Pounds/Inches Not Coming Off!! My Body Hates Me. page

[Hawaiianlion]

I know. I know. Everyone and their mom has the same question and I have put off posting my question until I was entirely out of ideas. Well, here we are.

I started my primal lifestyle back in September of 2010 and lost 50lbs within that year. (I was even featured on Mark's success story section! Yay!) Feeling good. I could actually visualize myself at my goal. But I have quit losing. For the past 6 months (probably more now...) I have been stuck at the same weight and the same inches. I. Need. Help.

Quick Stats:
29 year old female
5'5"
150lbs

Rarely any cheats. I am more of a 95/5 type...not the 80/20. I recently started IF and, while I feel better, it has done virtually nothing for fat loss....for me. I have been tracking my food intake, my workouts, I sleep well, am generally not stressed out... and I just can't find the hole!!

I am starting to think there is something medically wrong with me. Something metabolic, hormones, food allergy? I have been avoiding the doctor because, lets face it...they suck. I feel like I would call and be like, "yeah, hey, I can't shake my fat." and they'd hang up on me. And thus, I turn to you all. I am at a complete and total loss.

I am happy to post an example day of eating or exercise. My inches. My hair color. My eyes. Where I grew up. My favorite vacation spot. My credit card number...what?! ANYTHING, I just want to meet my goal. I am so, so close.

I do Crossfit type workouts 3 to 4 times a week.

If your suggestion leads to me feeling fully confident in a swim suit, I will buy you a steak.

Thanks so much for your suggestions guys! Your vast knowledge is invaluable to me.

[primalrob]

you look like a goddess in that swim suit. medium rare please.

so, i know you have more that you want to lose, but let's take a moment and feel good about that first 50 pounds. you there? good.
now, onto the rest of the weight you want to lose. it would be helpful to see your diet, but i'm guessing you've been at this long enough to know how to eat primal.
i think if you want something to change, you have to change something. maybe that means throwing in some high carb days once in a while. maybe you could switch out those crossfit workouts for some heavy lifting or high intensity work. add some sprinting.
i don't think it's going to take a lot of change, and certainly not minute changes...but start shifting things and see how that affects your measurements (because, after nearly two years, you don't care about the scale anymore, right?).

[jakey]

i'm only in it for the steak

so you've made this work in the past, and now there's a plateau... this can be damn discouraging! but there are a few details i'd love to gather - are you counting your macros or your calories? are you concerned with sticking to a certain macro percentage? what kind of foods are you eating?

[sakura_girl]

I agree with the heavy lifting. Crossfit exercises can only get you so far.

I also agree with the carb cycling. Maybe you can experiment with IF? Can you give us a sample of a day or week of your food intake?

[lev96]

First of all, I just want to congratulate you on doing as well as you have. I think I found your success story, but just in case I was looking at the wrong one, can you link us to it so we can learn more? Also, please go easy on yourself. You sound very stressed. I know its disappointing, but just keep reminding yourself of all you achieved.

I agree with both primalrob and jakey, and have a thought of my own:

1) switch things up a bit - change the crossfit to LHT sometimes, alter your meals a bit. walk a bit more, play a bit more. whatever change you want to try. just see where it takes you.

2) get a good handle on your macronutrients - I don't generally subscribe to counting calories, but with the nutrient/fat dense food that us PBers eat, it is easy to eat more than our bodies need.

3) Before IFing, make sure you read mark's recent post about women and IF. But, skipping meals here and there worked really well for me in the past. I also am a bit stalled, but cheating with ice cream semi-regularly will do that to you. So I also recommend no ice cream... wait, that's my problem...

I look forward to hearing that you get back to progressing towards your goal!

[Lawyerchick12]

wow you guys are so positive in your responses...I love it! We Definitely need to peak what you eat on a daily!

[primalrob]

wow you guys are so positive in your responses...I love it! We Definitely need to peak what you eat on a daily!

imagine our responses if we were offered a whole cow.

[lev96]

wow you guys are so positive in your responses...I love it! We Definitely need to peak what you eat on a daily!

I'm not usually this positive. I'm just doing it for the steak AND the credit card number. Jakey needs to set his sights higher.

[McChunky]

I would be curious to know what your carb / safe starch intake is with 3-4 days of Crossfit… If you've been low-carb for a long time now, you might be having some adrenal or cortisol issues.

If you haven't already, I would experiment with upping your carbs and / or scaling back on your workouts. As far as IF, I've heard Robb Wolf say it can either be the thing that finally breaks a plateau or the thing that really kills you. If you're not crazy about doing it, just do what feels right and eat as instinctually as you can.

[teach2183]

Now don't take this is as a creepy question... what size is your chest? (Large breasted women can carry 8-10lbs there) What size clothes are you wearing? Is it possible whatever your goal weight is, is unrealistic? If you are able to do everything you want, maybe you don't need to lose any more weight as your body is happy where you're at? Just some ideas to ponder as often we can get caught up in scale measurements and lose sight of the overall, healthy picture.