of some description. Should come in around my calorie goal.

I love a lentil soup. It’s called get well soup in my house as generations of women in my family have made it for children when poorly. Full of garlic and onion! Roll on autumn.

Im buzzing at the moment. Using the Zoe app has made me focus a bit more on quality of food. I’ve not restricted amounts at all, just trying to eat 3 healthy meals with lots of veg. And I have so much energy. Well as much as a 45 year old working mum can I reckon! I’ve also just got my period and normally an angry bloated hormonal mess. But I’m feeling pretty good so whether it’s the weight training or the diet I’m going to carry on with both!

today’s menu was:
b - overnight oats with blueberries, flax and chia seeds
l - quinoa salad with chicken
tea - beetroot risotto and broccoli.

Still feeling energized today. Meal plan today

B - overnight oats
L - ham sandeich
T - quiche and salad. Or maybe beef chilli. Not so sure.

No exercise today but will try and fit in a dog walk and blackberry pick.

How is everyone getting on?

@WhitegreeNcandleI am glad you’re feeling so good, I found the Zoe plan really uplifting as well. I hated the app and it was too expensive, but actually I did feel good on the plan, and interestingly on reflection I did not keep it up after quitting the app so clearly the “game” works too. I also love soup, I’m not great at making it, and tend to go for thicker heavier soups, but they can be hard to calorie count.

can’t believe it’s Thursday again, these weeks thunder on past don’t they? I am definitely going to run today, it’s going to be a beautiful day, and also tomorrow. Today I have baked oats, yogurt and fruit, lunch will be soup and some sort of protein/salad and dinner will be mince with fajita spices and beans with rice and veg.

@WhitegreeNcandle I'd love the recipe for your lentil soup if you're happy to share!

And I wanted to say I always find my hormones are happier when I'm routinely exercising and eating well. Alcohol is a trigger unfortunately too.

I've eaten at maintenance for the past 2 days because I've been so hungry - it's made a difference and I'm feeling better now, so I'll eat at a defecit again from now.

Exercise wise I'm aiming for:
100km a week Zone 2 rides on Zwift
40 min weight workout every other day
1x 5k jog a week, more if I feel like it
12-15k steps a day

A typical defecit day menu
Breakfast - eggs & Veg
Lunch - Tuna salad & apple
Dinner - homemade chicken thai with sweet potato
Snack - Kefir yoghurt with cacao, flax, chai seeds and blueberries
Usually comes in at 1450kcal

With exercise I'm burn around 1900kcal a day, my TDEE is 1250.

It's painfully slow to lose!

5 weeks in and I'm still only at 1.7kg loss.

@TakeTheDog what calorie “allowance” do you go for daily? My Garmin calorie count puts me at about 2000 a day and I find that more accurate than the calculators, after all it is on my arm every day. It’s interesting if I do a strenuous workout I tend to cut back on other places, my overall weekly burn is usually the same. I have my nutracheck set to 1550 a day which should give me a 1lb loss ish each week, but it doesn’t really work out that way. I don’t show my exercise calories in my tracker anymore, eg I don’t allow any of them back except if I do a really long run

I am 5’7 and weigh 11.6 which is bmi 24-25 so just on the cusp of normal/overweight

Garmin is well known for overestimating calorie burn so I always take it as a very general guide

But like you say, not eating back exercise kcals is definitely key

To lose 0.5lb a week I aim to eat a max of 1400-1450kcals a day. I'm much shorter than you at 5'1!

My bmi was 24.4 five weeks ago, 23.6 now after 1.7kg loss.

It’s so hard to know, I find my Garmin fairly accurate in terms of relativity - eg, if I run 5k it says x calories, but if I run 5km of hill reps it definitely tracks more, same as if I do a hiit workout it ei be x calories but if I do it with a dumbbell it will be more. I think it does base on your exertion/heart rate to an extent (unlike Fitbit where they count ironing as swimming and all exercise calories is just a straight x cals per minute, even if you forget to stop your watch when you finish, it can’t tell). But definitely eating back exercise calories doesn’t work for weightloss. However, if I do a long run or a really hard workout I just have to eat more, or I can’t do it. It’s a cycle I get trapped in sometimes. I think to be honest it’s not my exercise cals that are out but my bmr, genuinely since turning 40 I think everything has just ground down to a stop and my actual calorie burn daily is about half what it was 🤣

such a long day today, I am doing a really boring technical piece of work that is very important and will be widely scrutinised and it’s just stressing me out and the need for 100% accuracy is killing me. I went for a lunch run which was nice but my legs are heavy and after 3km I just hated every step.

Tonight we’re having fajita mince and wedges and I made some bread 🤦‍♀️

I hope you're having a restful evening after the intense work!

Couldn't agree more - since hitting 40 my body has said 'here's an extra half stone you don't need'.

I used to be able to drop 2-4kg very very easily but not anymore.

It really is bloody hard when you're exercising and not wanting to eat those kcal back but your body needs fuel!!

It's such a balance.

I was trying for 1200-1300 kcals a day but I felt really heavy, tired and poorly so that didn't last long!

It's so frustrating having to count every calorie yet it comes off so slowly.

Interestingly this is the first week I haven’t counted calories in a long time but have lost the most!

That’s interesting @WhitegreeNcandle, I have often wondered about intuitive eating but I just know my appetite far exceeds my needs and I don’t trust myself. The only time I ever successfully lost weight without counting was when I did Whole30 and for 30 days ate no processed food or sugar - I felt amazing and lost 11lbs.
Do you think because you’re not tracking you are subconsciously eating less?

Friday is my official weigh in and I have maintained although last night I did have a couple of glasses of wine. I might weigh again tomorrow as I feel like I could have done a little better that that. The joys of slow losing eh?

I think that goes back to my earlier comment as well, I find certain things just ‘stick’ these days like a glass of wine or 2 will absolutely cause a gain even though the actual calories and actual weight of the wine even, are not anywhere near enough to cause the amount of gain.

@thenewaveragebear1983 totally get you about the sticking. 10 years ago I could still drink a fair bit and eat a lot at the weekend. But now I just bloat and retain the weight.

Im using the Zoe app and I find it’s motivating me to add healthy things. It’s doing a bit what Alan Carr did for me with smoking, makes me want the junk less.

So I had a treat tonight but it was cauliflower crisps (still unhealthy UPG but better than a bag of salt and vinegar twists!) and two squares of a properly nice chocolate. I’ve never had it before (and might not again at £6 a bar) but it told me to Melt on the tongue. Oh my days did that hit the spot!!

Morning all. Today’s meals:
B - scrambled eggs with spinach and tomatoes
L - broccoli and chickpea salad base - will add a protein. Maybe halloumi
T - aubergine chilli

A whole morning of gardening ahead!