Burn more calories than you eat.... what else? - Weight Loss Message Board

turtlegirl · 03-19-2006, 01:24 AM

Many people will say that the only thing to weight loss is to burn more calories than you consume. But it has to be more complicated because whenever I diet, I stall out after losing 15-20% of my total weight, and I'm still burning more than what I eat.

I'm not currently in a stall but it seems like every time I am changing my diet to lose weight, I stall out at that percent loss for many months.

So what about fat grams and fiber grams and sugar and all of that stuff, does that matter at all?

And how do you know how many calories is a good amount to aim for?

bluejbirdie · 03-19-2006, 06:59 AM

IT is 100% True that all you have to do is burn more then you eat. Nothing else mattters!

But there is a catch...what you eat, what you do, and to an extent when you eat does matter. It affects How much you are burning.

Your Metabolism is what will burn a Huge Chunk of your Calories each day.

You say you are still burning more then you eat...your not. This is because your metablosim has chnaged...it has slowed down and you are no longer burning as many calories as you used to.

By Eating the Right things and spreading it out through out the day you can help to maximize your metabolism. You also need to be doing some sort of Weight training to Build some Muscle.

The More muscle you have the higher your metabolism will be. When you eat less and Lose weight,it is inevitable thatyou will lose some muscle. With out exercise you will actually lose a fair bit of muscle, Adding Cardio will lessen the amount and adding weight training alon with the cardio will make it almost negligble.

Also your metabolism will just get used to the amount of calories coming in and naturally adjust to that over time.....this is why people plateau.

Some times Just eating more for a few days can kickstart you metabolism and get it to start burning more. Other times it can take much longer and you will have to concentrate on rebuilding the muscle that is lost.

One of the biggest problems when calculating calories for weight loss is that you never really know how many calories you are burning every day. Every way of calculating is only an estimate and most of those estimate seem to over estimate rather then underestimate.

boicrazy3188 · 03-19-2006, 08:09 PM

Have you ever recalculated the amount of calories you eat when you lose weight? When people lose weight they need to consume less calories than before. Say your 180 pounds to start. Thats 2300(use a calorie calculator to calculate, this is just an example) to maintain your weight. 2300-500 is 1800. So you stick to that and when you reach 165 pounds you plateau. So, what you have to do, is recalculate what your taking in. Now, to maintain you need about 2100 calories. 2100-500 is 1600. 200 calories x 7 is 1400 less calories your getting which is almost a half a pound.

It guess it could be the same thing as eating more for a while. If you take in 200 more calories a week, your body will jump start and when you go back to eating less, you'll lose. Whatever it is, eating less is the key. Don't forget to exercise!

I hope this makes some sense...good luck

Melting2fast · 03-20-2006, 06:44 AM

Stall?

Is that the same as plateau?

It happens to me about every two months. Most recently I went three weeks without losing one single pound, same diet, same workout routine.

Then on the first day of the fourth week I was down by three pounds in three days and the weight just started coming off again. I dunno why it happened that way, just did.

Don't get down on yourself when you hit a plateau, just keep pushing through.

shelliam · 03-21-2006, 05:26 AM

When it happens to me my whole body seems to adjust itself. My weight will shift in to other areas and such.After a plateau I may lose a few pounds the week after depending how long the stall was. I talked with my dr about this and he says to take plateau time to adjust things in your diet or exersize routines.