Alright this is a long one, so strap in. I’ll start off by saying that I was a teen who could eat whatever, whenever and weighed a solid 120lbs at 5’5 through high school and the first year of college. I was happy with my body and weight was never really an issue for me. I gained a little weight around freshman year but even then I was still happy with my body.
Sophomore year of college (about 7 years ago now) I found out I had a benign tumor wrapped around my spinal cord (long story) and had it removed. This was kind of when everything switched for me. After my surgery, I was basically bedridden for about a month and wasn’t really supposed to do much movement so I could heal. Standing and walking could be painful sometimes but I eventually got a lot better with PT and slowly increasing my activity, etc. I gained 15lbs my first year after my surgery and since then it has been increasing ever since. This last year during the pandemic I was at my highest weight of 184. I have never felt so ashamed of my body.
Before the pandemic I was around 168 and was very happy with my body. I was pretty active, I ate well and was working out around 4-5 days a week. So things really slowed down for me once I wasn’t able to go to the gym. I have spent a lot of time working out In my basement, but it’s just not the same for me unfortunately.
I’ve been calorie counting on and off for about 5 years now, mixed with trying weight watchers, tone it up, and other weight loss programs. Nothing ever seemed to work for me long term, or I found myself starving. Weight watchers had me eating some days around 1000 calories.
Finally, the other day I met with a registered dietician. I am fortunate enough to have great health insurance where I can get up to 6 appointments a year without any copay or costs. I knew I needed to do it. Going in circles was gettin OLD.
After talking with my dietician this week, I discovered that I have been MASSIVELY undereating and my metabolism has slowed way way down. Calorie counting I was maybe eating 1500-1600 calories a day which is why my weight was not budging.
It simply was not enough for my body to provide me with energy other than just survive. My BMR as a 5’5 female is around 1500 calories a day. That means I was only eating the bare minimum to just survive and my body was essentially saving and storing fuel and fat. My dietician explained to me that this was the reason why I have been struggling for so long to see progress. I know that this isn’t the case for everyone- but if you’ve been in a caloric deficit for too long and nothing is working- it’s possible you simply aren’t eating enough.
So my dietician and I sat down and did some calculations and she explained to me that on an average day I typically burn around 2400 calories just waking around, working, doing chores, working out, etc. Being in a nearly 1000 calorie deficit was stalling everything for me.
The next steps are bumping up my calories slowly- from 1500 to 1800 to help increase my metabolism. Since I burn around an average of 2400 calories a day this still puts me in a caloric deficit.
I’m curious to see what happens next- I know my weight will probably fluctuate at first and I need to be patient. Weight loss isn’t linear especially as a woman-but I’m so excited to be getting help from an RD.
I just wanted to share my story and I’ll post updates along the way. Has anyone else had any experience with this?
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