Stalling for 8 months made me lose hope, what happened?

[hellothere55]

Not sure if this belongs in the motivation board or here, but I figured it's more related to this.

So, April of 2011, I was 250 lb. I decided to diet+exercise (just cardio) very strictly. October of 2011, I was 194 lb. Everything was fine, but I started to stall for a couple of weeks, so I added in weightlifting while still on a strict cut. I was 188 in June of 2012.

I lost ~6 lb in 8 months, which is very slow, and it's not like my body/waist was changing shape or anything to my eye. I tried a bunch of stuff and none of it made a difference (cheat meals, different HIIT, counting every calorie, eating very low calories, alternating number of calories).

In September 2012, I decided to not even be on a cut and instead just lifted weights and ate freely. In December 2012 to now, I haven't done anything. I'm at 215lb now.

I haven't done anything because I've been depressed and I lose hope rather easily, especially if something takes me a lot of effort. Every time I feel like starting back up again, I don't want to, because I feel like it's for no reason.

Any reason why the stall even happens? What should I do? Any similar stories? I made an appointment with a doctor where I'm gonna ask them to take a look at my thyroid, because it'd make a lot of sense if something was malfunctioning with it.

[eriquee]

macros?

Buy a food scale, and weigh everything.

Lift weights to preserve muscle mass, otherwise after losing all the weigh you want, you will still look fat, just smaller, if you want the `lean look` lift weights.

reduce your calories by 500kcal, for 2 weeks and see if weigh loss resumes.

if you THINK you are eating low calories, buy a food scale and weigh everything and re calculate how much are you eating, by far most of the problems people encounter with diet plans, is UNDERESTIMATE how much they eat, or how much the amount of food you eat weighs.

[Vaylor]

You were either eating at maintenance or not counting properly.

[hellothere55]

macros?

Buy a food scale, and weigh everything.

Lift weights to preserve muscle mass, otherwise after losing all the weigh you want, you will still look fat, just smaller, if you want the `lean look` lift weights.

reduce your calories by 500kcal, for 2 weeks and see if weigh loss resumes.

if you THINK you are eating low calories, buy a food scale and weigh everything and re calculate how much are you eating, by far most of the problems people encounter with diet plans, is UNDERESTIMATE how much they eat, or how much the amount of food you eat weighs.

I made sure not to underestimate. If I was eating 500 less calories, I'd've been eating at 1300 every day, and I had very bad symptoms when eating at 1200.

I didn't count macros though; just calories. If I had to throw a ballpark, itdve been mostly protein, then fats, then carbs.

[activeseven]

Your calculations for either the calories you are burning, or the calories you are taking in are wrong. The fact that you are not losing weight proves it.

How exactly are you determining these numbers? Your burn and intake that is. Maybe we can help set you straight.

[ThySparticus]

You ate freely and now you're coming here to ask why haven't lost weight?

I highly doubt it will turn out to be a thyroid issue, but go get it looked up anyway. When you come back and everything is in check you'll realize you simply ate too much.

Also, before we answer anymore question have you read the stickies?

[hellothere55]

Your calculations for either the calories you are burning, or the calories you are taking in are wrong. The fact that you are not losing weight proves it.

How exactly are you determining these numbers? Your burn and intake that is. Maybe we can help set you straight.

I didn't calculate how much I was burning. I just did HIIT burpees or running 3 times a week (started as burpees, went to running to make it more intense), and once I started slowing down, added in weightlifting 3 times a week (as said in OP) but did HIIT 2 times a week.

For consuming, I used a scale for a while and made sure to get 1800 a day. So one day I might get 450 for 4 meals, or I'll get 360 for 5 meals, or I'll have more in the morning and less later, etc. I read labels for serving sizes and just based it off that. If it didn't have one, I looked online. So it would've been like, 'ok, I have 400 calories to play around with this meal. I'll eat 4 oz chicken (1oz is 30 calories so thats 120), an apple (~100), half a cup of whole milk (75), a cup of vegetables like carrots and spinach (~40ish), and have like 70 calories worth of walnuts'. There are some variables in there, like the size of the apple and the vegetables, and ketchup for some meals, but I seriously doubt those things would cause significant problems, especially since it's not like it was something crazy.

