I'm starting to enjoy the view from this plateau

[darkemeralds]

I'm not sure there's a precise definition of "weight loss plateau," so I'll say that mine really got underway twelve days ago.



The plateau is evident on my Hacker's Diet chart:



The diamonds are my actual recorded weights. The red line is the trend--the most probable actual weight smoothed for daily fluctuations in water and stuff. It's obvious where my body slammed on the brakes. Why is another question, though there may be a clue here:



Both charts cover the same time period, December to the present. This plateau started when my average calorie intake (the orange line) declined sharply.

I tried jolting myself off this plateau with high-calorie days, but I was really uncomfortable with that approach. It felt out of control, like the thin end of a very familiar wedge. Next I'd be riding waves of ice cream with a pound cake surfboard, and that would be the end of that.

Theories about altering the ratio of macro-nutrients (fat, carbs and protein) very quickly started to feel like the old magical thinking (Atkins diet! Whee! Eat as much meat and cheese as you want! It's magic!), distracting me from the basics of energy in and energy out.

So, after much sturm und drang over this frustrating setback, I've decided just to carry on, with a slight nudge back up in daily calories. My body simply can't decrease its metabolism forever--even if I were in a coma and the feed tubes were delivering my current calories, I doubt if I would gain any weight. Since I'm not in a coma, eventually the fat cells will just have to surrender their greedy grip on the groceries.

Meanwhile, I feel strong and well, and very far from comatose. And what, after all, is a two-week plateau in a diet that's going to last well over a year?

To change things up a bit and get more information, I just ordered the Withings, which not only measures weight, fat, and lean body mass, but sends the data wirelessly to the internet. So pretty soon I'll know for sure what's what in there. And hey! So will Twitter*

*Optional

Comments

[verilyvexed]

First off, how did you generate the calorie chart? It's snazzy. I have two weight charts going, but no calorie chart.

Next, I have to say that it appears your trend line is still going down, albeit more gradually than before. Are you measuring yourself, by any chance? Obviously there's a difference in how your clothing fits, but measurements from different time periods might be helpful as well, since the body is so damned weird when it comes to weight sometimes.

Third - there is yet another plateau-busting plan I've read about, which had completely slipped my mind 'til a day or so ago. I've been thinking about your plateau and expecting to hit one myself any day now (optimist that I am); losing regularly so far, and down 15 pounds, but Lose It! adjusts the daily intake to allow for decrease in weight... and mine won't go down much lower. It's 1,255 at present.

Anyway, this strategy was instantly dismissed last time I was doing this as it seemed too involved and took too much time, but seeing as neither of us are in a race, it might be helpful. It's pretty simple: you gradually increase your calories (about 100 a week, if I recall) - as if you were going on maintenance. Only right after you stabilize, you cut back again. It's supposed to work because your body has adjusted to the new intake, so when you cut back again, it's going into fat-burning mode all over again.

Here are some links regarding the notion.

This article doesn't suggest that plan so much as taking a break, but the logic behind it is the same. (Though I find it difficult to believe anyone who could easily 'take a break' in the middle of a diet and come back with no problem would need to be on the diet in the first place. That sort of careless discipline just seems really bizarre to me.)

The alternative to upping your intake to rev up your metabolism then cutting the intake would be to up your exercise more, but you're already getting plenty of exercise, from the sound of things. Although, muscle burns more than fat: have you tried strength training?

Withings scale looks shiny. Keep us posted on it, please! Lose It! promotes it pretty heavily (and offers a discount! of, like, 2%! but so does probably everyone) but I'm too cheap at present to buy one. Would certainly encourage me to weigh daily. And might be a good investment if it's better on batteries than my current 9-volt-devouring monstrosity. Still, scale envy. Shiny.

[darkemeralds]

Thank you! Great links and very thought-provoking.

I record my daily weight, total calories, and exercise calories on a regular old spreadsheet, and the chart is derived from those columns and some calculated ones. I'd be happy to share it with you. I use OpenOffice, but I've got an Excel version at work that I could email you. Let me know.

My weight took a plunge this morning (3.8 lbs!), and rather than hopping on the irrational-glee-wagon, I did some more number crunching. I have data for the past 70 consecutive days, and I've discovered that my daily weigh-in has registered either no change or a decrease only 66% of the time. The other third were ups--all along! So it's literally two steps forward, one step back for me, but there was one really big step back a couple of weeks ago that threw all the calculations terribly out of whack.

I agree that anyone who can casually go completely off a diet and then easily get back on it probably doesn't have a significant weight problem to start with--at least, that's not behavior I can manage--but I think I could do a minor increase for a short period, as long as I write everything down. I raised my calorie bar on Livestrong by 150 and shall practice hovering around that number for a while.

What kind of scale do you have that calls for a nine-volt battery?

[verilyvexed]

(100 years later, a reply!)

I've started using gDocs spreadsheets -- thanks for the Excel offer, though! I'm too lazy to hunt up/re-install Office, and I think Open Office doesn't work on Mac.

How's the Rivendell biking going?

I've taken up walking/jogging (I call it "running", even though I can at present run for approximately 8 seconds before wishing desperately for death) and wanted to do that*, but the weather's been awful lately, grr.

