I am four days short of a month into my diet and exercising plan and I have to admit I am just a little bit annoyed. I am making a lot of sacrifices every day in my diet and yet I am seeing tiny results. I am also exercising nearly every day for at least 30 minutes (many times more like an hour) and my body looks pretty much the way it did a month ago. This annoys me.
However, I am encouraged. I do feel quite good. I also have been able to maintain a very good sleep schedule, which many of you know has been a struggle for me my entire life. Furthermore, I am actually enjoying exercising and calorie counting. I don't know why I enjoy it. I have done these types of plans in the past, but have hated them so much that I give up in about a week. So, I am glad the Lord has given me joy in this pursuit this time around. I am also grateful for an encouraging husband who allows me to have time to exercise and tells me I look pretty.
So, 4 weeks down and only 4 pounds to show for it. If you take my highest weight during this time period and subtract from my lowest weight (which came and left 3 days ago), I have lost 7 pounds. But from my starting weight to my ending weight to date, I can only claim 4. I don't understand why my weight fluctuates so much. Even throughout the day, I can gain something like 3 or 4 pounds from my morning weigh in to an evening check up. I am sticking to a 1600 calorie per day diet, so it's not like I eat a ton of food. I also have been making sure to drink plenty of water. In fact, I think I have a total of 5 sodas total this whole past month (2 coming through our mini-vacation to Indy) and literally nothing else besides water. I wasn't even this strict about my diet when I was pregnant with Noah.
Counting calories through http://www.caloriecount.about.com/ has also opened my eyes to the amount of good and bad nutrients I put in my body daily. As I had posted before, my sodium intake was through the roof. Now, thanks to good suggestions and realizing what foods are sodium no-no's, I have that under control. I even took one of my reader's excellent advice and bought a really turkey instead of deli meat for making sandwiches. Sure, it is easier to buy deli meat, but when 1 serving has 24% of your daily need of sodium, you realize something needs to change ( 1 cup of a roasted turkey only has 4% of your allotted sodium intake).
Now dear readers, I need your help on two more items. Calorie/nutrition awareness has showed me that my diet is too low in potassium and calcium. I have been eating 1 banana a day and have been incorporating sweet potatoes into my diet more often, but I still am only taking in about half of my need for potassium. Do any of you know any super foods that don't have a huge caloric impact, but hit hard in potassium? Also, is it even possible for me to have 100% of my daily need for calcium when I am on a 1600 calorie per day diet? How do I get 100% of my calcium needs met when my sodium is supposed to stay under 1500 mg a day? Please feel free to to share any ideas you have run across that have worked for you.
6 comments:
I usually take a multivitamin to cover my bases. I eat healthy, but when you're trying to limit calories it is very hard to get everything through diet alone. I also take sugar-free calcium chews from Costco.
I always enjoyed calorie counting, and more rigid diets. I think it allows my OCD tendencies to come out in a way that isn't too destructive, so it makes me happy :-)
My weight fluctuates a lot, too. I sometimes worry that I'm becoming one of those "yo-yo" dieters, which they say is really bad. I just don't really know how to stop the cycle.
Couple of thoughts.
1. Take a multivitamin and calcium supplement... it really does make a difference. I take the target brand gummy ones. Delish.
2. Are you eating within 30-45 minutes of exercising? When you exercise your metabolism goes up. You need to feed your body within that window and it will keep your metabolism and up and burning much longer through out the day. If you miss that window, it almost defeats the purpose of working out. It seems counterintuitive to burn 400 calories and immediately drink a 350 calorie smoothie but it works and then you don't have hunger pangs or SALT pangs later in the day.
3. When you say 1600 is that total or NET? If you are working out you need to add the calories in that you burn. So if you want a net of 1600 but you burn 350 then you should eat 1950. Otherwise your body goes into starvation mode and you burn muscle not fat.
Keep up the good work. A pound a week is totally reasonable. Some weeks I lose pound then go a month before i drop 4 lbs all at once. I've been on the same plateau for two months now. It's frustrating but you need to stick with it. You'll succeed in the end!
First, muscle is developing also and there are other ways to determine "fat" weight loss such as feeling a difference in clothing and taking your body mass.
Second, as the day goes on the body naturally puts on weight. Salt in food makes the body maintain water and at night while you are sleeping it decreases. Therefore, what counts is weighing yourself at the same time every day, usually in the morning about a half hour after waking up before breakfast.
this is just a couple things I learned from when I use to be a runner. I actually weighed approx. the same when I was running and a year from when I stopped, due to muscle weight. My pants fit different though once my running muscle starting leaving and I'm sure my fat index went back up.
Erica
Losing 4 pounds in that many weeks is not slow progress! From what Kristen (our resident health and nutrition facts lady) tells me, if you lose much faster you will just gain it back yo-yo style. What you are doing is very healthy and sound all around! Hurray, Lauren! (Now, I'm going to have to look into your lowering Na tips, as both Tim and I need to do that more diligently!)m
Hi Lauren,
I am on a diet too, calorie counting and exercising for about a month now as well. I learned that it is extremely difficult to lose more than one true pound of fat per week. Some diets, such as the Atkins diet, cause you to lose water right away so the scale says you lost weight, but it wasn't actually fat.
You may already know this, but it takes burning 3,500 calories to burn a whole pound of fat. So you have to eat 500 less calories than you burn everyday for 7 days to lose a pound of fat.
I don't think it's really possible to do more than that, without feeling like you're starving. I need to lose 10 lbs to get back to my "normal" weight and I just told myself I was going to allow myself at least 10 weeks. Anything faster backfires, I think, and makes it easier to quit and then gain it all back.
I read that anything less than 1200 calories net, not 1600, causes starvation mode in your body. So often I'll exercise and burn appr. 300 calories, so that day I allow myself 1500. If I don't exercise, I only allow myself 1200. That seems to keep me from being too hungry as long as I spread the calories throughout the day and have something hearty for breakfast, like an egg or two.
Anyway, I think you're doing great to lose 4 lbs in 4 weeks. Keep it up!
I keep meaning to post here that peppermint tea has potassium (no calories, if you don't drink it with sugar -- very pleasant taste).
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