2 lbs a week question. Hi I have a question regarding the best way to lose 2 lbs a week in a healthy manner. I’m on the sparkpeople site but haven’t been able to find the answer with their resources. I’m sticking to a 1600 calorie diet daily and SP suggested that I burn about 800 calories a week to reach my goal weight and lose 1-2 lbs a week. This week I burned about 3000 calories from hitting the gym and Zumba class which is far over the 800 recommended. I thought that burning more would help me lose more but I haven’t lose anything this week and I guess I’ve slowed my metabolism down. What is the best way to find my balance and hit the 2 lbs a week weight loss goal?
22, female, 239 lbs
I’m now thinking that my resting metabolic rate is about 1800 and I probably burn 2400 daily before exercise. If I add another 600 calories a day to that 5 times a week, I’ll create a deficit of 7000 calories weekly while sticking to my 1600 calorie diet. Will my metabolism be normal if I do this or will it still be slow?
Trying the dr in poteau. I started Monday, hopefully for the last time. They give you pills, they seem to be working with no side effects.They also have a diet and a nutritionist on staff as well as a trainer. I guess I will find out if it works when I go weigh in.
Did you just start exercising?. I found that it took at least 4-6 weeks to start to see changes on the scale.
While I didn’t lose “weight”, I could feel my body “shifting” and noticable differences in my appetite and how I felt.
Also, even if things are going consistently, I found the weight loss to vary by week. Some weeks 0, other weeks I would drop 2.5 pounds. It takes time for your body to adjust to changes, and to letting go of the weight.
Is the exercise you are doing something that you can keep up indefinitely? Or, are you in overdrive?
I lost 25 over the summer. I lost 25 lbs over the summer between May and August and then started school and had an ankle injury. I regained 5 between September and December and restarted for the new year. I have lots of time on my hands now so I was planning on working out 5-6 times a week @ 4 days 60 minutes cardio & 2 day 40 minutes cardio with 20 minutes strenth training. Maybe I am doing too much??? I feel okay :/
During my weight loss over the summer, I was pretty active on my summer job and got in about 60 minutes of official cardio at the gym or at Zumba class. I averaged a 6 lb weight loss each month and I ate about 1600 calories a day then, usually a little more.
I agree with this ++. I have been exercising for 2 weeks now I haven’t noticed a # difference but I feel Different. lol. like my butt doesn’t shake AS bad…
If I can feel the burn it must be working.
You can’t control your metabolism.. What happens when you diet is that your body thinks that you’re in a famine so it begins to turn the amount of calories that it burns to conserve energy. The more food you cut from your diet, the more your metabolism sinks. There is nothing to be done about it. So, you may start off losing weight at 1500 calories a day, but within weeks, that can change. I can tell you this, unless I exercised over 90 minutes a day, i would lose about 1/4 pound per week on an 800 calorie a day diet with 60 minutes of exercise.
You just have to experiment and see where your body will lose weight.
For me, I could take a couple pounds a week off by exercising 90 – 120 minutes per day minimum. I walked 8 to 10 miles per day every day at about 12 minutes per mile and kept my calorie intake to around 1200. Once I switched to low carb, I could eat more and had more energy. But everyone is individual.
Here’s a good article on weight loss:
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/05/08/health/08fat.html?_r=1
And a good documentary:
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/takeonestep/fat/video-ch_01.html
all those numbers are just estimations. And can be pretty far off. Most people and many calculators way overestimate — so don’t assume you actually burned 3000 calories exercising. That’s actually quite a lot.
No, you have not slowed down your metabolism is you are eating 1600 calories and exercising. It’s more likely that you overestimated your calories in and underestimated your calories out.
I’d workout more and keep your calories eaten the same.
BMI Calulator Plus, look at it. http://www.webmd.com/diet/calc-bmi-plus – Plug your information in and it will give you all that you need to figure out your numbers accurately.
Thanks. Thanks very much for the resource and the extra help!!
BMI itself is worse than useless. See Top 10 Reasons Why The BMI Is Bogus and Why doctors won’t stop using an outdated measure for obesity.
Of and by itself, BMI tells you virtually nothing about fitness. Waist:height ratio (also calculated at the WebMD site) is much more useful.
Better: compute your body fat percentage and estimate your BMR (basal, or resting, metabolic rate) from it.
There is other info. If you actually clicked the link, it shows waist to height. It goes over BMR also. Look at the link before you actually knock something. If someone doesn’t have a way to check their body fat, there is nothing wrong with looking at that. Most places that check body fat, like gyms, do it incorrectly anyway.
Yes, I noted that in my post. The key information provided, however, is BMI.
If you’ll actually read a post before knocking it, you’ll notice a key sentence such as “Waist:height ratio (also calculated at the WebMD site) is much more useful.”
And I’m very well aware and have commented many times on DiFo and FitFo of the inaccuracies of many body fat tests, particularly hand-held electrostatic meters. My own preferred tools are body circ measurements (accurately trending of changes if not the best absolute measurement of BF%), eyeballing (pretty good if you have an idea where muscle definition occurs), and hydrostatic or bod-pod measurements (more expensive, less convenient, but accurate).
I like submersion. But that is expensive. When I was wrestling I could do it at ASU any time I wanted.