I've been lurking here for a week or so, and everyone is so helpful that I thought I'd ask for some! I'm sorry this so long!

My goal is to either drop a clothing size or get to 200 by end of October.

Prior to starting Atkins in May, I was on Weight Watchers for 2 years, lost 40lbs the first year with no "exercise" but increased activity, but only managed to maintain that initial loss during the last year. Ihaven't had any great losses on Atkins - 4lbs total, but have lost 2 inches in various body parts.

Using the accepted guesstimate of 70cals per Weight Watcher point, I was taking in about 2000 cals/day. So if the right BMR calculation is 10xweight seems as though for 2 years I was eating too few calories and perhaps my body is in starvation mode. Or is that just wishful thinking?

On top of perhaps eating too few cals to feed my BMR - since March, I have been walking/running 4x week for 45 minutes with ever increasing running intervals. At this point, calculators adjusted for weight say I should be burning 500+ calories during these workouts.

I will be starting a weight lifting program this afternoon with a trainer - and expect to be lifting 3 days a week. Instead of following strict Atkins - I want to try TKD but I'm having a really hard time being able to eat all of the protein that I should be.

Current weight: 234
CKD Parameters = 2800 cals/day. 211g of protein

I usually consume about 1700 cals per day with 100g protein/20gcarb/100+ gfat - and I don't feel hungry at this level - probably because of all the fat!

Yesterday, with great effort I ended up with 2622 total (fat:196g,carb:16g,protein 190g). Protein primarily from chicken breasts and ground beef. Fat primarily from an oily tomato sauce, mascarpone cheese, and macadamias. I could not have eaten ONE MORE THING - and woke up still feeling full this morning. And the scale was 4lbs higher than yesterday am.

What do you all think of my starting out lifting with TKD?

Psychologically, I'm having a really hard time accepting that I need to be eating 1000 cals more a day - when I haven't been losing at the current level even w/ vigorous exercise. Even if your body is in starvation mode from too few calories, isn't there a point at which someone would lose weight regardless? Theoretically, based on my usual menu up until now, I COULD have been at a 1500 cal deficit 4 days a week.

Am I the only one who feels like their bodies defy the laws of phsyiology and thermodynamics?

ANY comments or suggestions would be helpful!