Am I Doing Something Wrong?

I realize I have not been doing this for very long, but I want some help (and some explanations as well) if possible.

Short story: I had my son back in Nov. 2011 and weighed 225 when he was born. After I had him, it went down to about 215 and within a month I was down to 203 lbs. Since about January of this year, I have gone from 203 down to 185 without doing much outside of walking.

However, recently I have decided to make large changes in my life for my overall health and to help set my son on a positive and healthy food relationship when he is old enough to start eating solid foods with my husband and I.

So, I religiously started calorie counting (and believe me, it's not easy when everything you eat is homemade by you or some awesome Japanese person). I went through the process to find out what the recommended daily allotment of food was (makes it sound like I live in a concentration camp.. :S). Anyway, here are the stats:

SW: 185

CW: 183

GW: 135

Height: 5'9"

Body Fat %: 31% (don't laugh at me.. I hate being overweight)

Age: 27

Calories a Day: 1650

So anyway, I am trying to get down to this seemingly unobtainable goal and I have only lost 1 lb in the two weeks I have been doing this, despite exercising at least 30 minutes a day (it's a Jillian Michaels DVD most of the time or sometime I will play DDR for an hour and a half). So at the end of the day, I have net calories that are always -500 or more.

I always make sure to drink at least 8 glasses of water. I am really careful about not drinking a lot of soda (I occasionally have a melon soda out in town with my husband) and I don't drink juice. Outside of my sodium always being "Too High", most of everything else is spot on (I'm proud of myself for being able to keep to these changes).

So I don't understand why with all this work I have been putting in I have only seen 1lb drop in 2 weeks when other people can lose 1-2 lbs per week doing less than what I do. It's really frustrating and I am getting discouraged already.

I don't want to fail this time because I have been battling my 'bulge' since I was 10. I want to know what it is like to be healthy and fit.

So do any of you more experienced users out there have any idea what I am doing wrong? What am I missing? Should I eat more despite the fact that I don't do much outside of my exercising? I mean, I sew, I knit and I do other little things that burn minimal calories, but nothing major.

I don't think it's muscle gain, either.. considering my clothes still fit the same and the clothes I want to fit into I still can't. >:( 

I had similar stats 27, 190-185 sw, 130-135 gw, 5'8" and started about 1500ish cals (before I knew about this site and BMR). It took about 3 months to lose about 30lbs without exercise. Then a horrid plateau I turned to maintenance during Christmas/holidays. Then&nbs p;I found cc in Jan and an abundance of information :D Then from cc sw 160 to cw 140 (calorie cycling 1400-1700 and/or 200-700 deficit cycling). Long hard road but worth it, weight loss is much trail and error as it is a game of patience, I swear sometimes!

Water retention since you are working out everyday you may have water retention from that masking your loses. I have stalls/plateaus (3-6 weeks) and whooshes myself (suddenly dropping 2-5lbs), on a current 6 week plateau at this time too. Any who articles worth reading on water retention:

http://www.leangains.com/2010/01/how-to-deal- with-water-retention-part.html

http://www.leangains.com/2010/01/how-to-deal- with-water-retention-part_28.html

http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/of- whooshes-and-squishy-fat.html

You are eating about your BMR which is good for a minimum amount but you can be eating more since you are being active daily. 1908-2137 (according to this cal: http://www.freedieting.com/tools/calorie_calc ulator.htm), so funny enough you may get better results eating more.

But 1lbs in 2 weeks isn't that bad either, so don't think you are doing anything wrong :)

Thank you for the links. I honestly didn't think I would still be having water retention with as much water as I drink in a day, but maybe with the high sodium levels, I still am not drinking enough to flush out my system completely?

And I have considered eating more, mainly because it kind of bites when you realize you are starving but you can only eat 200 calories worth of food without going over. Maybe I should eat more.

For years and years, my body has gotten used to going by on quite a little food. My husband used to (and still does) freak out about how little I would eat. Then again, he is 6'4" and can consume close to 3000 calories without seeing any negative results from it.

It just seems like 1/2 lb a week is too slow for what I am doing. I dunno.. a lot of this is all Greek to me! 

