Confounded- almost to week 7

I'm 52 yrs old, one 30 yr old child, still have regular periods, but am definitely in perimenopause. I had great results in the first 4 weeks, then seemed to lose and gain the same 1 lb for 4 weeks straight. In my case, I did have to correct some things, like eliminating the little cheats of honey, using the right cream in my coffee, switching to lentils, and more protein at breakfast. FINALLY, at week 8, the pounds are moving again, and I am down 1.5 lbs today. So, keep the faith, and try the tweaks suggested by our experienced contributors.

Also, it might help to tell us what your last cheat day looked like.

Joy, first I want to say you certainly have my admiration! I've been so impressed by your positive attitude and strict adherance the whole time you've been here and especially now that you are still not seeing the results you want, you have NOT just thrown in the towel, but instead have reached out, tracked and tweaked even more, and have become even more open to options and suggestions and experiements than you already were! Amazing, and very admirable!!

Just an idea and I don't know nearly as much as others here, but could it be possible you're not getting enough calories/food? Enough fats, specifically. I had been stalled for about 4 weeks, not losing, just bouncing back and forth, the same pound or two. VERY frustrating, as I had not strayed from the bare-bones program ONE WHIT. My sister reminded me that when she was on WW and stalled for quite a while, while "legal", she was encouraged to try increasing her WW Points. She did that and began losing very well again.

I read what I could find online about eating too few calories, because when I added up what I ate, I was getting 1500 cals MAX. And I am still 100 lbs overweight. So, I needed more than that. I added cals by adding fat. I added a snack of 25 almonds mid-morning (YES, I KNOW...pick up all the 4HB-ers on the floor who fainted dead away at that...) and I added more butter to my meals. Several afternoons, I would have a packet of plain or hot peanuts, about 250 cals per pkt. That was increasing my cals by 450 - 650 a day.

After a week and a half of that, the scale FINALLY started moving again. I have no clue why, except for the theories about the body going into "starvation mode" when calories are consistenly pretty low.

During the same time period, my Anything Days were really pretty tame because I just wasn't into the horrific stuff any more and was having more stuff like fruit, yogurt, cheese, rice cakes, etc on those days, so I probably wasn't going off the charts calorie-wise then either.

Just a thought.

AGAIN...you are SOMETHING ELSE, Lady, and my hat is off to you BIG-TIME!

e-hugs!

Gretchen

After nine weeks on SCD I've lost about 9 lbs and those were within the first four weeks. I know I'm not getting enough water. And I'm pretty sure my calorie intake is low. I'm just not hungry and not real fond of beans but I force myself to eat about a cup a day. Is there a certain number of calories we should strive for? I'm 5'6 and have about 30 lbs to go and I'm 49. Really tough losing this weight. Last week on my cheat day I ate pizza as the only cheat food and I gained 6 lbs and could never lose it all before the next cheat day today. Really? How could that be possible? I didn't eat six lbs of pizza. Lol. This is getting so frustrating for me but I have to continue. It's too important. I just suspect maybe I'm not eating enough calories but I'm scared to increase them. Any thoughts?

Hmm, your meals look pretty darn solid, Joy. As much as I know you probably measure these out and are within parameters. Could you drop the almond butter and possibly unsweetened almond milk for a week and see if that helps at all? Maybe the baby carrots? I know it's all allowed and I suspect you aren't overeating them. But, just as an experiment for one week. If taking them out doesn't change anything, then go ahead and continue to eat as you usually would. Perhaps, increasing your protein to like 125g?

Your water consumption is solid, everything looks like you should be losing more than just a few pounds.

If it isn't the meals, it COULD be the STRESS. Stress causes you to secrete CORTISOL which is a hormone that likes to hold onto fat. So, if you are stressing a ton that may be why your body don't wanna give up the weight so readily. Justin's idea about getting a massage is a good one. Perhaps get some "alone time" where you can just relax, sleep, rest, drink some green tea or coffee. Basically in a state of not worrying so much and stressing. Also, your irregular periods can play havoc on your body as far as water retention, which I may be speculating is also happening and why you aren't losing much.

And as far as exercise, that COULD ALSO be a factor as well. Question, how tall are you? How old are you? How much do you weigh? How much do you want/need to lose?

All those come into play when seeing how much you'd lose per week. If you are far away from your goal, then you should be losing at least 2-3 lbs a week on "good" weeks...maybe 1-2 on "off" weeks.

Let me know! I want to see you succeed!

Please hang in there. Totally identify as I have just completed 5 weeks and only lost a total 5.5 lbs. I too am in a very stressful situation that's likely to go on for the next 6 months or so. I think you're right that the stress is a powerful force working against us. I have experimented, within the rules, a lot. I find that lots of water, fewer beans, and no big evening meals give me the best results. Also, I do better if I stick to chicken, eggs, and tuna and skip the beef. I do kettlebells 3-4 times a week, but have been doing them a couple of years, so don't know if it is as big a factor anymore.What I have noticed is that my anxiety went down as soon as I started 4HB and my energy went up. Even if I never lost a pound, that is worth something. But, despite the small weight loss, I've gone down a jeans size, from 16 to 14. My inches aren't adding up to a lot but I'm clearly losing somewhere. Good luck but just keep on going. I'm convinced you'll see some form of progress even if it isn't in pounds.

