Needing some serious advice here. 😵💫
I’ve been following a strict diet and exercise plan for 19 days and for the past 11 days the scale has barely moved. I’ve been following the 75 Hard program and this is the plan I’m following:
Diet:
~1,500 vegetarian, balanced, whole foods
1 gallon of water/day
No alcohol
No cheat meals
Exercise:
45 min of intense aerobics 5x a week
45 min of light aerobics 2x a week
45 min of yoga 7x a week
I track, weigh, and portion out all food, use my Apple Watch to track exercise and activity, and I put everything into my nutrition app LoseIt! According to my app I’m in a ~1,500 deficit each day. From that calculation I should have lost a little over 8 lbs. in reality I’ve only lost about 5lbs.
Week 1: I lost 3.4 lbs
Week 2: I lost 1.2 lbs
Week 3: I’ve lost 0.6 lbs
Seems each week I’m losing half as much.
My goal is to lose 40 lbs in 100 days. (Lofty, I know, but I am committed). If I don’t lose exactly 40, that’s fine. Even if it was 30-35 lbs I’d be ecstatic! But the way my weight loss keeps trending the past 2 weeks I will have only lost ~16 lbs in 100 days. Yes, losing 16 lbs would be incredible, but it’s not my goal and is off by a huge margin.
Any advice, tips, insights, or sharing of similar experiences are very much appreciated because I don’t know wtf is going on!
by Glittering-Proton
18 Comments
Are you getting enough sleep? How is your stress?
Weight loss isn’t linear. Our bodies aren’t machines. You’re not going to be able to precisely plot and plan your exact weight loss week by week. Give it time. If your calorie counting is on target and your calorie deficit is what it should be, the scale will catch up eventually. I think you’re setting yourself up for failure, or at least disappointment, with unrealistic expectations.
What is your height and weight?
Is there a reason you feel like you have to weigh yourself daily? I just weigh myself weekly. There is a great deal of variability in weight from day-to-day. I don’t think that frequency is a particularly useful way of getting data regarding weight loss. It’s probably not great for your mental health either.
Also, your two pictures show a lot of progress to me. I think you should feel proud of what you’re doing and focus on the healthy lifestyle choices. If you keep doing what you’re doing, you’re going to lose weight. You already have.
FYI, a healthy weight loss goal would be losing 1-2 lbs a week max. So about 28 lbs max would be a better goal for you than 40 lbs of weight loss.
I’m not sure if you are exercising too much and not allowing your body recovery time either. I used to work out 7 days a week and I was tired during every workout session; so I half-assed most of my workouts. That meant less intensity to burn any calories plus less recovery time for my body to heal itself. You know your body better than I would so make your own judgment on that.
Also, depending on what you ate, or even hormones, your body could just be holding onto water.
Based off your pictures, there is a difference so that’s a good thing. I know ppl tend to look at the scale as a way of measurement but I think it may be better to judge based off a measuring tape. You could have gained muscle but burned fat.
Looks about right. ~2 lbs a week, on average. It’s working. You’re not going to get faster than this.
First, I encourage you to look up what 16 pounds of fat looks like. It’s a lot, and it will be a huge accomplishment.
But also, 40 pounds in 100 days? Most weight loss plans involve 1-2 pounds a week or 1% or so body fat lost each week for people much larger than yourself, but beyond thus what is your plan after 100 days? It probably took you more time than that to gain whatever extra weight you have, and building the habits to lose it might take yet more time. If you hit that goal so quickly without a plan for after you are setting yourself up to just gain the weight back.
ETA: if you have periods, pay attention to your cycle. I was steady for three weeks as I had a late period and lost like 4 pounds over the course of days. It still averages to about two pounds a week, but apparently I was just holding onto it.
As a woman your cycle can affect things, I’m usually lightest about a week into my cycle and it goes up around my period (I never weigh myself when I’m on my period). I don’t think that’s enough time to really determine a trend, keep at it and see if things pick up again. There’s always the possibility you’re tracking things wrong or packaged foods have an incorrect calorie count. It could be so many things really. FWIW I was constantly bloated when I tried going vegetarian, it could be affecting how your stomach looks, but I do see a difference between the pictures. Hang in there.
