How slow is slow for last 10 pounds?

Argh! Argh! @(@%@$#()*^&$

That's how I feel right now.

I just got off a @(*$& plateau that took me 6 @#($& weeks to get through 1 @(*#$& kilo.

Then it broke, and yay time to celebrate right? Not.

I lost ZIP between last week and this one. ZIP. ZERO. NOTHING. And I've upped my exercise days from 3 times to 4 times a week. ARGH. I don't know if I can make it 5 times a week, it's getting old.

Anyway, that's just the ranting. I hear the last 10 pounds is notoriously difficult, which is about where I'm at. What I want to know is how difficult is difficult? Did you get through it? What was your rate of loss? Do I need to do something radical or just grit my teeth and carry on at this rate?

My current rate is a PLODDING, DRAGGING MY FEET 0.25 pounds a week.

I'm frustrated. Can you tell? ;)

To answer your question: it will take forever  No, no I'm kidding. Actually I don't know, because I haven't gotten to that point yet. 

Kuddos to you for getting there!

Here is what I can tell you: Don't up your workout, rather focus on your diet. Eat clean and within your calories intake for weight loss. Drink more water. The reason I am suggesting it is because when you workout harder you build more muscle and it kind of evens out what you lost. Proof of it is that you are not gaining, am I correct? I write from experience, because when I try to see if I lost weight just with diet and I did. Then I added workouts and the weight either wasn't significant or there at all for three weeks! Then I decrease the workouts and kept with the diet and I started losing again

Hope it helps. Keep on trying!

karmin26: thanks for reply and encouragement. Yes, I am not gaining. Yes, trendline is headed downwards, but man this is sloooowwwww.  Yeah, I probably need to be stricter with what I eat, I've been more liberal with the diet on the weekends.

I should clarify: the last 10 pounds are just to get into healthy BMI. It SHOULD be achievable, right? If I'm already within the healthy range, then it's understandable that the body might have reached a set point, but that can't be the case for me right now.

0.25 lbs a month sounds about right if you are just doing what you were before. I think that for that last bit you really need to up the exercise.

Sometimes your body just doesn't want to lose any more though. Taking a break for a while and then starting again in a month or so might help but really really slow is what you can expect.

Original Post by vwiggins:

0.25 lbs a month sounds about right if you are just doing what you were before. I think that for that last bit you really need to up the exercise.

I need to clarify. My current rate is about 0.25 pounds a week, not a month. Are you telling me it can be slower or was that a typo? Cuz if it can be slower, I am officially freaking out right now.

From my experience, I have good news and bad news:

When I was ten lbs away from goal (and just inside my healthy BMI range),I plateaued BIG TIME. I tended to do this about every 10 lbs anyway. In frustration, I decided to go to maintenance and upped my calories. Bam! 5 lbs lost in 10 days.

Then, I stalled again. I've plateaued AGAIN and now I'm maintaining. It kinda sucks to not be able to lose that last 5, but, heck!, what's 5lbs anyway? I'm focusing more on shape than size now and if the last five happens to come off naturally due to more muscle and increased metabolism, well, I won't shed a tear.

I suggest going on maintenance for a week or two. Dieting can slow your metabolism even if you're not in "starvation mode". Maintenance is good practice for later and can reset your metabolism. At this point, why not?

Its been taking me FOREVER!  I found in the past couple weeks that zigzaging my calories has helped immensly though.  I was stuck between 138 and 140 (my goal is 130) and i started zigzaging, now i'm around 136 - 137.  It seems to be working quite well, so i'd recomend giving it a shot.

The last 10 lbs took me 4 months.

So that's 2.5lb/month, or about .5/week... but I seem to remember the last month dancing just half a pound away from my goal.

I would be ecstatic to lose 1 lb per month.  I only need to lose about 4-5 pounds.

Yeah, the last few take forever. It's mostly because (if you're like me) you've already lost a lot of weight, and your metabolism has changed to account for that weight loss. I eat at maintenance for awhile, with double the exercise, and then go back to dieting. It seems to work, but I'm sure it'll just get more and more difficult the closer I come to my goal. I've lost, like, 2.5 lbs since the 20th. Not very much, but 2.5 lbs is better than 0 lbs.

Original Post by amethystgirl:

The last 10 lbs took me 4 months.

So that's 2.5lb/month, or about .5/week... but I seem to remember the last month dancing just half a pound away from my goal.

Whaaaattttt!!!! *falling to the floor in a dead faint* :)

sigh. Thank you everyone for the input and suggestion. Asphyxiac: no, I haven't lost a lot of weight (congrats!), so I'm not in a similar situation, but I think switching to maintenance for a bit will give me relief for a while. I had this mental goal that was my original goal date given by CC, but I see now that I don't have to hold on to that, as long as the scales move in the right direction eventually. (it coincided with my birthday and I thought, wow what a great present! ;) )

So, I'll probably switch to maintenance in a couple of weeks, when the holidays come and I can't diet effectively anyway. I have a more realistic expectation now.

Thanks again!

i have a bit of a newbie question - what does it mean to switch into maintenance?  does it mean consuming the number of calories indicated in the burn meter according to our current weights?

yup. u got it.