New motivation

Hi All,

I've delayed writing this post since last weekend as I'd already written three on the same day!! Don't want to overload you folks...if you're like me you follow a million or so banded blogs and it's hard to keep up to date with them all without people posting four times in one day!

Well...The skinny is...(get it? Skinny?..I know it's bad) I decided to use my last fill as a motivation point and try and lose 7lbs in two weeks by eating around 850 cals a day (in my world that usually means nearer 900-950).

The way I planned to do this was to use my 3 days liquid 3 days mush for the first 6 days and then use a weeks worth of 'Weight to Go' products which are meal replacements (shakes, soups and meals) sold by my provider that add up to 850 cals per day. what I've discovered so far is the usual...my body is very quick to adapt to very low cals and after 3 days my weightloss slowed down to nothing!

First day was mega as I lost 2lbs straight up (one of those pounds I'd been toying with for about 3 weeks..on again off again...you get the picture so it was only hanging on by a thread. The other was an extra. Then the following two days I lost 0.6lb a piece. This made sense accoring to my fat secret app which calculated that I was consuming around 1400 fewer calories per day than I was eating (if 3500 cals equals 1lb). Then on day four, five, and 6 NADA, NOTHING...that was so hard to carry on with but I did, finally on day seven I lost 0.4lb...this does not compute with the logic of 3500 calories defecit = 1lb weight loss.

A lot of people have discussed this recently and my theory for what it's worth is that our bodies slow down our metabolism when we consistently consume too few calories. I felt quite lethargic and woolly headed, so I'm not in much doubt about which functions my body was slowing down on to conserve energy.

The result of this little experiment was that I decided that the best way forward for me was to up my calories to a more sustainable (but still weightloss) level and just use the prepackaged, calorie counted meals I'd bought to trick my body...I'll throw in an extra low cal day twice a week to up my weight loss but not lower my metabolism and see how this goes.

Previously when I'd been eating more calories my body was very responsive to my good days and I'd see it on the scales...but I just don't get the reward for my efforts when I consistently eat too low calories.

Our bodies are more complex than the simple calories in-calories out model once we get into what...to our bodies...is an emergency in terms of calorie defecit. I suppose it had to have ways of surviving famines in cave man days. It's scientifically accepted fact that our metabolism does slow down on very low calorie intakes (this is not permanent though and it returns to normal once our calorie intake returns to a healthy level), the exact level of calorie intake which will cause this to happen varies by person.

Also, it is scientifcally proven that our bodies will conserve fat stores and burn muscle first when calorie levels are too low. Muscle as we all know is less efficient than fat and burns more calories at rest, so it is more efficient in times of famine to burn muscle and conserve fat. In times of true famine people with less efficient bodies would be more prone to die before those with more efficient ones, so it makes sense that over millions of years we have evolved to be efficient when food is scarce. (Scientific lecture over...I am not...as you may have guessed a scientist, I am merely paraphrasing from the reading that I've done).

So I'm happy in that I've dropped 3.6lbs this week, but I did suffer for that loss and I don't think I had to suffer like I did...I think I could have lost this amount on a more sensible number of calories...especially if I'd had any energy and done any exercise as I would normally have done. The other effects of drastically reduced calories for me is that when I increase them I feel I've been deprived and i want to eat bad things like chocolate and carbs!! Also, I've felt very low and depressed even all week...that wasn't pleasant for me or my family.

It'll be interesting to see how much I lose this week with the new plan...I'll have to try and stick to it now that I've put it out there...hard to do on the long weekend...so much temptation.

I hope you all have a good time and have something nice planned for the May Day weekend.