Counting calories, exercising and gaining weight....

angaustinbrody

angaustinbrody

New member
I lost a significant amount of weight a few years ago (60 pounds) by eating around 1200 calories a day with ZERO exercise. Sure, I was 150 pounds, but I was all jiggly, had no more energy than I did when I was 60 pounds heavier. Got pregnant, gained back all of the weight and still haven't lost it and my youngest is almost 5!!

So this time I am doing things differently. I am eating more calories and exercising. I'm 5'7 and started at 212.2 lbs. I got down to 198 lbs with diet alone, sticking to 1600 calories a day. I started doing the couch to 5k program two weeks ago and am now almost done week 2. I am also doing the 30 day shred on days in between with one rest day a week. Todays weight.....201.4 lbs. I am consuming anywhere between 1500 and 1800 calories a day.

I have a hard time with salads or raw vegetables because I have a jaw problem. If I eat something that requires a lot of chewing, I pretty much need to do a pureed diet for about 3 days after to help out with the jaw pain. My breakfast is always the same, 1/4 cup homemade hemp heart granola soaked in 1 cup applesauce. Lunches are usually 3 or 4 ounces of a lean meat on a piece of bread with some fruit. Dinners are usually 3 or 4 oz of meat, 1/2 cup of brown rice/red potatoes/cous cous, and a vegetable. Snacks I generally stick to fruit or yogurt.

I am losing inches but I'm not sure if those inches lost were from before I started exercising or after. But as of today I'm down about 9 1/2 inches.

I just want to make sure I'm doing this right because this is the LAST time I'm going to need to lose a large amount of weight, I am NOT going back. I post on another weight loss board and a lot of people recommended 1200 calories. But like I said, it did it once and there's no way I had the energy to workout. And I don't want to just lose weight....I want to be healthy. I got my calorie recommendations from the freedieting website.

Any advice?
 
If you really aren't losing weight then you're going to have to lower the calories further. If you're happy with your energy levels and your workouts are going great, stick with what you're doing. You seem to be in maintenance which is perfectly fine. Just keep chipping away at the body fat.
 
NedoCTB said:
If you really aren't losing weight then you're going to have to lower the calories further. If you're happy with your energy levels and your workouts are going great, stick with what you're doing. You seem to be in maintenance which is perfectly fine. Just keep chipping away at the body fat.
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I want to lose 50 more pounds. So I defenitely don't want to stay at this weight.

Energy levels are awesome, I feel like a million bucks already. Mood has improved 100% since eating better. ALl through elementary school, middle school, and high school I used to do cross country running so I'm really loving the workouts! Just not sure about where my calories should be! BTW I'm almost 29 years old.
 
If I were you I would up the exercise a bit. You seem to have a handle on how many calories you are consuming but you havent mentioned how many roughly you think you are burning.

You could drop your intake but it doesnt sound like that is something you want to do so the alternative is to continue to consume the same amount but expend more.
 
If you're getting all those benefits, then you're most likely in maintenance. Just drop your calories until you're at a level where you feel good but you're losing at a pace that is right for you. If you find your maintenance calories and then take 250 calories away from it, you'll lose 1 lb every 2 weeks, 500 = 1lb every week, 750 = 3 lbs every 2 weeks, 1000 = 2 lbs a week.
 
ForRealThisTime said:
If I were you I would up the exercise a bit. You seem to have a handle on how many calories you are consuming but you havent mentioned how many roughly you think you are burning.

You could drop your intake but it doesnt sound like that is something you want to do so the alternative is to continue to consume the same amount but expend more.
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Well my BMR is 1712, then my treadmill says I burn just over 400 calories with my workout, but I know how inaccurate those can be so I'm guestimating 200 calories. I have no clue how many calories I burn during the 30 Day Shred but I feel as though I work almost double as hard with that workout than I do with running.

I'm honestly open to any suggestions. I can most defenitely drop my intake and I can also up my exercise. I'm willing to do anything. I just want to make sure I develop LIFELONG eating habits and LIFELONG exercise habits. What I did before was not maintainable because my calories, I believe, were too low. And I want to be healthy.....not just a normal weight.
 
NedoCTB said:
If you're getting all those benefits, then you're most likely in maintenance. Just drop your calories until you're at a level where you feel good but you're losing at a pace that is right for you. If you find your maintenance calories and then take 250 calories away from it, you'll lose 1 lb every 2 weeks, 500 = 1lb every week, 750 = 3 lbs every 2 weeks, 1000 = 2 lbs a week.
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But if I'm at maintanence right now at 1700 calories and I want to lose 2 lbs a week how would I do that? Surely I can't eat 700 calories a day.
 
