HELP! weight loss nightmare

[vez58]

Hi there all,

I'm 21 and i feel like i'm in loosing battle with weight loss. I eat less than 1000 calories a day and i run 12kms 6 days a week however i continue to stack on weight allot of which is not muscle according to the skin fold callipers I really don't know what to do after exhausting allot of options to kickstart my weight loss including increasing my exercise and having supplements including omega three oils to make sure my body isn't clinging to fat because it doesn't get much from my diet. Any tips would be a god send!

thanks in advance

[Metalcharm]

My advice is to not incerase the exercise but to increase the food! You really have to eat more. 1000 calories a day at that level of activity is not sustainable and your body think it's starving itself so it's hanging onto the fat for dear life.
Get onto a site like myfitnesspal.com and you input your details and it can give you an idea on how much you should be eating.

There is also this site .. http://www.fat2fitradio.com/tools/bmr/ .. put the details onto that page and it will give you your BMR and will give you an idea of how many calories you shoul be eating. It will give you a shock as I wouldn't be surprised if it says you should be eating over 2000. If you did start eating at that level it would take your body a couple of weeks to get used to it and then it will realise that it can start getting rid of the fat (and the omega pills! )

[CronicBadger]

Hi vez58

Are you sure the weight increase is not muscle? Do you measure yourself - hip, thigh, tummy, etc?

If you're creating an energy deficit, and obviously building muscle bulk, and experience weight gain, then in all likelyhood it's muscle weight you've gained - unless you've kicked your body into starvation mode due to your low energy intake.

It's possible you're caliper measurements are erroneous. It's also possible that the fat cells have taken in water to replace the lost fat (this is just a temporary balancing attempt) and it's water retention you've been measuring.

And, finally, MetalCharm is spot on about the calorific intake. That's way too low according to medical standards and almost certainly WILL force your body to retain its fat stores at the expense of other internal organs and your overall health.

Another good tool source is the link at the top of this page.

1) Click on Diets (next to Home) to open the Diet menu bar
2) Click on Diet Tools

The Diet Tools menu has some useful tools such as:
* Body Mass Index (BMI) Calculator
This BMI Calculator is designed to help you get a sense of whether your weight is "Underweight", "Normal", "Overweight" or "Obese".

* Daily Energy Needs Calculator
This Daily Energy Needs Calculator uses the Harris-Benedict Formula to determine your average daily energy requirements.

[vez58]

Hi guys,

thanks so much for the advice i have an account on my fitness pal and after reading posts on these forums i was aware of the idea that low caloric intake paired with high expenditure could cause my body to go into starvation mode. Thus using myfitnesspal i increased my intake for three weeks with the outcome of a gain of 3kgs despite still being under the recommended daily intake. If i was in starvation mode would i experience an initial increase in weight loss followed by weight loss?

[CronicBadger]

Hi vez58

There's often a lag of up to a few weeks before the body switches into weight-loss mode. The body is not a digital device that just flips between states easily. It's a complex chemical factory that's evolved over millions of years and has all sorts of reactions that vary to a large degree between individuals in different environments.

If your body was in starvation mode then your body functions won't instantly go back to their normal activity level. So, just give it time. And of course see your doctor if you feel something's wrong.

The important thing is to be consistent and do the right things over the long term. It's very difficult to put on a kilo of fat in a week because that requires about 37000Kj of surplus energy. So most likely the gain is a combination of muscle, water retention, food bulk, etc.

[vez58]

That all makes allot of sense and the possible causes of the fluctuations in weight are very likely. From your advice i think that i might have to deal with the psychological hurdle before i'll be able to deal with a possible weight gains. As you can imagine i have restricted my intake and worked hard to loose very small amounts of weight and to try and stop weight gain and thus it might feel like all the hard work has been for nothing when i gain weight! However i am willing to take this chance because as you would imagine this lifestyle seems unliveable at times.

thanks so much

[wants2loseWEIGHT]

Wow! I now know what will cause starvation mode. Great! Will then have to manage my eating habit.