I'm five weeks out and eat about 600 per days and between 50-70 grams of protein. I'm exercising (bike riding or speed walking) for an hour each day. Is it still right to keep the calories at 600 or will this bring on a stall for too low net calories?

I'm five weeks out and eat about 600 per days and between 50-70 grams of Protein. I'm exercising (bike riding or speed walking) for an hour each day. Is it still right to keep the calories at 600 or will this bring on a stall for too low net calories?

I kept calories at 600 daily throughout my entire WLJ and did 1-2 hours of hard cardio daily and never really had a true stall.

My program advises to stay under 800 for the entire time you are losing.

There are some exceptions to that. For example, when I was training for my first triathlon (about 7 hours of high intensity exercise a week), my surgeon wanted me to up my Protein to 100 g a day and that caused my calories to go up to about 900. Then, when I upped my workouts even more, I got to up my protein to 120 g a day and that caused my calories to go up to 1200. But I still lost weight because I was working out so much.

You need to eat enough to have the energy to do your daily activities IMO. If you are so tired that you take naps all the time, don't exercise as hard, and otherwise conserve energy, you are lowering your calorie deficit. But if you have plenty of energy, all more calories will do is slow down your weight loss.

It's a myth that you "need to eat more to lose weight". That advice is based on a combination of wishful thinking and misunderstanding of some studies that have been done around this subject.

If you operate at a calorie deficit, you WILL lose weight. That's just physics. :Cry:

Thanks! That makes me feel better. I sure would love to be able to do a Triathalon someday - or better yet just to look forward to exercising! :Cry:

If you operate at a calorie deficit, you WILL lose weight. That's just physics. :Cry:

THANK YOU! I gave up explaining that a long time ago.

I only see it on band boards, I never see it on sleeve boards but I cringe each time I see .... "My doctor said to eat 800 calories a day and if I do not eat 1500 calories a day I don't lose."

Oye veh....

Oh, I see it on the sleeve boards. I see it all over OH and it drives. me. crazy. I even wrote a whole post about it on my blog!

Fatty Fights Back: MTYHBUSTERS: Starvation Mode

I would never lose weight if I upped my calories to exercise.

One reason I exercise is because it improves my moods, but if I ate more so I could exercise, I am sure I would not lose weight.

I had a resting metabolic test taken, and it showed I have a very slow metabolism.

Oh, I see it on the sleeve boards. I see it all over OH and it drives. me. crazy. I even wrote a whole post about it on my blog!

Fatty Fights Back: MTYHBUSTERS: Starvation Mode

Do you ever see people writing things and they don't see it but others can, they just can't give up food. They are smack in the middle of the "fat mentality" and they are still looking for reasons to justify more food?

I used to do it before surgery, "I deserve this 'cake' because my boss was a butt head today." Or, "I don't feel well, I'm sick so it is okay to cheat." I see the same thing with, "If I do not eat at least 1500 calories a day I will not lose." Those are the same people losing 1# a month.

The head stuff is the hardest part of WLS.

I know each situation is different. I am still breastfeeding.....hell I pumped all through Mexico....woke up and pumped............... (should have seen the purple border gard when he went through my bag or the fact I wanted no pain meds by plain tylenol)

so in my case I need to be at at least 1000 cals with a minimum of 100g of carbs and 60 -80 g of Protein to keep making milk......but that burns about 500 of them.

(also why my weight loss has been so great since surgery - 14.5 today)

Well, maybe that's me, lol, maybe I just cant give up food. It doesnt matter if it is, I guess, as I'm not fat anymore regardless.

I agree entirely that you dont have to "eat more to lose". What rubbish. I dont believe in starvation mode either. What I do believe is that plateaus can happen no matter what you do and they are a natural part of weight loss for many people.

But I would DIE on 600 calories a day. No way no how could I do it. I like to eat, sure, but I dont eat past being satifisfied anymore and for the most part I only eat when I'm hungry. But even with WLS my appetite and physical hunger meant I was at 1500 a day to lose and I eat about the same (but some days up to 2000) to maintain. Obviously I have a fairly loose band to do that.

That sounds like so much but its pretty in line with what a normal person would need to eat to stay at a normal weight - its probably a bit less than a woman of my height and activity levels *should* be able to eat. But if calories got too low (I was at around 1000 for a while when my band was a bit tighter) whenever I went for a run, I felt like I was running through Water, I lacked energy so much. I was fine for my everyday activities but I just didnt have the extra to give for exercise.

So I tend to go WHOA 600!!!! Too low, too low. But we ARE all different and we are overweight for different reasons. If all of us had killer fast metabolisms we wouldnt be weight loss patients would we? And if 600 is what it takes, thank goodness we have surgical options to make that possible.

So I tend to go WHOA 600!!!! Too low, too low. But we ARE all different and we are overweight for different reasons. If all of us had killer fast metabolisms we wouldnt be weight loss patients would we? And if 600 is what it takes, thank goodness we have surgical options to make that possible.

It was low and my doc did not necessarily approve. I sooooo did not want to be fat anymore and I was ready. I also knew I would lose my band eventually and I did not want bypass. So I was hoping that being at goal was incentive enough to stay there.

Today I know I would not have maintained without my sleeve but I didn't know what else to do.

Do you ever see people writing things and they don't see it but others can, they just can't give up food. They are smack in the middle of the "fat mentality" and they are still looking for reasons to justify more food?

Yes.

With the sleeve, the first thing is trying to convince themselves that they need the biggest sleeve their surgeon is willing to give them. But it takes other forms too and you see it with all the different surgery types.

But I would DIE on 600 calories a day.

But you aren't an early post-op with a very swollen tummy that can only hold so much. It's a completely different situation.

OTOH, maybe if you ate more Protein, you could have run on 1000 calories a day. :wink0:

Only after I got over the kidney stones!