Low Carb Diet = Weight loss halt: help!

Un4given

New member
Hello there.

I recently (as of March this year) started exercising and dieting in order to lose weight. I was 226 pounds when I started and after some research decided to go on a low carb diet along with my exercise.

I do an hour of cardio 6 days a week with an hour of mid-high intensity weight-training on alternating days along with my cardio (so about 3 or 4 days a week).

I have lost 16 pounds since then, but have been stuck for past 2 to 3 weeks at my current weight (210 lbs) which seems to fluctuated between 211 and back to 210 regularly.

I fear that the weight I have loss was in fact "water-weight" used to process my high protein diet and that I am going to put my weight back on or not lose anything any more at all =/

I need some advice and info regarding this please.

By low carb I mean no bread or pasta or junk food whatsoever (also low sugar etc as I gave up Coke and any carbonated soft drink and instead drink water). I still however eat vegetables and occasionally fruit.

I also drink about 3 glasses of full-cream milk a day, so my diet MIGHT be high in fat especially because I am eating low carb food like meat and pork and chicken etc.

Do I have reason for concern?

Desperately confused at the moment, to the point where I am scared to even go ahead exercising and dieting as I might be plunging further down the wrong path. So ye, any help would be GREAT:Y appreciated thx!

:bigear:

P.S: I eat 3 meals a day BUT because of varsity and studying late at night etc, I end up eating breakfast (about 10 AM), then kinda skipping lunch, eating supper (5PM), then eating again a few hours before sleep. (10PM)

Is this a no-no?
 
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When I tries the atkins diet I lost a ton of weight, 100+ pounds, until I just couldn't stand not having bread anymore. Then I binged on pizza until I had gained it all back.

Not sure why it isn't letting you lose as much weight. It seems to work for everyone that tries it. It's sticking to it that's so dang hard.

There is sugar in milk, at least, normal milk. IDK about full cream milk - is that sugarless?

Are you using sugary sauces on your meats maybe? Like BBQ sauce? That has a surprising number of carbs in it.
 
Hey!

Well I have no problem staying away from the carbs so far as I THINK I have the willpower. I also do not feel constantly hungry without the carbs.

Full Cream milk, according to the nutritional info I am now reading on the packaging, entails:

Per 100ml: 4.7g carbs, 3.3g Protein, 3.4g Milkfat.

I do not use any sauces on my meats. Totally gave up mayonnaise as well.

Could this be the culprit? (The Milk)

Could it also be my exercise routine? Because some sources say I need to do 2 hours cardio a day not 1 hour, but problem with that is I don't know what to do for an extra hour? I do 30 min rowing, 30 min on treadmill, I can't cycle coz I have a foot problem that makes cycling impossible, and ye =/
 
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Well the theory behind the Atkins diet is that your body needs carbs in order to produce an enzyme that tells your fat cells to stop releasing fat and store it instead. So, supposedly, if you never eat any carbs, your fat cells will never get the signal to store fat and will go into default fat-release mode, putting your body in a state of not being able to retain fat so you lose weight.

There's also sugar in fruit but you said you only have that occasionally. There can be carbs in vegetables too believe it or not, like carrots, sweet peas, squash, parsnips, potatoes, pretty much any vegetable that's not a green leafy vegetable can actually have significant carbs.

Eating the fruit, milk, non-leafy vegetables, might be allowing your body to produce enough of the fat-storing enzyme to keep you from losing the weight you should be losing. And as for exercise I think as long as you work out at least 30 minutes a day you're getting enough for the purposes of weight loss.
 
Ah I see!

I will def cut back on my milk and watch which vegetables to eat.

Do you think my abnormal meal-spacing/lack of any food during the midday might be causing my body to go into "starvation" mode and slowing down my metabolism and storing more of the food I do eventually eat at night as fat?
 
Starvation mode doesn't gimp your metabolism as much as "food experts" will say. When you go into starvation mode, which usually requires more than 12 hours of no eating, your metabolism will only decrease by about 10% which will hardly cause you to gain, or not lose weight. Everyone has a baseline metabolism that can't be ducked under no matter what you do. Unless you go into a coma, then you can experience a 35% drop in metabolism.
 
There's no such thing as "starvation mode". :) It's a dieting myth. There is metabolic adaptation, but that's not something that happens after a few hours or even a few days.

The bottom line is that you're eating more calories than you're burning. All this mumbo-jumbo about enzymes, etc. is overthinking the issue and a way to look for a scapegoat or magic bullet.

Start logging your food (and properly weighing/measuring it) and see how many calories you're eating each day.

Don't ride . No one gets fat eating a reasonable amount of fruit and veggies.
 
A low carb diet will cause you to lose some water weight, but I doubt it would be 16 lb.

A weight loss plateau can last more than 3 weeks. At the end of this, for no apparent reason, you will continue losing weight. If you know you are eating the right number of calories there is no reason to change anything. Just wait it out.
 
Thx for the advice guys!

I have not been accurately keeping tabs of my daily calorie intake, but I counted my typical calorie intake for the last week or so, and all have been between 1800-2000 calories a day which I don't think is too much considering my exercise and body weight etc.

Will see where my weight goes in next few weeks.

And thanks for the link KaraCooks, interesting read!
 
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