I just read Steve's post about using a scale and I think I might ditch the scale and stick to measuring. I mean, I'm down 9 1/2 inches so obviously I'm doing SOMETHING right. And I've gained 3 lbs in 2 weeks which could be anything. I'm pretty sure my calories are in the right range and I will up my exercise because I feel I can do more anyways.
 
Well, my mom is 45, around the same weight as you and she's not exercising at all... eating 1300 calories a day she's losing 1.5-2 lbs a week. Don't know why you think you need to eat 700 to lose 2 lbs a week.

The scale really isn't your friend in weight loss, and measurements are a lot more beneficial. I would stick with that.
 
You have your BMR, work out how much you need to eat a day (as your not bedrest you will be burning more then your BMR)
-25% and stick to that, any more and you risk slipping into a slowed metabolic rate, feeling lethargic and binge eating.

Drink plenty of water, keep up some form of exercise as it really helps you out, takes the edge off things, don't get me wrong you don't need to go at it 200% every day to lose weight (food matters more) but it is worth doing, even if its just walking every day.
 
How meticulous are you about counting calories? Do you have a scale to precisely weigh every portion? That's where I would start if you're not already doing that, it's very easy to make a mistake in calorie counting if you're eyeballing portions. (Especially if you're using cups meant for coffee to measure things like pasta.)
 
That is my first thought too...that you are actually eating more calories than you think you are.

I would NOT recommended decreasing your calories to 1200...been there, done that, gained the weight back plus more..so i know where you are coming from.

Keep calories the same but ensure you are being accurate with your calorie counts.
 
I think your problem is mainly just lack of patience. As you say, you have lost 9 1/2 inches!!!! Don't look at your progress from day to day, but month to month, year to year. In the grand scale (no pun intended), which direction are you heading, which direction have you been heading?? Overall you are getting smaller. Some days you may weigh more, maybe due to water weight, maybe a slight error in calculation, but overall what are you doing is right as demonstrated by your progress. Remember weight loss is very rarely linear.
 
angaustinbrody said:
Well my BMR is 1712
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Actually, that's your resting BMR. In other words, that's what you would need if you did nothing but lay in bed all day. You need to add in your activity. Based on what you posted, I would say you are probably in the "moderately active" range, so you would take that and multiply it by 1.55. So your BMR is actually 2653.

So, to lose 2 pounds a week, you should eat about 1650 calories daily. Which is around what you are doing, although you should avoid those days you get up to 1800. It shouldn't cause you to gain (because you aren't over your BMR), but it will slow your loss.

Now, as to why you gained weight. My guess is that it's one of two things: you are not as accurate in counting your calories as you need to be or it's water weight.

I second getting a food scale if you don't already have one. I got mine for about $20 at Target. Weighing your food is the most accurate way. Also, everything that crosses your lips gets listed!!! Even those little bites while cooking, etc. It all can add up.

If you are already doing that though, it's most likely water weight. If you ate something higher in sodium, or if it's close to your TOM, (or 100 other reasons, really) you might just be a little bloated. Drink a lot of water (at your weight, around 100 oz. daily) and you should see the number go back down in a few days.
 
angaustinbrody said:
I just want to make sure I develop LIFELONG eating habits and LIFELONG exercise habits. What I did before was not maintainable because my calories, I believe, were too low. And I want to be healthy.....not just a normal weight.
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You seem to be in the same frame of mind as me. I want to develop a healthy way of life and feel I am well on my way to doing that. However at the moment I want to lose weight not maintain my weight. I will bring my calories up once I am at the weight I want to be at but for now I will keep my calorie intake at a deficit so that I am not eating enough to maintain my current weight.

The eating plan I am on at the moment is not something I could stick to forever but that does not mean I will gain all the weight I have lost when I stop eating the way I am eating at the moment. I will gradually increase and keep up my exercise routine which will maintain me at the weight I want to be at.

I hear lots of talk on here about "dont go on a diet because if you go ON a diet it means you have to come OFF a diet" and its said like thats a bad thing. Sure dont go on some sort of crash diet but dieting is commonly perceived by people to be a method of losing weight and I dont see anything wrong with it. You need to also add exercise and you need to eat healthily but the reality is you must burn more calories than you consume to lose weight. If you didnt "come off" this diet then you would continue to lose weight. Lose the weight you want to lose and then work on a maintenance program that you can keep up for the rest of your life.

What it boils down to is you are at a stage where you want to lose weight not maintain. So you need to be burning more calories or consuming less calories or a bit of both. If I were in your shoes I would probably increase my cardio to 1hr 30mins a day 3 or 4 days a week, I achieve this through walking/running and find that sustained activity for 1hour plus gives me the best results. After a couple of weeks check your weight again and see if you have dropped some - I bet you will.

