Frustrated with my lap_band

SeattleCindy · May 14, 2004

Donali as always you have good advice. You were talking about the basal rate in one of your emails, I went onto fit day and looked under excersize. what is the basal rate what does that mean? does that mean that is how much im supposed to eat? cause for me it was like 2000 calories and that is a lot isn't it.. I want to lose

donali · May 14, 2004

At 5'6" and 270, my basal metabolism would burn 1940 calories with a sedentary lifestyle. I don't know your height, but you must be about the same height as I am.

Bear in mind that I am NO expert - I just have done some reading about metabolism, and as we all know, what works for one person doesn't work for another, so do not take anything I say as gospel truth. I am just putting this out there as one possible thing to look at that may or may not work for you.

According to many metabolism sites, the way to keep your metabolism functioning and still lose weight is to consume the number of calories required by your basal metabolism, plus up to 200 more.

Basal metabolism is the number of calories required just to keep your body alive - breathing, heart beating, kidneys, etc. If you only consume that many calories, the number of calories your lifestyle requires will kick you into a calorie deficit, and you will lose weight.

The idea in the metabolism theory is to reduce your calories gradually in response to your ever-changing basal metabolism to maintain greatest health and steady weightloss.

It takes more calories to keep a person alive at 270 than it does to keep them alive at 206.5 - so my basal metabolism has dropped from 1940 calories to 1664.

Since I do not log my calories, and my weightloss plateaus for long periods of time, I cannot vouch for the validity of this viewpoint, but there are lots of people who do, and then there are lots of people who say they cannot lose weight if they eat more than 1200 calories a day - period. There are a lot of factors in metabolism, the greatest being muscle mass, and then of course physical activity. I know of no way to accurrately measure how many calories I really burn at rest, so I just go by what "they" say.

I will say that I know I probably hit my basal metabolim calories and more most of the time, and have lost 96.5 pounds in 16 months. I am about smack dab in the middle of the lapband stats of 1-2 pounds lost each week - I average about 1.5.

I could lose weight faster if I exercised more (and kept from going so high on my calories), but I'm not sure I could maintain that behaviour for the rest of my life. So I am trundling along like I am, doing things I feel I can maintain as a permanent lifestyle.

Again, you have to find what works for you, and what makes sense to you. And then, whatever you choose to do, you have to realize that if you don't continue to do that, you cannot expect to maintain your results.

SeattleCindy · May 14, 2004

thank you donali, im going to try doing that monitoring it before i even get my fill and start excersizing and see if i can lose on my own for these couple of weeks. You are an inspiration. Im very glad i came on here to post and haven't been yelled at . Except alexandria hehe just kidding... Thank you for helping me to understand.

your new friend

Cindy

Alexandra · May 14, 2004

Hey, not fair! I was yelling at your doctor, not you. No patient is responsible for getting bad advice!!

Donali, I want to highlight something you just said because I think it bears repeating:

I could lose weight faster if I exercised more (and kept from going so high on my calories), but I'm not sure I could maintain that behaviour for the rest of my life. So I am trundling along like I am, doing things I feel I can maintain as a permanent lifestyle.

YOU GO, GIRL!!! That is precisely the approach I think makes the most sense for anyone who is deeply desirous of long term weight management.

And while everyone agrees that you're a success story, and I certainly think 96.5 lbs in 16 months should be big-time success by anyone's standards, your loss has averaged 6 lbs per month. But there are people out there who, when they look at themselves maybe having lost 36 lbs in their first six months, are declaring themselves failures.

This trip takes TIME, ladies and gentlemen. And we all must remember that a slow loss is a PERMANENT loss. And more than anything else, I think we all agree what we want is permanent weight loss.