8 glasses of water is the minimum for a healthy average woman. In reality, your minimum should be half your body weight in ounces. So if you're 185, you should be drinking around 93 oz (around 12 cups) instead of 64 oz with more than 93 greatly encouraged. The 12 cups should be your minimum. If you're exercising, you should drink a lot more than the 12 cup minimum. 

I will keep that in mind. As it is, I struggle to get the 8 cups in daily as I don't drink a lot throughout the day to begin with. I do always make sure to drink water before and after exercise though. Usually, if I go walking, I also drink water during that (especially with the high humidity where I live).

I will try to up the water intake and see if that helps more. It can't hurt (unless I drink too much.. but that's a lot of water).

Thank you for the input. :) 

Not a problem. I have a 24oz reusable water bottle with a straw that makes water intake easy for me. I don't drink much when all I have are cups or bottled water. Add a straw and I can get in 9-12 cups of water before 4pm when I get off work. It's just become a habit now so getting in that much water is no longer a problem.

Experiment with different bottles and different temperatures to see where you like water the most. I like a bottle with a straw with slightly cooler than room temp water. :)

don't forget the scale is not the main indicator of how you are doing overall have you taken any measurements of your body? A lot of the time you will stay at the same weight for weeks but you might lose inches off your butt, thighs, or waist.
This is why a lot of people get discouraged and give up so easily as they don't understand how weight loss works and only look at the scale.

Remember you are changing your lifestyle for the long run not short term so if you keep at it you will see changes it's not going to happen over night or even in 3 months..it takes time

If you've only been doing it a few weeks you might not see much change either. I also am in the 0.5-1lb range and it really varies week to week for me. You are not really THAT overweight so you don't want to get into the 2lbs and higher loss per week.

If you think its water, try a 4 day beat the bloat diet like the intro to the Flat Belly diet. I wouldn't get stressed as you are making the right moves, sometimes it just takes some time to see the results.

I agree with the other posts, but let me add a few things to watch out for that slowed me up in the beginning:

1. Do you have a scale for measuring out your food?  If not, remember that most people actually UNDERESTIMATE how much they are eating.  Accurate calorie counts are very important, as you already know, since you must cut 3500 cals from your maintenance amount to lose 1lb.  If you do the math, at 500 cals cut per day for 2 weeks you should have lost about 2lbs, some of which is probably not showing on the scale due to water retention (which can add up to 7lbs, as I've discovered myself recently...ugh).  So you're not off track, just keep at it.  :)

2. Watch salt intake, and since you eat home-prepared meals that shouldn't be too hard.  :)  Also, use CC's tools to monitor your macronutrients - I usually try to eat more protein when I'm losing weight.  When you drink a lot of water, it helps you process protein in larger amounts without as much strain on your kidneys, so keep up your fiber intake and eat more protein than carbs. Fish is wonderful, but don't over-salt.  Also, both salt and fiber can mask early losses since you need to flush them out before seeing your accurate weight (patience, young padawan)!  :)

3. Build muscle every chance you get!  It helps you acheive the fitness you're seeking and fit better into clothes and burn more calories, etc. etc. and so forth.  Lift hand weights if possible, or do calisthenics like push-ups and planks.  Even if you only do it 30 minutes 3x per week it will help you see results.  Ideally, do about 10-15mins warm-up first, then stretch, then do the bulk of your cardio after weight resistance for increased calorie burn!!  ;)  Also, don't worry about "bulking" - lift as heavy as you can safely and continue to push yourself!

4.  Are you getting enough nutrients?  Consider taking a multi-vitamin if you aren't already, just to be sure.  Also, I take Omega 3 & 6 pills to keep my healthy fat intake up there - fish is great, but flaxseed and nuts (just a few, they're high-calorie) help too.  Our bodies (especially females) seem to hold on to body fat if we don't consume enough dietary fat on a regular basis.

I hope you don't give up - the hardest thing about this process is the waiting to see results of your good choices...but they WILL happen, believe me.  I'm not patient at all, but I managed to get down from 215lbs to 130lbs and 14% body fat and stay there for years.  I'm back on CC since for 2 years I've been 145lbs/20% body fat and want to get back to 130-135 for my wedding!!  :)

Thank you, everyone for your input. I will take into consideration the facts and suggestions put forth that I haven't already implemented and see where that gets me. :)