The answer to all the “why am I not losing weight?” posts

[angelonline]

@butterfly2222 I saw that, but it’s not really a calculation issue, so I feel it deserves separate 5th category.

 

[butterfly2222]

@angelonline I put it in the TLDR, it’s definitely another possibility. I also put in a disclaimer about excessive restriction and nutrient deficiencies in the section about TDEE calculations.

 

[pandafan]

@butterfly2222 Should there also be a disclaimer about one just having less muscle mass?

r/loseit folks with a lot to lose, in the obese category, naturally have muscle mass to schlep the excess weight around, so the CICO advice is appropriate.

But on this sub we have many "skinny fat" types who, their primary problem, is lack of muscle mass (from overly sedentary lifestyles and yo-yo dieting) which reduces their BMR. The better advice isn't to tell them to count calories; it's to tell them to pick up some heavy weights, ignore the scale for awhile, eat a lot of protein, measure progress in inches lost and weight they can move, not in calories consumed.

Especially!! For the younger women, who are still in that window of time for growing peak bone mass. Did they lose a lb of fat or did they gain a lb of bone, which they'll appreciate in their 70s?

 

[butterfly2222]

@pandafan That is not what this post is about, otherwise it would be called “is losing weight the solution for you?”. Muscle mass influences TDEE but most calculators offer to calculate based on body fat percentage. When unknown, it usually assumes average/low muscle mass.

 

[montana1056]

@angelonline This is covered by point #3, option 1. If I have a painfully low tdee, and I'm eating as though I have a more standard tdee, then I'm not eating in a deficit. I've miscalculated my own personal tdee.

 

[angelonline]

@montana1056 TDEE calculators don’t do bad calculations, they assume the user has an average metabolism. If you gave it correct weight, age and height info the calculations weren’t the problem. The math was fine, the assumptions behind the numbers were the issue.

 

[pandafan]

@montana1056 Somewhere on r/loseit there's a link to a google sheet someone created that allows you to figure out your own personal TDEE. It works by calculating your daily weight gain/loss against your calories consumed. Over time it'll give you an accurate calculation of your TDEE. I've got a copy I've used on and off for years.

 

[arist007]

@butterfly2222 Qq, if your TDEE is for example 1800cal but you burn 400cal on a workout so in total you eat 2200 that day, does that mean you exceeded your TDEE therefore no longer in a calorie deficit? Thank you, appreciate your help!

 

[butterfly2222]

@arist007 How was your TDEE calculated? If using a TDEE calculator, did you log “sedentary” as your activity or did you log that you workout x amount of time per week? If you logged that you workout a certain amount of times, then it’s already accounted for so don’t eat those back. If your TDEE is 1800 and that’s your intake, you’d be in maintenance tho, therefore not losing weight.

If you logged yourself as sedentary, and then let’s say you want to lose 1 lbs/week, that would mean you have to subtract 500 calories to your daily intake, making it 1300. L

Now, to decide whether or how much to eat back from your workout calories. First, how did you calculate that you burnt 400 calories by working out? If it’s using a cardio machine that’s probably wildly inaccurate. If it’s using a smart watch, that’s probably still inaccurate but not as much as with the cardio machine. I’d personally be conservative about eating back calories from a workout, tho 400 is a big number. That’s the thing, it’s hard to know precisely how much you burnt from a workout.

From tracking my weight and my intake religiously I figured out my apple watch overestimates but not by a lot, about 100 calories/day, so if my apple watch told me I burnt 400 calories working out, I’d feel good about eating 300 of those.

You could also eat back 400 and the worst that could happen is you don’t lose weight.

Overall, to know how much you burn from workouts as accurately as possible, you gotta track your intake and your weight pretty religiously, write down exactly how much you think you burnt from a workout and make the best guess you can.

 

[arist007]

@butterfly2222 Thank you! Yeah I used my FitnessPal to track my TDEE as “active”. I do HIIT so every class I’m burning roughly around 500 calories or more so I guessed about 400 to be conservative. I’m tracking my calories burnt via smart watch. What made it confusing was my fitnesspal adds calories back to the daily amount depending on your exercise so I thought that if I burned X amount, I’d still be in a caloric deficit.

 

[butterfly2222]

@arist007 I’m not sure how accurate is MFP for TDEE calculations but I think what you’d have to do is either put yourself as sedentary in MFP or not eat back the calories, I think that’s what they intended for it it to be used and it’s somewhat of a bug (or just bad app features). Personally I’d probably put myself as sedentary and go with how much you think you’re burning from your workout and see how that goes.

Tho, if you’ve been doing that and it works and you’re losing weight at a pace you’re happy with, then, like they say “don’t fix it if it’s not broken”.

 

[arist007]

@butterfly2222 Thank you so much for your help, I really appreciate it!