Hello ladies. Count me in. I am almost at my first goal of 21 pounds off. I am going on week 10 of lo carb. Although this is not my first time around I think it will be my most successful. I have not been losing as quickly as I would like but I am seeing some noticiable changes in my measurements. I think it is best when we are in the TDC range to make small manageable goals. Trying to look at the full amount we want to lose can be daunting. My first two mini goals (not weight) were to be able to zip my coat up and to take the bra extender off my bra. I am happy to say I have achieved them both. Together we can do this.

Hi Allison, count me in, too. I'm really struggling to get and keep my weight down. My body really seems to be fighting me on this. I've read articles about having a "weight memory" and the body trying to restore it's fat stores, and with as hard as I am working on this, I have to wonder if it's true.

I hit my low weight of 178 last march 30, and have been slowly gaining ever since, regardless of what I try. I'm now 196.6. Last month, fearing seeing that 200 on the scale, I threw myself into a personal 2-week challenge of keeping the calories at or near 1200 a day. I was going out of town for the weekend at the end of the 2 weeks, and knew I'd be faced with hotel and seminar food, and taking a lot of my own snacks to have something to eat (inevitably, low carb travel snacks are salty) so I wanted to see how much I could lose before going.
I did a mix of 3 meal and IF days. I tracked every bite in Fitday and recorded it all. I succeeded, 2 clean weeks of VLC and 1260 average calories according to Fitday, and I actually saw 188.8 on the scale the day before we left.
I stayed as LC as possible while on vacation, but didn't worry about calories. Still, I was mindful and tried not to overeat. The scale was right back up to 197 when I got home, after only 3 days. Since my ankles swelled up like softballs by bedtime every day I was out of town, I assumed it was bloating/water, and got back to the business of clean eating/lowered calories.
Here we are 2 weeks later, and the scale hasn't budged.
It's very discouraging.
I doubt my ability to maintain eating 1200 calories forever. It's getting harder and harder now. I don't even know if it's doing any good. But a couple of 1500 or 1800 calorie LC days, and the scale goes up.
I don't know what to do to get my body losing again, the way it seems to be fighting me so hard.

I've lost this weight twice before, in 92-93 and 97-98, and put it all back on. I'm really rather terrified.

Yes, I could use the support of this thread!

I think part of my issue is approaching menopause and estrogen dominance. I am trying taking DIM and bioidentical progestertone cream.

I hereby formally apologize to every woman on this forum who has ever written they were doing everything right but not losing, for thinking to myself they weren't being honest!

it really sucks when your the one its happening to dont it Mizkitty?? I think we have all been there at one point or another. I sure wish I knew how to fix it cause I hate it too. Right now I'm in a stall and its driving me mad. I'm gonna try to up my protein and see what happens. Hang in there girl we can do this. Maybe gritting our teeth the whole way but we can do it

Okay a question to ask of you? Do you check your measurements. Often when we think we are in a stall our body is re-adjusting.

I buy those little 187 ml bottles of wine that come in 4-packs. There's quite a large and interesting variety of those available if you shop at the right place, and I find it makes it far easier to keep under control that way than if you have a regular-sized bottle of wine.

Are you still doing IF as well? I'm trying to incorporate that more. So far I'm mostly managing one day a week. Sundays are my usual day for a 24-hour fast - though I suppose next week, being Easter Sunday, I won't be able to do it. And then I have at least one day a week where I do pretty *high* calorie, like almost 3000 calories or so. That day is usually Friday. The rest of the time I try to stick to low carb, moderate calorie. I don't think I could ever live on 1200 calories a day either.

And I don't even think it's good to do so day in and day out, as I do believe your body then adjusts to that. I believe the fasting day and the high-calorie day both help keep my metablism from getting too complacent.

I read somewhere recently, not sure if it was in PPLP or Dr. Eades's blog, but I think it was from Dr. Eades, about a woman who found she could not eat above 1000 calories a day to maintain her weight loss, but 1000 was too depressing and spartan to maintain long-term.

So she did sort of a semi-IF routine, where she alternated days between a 500-calorie day and a 1500-calorie day. The net was still 1000/day but those 1500 days let her eat more normally and feel more satisfied. But being LC she didn't find the 500-calories days that hard either, and she always had something to look forward too the next day.

Yeah, I weigh myself every day, record my weight every week. But once a month I take my measurements. I'd been stuck at the same weight for three weeks so was curious to see where my April measurements fell. Every single measurement was the *same* or *higher* than March measurements. So much for that being a mood booster.

But today I was finally down a pound from my three-week low, so at least I moved a bit in that department even though my measurements bummed me out.

I too take measurements at least monthly. Sometimes every two weeks. I weighed this morning and I'm down 3 lbs. FINALLY!!! Only lost 4 lbs the whole month of March. So yeah I'm happy the scale is going in the right direction. Sooooo -3 lbs for me 12 to go to reach my mini goal of loosing 15 lbs by May 26th. I'll take more if I can get it but I want to lose at least 15lbs before my dr.'s appointment on that day

Today was my offical weighin day. I am down 6 pounds from last week. I finally made my first weight loss goal (or close enough only .10 away) so I changed my goal weight to 280. Not much change in measurements this time 1/2 inch on the hips.

Have you thought about doing just meat & eggs for a short time to see if that makes a differance? I am not strict on M&E but I follow that pretty closely with steamed veggies.

