Not losing weight on Keto plus workout

(Che Che) #1

I have been doing keto for three weeks. I am 180 lbs, 5’8" male. I am on 500 calories deficit, less than 20g carbs and eating enough protein and fat to satiate. I calculated macros and sticking by them. I am also watching my electrolytes. My ketones pee stick tell me I am on ketosis although I have learnt they aren’t reliable

I am also working out. 10 to 15 minutes of moderate weightlifting along with running for 4 miles on the treadmill on alternate days. I sure look a little toned but haven’t lost weight at all. The scale just moves +/- 2 lbs.

Any advise?

(Chuck) #2

Maybe you aren’t eating enough. It has happened to me, your body could feel it is in a starvation mode. On keto I eat about 500 calories more than I did on a normal diet and I still lose weight.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #4

Why are you restricting calories? That may be part of the problem. Also, what is your goal weight? And what is your body composition? People who lose fat rapidly on keto have a lot of excess fat to shed, and even they slow down towards the end; we like to say that the last 5 kg or 10 lbs. come off a lot more slowly than the first 50 kg/100 lbs.

Eating a low insulin diet is important for shedding excess stored fat, because insulin is the primary hormone involved in fat storage. But also relevant is how much we are eating, because skimping on calories signals the body there is a famine going on. This puts the body in “defensive” mode, where it hangs on to as much of our resources as it can, to get us through.

Our metabolism adjusts up and down to compensate for how much or how little food we are giving it. This makes weight loss difficult to achieve by manipulating caloric intake.

If left to its own devices, the body will signal us how much food to give it. This is why the standard advice is “eat to satiety.” Give your body as much food as it wants, and at some point it will tell you “enough!” and you will find yourself eating an amount that allows both the fat you eat and some of that excess stored fat to be used. So instead of cutting the calories, eat in a way that allows your appetite hormones to do their job and tell you how much to eat.

(Marianne) #5

Yes! Keto is waay different (and so much easier) than conventional “dieting.” Throw out everything you used to know, give it time and trust the process.

PS, I’d toss the pee sticks and stay off the scale. It sounds like you are seeing positive changes already in your appearance, and those other things will just serve to sabotage and confuse. Use that as your guide. Consider following this way of eating for the long term, even after you get to where you want to be. It is so much healthier.

Good luck!

(Robin) #6

Welcome!
Same answer from me. Your body has to trust you and your new fuel. Feed it, don’t restrict it. Keto will do its thing without having to significantly reduce calories…. Especially in the beginning. My advice is to get your body on board before cutting calories. Under 20g carbs will be sufficient. In fact, you may never need to cut calories.
When I gain or stall, I eat more. That’s not unusual.

Also… you don’t have a LOT of weight to lose, right? It will likely be slower anyway. But eat!!!
You got this!

(Che Che) #7

You may be right. I was trying to get into OMAD. It clearly isn’t for me at least at this point. I wasn’t hungry and I did not eat spinning the body into starvation mode. Thank you for your response

(Che Che) #8

I read on reddit that even on keto the calories in/calories out concept applies. Only if I go on deficit, I’d lose weight. Keto is just to keep you away from hunger and insulin spikes. Also helps with inflammation. This is what I read on reddit. I just followed instructions from there.

What you say makes total sense. I had a very bad head ache that simply won’t go away with pain killers either. I will try to feed my body until it asks and see how it goes. Thank you very much for your response

(Che Che) #9

I don’t know how to tell what I exactly eat. Mostly meat, egg, cheese. And I bought a sugar free electrolyte drink off Amazon. Thank you :slight_smile:

(Che Che) #10

Sure, thank you :slight_smile:

(Che Che) #11

Sure, thank you. I don’t have a lot to lose. My target is 145 though. I would look skinny at 145. But that’s where I am hoping to go. I am prone to easily put on weight. 35 lbs. to lose. I am not overtly out of shape at the moment. But I am not where I’d like to be. 160 would be a good look on me. And that will keep me healthy as well. I am hoping I can hit 145. I like to run. At 145, it’d be a great weight to run 5k’s at ease.

I am glad I found this helpful forum! Thank you again

#12

See what I did there? That’s the answer. You can play the game of constant tweaks (clearly down) until you find your correct TDEE, or do it the lazy way (which I like) of using an app lke MacroFactor that’ll figure it out for you.

When I wrecked my metabolism, I went and had it physically measured, not expensive, but more than that app for a whole year. My “calculated” macros were about 1000 off! Huge surpise why I wasn’t losing!

That’s pretty much whay I did, got into fasting, lost fast at first, and it just slower, and slower and slower until I couldn’t lose anything. Being a moron, I made excuses, wasn’t tracking macros at the time, had no clue. Then went and had it measured and learned how bad it was. Would have never happened if I’d been watching it up to then. Took over a year to fix it.

