This patient support community is for discussions relating to dieting,
alcohol and dieting, balanced menus,
diabetes, success stories,
exercise,
metabolism,
healthy dieting, healthy snacks, holiday tips, and nutrition. Also covered are discussions relating to specific diet plans like the South Beach Diet, Atkins Diet, Slim-Fast, Weight Watchers, Counting Calories, Fat Flush, Body for Life and others.
Are you counting every single bite you take? By far the most common reason for weight gain while "dieting" is unaccounted for tastes, nibbles, and little bits of food here and there. Some experts guess that on average we underestimate our caloric intake by as much as 500 calories a day!
MH has a great Food Diary available. Can you add it?
AND being "fine" is the medical equivalent of being "normal" which means you fell within the lab's reference range, which may NOT be "normal" for you. AND not all labs are using up to date reference ranges......... Insist on being checked again....
Aside from that - consider that maybe you aren't eating enough calories and your body is "storing" fat because it thinks there might not be enough food coming..
And of course, you have to have a way to "use" what you eat, so if you aren't exercising, you won't be using all the calories that you eat...... "Formal" exercise is not necessarily required..............
Here's the deal: 1 pound = 3500 calories. Losing 1-2 pounds/week is reasonable, but in order to do that, you need to end up with a calorie deficit......
Let's just say you want to lose 1 pound/week. That means you have to either eat or use (preferably both) 500 calories/day (3500 calories divided by 7).
I don't know if you drink sodas? Stop...... Candy bars, cookies, etc? Stop.......
Make small changes and eliminate one thing from your diet at a time and you will experience a very slow, but noticeable change... Add exercise - 30 min walking/day or something else that you enjoy - the change will be even more noticeable.
Follow Peekawho's advice and start the food diary - list everything you eat in a day's time - you might be surprised at the calories you are taking in. And not that - but when you look at the fat content versus protein, fiber, etc - yep, you might be surprise....
BUT, first and foremost - make sure you get checked for the medical issues (thyroid, insulin resistance, PCOS, etc) because there is NOTHING more frustrating than to diet and exercise your heart out and NOT lose weight. THAT was MY experience when I first started gaining weight and my doctor wouldn't *hear* me when I thought there was something else wrong......... Well, turns out HE was wrong, not me........
Good luck and keep posting to let us know how you are doing......also think about checking out the thyroid forum - there's great info there that might be helpful.
You said you have a cadbury chocolate once a month --- well, good news is, if you eat DARK chocolate, it's actually good for you and you don't have to limit to once a month, so long as you only eat small pieces.
Don't forget that you also need exercise along with cutting calories........Have you tried Stevia instead of spenda? Stevia is a natural sweetener and actually better for you than splenda.
Good luck and do stay with us so we can all take this journey together....
Stevia used to only be available in health food stores, but now even the grocery stores are beginning to carry it. I'm not sure where you live, but it is becoming more prevalent, I think.
I'll be interested to know how the changes work out for you?