Definitely looks like you’ve gained some muscle, I mean look at the first pic it looks like you’ve lost 15 lbs.
Lmao you’re not going to lose 40lbs in 100 days at your size.
I did over 50lbs in 100 days but I was morbidly obese. You are not.
Calm it down or you will just fail.
You’ve planned to lose a little under 3lb a week but that isn’t realistic for most people, especially people your size which isn’t that big. Big dramatic weight loss in short amounts of time are more typical of people who are quite obese. You are losing weight, it’s just at a more normal pace of 1-2lbs a week, which is the safe goal. And you’ve hit a plateau, which is also normal.
Don’t get discouraged just accept you might need to adjust your timeframe, and keep at it!
I can tell a difference between the pictures. It’s only been 17 days, and you *have* lost weight…
Screw the scale. How do you feel? I’ve lost 40 lbs since January, started lifting weights in February. I lost three lbs last mo but an inch from my waist and an inch from my hips. My endurance is great, I have killer quads and calves. If I was just looking at my weight, I’d probably give up. But, like, I *feel* great.
Start lifting! It’s gonna jack up your metabolism and increase your bone strength as you age—important for us ladies : )
I can def tell a difference between the photos! I would try to be just a little less obsessive. I find myself struggling to lose weight when I focus so intensely if that makes sense. Like still eat healthy and work out. But don’t punish yourself like this! Good luck 🤎
40lb weight loss in 100 days is absolutely insane, that isn’t a healthy goal at all unless you’re staring from the point of being ultra ultra obese.
You’ve lost about 6lbs in less than a month. You’re doing great 😀🥂
75 hard is incredibly challenging and a goal in itself without a 40lb weight loss in 100 days tacked on and doing that in a 1500 calorie deficit daily. This is a lot of goals to try to accomplish together and I echo others to aim more for 30lb.
In terms of things to try:
1.) Take measurements of your body to track progress over time too. Just because you aren’t seeing the scale number changing constantly doesn’t mean you’re not redistributing weight and building muscle and losing inches on your arms/stomach/legs over the week.
2.) You’ve shocked your body with a metric fuckton of aerobic activity in the last 2-3 weeks, and maybe your body is freaked out and inflamed or you’ve adjusted to it. To keep progressive overload going, consider switching up some of your intense aerobic exercises with body strength workouts, core work, swapping yoga with Pilates work, kettlebell workout or carrying weights or wearing a weight vest if you’re running, etc. goal is to continue stimulating your muscles and body in different ways to see if it gets the needle moving again.
3.) More protein, more fiber, and eating more in general. This is a tremendous amount of exercise to be doing on 1500 cals a day and if I’m understanding right that you’re planning to be at a ~1500 calorie deficit every day for 75+ days, I don’t know how you’re not passing out daily yet after 3 weeks. Alter your nutrition plan. Again, your body is probably freaked out. I’m not a doctor or nutritionist, but this is not healthy. It is not recommended to be in a deficit more than 7000 calories a week and by these calculations you’re at -10,500 a week. I’m sure eating more feels wrong to you but consider eating more cals every few days so your deficit is more like 0-500 cals some days and so the weekly deficit is in a safer range for weight loss. See if the fluctuations of extra energy/nutrition boost for your body’s metabolism moves you off the plateau to help weight keep coming off.
You could be making a dumpster fire out of your metabolism with these goals, try switching some things up with your workout types/intensities and your nutrition regimen and going a little less aggressively to see if things improve as you’d like.
If you’ve changed the variables and still aren’t seeing progress, go to a doctor and consult them. Maybe you have hormone or nutrition imbalances, or hidden health issues that are hampering your progress, and you can work together on a safe and manageable path forward.
U plato and stop losing weight after a while therfore u need to up the intensity of exercise to continue losing weight
8lb in 19 days is an astronomical amount of weight loss and shouldn’t be expected. 40lb in a sub 4mo window is also unrealistic. 1-2lb a week is more of a realistic goal and as you lose weight, your weight loss slows. So you won’t be maintaining the same rate of weight loss once you’ve started to lose weight. Your tdee will also change.
Your expectations are more of the issue than the process.