Hi there, I have spent a lot of time reading through other “Newbie” posts about not losing weight or reaching a plateau. I’m beginning to get so frustrated and angry with my body. I’ll give a brief history:
I was a heavy alcohol drinker and quit 3.5 years ago. I lost NO WEIGHT after I quit drinking. I may look less puffy or swollen but I didn’t have a dramatic body change…and the beers where I am from are intense calorie packed craft beers…and I drank a lot of them. I didn’t quit drinking to lose weight, but it would have bee a great perk for all the hard work I put in to bettering my life.
14 Months ago I quit smoking cigarettes and started a workout class. It is high intensity circuit training (Orange Theory…if you haven’t been I highly recommend it). I went from doing nothing and being a smoker to working out and eating paleo…AND I LOST NOTHING.
Almost 6 weeks ago I started Keto…and I have lost NOTHING. I have a keto app and count my macros. I drink plenty of water. You would think i’m lying and that i’m shoving Snickers bars down my throat in the closet. I promise I am not.
I am 31 year old female, 5’11 and 220lbs. I am active and healthy and sick of being classified as “bigger” or “Sturdy”
is there anyone out there who has a similar story? HELP
Almost 6 weeks Keto and no weight loss :(
Hi KT, That does sound frustrating and warrants further analysis. Could you please post a sample day of typical food? And also what macros you’re using. If you’re working out with cardio it may not help with weight loss. Strength training and brisk walking are recommended for weight loss. Too much exercise while trying to get your body fat adapted can be a problem.
Were you low carb on Paleo? That might explain why you didn’t have a big dump of water weight and so you never lost the retained water that carb eaters carry around. If your carb macro is above 20g. per day try lowering to that and be strict about staying under as much as you can. 10g. at the end of the day is awesome and shouldn’t be an excuse to eat more carbs if weight loss is your focus. In other words don’t look at 20g. as a goal, it’s a limit.
Do you have a diabetic or pre diabetic condition that you know of? Many people don’t know if they’re pre diabetic because they don’t get tested. In order to become overweight you pretty much have to have had high carb/sugar intake and increasing insulin response to store fat. So most overweight people, myself included started with some metabolic derangement and keeping carbs low will eventually lower BG and insulin response and it gets easier to drop weight. You have to stay with it, because any other way of eating isn’t going to be as efficient for healing your metabolism and getting healthy including your weight. 
I’ve been using Keto diet for almost 2 months and I’m gaining weight. Even with IF with 18:6 window. I’m 53 year old female cyclist and trail runner
Keto is no guarantee of weight loss.
Ketosis is driven by carb restriction. Weight loss is driven by caloric restriction. For many, ketosis just makes caloric restriction easier because carbs and insulin are no longer creating a false sense of hunger.
Without your macro goals and tracking results, it’s hard to make any suggestions.
My two keto mantras:
- “Minimal carbs. Adequate proteins. Fats as needed (for satiety).”
- “Eat when hungry. Stop when full. Mostly meat.”
Could be one of these:
- Ur body healing some other problem (likely liver itself) before bodys ready to burn fat
- Too close to maintain calories thus no loss
- Too low calories > lowered (female) bmr > slow losses
Also dont weight urself, take measurements of ur body every 2-3 days with tape measure, stick to clean food only and the fat losses will come.
I’m just jumping in here now because I’m new to the forum. I am an integrative medicine physician and see people who are having problems losing weight on keto and voicing these same frustrations quite often. We check fasting insulin levels in our clinic and most of these patients started off with a very high fasting insulin. As long as that insulin level stays elevated they will not be able to lose much if any weight. And it takes a while to come down. But it DOES eventually come down if you stick to the keto diet. So I see people who may have lost no weight for 2 months - but then their weight suddenly begins to drop. So hang in there!
Another strategy you can add on is time restricted fasting. I like a 6 hour eating window - fast for 18 hours (just plain water, plain coffee or plain tea). This strategy works GREAT for lowering insulin levels and reducing blood sugar and HgbA1C. (Also appears to reduce the risk of breast cancer and probably other cancers as well) This is often the FIRST thing I advise people who want to lose weight to implement.
Have you posted a day/two/three sample diet? Are you counting macros or eating intuitively? How often are you doing Orange Theory?
If you are really stuck, you could try to do a 24 hour fast to start off --I am currently just starting a 72 hour one, but you need to give yourself time to build up to that.
As a lifelong dieter whose weight has yo-yo’d most of my life I’m also very worried about this! Starting keto as can’t afford to gain any more weight but concerned it will have opposite effect.
I’ve only lost about 5 pounds since April. Still trying to find out what works but I’m not going to stop.
