I finally after 10 years went to the doctor for a full work up on Jan. 3rd. I think I mention it in my bio. Before I went I weighed myself at home in underwear and came in at 147. Got to the doc's office and weighed in at 155 clothed but no shoes. I don't know about you, but that seems like a huge difference. I decided to go with the doc's scale since I didn't like mine to begin with. She suggested I see the nutritionist, which I did and she put me on an extremely low carb diet, 50 to 60 grams per day and 1500 calories(although I stick with 1250). She says this is to jump start my metabolism. Well, three weeks went by and I thought I was doing well. According to the scale (which I had adjusted to match up with the 155 the doc said I was) I was now down to 144...YEAH! Not so fast, I go back to the nutritionist on Feb. 7th and not only did I not lose weight I gained 2 pounds. It gets even better, you guys are gonna love this!! I decide to get a new scale altogether (it's digital and analyzes body fat and water) and it says 155.5, okay back where I started. The next day it says 159.5, the next day it says 155.0, yesterday it said 160.0, and today it said 156. I think some one upstairs is getting a good chuckle out of this, I do have some deceased relatives with warped senses of humor. I don't live near the ocean, so I don't think it has anything to do with the tides. I eat 4 or 5 small meals a day and work out for anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour and a half (usually Sunday reading the paper while on the elliptical-I have good balance) per day. My blood work came back fine, so it's not my thyroid...I'm at a loss! Any ideas? Keep in mind I'm only 5' tall so right about now I'm feeling like a weeble!!
If a nutritionist is saying you should be eating 1500 calories a day, you should try eating 1500 calories a day. You might be burning too many calories and creating too large a deficit with 1250. Also, as for the flunctuation day-to-day, it's mostly all water weight--try weighing yourself only once a week, hard as it is! I know that my weight will flunctuate up to four pounds throughout the day.
Regarding water weight fluctuations -- are you eating more salty things one day than the next... take a look at the analysis ... if you hover your mouse over the blue underlined date, it will give you some further breakdown, one of them being sodium (salt) Do you drink a lot of caffeine?
I won't comment on the not having lost anything in general, because I am here more than 60 days, and have followed the diet to a "T" and the exercises recommended by my trainer and am the same blinkity blink weight I was when I came. I can do 40 min on the treadmill now, whereas I could only do 20, but no change in weight.
You are probably right... the guy upstairs is laughing at my ridiculous efforts, and laughing at my tears. 
I definitely see weight fluctuations of several pounds throughout the day. That is totally normal. For more consistency, try weighing yourself at the same time every day, first thing in the morning, right after emptying your bladder and before breakfast.
More importantly, if you are only eating 1250 calories and doing that much cardio, you are only getting your body about 1000 cal/day max, probably less than that. It needs approx 1200 to survive. Definitely up your cal intake to 1500 as your nutritionist recommended.
I shouldn't say that I stick with 1250, that just seems to be about the average. I went in to analysis and checked to see what my highest calorie intake was for a day and it was 1503, but there were quite a few days that it was as low as 800. Honestly that's not even on purpose. I never had a big appetite and I can't force myself to eat just to maintain a specific number of calories per day. I tend to be a picker, so to say I eat 4 or 5 small meals might not be accurate. A day might go like this: whole wheat english muffin and two hard boiled eggs & a banana, carrot sticks(equal to 3 carrots), 2 slices roast beef-swiss cheese-lettuce rolled up together & celery sticks, 1 cup cheerios dry, 1/2 breast roasted chicken with a vegetable. I may have another english muffin or carrot sticks before calling it a day and I drink decaffeinated tea and crystal light throughout the day. Thank you Fransen! I checked my sodium and it said 1,297. I don't know what it should be, but that seems high to me. Any more suggestions I welcome them and thank you to those who have already given some!
I recently joined CC, and I have read so much here about maintaining or increasing calorie intake to LOSE weight. It seems counter intuitive, but at your low calorie intake, your body is basically holding on to everything you put into it because it's in starvation mode. You should add in some calorie dense but still healthy foods - nuts, avocados, etc. - so you can increase the calories but not feel like you are gorging yourself.
Only eating 800-1500 calories plus all the cardio is not doing your body any favors. This is why you are not losing any weight. Have you used the tools on this site to see how approx how many calories you burn each day? Look at what you burn in a sedentary state, and add in your workout calories to determine your total burn. What is it? Just as an example, mine is 1700 not counting my workouts.
(Did your nutritionist discuss your current diet with you? I agree with he/she that your metabolism needs to be jump-started but I'm wondering if he/she explained why. Just curious.)
The recommended maximum is 2500, so 1297 doesn't seem high for sodium. However, that recommendation is on a 2000 calorie diet, so relative to calories it is about the same I think.
