Fat girl issues! Advice needed please :)

Hi all,

I'm having difficulty losing weight, like most people are!

I'm female, 25 years old, 5'10" and fluctuate between 210lbs and 217lbs. I can't seem to get past the 15st/210lb mark. The thinnest I've been in my adult life was 182lbs/13st 7lbs.

I've been living on a 1200 to 1500 daily calorie intake, eating fresh fish, plain chicken, low carbs and having protein shakes (Phd Diet Whey) every other day for dinner. I try to restrict the "naughty" foods to two meals a week, for example, I had pizza on Friday night, and McDonalds for lunch on Sunday. Other than these two meals a week, I eat well and stop when I'm full.

Typical exercise sessions include:
Monday: 1x swimming session, breast stroke at 30 minutes (realistically with resting in between I'd do about 15-20 of real swimming)
Wednesday:
7 minutes uphill walk at brisk pace for a warmup;
17 minutes of interval training on bike (3 minutes warm-up, 7 minutes intense pace and 7 minutes moderate pace);
5-10 minutes on stepping machine;
5 sets of 12 reps of stomach crunches;
3 sets of 12 lateral pull-downs at 30kg;
4 sets of 12 leg abduction exercises at 35kg.
Thursday: Pilates for 50 minutes
Saturday: A repeat of Wednesday.

I don't always swim; if I don't have a swim session I will have 3 gym sessions a week.

I have a knee injury which stops me running or doing high impact sports, and I recently tore a muscle in my lower back which restricts exercises such as rowing.

I don't know what I'm doing wrong, and I know that if I stopped eating "junk" permanently, I'd just give up and stay fat instead.

I've always been fairly big and people always have the impression that I'm muscular. Whether they're just being nice, I don't know.

I've been told by a gym instructor that I'm doing too much weights (for a lady..), but when I lower the weight it feels pathetic, like I'm not doing anything.

Can anyone please tell me what I'm doing wrong, or what I should be doing to lose weight?
 
Hey Likklenitty. Everything looks great, diet and exercise program and even the cheat meals(literally). I would recommend more fruits and veggies during the day. Fish, chicken and protein shakes have their place in fat loss but they are acidic or for a better term anabolic. Anabolic means they build up and they require energy to complete the building up process. The energy that powers Anabolism is Catabolism, the process of breaking-down(fats into fatty acids) and provides energy. Your best bet in fat loss is to determine are you in excess and eat more alkaline foods than you eat acidic foods. You can google alkaline and acidic foods and get a list. I would just look up the list of each and make my own menu starting with your favorites on both sides and from there just make sure you are consuming more from the alkaline side. Hope this helps and good luck in your quest.
 
I agree that you need more vegetables in your diet but it has nothing to do with the pH. Your weight/exercise regimen looks okay I would add more compound exercises (squats/leg press, rows, presses etc), and make sure you progress! Anything you're lifting 10x now, should either be heavier for x10 or x15 or x20 later. Also back to the diet.. FIBER! Don't start all at once, ease fiber into your diet increasing around 5g/d until you reach 100% DV. I realize these foods will say there's carbs (yes fiber is technically a carb, but believe me it'll help you lose weight in the long run). IMPO (aka no text is out) I believe fiber is most important in the morning and afternoon, so a good breakfast is where to start. I had an ex who was trying to lose weight and a happy compromise between cardboard and a bagel was fiber one cereal, maybe give that a try (with a protein of course).
 
I thouroughly disagree with the trainer who told you you're doing too much weight training, especially the "for a woman" bit. That trainer's parroting horse shizzle. I'd actually recommend doing strength training more frequently. You could also choose some much better exercises while you're at it. As Hoss said, squats/leg press, rows, presses etc are your friends, so long as you're able to do them safely with good form. They'll definitely do a lot more for you than crunches and abductor/adductor isolation exercises. Your current exercise regime isn't going to hold onto much muscle mass, which you want to maintain as much of as possible while losing weight (partly to keep your metabolism up, partly to keep your health/function/vitality up, partly to make sure that the weight you do lose is in fact fat - there's no point in losing 10lb if it's 10lb of muscle).
 
Wow its so rare that I meet someone that is my height ans weighed how much I did but I had the same problems. I 'm 5"10 as well and was able to get from 216 to 185 but then I was stuck. Then I finally found a workout that was great for me that I loved and put the right things in my body and got down to 170. Ill send you my email and I can help you through the process if you like.
 
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