I have been finding the only thing that seems to work for me is eliminating all sugar substitutes, staying Pure Keto, I have eliminated all dairy now too, and Fasting… I did a 72 hour one and have started another one since last night at 5 -will break Sunday at 5.
Paleo is often too high in carbs for most people to lose a significant amount of weight. But I’m betting that with that change and working out that you got some good body recomp from fat to muscle, so that’s one in the win column.
However, to lose weight, I agree with @OgreZed. There’s a lot of “just cut your carbs and eat whatever and the weight will fall off” messaging that happens around keto. This works for some people, but doesn’t work for a lot of people. Looking forward to seeing more details about exactly what and how much of it you’re eating every day, so we can give you some more helpful advice.
Thank you all for the information. I haven’t done a fast longer than 16hrs, I will start to build up to a 24hr fast and go from there.
an average day is:
( 7:30am) Coffee with 1tbsp of heavy cream
workout
(9:30am) Coffee with 1 tbsp heavy cream
1pm-hardboiled egg, Baybel Cheese, Almonds, Deli Meat
7pm-some sort of protein, either beef or chicken and a salad or veggies.
I tested high for Estrogen and Cortisol. The workout that I do is high intensity, I was told by my Naturopath that this can be counter intuitive because the high intensity is creating a stress response in my body. My membership is done in September. I will start doing more weights and lower intensity workouts to see if this changes anything.
I have stopped weighing myself and am focused solely on non scale victories at this point.
It gets depressing having a body that is stubborn to change, when I have literally changed everything about my health and lifestyle.
However I do see changes, I seem brighter and more lean. I can’t wait to be another size and weight!
I appreciate all the support
Enjoy those victories! Brighter and leaner sounds good to me. Just because the scale doesn’t do what you want doesn’t mean you aren’t healing and getting stronger inside. Good luck!
Just note mentioning, your 1pm meal doesn’t seem like a lot of food. Are you full after eating that or do you feel like you could eat a bit more?
This doesn’t look like a whole lot of food.
Can you please post the totals for your macros and calories?
I agree.
I also agree with your naturopath about the exercise. I’m not saying “no cardio,” but moderate cardio and muscle building activities (walking, gardening, kayaking, golfing, etc. and weight lifting or bodyweight exercises) are much better for weight loss and overall health than chronic cardio. Some short, high-intensity bursts every week or two can be a better alternative.
it depends on the day. if i’m still hungry I will usually get a salad or eat a bar that has 4 net carbs. Today I had tuna with mayo and Flackers.
Some days I eat eggs and bacon for breakfast. It all depends on if i’m hungry or not.
I use an app to track my macros. When I enter my age, weight and height it always gives me way more calories than I need.
20g net carbs (some days i’m under, some days i’m right at 20, and a few I go over)
the App set my calories to 2500, but I never go that high. I usually am about 1300-1800calories
fat is 157 g per day, but I usally get about 100
protein is 126g per day, but I usually get around 50 or 60g
Apps and online calculators are really just general estimates, I agree, but why do you think 2500 calories is “way too many” for you? It actually sounds just about right for maintenance for someone of your age, height, and weight doing heavy cardio workouts a few times a week. Of course, you don’t want to be in maintenance, you want to lose weight, so you need to be a bit lower, sure.
But 1300/day is going to put the breaks on your metabolism. Lots of people find that if they under eat, they don’t lose weight. You should be easily losing fat at a steady pace at 1800 calories (some people might be losing weight eating more than that).
My other concern is that you’re not getting adequate protein, especially for someone who works out as much as you do. The best estimate is something like .8g to 1g of protein per pound of lean body mass. You can calculate this from an estimate of your BF%. Some people like the easier calculation of 1g to 1.5g of protein per kilo of total bodyweight. Both of those estimates put you somewhere around the 100g to 125g of protein/day. There’s also a link to a nice chart at Virta Health in this thread: Virta Health - How Much Protein on Keto. Whichever method you choose, if you work out a lot, as you do, you want to be towards the higher end of the ranges. It’s also pretty hard to overeat protein–“high” protein is really something like over 175g/day (unless you’re a competition athlete).
I’d keep tracking for a while to see how changes in how much you’re eating effect you (and to arm you with some info to make further tweaks), but for now:
- Keeps carbs very low
- Get adequate protein
Get whatever balance of energy you need and want from fat and make sure you’re not under eating. If you’re at all hungry, eat!
According to my tracker, I’m supposed to have 1900calories a day but I keep falling short. My dinner is always under 1,000 because I’m paranoid about going to bed after eating a heavy meal but I’m not losing weight so I either have to eat more and stay up later I guess.