Right now I am unemployed so any activity I get is from housework and exercise. So with that it mind, 45 minutes(+/-) on the elliptical is probably not a lot. I also break it up so that my body doesn't catch on to me. I might get on the elliptical for 20 minutes, then go do some laundry/dusting for and hour or so, come back and get on for 20 to 30 more. I found it to be a good way to watch the soaps and/or read the paper. My nutritionist is aware of my diet, I was able to print out the month of January for her to look over. Her only comment was for me not to be so "retentive" about logging every gram of carbs that I ate and gave me the 50 to 60 gram range to work with. If I understood her correctly, the reason for the low carb diet was that carbs and sugars have a tendency to sit around in your body until needed and if not used, turn to fat. Where I am not working therefore not getting a consistent eight hours of movement a day and I am not running or doing any weight lifting(yet), a smaller amount of carbs would force my body to burn the calories, protein, and stored fat. She only plans on keeping me on this another 5 weeks and will modify depending on my weight loss or lack of. I know my biggest hurdle is getting past the psychological part of eating. Even though I know you are right about the calorie intake there is still that little part that holds me back, especially if I start to get bloated at any point in the day. Thank you again for your help. It's a lot cheaper than a therapist and I feel like people really care instead of being paid to care!!
Monday is a new week, I'll see what kind of changes I can make.
Thanks for this post, it answered a question I was going to ask (I've been plateaued for almost 3 months, and in the past 2 weeks the weight has begun creeping back ...)
I wanted to know if a low-carb diet for about a week would do just that - "jump start" my metabolism ... it is nice to see that info from a nutritionist!
One comment about water weight and sodium intake. Don't depend on just your tastebuds to control your sodium. Read labels. SODIUM CHLORIDE tastes salty, because it is salt. SODIUM does not ... and it is in loads of foods that don't taste salty. And things that do taste salty (chips and pretzels) do so because the salt is on the OUTSIDE. For example: a serving of crunchy salty REGULAR Pringles (15 chips) has 200 mg sodium. A serving of Progresso chicken and noodle soup?? 920 mg. Now, I'm not comparing the nutrition value of these, because obviously the soup is more nutritious. I'm just trying to point out that sodium is sneaky in food, so you have to be careful.
Good luck and thanks again ... Monday IS a new day and I'm going to give it a go as well.
Years ago, I use to weigh in often. But too, learned and accepted that weight fluctuates too much throughout the day. I have found that I am much, much happier weighing in once a week, at the very least. Usually after the first morning bathroom call, and on the same day of the week. For me it eleviates undue frustration.
Okay, it's beyond frustration and now working toward nervous break down. I failed to mention that although I have only been on this site since the end of December, I have been working on losing weight for the last two years and intensified it over this last year by adding the elliptical to the multitude of other equipment I have. The only thing I don't have is weight training equipment and I am working on getting a bow flex. I could deal with the fluctuations if I was losing weight and then seeing a + or - daily, but I haven't lost anything really. The scale hovers around the 155 mark + or - 3 pounds. That is part of the reason I went to see the doctor in January and agreed to the nutritionist. I figured a new year, a new start and what better way to start than to make sure there is no physical reason why I'm not losing weight. I felt that I had set a realistic goal of 30 pounds by the end of May and I am following the suggestions of the nutritionist and my fellow weight crusaders almost to the letter. No cheating, this means too much to me! Too add insult to injury I went shopping last weekend for a new pair of jeans and a pair of dress pants. Size 10 because that's what I'm wearing now and I got the jeans on but couldn't button them and I could button the dress pants but not exhale! I thought about what people said as to not enough calories and starvation mode, but I'm having a problem consistently making 1250. Then the light bulb went on and I said okay not more food, just more calories. But where do you find something high in calories but low in fat and carbs? Please help, because at this point if I don't lose anything by the next time I go back to the nutritionist in mid March, I'm making another appt. with the doc and getting a prescription.
If you want to add calories, but not carbs, you have to add an alternate... well, you don't want to add fat, so that only leaves protein.
Try protein shakes, Lean chicken or turkey, white fish, egg whites, LEAN ham, tuna, canned salmon (eat the bone, it is high in calcium) shrimp, legumes especially beans, hummus, fiber eg.. rye crispbread, lentils, almonds..
Thanks fransen, I'm going to work on a new menu this weekend and see what I can come up with. Adding more food is just not going to work, your idea is very workable. For example, I worked with my brother-in-law painting the past couple days and I burned 2,174 calories for 7 1/2 hours of work each day. Could you imagine trying to make up that deficit! I think I would have to be eating every five minutes. I will let you know what I came up with, thanks again!!!
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