#13

It always applies, the problem is rather than having some common sense and realizing that our metabolisms are VERY complex, and that calories, hormones, and other factors come into play, people like to pick a side, and completely ignore the other one. People like to say ONLY calories matter, or ONLY hormones matter… they both matter.

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #14

It does, and it doesn’t. It not as simple as “a calorie is a calorie.” Where fat loss and metabolic health are concerned, what we eat makes far more of a difference than how much.

As Dr. Stephen Phinney observes,

“We are not what we eat; we are what our body does with what we eat.”

And as Amber O’Hearn has stated,

“We need a caloric deficit in order to shed excess fat, but we don’t need to restrict calories in order to achieve such a deficit.”

And as Dr. Eric Westman tells his patients,

“Calories count, but we shouldn’t count them.”

The standard advice for a ketogenic diet is to keep carbohydrate intake very low, and then eat enough protein and fat to satisfy your hunger. Let your body tell you how much to eat.

And lastly, as Gary Taubes, the science journalist, observes, people who cite the Laws of Thermodynamics always get the direction of causation wrong. We eat at a caloric deficit because we are in weight loss mode, not the other way around. You can (sort of) lose weight by cutting calories, but the body eventually responds by cutting the metabolic rate, which is essentially moving the goal posts, meaning we have to cut calories further, and the body cuts the metabolism further, and so on, until we either starve to death or give up and binge.

#15

What is moderate weightlifting? You do it very comfortably as you don’t really want bigger muscles?
I only heard about weightlifting where you push yourself in order to get stronger. Even if I didn’t give my best myself but that was the plan. Now I mean business and need to raise my weights very regularly.

The others wrote what I wanted though I am a bit curious what macros you calculated and why you think your energy need is what you think it is. I had no idea about mine until I could calculate it from my fat-loss, thanks to my very stable weight apart from the slow or no fat-loss. Oh and just then in my life I wasn’t active so the totally mysterious energy need of activity didn’t interfere.
Calculators aren’t reliable.
Now I base my vague idea on those times 12 years ago (and I can use some info since, I know how many calories result in maintaining. almost any, by the way) but it’s very possible my body changed. So I just eat enough to have satiated about all the time (except before my meals, possibly. not always), look at my macros, if they are too high, I try to tweak my food choices and exercise more (I need that anyway, I never did it primarily for fat-loss but I surely need them now for that too as I tend to eat much so my energy need must be high enough)… Oh and I need my high-cal days here and then, they come anyway and they probably help with my metabolism.
500 kcal deficit sounds great, I am just not sure it’s truly that amount and if it’s so simple in your case. It works well for some of us and not for others, apparently.

But it’s good you eat to satiation. While eating that much less. Not all of us can do that with your extra fat mass.

(Marianne) #16

I always tell my husband that skinny doesn’t look good on a man. Thin and trim, yes, but not too thin. Of course, that’s my opinion, which nobody asked for but that I am more than happy to give. :rofl::wink:

(Bacon is a many-splendoured thing) #17

For what it’s worth, this is what normal guys used to look like:

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(Chuck) #18

Yep I looked that way when I was in the Navy and weighing the same as I do today. But age has changed the body composition.

(Marianne) #19

To me, those are “boys.” Young men and women can get away with that because their bodies are [quote=“PaulL, post:17, topic:118478”]
For what it’s worth, this is what normal guys used to look like:
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These are “kids” to me (although they could fight in a war at 17, 18). Youth is very forgiving.

(Chuck) #20

If we were still boys in our mid twenties then we were boys. I didn’t even go in the Navy until I was twenty one and stayed for 8 years. I went in at 168 pounds and finished boot camp at about 210, I left the Navy weighing 210. I now weigh 207.

#21

I agree but some people say “skinny” instead of “slim” and the like. I thought English is like that but I saw a video and skinny is negative, not positive. WHY people use it as positive then? Just because we have too many obese people and they can’t comprehend that if we go too far into the other direction, that isn’t good either? No, I think most people just think about nicely thin when saying “skinny”, stupid word using trend…

5’8" and 145 sounds great for certain men. My SO, for example (who is 5’9"). He is a bit heavier and softer now. If he ever manages to follow my footsteps and train, he will be “even” heavier (he is 152 now, not exactly heavy but he have very visible extra fat on his belly, he gains fat there first, that’s why he wish for 145 with his current musculature, that looks good. still very far from dry) but he will look better :wink:
I often see big numbers for men as ideal/minimum weight but most men simply aren’t muscular enough not to be fat with those numbers. And it’s fine to be athletic and running a lot and not having big muscles…