Hi, I'm 44 and was eating pretty cleanly when I started SCD also (I'm a few days into week 7). I'm 5'9" and started at 154.1 lbs and my lowest weight so far has been 148.2 lbs (today 148.4) so I'm pretty much bouncing around the same -5 lb range. I've not had professional body fat testing, but between a hand held Omron and the pics, I'm guessing I'm in the 25-ish% BF range. I'd really like to be in the 18-20% BF range. I've lost 4.5" which is great and most of my focus is on the inches although I can't help but look at the scale and monitor what seems to affect it.

I find that my results are slow and not even always steady, although previous to SCD I would seemingly gain a few lbs here and there for absolutely no reason, so steady the other way is exciting to me. I've never had a weight problem until the past few years when I pick up and drop weight with no noticable changes to my normal habits. I've probably overall gained about 5-15 lbs over the past few years (depending on the day/month but steady up). I was a competitive athlete through my early 20s and seriously never even thought about what I put in my mouth until the past 5 years. If my clothes started getting tight or I didn't like the way my bathing suit fit I'd simply fast for a day and I'd be back on track. Before SCD I tried seriously cutting my calorie intake and upping my exercise and monitoring daily from Jan - Aug I never consumed more than 1400 (usually 700-900) calories in one day and still managed to gain 6 lbs. If it had been anyone else telling me that I would have told them that surely they were missing something and not calculating correctly as it seemed impossible.

I travel like crazy for work, which even when I stick to the diet seems to wreak havoc on my system and makes me retain water. I also have a pretty high stress job and am trying meditation and light yoga (although the massages sound like an excellent idea!) My acupuncturist has been blaming cortisol on my challenges this year but I don't seem to have a silver bullet to overcome the stress piece. I know that part is up to me - not necessarily changing my life or job but changing my attitude and reactions to it. I do know that stress affects my sleep (wake up frequently) so sleeping through the night is always a cue that I'm headed in the right direction, although those days are still numbered on one hand at this point.

Where I miss following the diet while traveling is the 30gm in 30 minutes and probably don't get the same water intake I get when I'm at home or the office and notice how many times I'm refilling my water bottle. I don't take "normal" cheat days as I realize that one of our chefs will likely go out when I'm traveling to their property and so I just let myself eat things I normally wouldn't for at least one meal each trip, sometimes two. It is also hard to eat as often as I normally would at home.

I find that I don't really miss the beans for energy, so I've cut them out most days. I notice I have better results when I up the fat (flax seed oil, avocados, butter) and water (there really doesn't seem to be enough water that I can consume even when I've had a gallon). I've mostly cut tomatoes and carrots as I personally seem to be pretty sensitive to sugar (natural or not), and believe it or not, chewing sugar free gum also seems to have a negative effect (not sure when I picked up the sensitivity to artificial sweeteners).

Unsweetened coconut milk does not seem to have any adverse effects for me so I drink it every day in my coffee when I'm at home (not usually an option when I'm traveling - ha) and every few weeks it sounds good to just have a glass of it.

I also notice I have better results when I don't have late night dinners. I'm guessing it is still just sitting heavy in my belly when I weigh in the next day and not really actually affecting the overall weight loss goals. (I get up between 4:30 - 5am everyday)

The upside is I feel much better, my clothes are fitting better, etc. Even though I've not lost any inches this week, I do notice a change in that my clothes are fitting differently this week so that is good too. With my lifestyle, it is most important to me that I find habits that are sustainable that keeps me changing my body into less fat no matter where I find myself, so while I had hoped to be a little further along by now I'm actually feeling good about where I am and where I'm headed!

I will be watching the answers you get as well, to see if I'm missing something too!

Look at natural and unnatural sugar, beans and seriously, I think stress is a big piece of this. I'll let you know if I figure out something awesome to combat the stress side of things LOL

P.S. Week 5 I actually spiked up above my beginning weight after extended travel. Took a full week to get back down to my week 2 weight but moving steadily down again.

In addition to all above wicked tips I would also recommend a 5 minute guided relaxation meditation as that will go a long way to reducing stress Iphone has piles of apps and you tube as some guided ones as well!

I'm 52, 5'9", perimenopausal, no kids. Like zhunt, I travel a lot and can't always be compliant or get enough water, but I try my best and am successful at being compliant when I'm home. I also have a great deal of stress. So, I came to the conclusion that losing slowly was better than not losing at all. It is what it is and the above factors won't change.

I also have thyroid issues. I had thyroid cancer in 1993 and had 2/3 of my thyroid removed. I am on enough thyroid hormone to shut down my natural thyroid function. I never had issues with losing weight after I went on thyroid hormones so I don't think my stall was due to my thyroid. However, I do believe it's hormone related somehow and I've been doing some reading lately to try to figure it out.

I lost 10 pounds almost immediately on the SCD and then came the 30 day stall !!!

Not one pound up or one pound down. It was super frustrating. (BTW, I'm on Day 101 today.)

I finally broke through the stall recently and am losing again. What was it? Well, I can't really pinpoint it since I don't track anything. But, here are a few things I did that may have helped.

I increased my protein. By how much I can't say, but I added an additional protein snack later in the evening.

I also found a dinner meal that was easy to make and that I can be consistent with. Funny thing is it's got squash and carrots in it. And, I'm losing!!!

I'm also trying to be more consistent with my kettlebell workout squeezing it in at least 3 times a week even if I'm too busy or don't want to do it. It only takes 12 minutes so there's no excuse.

I am not doing damage control, PAGG, cold packs, any of that other stuff. Just the diet.

I really think there's something about older women not losing as quickly and stalling. It seems to be a very common theme. I'm reading about more of us stalling for 30 days. But, you WILL break through it. Just stick with it, Joy!