[hellothere55]

You ate freely and now you're coming here to ask why haven't lost weight?

I highly doubt it will turn out to be a thyroid issue, but go get it looked up anyway. When you come back and everything is in check you'll realize you simply ate too much.

Also, before we answer anymore question have you read the stickies?

I'm saying for 8 months of the duration of me being active+healthy, I stopped losing weight for no apparent reason (Oct/2011 to June/2012). The eating freely thing came after the long period of non weight-loss (post June/2012).

I'll take a look at the stickies

[Mdenatale]

Read this thread: http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showth...hp?t=121703981

A hormone issue is highly unlikely. You need to get a good target for protein, fat and carb intake that fits with a calorie intake of about 500 calories per day below your maintenance level. Once you establish that and live it by the book for a few weeks you can judge the results and adjust from there. Until you get the macros and calories tracked closely you are going to have a hard time diagnosing a problem.

[activeseven]

I didn't calculate how much I was burning.

I stopped reading your post after this. Serious bro? If you want to lose fat you have to ensure you are burning MORE calories then you are taking in. If you don't know your energy in you're missing half the equation.

Here is a link for you to read: http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat...-equation.html

[hellothere55]

I stopped reading your post after this. Serious bro? If you want to lose fat you have to ensure you are burning MORE calories then you are taking in. If you don't know your energy in you're missing half the equation.

Here is a link for you to read: http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat...-equation.html

I wasn't really sure what the point of that article was, other than "theres a lot of science in losing weight that people don't know about", but no kind of practical advice. Unless there was something in there that I looked over. Regardless, I was eating at 1800 and doing 2 days of HIIT with 3 days of weight lifting, is that still not enough? I said this in the other post too; I wonder if you'll even read this far.

[hellothere55]

Read this thread: http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showth...hp?t=121703981

A hormone issue is highly unlikely. You need to get a good target for protein, fat and carb intake that fits with a calorie intake of about 500 calories per day below your maintenance level. Once you establish that and live it by the book for a few weeks you can judge the results and adjust from there. Until you get the macros and calories tracked closely you are going to have a hard time diagnosing a problem.

\

For the macro amount part, it says not to do it in ratio, but it also says to reduce calories for 20% if you want to lose. Meaning, is it just 20% off each amount of macros per lb bodyweight?

I was eating at 1800, maybe that was too low below maintenance?

[activeseven]

I wasn't really sure what the point of that article was, other than "theres a lot of science in losing weight that people don't know about", but no kind of practical advice. Unless there was something in there that I looked over. Regardless, I was eating at 1800 and doing 2 days of HIIT with 3 days of weight lifting, is that still not enough? I said this in the other post too; I wonder if you'll even read this far.

The point of the article was to understand the energy balance equation. Highlighting the fact that you cannot utilize that fact unless you actually know what your burning a day. It doesn't matter what you eat and how much HIIT if you're still eating at a surplus. You can't know if you're at a deficit or surplus unless you track the energy you're expending and compare it to the energy you're taking in. Hence the equation. You MUST understand what you are burning in order determine if how much you've eaten will put you in a caloric deficit or not. This isn't rocket science man, you have no idea what you're burning so therefore you have no clue if you're at a deficit. Though the truth is...you're NOT at a deficit. Otherwise you would lose fat.

[blindspot13]

Calories in vs calories out. You simply didn't measure/track/record/weigh everything. It's pretty obvious to me if it took you 8 months to realize you were "stalling" that you were just ignoring the problem (IE probably overeating and wishful thinking).

Start again today, fresh and new. You won't stall if you do it properly.

[Kostya1981]

My opinion:

Body is not just machine with mathematics laws. It's smart, very smart in questions of adaptation. When you change surrounding enviroment - your physiology follows it.

When you drive car with lack of fuel - you obviously trying use pedal with much more accuracy and slow down speed, turn off conditioner and so on (as a metabolism).

That's is why any diet don't run long time on deficit. You need, time to time, slowly back to base level, but then use fast input in deficit... repeat.

[activeseven]

Body is not just machine with mathematics laws.

Um, yeah it is. The body follows the Energy Balance equation. No one breaks the laws of physics.

http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat...-equation.html

When you change surrounding enviroment - your physiology follows it.

