What am I doing wrong? page 2

[Duceswild557]

I think it should be clear you need to be exercising. And I would even recommend you specifically do HIIT. That's high intensity interval training, and if you do it you'll likely lose your 20 lbs within the year, just saying'.

[Warmbear]

I would say ditch the probiotic capsules and eat some fermented foods. Such as sauerkraut or kimchee. you get veggies and the biotic load as well, or some home made full fat yogurt. More veggies and a crap load of mixed leafy greens and spinach. I put spinach in just about everything.

I also IF on and off during the week.

[ChocoTaco369]

You're not doing "anything wrong." Your food choices are fine. I'm assuming you're eating until you're full? If so, that's likely the issue.

It's not in your body's best interest to be 7% body fat. Historically speaking, having six pack abs means you're more prone to death if a famine were to occur. Your body would much rather be sitting pretty at 12-14% body fat than 6-9% body fat. You're just a mobile with 12-14% body fat, but you're not as prone to death. Generally speaking, if you're following your satiety, you're not going to get extremely lean. You'll be "healthy lean" but not anywhere close to ripped.

If you want to lose weight past your natural hunger, you'll have to do two things:

1.) Really step up your lifting weights game. This is where hormones come into play, and you need to start lifting heavy and regularly. This will improve body composition. Your body is in constant flux - you are constantly storing and losing body fat. Stepping up your lifting game will ensure that when you're storing excess calories, you will preferentially store them as lean muscle mass instead of fat and when you're burning excess calories, they come more from fat than muscle. You know that phrase "body composition is 80% diet?" At your level, this is where the 20% of exercise comes into play.

2.) You need to exercise portion control. It's a caloric issue for you. Eat less dietary fat and more protein. Eat more carbohydrate, particularly fruit. If you're going to reduce calories, it's important to keep your thyroid supported, and you'll do that by increasing the % of your calories coming from fruit sugar. A caloric deficit downregulates thyroid, and a low-carb caloric deficit downregulates thyroid most of all. It helps to heavily salt food as well - salt is pro-thyroid.

In short, lift heavier, eat less calories, start shifting calories from dietary fat to protein and carbohydrate. If I were you, I'd start by eliminating the "snack."

[Knifegill]

Cheese and nuts. Drop those and watch the weight drop. In my experience, anyway.