* - or Bilbo's route, or the Fellowship's, or any random hobbit's. Do you have The Atlas of Middle Earth? It's delightfully geeky. Wish I hadn't sold my copy a couple of years ago. >

[darkemeralds]

This strange, strange idea of "running" keeps coming my way, and I'm giving some serious consideration to the C25K running plan. A HackDieter I follow in Tel Aviv reports starting with it a few weeks ago and having great success.

The biking across Middle Earth is rather slow at only eight miles a day. I need to check in and see if I've left the Folded Lands yet! The whole Eowyn's Challenge was developed by the author of The Atlas of Middle Earth, from what I can tell. Sadly, she passed away before all three of the movies came out.

[verilyvexed]

Hee, I had C25K bookmarked and hadn't even paid attention to the title! I can't be bothered timing myself every minute, but usually I go round a half-mile track so I've been trying to just choose distances gradually farther and farther apart. I never thought I could run - knees hurt, asthma as a child, then being a smoker (almost 3 weeks quit, me! /random)... but those were all just excuses. I don't care now. I want to run. Screw breathing.

I tried one of the ME walks before, did 7 miles in one day (on a whim after 2 hours sleep), then abandoned it. Hello, bipolar disorder. XD

That is indeed sad - I didn't know she'd passed away. 8(

[darkemeralds]

You quit smoking?

CONGRATULATIONS!!!!!

(Been there, done that, can attest to the massiveness of the accomplishment.) Go you!

[verilyvexed]

Thank you! It wasn't even difficult, I'm sort of amazed. And I'm down 22 pounds - again, no difficulty. And! I had a question to ask -- did you ever find your clothes size would change not much all, then randomly drop something like 4 sizes in 2 weeks?

It was funny, I had temporarily abandoned all attempts to quit smoking and discovered a video on EFT and watched it, after having heard you mention it. Was feeling down on myself, so did some general "even though I think I'm crap," type thing... Then I went to bed. Woke up and quit smoking. Somehow went from "I fail at life" to "I'm too awesome to pollute my body with this." 8D

[darkemeralds]

That's a wonderful story! The most powerful work I've done with EFT has been based on those big, nonspecific negative messages. Just digging in at "even though I think I'm crap" is incredibly powerful. I'm so excited for you!

And yes, fit of clothes seems to follow a graph that leaps up and down and dances around the line of weight loss. It's strange. I really want to begin tracking body measurements. Not sure why I haven't.

"Even though I'm really resistant to that..." :D

[verilyvexed]

Thanks! And I have to agree, just based on my short experience. I tried tapping on a headache once, and it worked - but only for a few minutes. Tapped again, same thing. Would've been easier to have popped an aspirin, granted.

Oh, you should with the measurements! It's a more concrete way of seeing your progress other than with the scale. Your clothes fit differently, true, but you might've lost 2" off your thighs due to gaining muscle and trimming up even if the scale doesn't move. I take measurements every 2 weeks and a photo monthly. And if I could figure out some way to stick those photos in a spreadsheet and have something intelligible come out, I'd be all over it. XD

[darkemeralds]

There's more than one way to visualize data! Your photos will make a great "video"--paste them all together in a series of stills, one fading to the next. I would love to do that! I was planning on taking a series of photos, once a week or something, wearing black leggings and a black turtleneck, standing in the same place with as close to the same pose as I could manage.

Sadly, the first set I took was so shocking that I've never had the nerve to take any more, even though I know things are improving. I'll probably wind up with about three pictures: before, almost after, and after. I'm already regretting not capturing the in-betweens.

On the headache: yes, from everything I've understood, EFT works on underlying issues better than on symptoms, and the principle is that the underlying issue of most kinds of pain is stress. Stress makes all pain worse. The sessions on pain all suggest starting with a few questions like When did this start? What was happening in the 24 hours prior to that? What does this remind me of?--and then tapping on stuff that arises from the answers. But yeah, for a fleeting tension headache, a couple of aspirin and a glass of water are probably a faster, simpler solution.

[darkemeralds]

I just thought what a cool animated gif icon the transitional photos would make. The Amazing Shrinking Woman!

[verilyvexed]

Hee!! That would be awesome - but mine are me in pyjama bottoms and a tank top rolled up so my tummy's showing. I think my stretch marks might break the internet. XD

[verilyvexed]

(Didn't intend that to sound pompous re the smoking or weight loss, incidentally! I'm a bit in awe over it - it just hasn't seemed nearly as difficult as I thought it would.)

[karen_jk]

I continue to admire you for all you've accomplished, and I hope that you will continue to applaud yourself for this project in spite of having hit a plateau.

I have one idea but it may not be right for you. Lifting weights and increasing muscle mass boosts your metabolic rate. Even lifting very light weights will build muscle mass. The only thing is that once you start lifting weights you have to keep doing it; I stopped a few yrs ago and it led to more weight gain. If you went for this idea you'd need some 5 pound weights and a video about safe weight lifting.

[darkemeralds]

I think that in general, I really could stand to do more resistance and weight-bearing exercise. Bicycling, as wonderful as it is, is like swimming in not being the very best fat-burning exercise.

Lifting weights, per se, is a bit of a problem for me because I've got some arthritis in my hands, but you've got me thinking about things like push-ups and other calisthenic-type methods that use the weight of one's own body parts to create resistance. Good idea! Thank you.