I Must Be Doing Something Wrong - Losing Weight.

[Flufferoon]

Hello, I am a 19 year old female at 5'3'' and between 110 and 113 lbs.

• I am a vegetarian
• I work between 23 and 28 hours a week, on my feet and walking around (retail job), but nothing too serious or intense at all.
• I get to the gym about 3 to 4 days a week although I'd like to be going more often.
• At the gym I focus on fast-paced walking on the treadmill (4.0 mph between 12.5 and 15 incline until I burn a certain amount of calories)
• I also focus on planks, leg lifts (on the floor), leg adduction and abduction, lat pull-down, and a small amount of chest press.
• I do not get much protein.
• I eat mostly fruits and vegetables, but included in breakfast I'll have some Cheerio's Multigrain cereal or Bagel Thins.
• I've been attending the gym since the beginning week of January (it is now late February) and have not seen sufficient results.
• I believe I take in around 1000 calories a day but I might be taking in 100 or 200 extra, since I have a bit of a problem with grazing on small bits of fruit like strawberries, melon, or grapes or a handful of cereal or one or two crackers.
• I would like to tone, but I don't want to become thicker or bulkier, I would like to slim down and get to between 90lbs and 100lbs.
• At the beginning of January at the gym, they told me I was at 27% body fat.
• Apparently, when I arrived at the gym and they took measurements, I was 108lbs, Lean Body Mass: 78.8 lbs, Fat Mass: 29.2 lbs, and BMR 1120. BMI was 19.1.

So, I'm not very sure what to do. I have a very busy schedule between school and work, and that doesn't leave much time anymore for the gym, unfortunately.
-I get hungry often, and the worst time is in the morning and around dinner time. I always crave a snack after dinner, and I always crave fruit.
-I'm afraid that all this fruit is too much sugar for me.
-Generally, I have about 3 servings of fruit per day, containing 2 cups of melon and 1 cup of strawberries, or an apple.
-I do eat frozen vegetables, mainly from Green Giant, Birds Eye, or Pict Sweet.
-I think I have a problem with night snacking.

What should I do? Do i need to give more info on everything? :/

 

[JohnD321]

Hi Flufferoon, from reading your full post It doesn't seem like your doing much wrong but one thing that caught my attention was that you say you are doing fast-paced walking until you burn a certain amount of calories. I feel like this is an ineffective method of trying to lose fat. I would recommend more high intensity exercise and not to focus on the amount of calories you are burning but to focus on doing high intensity exercise until you are too tired to do anymore. The biggest mistake people make is they look at stats and numbers too much you will never be able to find out what your limits are, and constantly improve your fitness, if you choose how many calories you are going to do before you exercise. Just exercise until you reach your limits! Hope this helps.

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Former Obese Now Healthy Person Who Owns This Blog Teaching People How To Lose Weight Like I Did!

 

[Wardy257]

If you complete the Schofield equation then by my calculations you are not eating enough. I make your BMR as 1227 calories but you then need to modify that based on activity levels so you are looking at around 1700 cal on a non-training day and around 1900-2000 cal on a training day.

Your lack of calories combined with relatively low intensity training is not the best recipe for success. You body is probably in trying to retain energy (through fat etc) as it is not getting enough cals plus your low intensity work out is not stressing your body enough to burn all that many calories. With a distinct lack of strength training you are probably loosing muscle mass, not fat and therefore reducing your metabolism when you should be increasing it.

So:

Increase your calorie intake and ensure you get the correct macros (carbs, fat, protein). Advice on this differs so do some research from reliable sources and choose your ratios and stick to it until it is proven to be ineffective. As a rough guide your macros should look something like this:

55% carbs
30% fats
15% protein.

Snacking on healthy foods is not an issue and is most likely down to you not eating enough calories. However, it would be worth you keeping a strict food diary for a week or 2 to confirm your calories intake.

Increase your intensity

In order to get fitter/stronger etc you need progressive overload, to continually increase resistance or intensity. So you increase speed, incline, duration etc each week (or as appropriate). With cardio you also need to mix and match what you do so use a treadmill for a couple of weeks, then switch to a rowing machine for a couple of weeks and so on. There is nothing to stop you doing to separate cardio machines per workout and swap them over in a staggered maner.

Increase Strength

Strength is the key to everything so you need to increase it by lifting weights. Machines are fine to a point, especially beginners, but you cant beat squats, bench presses, deadlifts and rows with barbells or dumbbells so give them ago. Remember progressive overload so you need to increase the weight regularly, perhaps weekly at first.

You will not become thicker/bulkier by increasing your strength unless you are taking steriods etc so don’t worry.

Log everything, you need to record all your training so you can monitor intensity. This will also help people on this forum analyse your training if it goes wrong.

 

[walterrichmand]

It is not enough that you go in Gym 3-4 days per week. I think you must have proper diet chart which you can get from your family doctor because he gives you to right tips. Here many people give right information (advice) for losing weight.