If you drop your calorie intake any more than you already have it is probably going to result in you being tired and not wanting to work out.
 
angaustinbrody said:
But if I'm at maintanence right now at 1700 calories and I want to lose 2 lbs a week how would I do that? Surely I can't eat 700 calories a day.
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Hi angaustinbrody,

If you still need help determining your daily caloric intake numbers, I explain how I did it in this post.

With regards to the diet:

- track caloric intake accurately (write it down, add it up, know where you are at from day to day)

- I used a scale to weigh food (but only for foods that I couln't measure any other way, like meats, or foods whose calorie values were given in grams, rather than volumetric. There's only 5 or 6 food items I ever had to weigh anyway.)

- Depending on the aggresiveness of your caloric deficit each day, there will come a time when your fat loss will plateau, and despite your lowering of intake even further and exercising more, you will not lose weight. You will know you're in this phase when you start feeling tired and without energy. At this point, your metabolism has downregulated due to the prolonged caloric restriction (leptin levels have decreased, along with thyroid levels, etc.) You will need to do a "diet break" by coming out of caloric deficit completely and eating at Maintenance Levels for a few days, or even a couple of weeks (this all depends on the how aggresive a deficit you've been carrying up to that point.)

- Alternatively, you can "build in" periodic diet breaks along the way (1 day every 7 to 10 days, again depending on the deficit your carrying) to avoid getting into the plateau in the first place. This sort of "caloric spiking" causes leptin and thyroid levels to rise to normal levels, and allows your metabolism to get squared away again.

With regards to exercise:

- Make sure to incorporate Resistance Training into your weekly exercise routine (this can be bodyweight or dumbbell weight exercises) at least 3x per week on non-consecutive days.

- Cardio can follow the RT exercise.

- Careful not to overdo exercise too soon. I started at just 3 structured workouts per week (45 min: 25 min RT + 20 min cardio) and obtained great results by it. You're exercising 6 days a week. Make sure to account for that in for your daily intake (your TDEE/ML value will be higher with 6 workouts per week vs. 3) If you enjoy the 6-day exercise routine and it's not adversely impacting your diet or exercise in any way, then go for it. I just want to provide you with another point of reference where that's not needed to achieve your fat loss goals.
 
biggestloser105 said:
How meticulous are you about counting calories? Do you have a scale to precisely weigh every portion? That's where I would start if you're not already doing that, it's very easy to make a mistake in calorie counting if you're eyeballing portions. (Especially if you're using cups meant for coffee to measure things like pasta.)
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I do own a food scale yes and I use that to measure. Most of my food is measured in ounces. :eek:)

Tamago said:
I think your problem is mainly just lack of patience.
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Amazingly enough I actually am being really patient this time around. I know I've lost inches and I am so proud of myself. I just want to make sure I do everything right this time around because I do NOT want to be doing this again.....EVER!

mizzie said:
Actually, that's your resting BMR.
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THAT makes sense. hehe. Thanks! ;)

pablorivera said:
Hi angaustinbrody,

If you still need help determining your daily caloric intake numbers, I explain how I did it in this post.

With regards to the diet:

- track caloric intake accurately (write it down, add it up, know where you are at from day to day)

- I used a scale to weigh food (but only for foods that I couln't measure any other way, like meats, or foods whose calorie values were given in grams, rather than volumetric. There's only 5 or 6 food items I ever had to weigh anyway.)

- Depending on the aggresiveness of your caloric deficit each day, there will come a time when your fat loss will plateau, and despite your lowering of intake even further and exercising more, you will not lose weight. You will know you're in this phase when you start feeling tired and without energy. At this point, your metabolism has downregulated due to the prolonged caloric restriction (leptin levels have decreased, along with thyroid levels, etc.) You will need to do a "diet break" by coming out of caloric deficit completely and eating at Maintenance Levels for a few days, or even a couple of weeks (this all depends on the how aggresive a deficit you've been carrying up to that point.)

- Alternatively, you can "build in" periodic diet breaks along the way (1 day every 7 to 10 days, again depending on the deficit your carrying) to avoid getting into the plateau in the first place. This sort of "caloric spiking" causes leptin and thyroid levels to rise to normal levels, and allows your metabolism to get squared away again.

With regards to exercise:

- Make sure to incorporate Resistance Training into your weekly exercise routine (this can be bodyweight or dumbbell weight exercises) at least 3x per week on non-consecutive days.

- Cardio can follow the RT exercise.

- Careful not to overdo exercise too soon. I started at just 3 structured workouts per week (45 min: 25 min RT + 20 min cardio) and obtained great results by it. You're exercising 6 days a week. Make sure to account for that in for your daily intake (your TDEE/ML value will be higher with 6 workouts per week vs. 3) If you enjoy the 6-day exercise routine and it's not adversely impacting your diet or exercise in any way, then go for it. I just want to provide you with another point of reference where that's not needed to achieve your fat loss goals.
Click to expand...

Excellent post, thank you!!!!
 
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