ANY AND ALL ADVICE APPRECIATED!!
I joined reddit and am posting in here out of literal desperation and confusion about my complete inability to lose weight. I'm a ~5'5 female, around 130 lbs currently. My average weight for the past three or so years since I started college has been between 117-123, and I genuinely feel the most comfortable at a weight of around 120. I went abroad to Europe at the start of my junior second semester. While in Spain., I was essentially binge eating, downing (my rough estimate) upwards of 2,500-3,000 calories a day, a diet super heavy in carbs, sugars, and rich alcoholic beverages. My program was cancelled due to the virus in late March, and so as soon as I came home to the states I was determined to rid myself of the 10 lbs of pure fat that I'd managed to put on, reasons for this being that my clothes literally didn't fit anymore (jeans were unbearably tight, shirts and sweaters rode up, underwear was uncomfortable) and I couldn't afford to buy a whole new wardrobe obviously. Also, I felt weighed down due to the extra pounds, it was pretty much all fat and no muscle; it congregated in my sides and lower stomach and arms and in fat deposits in the back of my thighs. I thought it would be SO EASY to drop a few lbs, because I completely overhauled my diet. Instead of indulging in constant carbs, sweets, and large portions, I began a healthier diet consisting mostly of yogurt, eggs, occasional breads, nuts, nut butters, fruits, veggies, etc. not always perfect but overall significantly more healthy than my diet abroad. Additionally, I cut out what was probably 6,000+ calories worth of alcohol per week. But the weight would SIMPLY not budge, not even a little bit. In the past, if I've ever packed on a few extra lbs, it's been relatively easy for me to lose weight, with cutting out sweets and simply eating less. But ever since this particular weight loss journey, absolutely nothing would make the scale budge.
I realized after about a month into this journey that I was eating healthy foods, but not in a caloric deficit. So I continued with the healthy foods, but began to track my calories. BMR is 1,350, I started eating about 1,500-1,700 cals of healthy food per day. Realized that maybe my sedentary quarantine lifestyle was the problem, I wasn't burning off enough extra cals per day. So I started going on longggg daily walks with my mom, started running again (around 1-2 miles per day, I'm not an amazing distance runner but it was a start), hiking, Chloe Ting ab workouts, etc- around 350-600 extra cals burned per day. STILL no budge. So I got more desperate. I began intermittent fasting, doing the 16:8 method most days, occasionally the 18:6. I also cut my daily caloric intake to 1,200-1,400/day around 2 weeks ago. I upped the exercise per day, cut out every food that I believed might be making me maintain my weight- no more peanut butter in my smoothie/yogurt bowls, no more bananas (only low-cal fruits like berries and melon), very minimal bread, switching out my yogurt for dairy free options and cutting out most of my dairy intake, no more deserts, NO snacking....scale has not budged a single pound. I genuinely thought that maybe my scale was broken, so I took new progress photos, comparing them to a series of pictures I'd taken right when I returned from abroad. There was absolutely no visible change whatsoever. The two things I noticed were that my face looked slimmer in the second picture (probably because I returned to Arizona from Madrid and went from incredibly pale to a lot more tan), and the bulge in my side profile actually GREW, maybe because I've been bloating unbearably for the past month. There's an almost imperceptible difference in my hourglass, one that could easily have been influenced by a posture change in the two pictures.
It's UNBEARABLE and making me incredibly insecure and disgusted with myself. I know that it might seem so shallow to be completely torn up about a 10 lb weight gain, but it's upsetting me so deeply for two reasons. Number one, I feel incredibly uncomfortable because NONE of my clothes fit properly anymore. I can no longer wear jeans because they cut into my stomach to the point where I can't breathe, even standing up, and I'm unable to sit down. My tops all fit too tight on the arms and expose my stomach. And all of my underwear and sleeping shorts cut into my sides and legs to the point of actual pain. I really cannot afford to replace all of these clothes, and I'm nervous about returning to my school apartment next month- I won't be able to wear any of my clothes when spending time with my friends. Also, it's unbearable because like I said, I've made a COMPLETE shift in my diet. I was eating like crap for months abroad, and now that I'm home, I've been taking extreme pains to eat less, putting myself in a deficit and often feeling extremely hungry (it usually takes me at least 1,700-1,800 calories a day to feel full, so 1,200-1,400 leaves me with uncomfortable hunger pains). I've also been spending so much of my time walking/running and exercising in the hope that I might burn off some extra calories. With this shift, I still look EXACTLY the same as I did when I was eating like trash. It genuinely feels like it was all for nothing- essentially, if I'd continued to eat whatever I wanted to I'd probably look exactly as I do now....the ONLY difference is that in Spain, I walked around 20,000 steps a day because I was in an extremely walkable city. But if I'm walking around 10,000 steps and eating extremely healthy, why why why do I still look identical to the way I did when my diet was 2,500+ calories a day of sugar and carbs? I'm actually days away from giving up and completely starving myself because I'm so frustrated and bewildered, and I want to be able to wear all of my clothes again. Should I see a doctor? This feels like some uncontrollable hormonal issue, and I've been bloating to the point of discomfort every day as well. I promise I'm not over-exaggerating the steps that I've been taking towards weight loss, I've been doing everything I stated above. I just really want answers.
TL;DR: I've completely overhauled my diet- cut out alcohol, sweets, and unhealthy carbs. I've upped my exercise routine, taken up intermittent fasting, and been tracking my calories for TWO MONTHS. I've been in a near-consistent caloric deficit for months, ranging from >100 - >700 every single day. I've lost absolutely no weight, and am bloating unbearably. None of my clothes fit and I look identical to two months ago when I began this journey (based on scale and progress photos). How is it possible that a constant calories in-calories out (CICO) diet of healthy foods (oatmeal, fruits, vegetables, rice/beans, occasional protein bars, dairy-free yogurts, rice cakes, eggs, etc). has had absolutely no effect?
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