Someone Help PLEASE!!!

I have been restricting my calories to about 1200 calories a day and working out 3-5 times a wk since jan 1st and not seeing any wght loss. (not one stinking pound!!) My dr. just says keep trying harder. I have increased hunger, which I have told them, been checked for thyroid and high cholesterol with everything fine. (cholesterol a little high, but not terrible) is there something else that should be checked or am I doing something wrong? I am a woman 5'4 and 170, so I have the wgt to loose! Please help!!

it Honestly sounds like your not eating enough.

1200 is the minimum for a very small inactive woman - eat more. Check out www.phord.com/cc to get a calorie target.

I'm about the same stat wise, 5'4" and 173 now.  I've hit a bit of a platuea myself where i'm finding the scale just wont budge.  What i'm trying is looking at what i eat and when.  I'm then going to focus on eating smaller meals more regularly and only eating very healthy food.  I've heard all this helps and can keep you updated on if it works for me.  Also, one thing which did help me in the bit of weight i already lost was not eating within three or four hours of going to sleep.

I hope that helps!

I don't know how old you are, but after plugging your stats into a calorie calculator, you are more than likely undereating.

With all that working out, you could eat around 1650-1750 and still safely lose a pound a week... Even more if you're under 21

Use the Advice section.  Here's just a small sample of what you'll find to help you.  These answers are all about eating too little

http://caloriecount.about.com/cc/qa/search.ph p?qa_search=Starvation+Mode&x=10&y=12

Question

I am 25 - 30 lb over weight. If I eat only 1000 to 1200 calories, shouldn't it burn the ALL that stored fat first?

Answer

Your body will not selectively burn stored fat because your central nervous system needs glucose and you can’t make glucose from fat.  But protein can be converted to glucose, and so the body breaks down your muscles to provide it.  Ultimately, you lose lots of muscle along with fat, and that drives down your calorie requirements because muscle burns calories but fat does not.  You then maintain a higher weight on less food making weight gain inevitable.  For best results, eat the number of calories prescribed by the Calorie Target calculator in the Tools section.

Other things you can look up are plateaus

Use the CC tools to determine your caloric needs.  One way to do this is to figure out your burn using the Burn Meter.  Once you see how many calories a day you burn (on average) you can deduct 250 to 1000 calories a day to lose 1/2 to 2 pounds a week. 

Well, thank you all. I have plugged in my stats and I should be consuming around 1440 calories to lose 1.58 pounds of fat a week. :) just seems like I should have lost something by now. I keep fluctuating but basically stay the same. Its very very frustrating and when I don't see the scale moving, I kinda havethe tendency to think 'well ok, lets just eat everything' and I know thats not the right mind set either.

Hailey, I got the same kind of "advice" from my doctor for years.  He was wrong.  A lot of doctors are using out of date information. 

For the next few days, try eating more and you might be surprised at what happens.  Please let us know!  Everybody is here rooting for you and supporting you.

I agree it's possible that you might be undereating, I know that I have experienced plateaus from undereating, but it seems suspicious to me that you haven't lost even 1 pound in 3 solid months of undereating. While very low calorie diets aren't the best choice for people who are not medically at risk from being overweight, doctors will often put people on 800 cals a day with light exercise and those people lose like crazy...

Everyone's body is different and undereating is not a good thing, but I wonder if you aren't underestimating your caloric intake.  One of Mary's recent "Answers" listed a statistic that on average, most people log half of what they actually consume, even in a controlled environment. 

If you haven't already, invest in a food scale and spend one solid week RELIGIOUSLY weighing and measuring everything that you put in your mouth and then write it down.  I use a digital postal scale originally purchased for my ebay store that I got at Wal-mart for $14.99.

I have become pretty good at eyeballing after 3 months of weighing everything, but I can tell you that first week was a rude awakening.  It's easy to rack up an extra 500 calories a day through inaccurate measurement and that is your pound a week (not) lost.

I know this seems like it will take a lot of time, an extra 10 minutes a day of added work to your food prep is nothing compared with three months of hard work and dedication with no result.

Good luck!!!

when i was still a bit over 200, i had dropped my intake to 1450 for a while and all my weight loss stopped. i went back up to 1600 and started losing again. i know it seems crazy, but there is some sort of wisdom in making your body think its well fed when running a deficit. i lose slowly, but i lose! now i just have to exercise more if i want bigger deficits. not a bad thing, all in all. 

i second the weighing and measuring advice. its key. 

Original Post by amethystgirl:

1200 is the minimum for a very small inactive woman - eat more. Check out www.phord.com/cc to get a calorie target.

 that link didn't work...??

works for me!!

I agree with those who say you need to take it slow and easy, and that you may not be eating enough. It may be possible that you are not counting your calrories accurately. That may be more likely. Counting takes practise, and you need to count everything. We are not so good at eyeballing calories at first, but over time we get on to it.

So, measure, weigh, calculate, log, and keep track for a week. You may be right on target, but you may be underestimating how much you really eat :-)

I know that I sometimes have lost more weight on a higher calorie diet (about 1500) than on a lower one (1200).  When you cut your calories too drastically your body thinks its starving and tries to hold onto your reserves.  Not what you want.  Also be sure to measure at least when you start it is really easy to miss calories.  Even thought I am now at my target weight I still have to weigh and log everything or those "just one bites"cause the pounds to creep back on.

Your pounds creep? because mine bum rush me! 

I agree that you might need to up your calorie intake. 

And I don't know your doctor, but - get a new doctor so you can have a second opinion. Even better would be a nutritionist or a doctor that actually specializes in this sort of thing. Doctors aren't infallible and they certainly don't know all  (okay, mine seems to, but...)

Also, I didn't see this mentioned anywhere, but what kind of exercise are you doing? because that may determine part of the answer. Count your calories religiously - even those snacks - and take a look at how many calories you're burning when you exercise and what kind of exercise you're doing. 

Please, let us know what you find out!

i know exactly how  you feel, i have been exersizing 6 days a week , on my 7 th week eating less than I used to, even counting calories the last 2 weeks and i haven't lost a pound.  I have lost a few inches, but this doesn't even make sense.  I can't figure out why the scale doesn't move.  I am getting frustrated.

i know exactly how  you feel, i have been exersizing 6 days a week , on my 7 th week eating less than I used to, even counting calories the last 2 weeks and i haven't lost a pound.  I have lost a few inches, but this doesn't even make sense.  I can't figure out why the scale doesn't move.  I am getting frustrated.

Original Post by tina296:

i know exactly how  you feel, i have been exersizing 6 days a week , on my 7 th week eating less than I used to, even counting calories the last 2 weeks and i haven't lost a pound.  I have lost a few inches, but this doesn't even make sense.  I can't figure out why the scale doesn't move.  I am getting frustrated.

a pound of muscle takes up a lot less space than a pound of fat, so you can assume that you are losing fat and gaining muscle if the scale isn't moving but your losing inches. sounds like success from here. lost inches tell you that you are losing fat. the scale not moving indicates muscle. not at all something to be frustrated about! what your doing is working! 

i don't know your stats, but if your not at a healthy weight, you might shoot for about a 500 to 700 calorie deficit a day, without changing anything else, that should give you about a lb+ a week. 

if you are in a healthy weight range, toning up is a great thing. the number on the scale might be less important than crafting a stronger, leaner, fitter body.