this OWL thing....I keep my carbs anywhere from 30 to 50 and my calories are NEVER over 1,000 (usually around 850). The scale hasn't moved an INCH in the past four weeks. I'm getting VERY frustrated. Working out still four days a week and have even increased my running. I'm sick of this......

Well, for one, you aren't eating enough. 850 calories? At 5'7? Plus all of your exercise? Your body is probably in starvation mode, thus no movement on the scale... Did you do a clean induction? How much weight do you have to lose?

Man! Gotta agree with that! 850 calories wouldn't feed my cat for the day, never mind a fully grown human!
No wonder you're not losing.
What plan are you doing?
If Atkins, get some more fats in there immediately!
if SB, eat more veggies, dressing on your salad and lean proteins, plus some LF cheese.
Stop starving your poor bod!

Hellooooooo!! YOU ARE STARVING YOURSELF! You need to eat more calories! Of course you are not losing, your body is slowing down because it thinks you are starving!

We need to know your current weight in order to tell you where to take your caloies up to.

Tom

Ouch...okay

I agree the calories may be low but I'm just not hungry (not kidding). It's almost like I feel "bloated" after I eat. My current weight is 154 (hope to get to 135). Doing "low carb" but not Atkins (because it confuses me). I guess that I just try to watch calories and carbs.

Thanks everyone.

If you switch to a specific plan for awhile (like Atkins or South Beach, for example) and really try to be faithful to it, it will be easier for you to then figure out if you are doing anything "wrong". No matter what plan you are on, though, I agree with everyone else- your calories are too low. If your carbs are coming from some bread products, as opposed to mainly veggies and fruits, you may find that is giving you the "bloated" feeling. I didn't realize until after I started doing Atkins that my digestion was so sensitive to wheat.

Well, and I guess that that's what I thought that I was doing with the Atkins OWL (doesn't that mean "one going weight loss")? thingy (staying between 30 and 50 carbs a day). Re: the bread, I stay away from it as much as possible....pretty much just eat eggs, salads, chicken and broccali (sp???) I don't allow myself ANY processed sugars or drinks. Just water. Maybe I will just try to eat smaller meals but eat five times instead of three?

You aren't hungry because your metabolism has slowed down. Your body isn't burning many calories right now. I would increase your calories by 50 cals per day till you get to around 1600-1800 calories per day. Continue your workouts. STAY OFF THE SCALE!!!!! Your weight may increase by increasing your calories but you have to do this so that your metabolism can catch up.

If you aren't hungry you are going to have to force feed. Make sure you don't supplement these extra calories that you need to eat with high volumes of fat. Increase the healthy proteins, carbs and vegetables. Also increase your fat but watch it.

Tom

I guess when you made that statement I sort of figured you meant you were not doing Atkins according to the specifics of the plan, but more or less a generic low carb approach, which people often refer to as atkins, but it isn't quite the same. For me personally, I doubt I could lose any weight on 50 carbs/day, but that is just me. On the other hand, I don't count calories, but I suspect there are many days I eat close to 2000 cals! The Atkins approach works very well for me, but lots of people find they do better on South Beach or one of the other programs. I saw in your profile that you read the Atkins for Life book, but that's more designed for people who have already lost their weight doing Atkins and now they are maintaining. You might want to read the Dr. Atkins New Diet Revolution book, which is kind of the Atkins bible, if you are interested learning more about the detailed specifics of Atkins. That will tell you more about moving up the "carb ladder" so you can figure out what best carb level is for loosing, along with a bunch of other information that is not in the Atkins for Life book. However, there are also a lot of other good low carb plans out there that you might find are a better fit for the way you like to eat!

Debbie~ Gosh, good information. I never would have thought that my body would think that I'm in "starvation" mode (or whoever said that). I will get the book and read through it. Maybe it will help me understand how to actually approach it all. I have to remember that we are all made up differently. In so many of the posts I read that people on OWL stay anywhere from 30 to 50 carbs.

Tom, also the whole calorie thing you mentioned does make sense, it's just that my mind probably wouldn't allow me to go up to 1600-1800 calories in a day. Maybe I can increase it to around 1200 at first, then if that doesn't work, increase further.

I'm just getting so sick and tired of not getting to where I think that I need to be. I have lost a total of 51 so far so I've been doing something right up to this point. Now just nothing will move that scale....I'm a scale whore (look at it all the time)

Good for you- knowledge is power, at least where weight loss is concerned!!! And congrats on what you have accomplished so far!!!

You are obviously not eating enough. your body is in starvation mode. Why would you keep your calories so low ?

You know, I don't know why my calories dropped like they did. I just got to the point where I'm not hungry. I really don't have an excuse for that one other than I go onto Fitday and record everything and I just quit eating so many calories...hang on, maybe it's because I couldn't figure out the "how many carbs I need" thing. I just knew that I kept going over the 20. Now that I think of it, I was probably trying to offset (or justify to myself) the increase in my carbs. Does that even make any SENSE? I don't think it does but hey, half of the crap I say never makes sense. <Okay, got off of the subject>

What the hell. I need to quit being such a scale whore and quit worrying about what it says. But I hear that Kate Moss got fired from some of her modeling contracts and I guess I was hoping they would call me to take her place

Oh, but honey, that gig is mine!