Which alters the equation and proceeds to follow it to the letter.

That's is why any diet don't run long time on deficit.

Wow really, I've cut for 14 months straight and lost ~90lbs.

[Mdenatale]

\

For the macro amount part, it says not to do it in ratio, but it also says to reduce calories for 20% if you want to lose. Meaning, is it just 20% off each amount of macros per lb bodyweight?

I was eating at 1800, maybe that was too low below maintenance?

Generally your protein and fat intake remain stable. As your body weight and body fat change over time you may need to make some adjustments. The calorie deficit usually comes from adjusting carbs.

Lets say your maintenance calories is 2500 and you figure your macros to be 200g protein and 75g fat. Those 2 add up to 1500 calories. If you were simply trying to maintain your weight you would be looking at about 250g of carbs to get you to 2500 calories per day. If you want to cut at 1 lb per week you would drop your total calories to 2000 per day, by maintaining you minimum on protein and fat, but cutting back carbs to 125g. That's a little bit over simplified, but I think it makes the point.

[DatMurse]

you arent doing anything to keep track of calories and you are wondering why you arent losing weight?

You are eating according to your metabolic needs. Nothing more to it and you are eating at maintenance or possibly 100 cals daily.

You had no broad or specific plan to lose weight.

[ThySparticus]

\

For the macro amount part, it says not to do it in ratio, but it also says to reduce calories for 20% if you want to lose. Meaning, is it just 20% off each amount of macros per lb bodyweight?

I was eating at 1800, maybe that was too low below maintenance?

No it means to take 20% off your calories, which will mostly come off (if not all of it) your carbs considering you have a set amount of minimum protein and fats you want to maintain the muscle you have and not mess up your hormones. But lowering your carbs will only lower your energy level in the day (which sucks, but its better then the previous options).

Either you're are extremely inactive and need to eat less than 1800 or like almost everyone else, you're eating too much. Yes you have to count everything, yes you have to weight everything and no being around the ballpark isn't good enough. You've been stalling for what I gather to be more than a year, get a strict grip of your diet or accept that you'll stay this way forever. There's no magic answer to your dilemma other than put more work into your nutrition and less into all the other gimmicks of losing fat.

[f2dz]

I know how you feel OP, it can be super frustrating stalling for months on end. I stalled for around three months before seeing any drastic changes.

Judging by your weight I'd guess the cals you were eating were too low. I'd suggest recalculating your maintenance and start on a 10% reduction. Do a solid lifting routine coupled with HIIT training three times a week for 10-15 minutes, making sure to accurately track every bit of food that you consume.

If your cals are too low you'll end up just holding onto more bodyfat as your body freaks out and tries to maintain itself with such a lower intake than what it's used to.

Stalls happen and you have to push past them unfortunately. It's tough, but worth it in the end.

[Kostya1981]

Made some search for you. Buddy, hope this will help to find answers for your question.

http://forum.bodybuilding.com/showth...hp?t=150242583

[dfalkoff]

Have to make sure you are accurately tracking your calories.

[hellothere55]

Alright, so I guess here's what I'm going to try.

1. First go to the doctor, get thyroid examined, get body fat percentage, [set up physical therapy to help my wrist and back which have some weird kinks]
2. Find macro amount I need via calories, reduce by 20%
3. Record macro amounts daily
4. HIIT sprint twice a week
5. Some lighter cardio once a week or so

I'm not even sure how I'd add in weightlifting to the calculation of all these macros and whatnot. If I did, my routine that I've been using for like 6 freaking years on and off is just

one day - Squats 3x5, bench 3x5, deadlift 1 (or 2) x 5

next time at gym -Squats 3x5, OHP 3x5, bent over row 3x5

3 times a week


Eventually I can't do the squats on the bench day anymore because I need enough time to heal. Maybe I should change up the routine and do splits like everyone else.

[unleashthelion]

Why would eating at maintenance for 8 months make you lose hope?

[Brad805]

Put down the fork and spoon. Sorry, it really is that simple. I too thought I was at a plateau, but in reality it was just a case of not wanting to stop a few bad habits. I stopped that, and all is on track again.