Hi Karen, when I read about your ankles swelling, I wanted to reply to this thread. Do you have high blood pressure? My ankles were swelling like crazy by the end of each day about a month before I was diagnosed with HBP (and I actually ended up having a slightly enlarged heart due to undiagnosed HBP that was left untreated for so long). Don't mean to scare you, but just wanted to let you know my experience. My BP is soooo much better now on LC, so hopefully, yours is fine, too.

As far as the April challenge, I'm in and my goal is 10 pounds.

Sonia

Hi Sonia,
I no longer have HBP. 130 pounds ago, I was on a strong dose of lisinopril, (still had HBP) and had lots of issues with foot and ankle swelling which I learned lisinopril itself causes. I've been off the HBP meds with normal blood pressure about 2 years now.

Thanks for your input. Good luck on your April goal.

My weight is down 1.4 pounds since my first post. I'm not too excited though, I've managed to lose and regain this same 7 pounds a half dozen times this past year. Just gotta keep pushing on, though.

[quote]Are you still doing IF as well? I'm trying to incorporate that more. So far I'm mostly managing one day a week. Sundays are my usual day for a 24-hour fast - though I suppose next week, being Easter Sunday, I won't be able to do it. And then I have at least one day a week where I do pretty *high* calorie, like almost 3000 calories or so. That day is usually Friday. The rest of the time I try to stick to low carb, moderate calorie. I don't think I could ever live on 1200 calories a day either.[quote]

Hi Merpig,
I still do IF, on average 3 days a week. Some weeks more, some less. If I have a high calorie day or 2 in a row (2400) my weight jumps up several pounds and takes me 2 weeks to get it back down, so i try not to do that. But I'm not always succesful, so that's why I've been losing and regaining the same dang 7 pounds for the last year.

Hi Karen,

First of all, I'm sorry for the delay in responding. I had a nasty headache Friday night and Saturday and wasn't up to typing what I want to say. Thankfully, it's gone.

I'm so sorry to hear you're having such a rough time. What you describe goes beyond frustrating to downright frightening.

I've reached an age (46) where my hormones seem to be changing and causing me problems too. First I decided to get rid of the fruit I was eating. It made no difference; my weight stayed the same. Then I got rid of the alcohol I was drinking. Again, no change weight-wise/size-wise. Then I eliminated all dairy because so many people report breaking stalls by getting off dairy. For me: nothing, no change in weight (but I did have some health improvements). Then I thought I'd go back to intermittent fasting. For the first week I saw no loss whatsoever. I was frantic at that point. I mean this was ridiculous: I was down to meat, vegetables, eggs, and a bit of nuts only, and only during a limited eating window, and getting zero results in fatloss (but I do see health improvements).

This is insane. I've lost in the past with a lot less effort than this. And I see people my size on tv programs losing astounding amounts week after week. I thought that people only got stuck like this when they were close to goal, not at nearly 300 pounds. I want to scream.

[Warning to sensitive readers: female discussion ahead]

I know what it is: I'm peri-menopausal. I missed two periods last fall and now have missed three consecutive periods this year. I am so sluggish and tired I can hardly scrape myself off the couch to go to bed. I haven't seen a doctor about it, I haven't yet looked into hormone replacement because I've become so skeptical about doctors and prescriptions.

Oh how I wish I'd finished losing weight before getting to this stage in life.

Karen, how does the DIM and progesterone cream affect things? Is it supposed to help or hinder weight?

I've barely begun looking into information on menopause, but I did find one thing that's roused my interest: melatonin. There was a study done in Italy where they gave 3 mg. a night to peri-menopausal and post-menopausal women for six months and saw dramatic results. Women in a control group got a placebo and saw no improvement. But the women receiving the melatonin all saw their hormones normalize. They all began getting their periods again, even those who had not had a period in years. All their menopausal symptoms went away.

I haven't found anything about this affecting weightloss, but I intend to experiment on myself. It seems to me that if this hormonal shift is causing me a big weightloss stall, then normalizing those cyclical hormones should get me back to where I can lose again. One article I found from a doctor in Britain speculated that using melatonin, just 3 mg. a night, could forestall menopause for 20 years! After I finish catching up here I'm off to Whole Foods to buy some. It's cheap, too.

Another random experiment I'm going to try on myself is taking milk thistle, just because NancyLC reported losing six (?) pounds fast when she started taking it. I don't know why, but I think it's probably harmless and good for your liver. It's expensive, though.

My last experiment will be the Eades' supplement Pentabasol. He reported in his blog that they did some controlled testing of it and saw real results. That will be my last-ditch effort because it costs $60 per month -- <gulp!>.

Oh, I might try giving up nuts too. That's been a stall-breaker for a lot of people.

Karen, have you looked into food intolerances? I read the book that Sarah (Citruskiss) is always recommending: The False Fat Diet by Elson Haas. It's all about elimination diets. It seems a lot of people suddenly drop 30 pounds when they uncover a food sensitivity. These change over a lifetime, so you may not have had trouble with gluten, for example, in the past, but you may have developed an intolerance to it. And for reasons I don't understand, that intolerance could be making you unable to lose weight.

This has gotten quite long, but I wanted to get all that out.

I hope things get better for you soon.

Hi Carrie! Glad you're here. I like your mini goals. Keep us posted.



Fantastic! You must be soaring!

Yay Debbie!