I am not losing weight on this diet. I have stuck rigidly to it and when I weighed myself this morning I had gained, having only lost a couple of pounds anyway in the first two weeks. Yesterday I went to bed hungry but thought I have to stick to it and have been reading not only all the success stories on here but on other websites. I have stuck to 800, using my fitness pal to ensure the calories and carbs are exact and the diet has taken over my life but it is a disaster. This morning I have a headache and feel lousy. I was on this diet to turn around prediabetes and lose the weight I had put on over the past three years, I wish Michael Mosley actually contributed to these forums as I would like to know why I have failed.

WeeScot, I know it seems disheartening but you are not the first person this has happened to. There is absolutely no way you can be on this amount of calories and not be shedding. It will show up soon – It may be that it’s all the visceral fat on the inside you are getting rid of first! Most of all you need to remember how much healthier you are on the inside since starting. Just give it some more time because what have you got to lose? Don’t throw away the time you have already invested! I am a super slow loser but know that I am so much healthier and will get there in the end, and so will you! Please stay!

WeeScot -. I agree with Inca – please don’t give up.

I think LindaA has posted a link on this issue. When you are losing fat (which you must be at that level of calories) your fat cells fill up with water and your weight doesn’t change. Then suddenly – sometime later – the weight drops significantly as the fat cells give up the water. I think I have seen it called the whoosh effect on this forum.

It was Avila who posted the link on 16th November.

Thanks all and especially Inka13 glad I am not alone! I have taken today out a bit not gone mad and will get back tomorrow. I am also constipated so have done more research and am going to up my veggies which I can do without compromising my carb intake. Also I am missing bread and discovered a bread called Hilo claims to be high in fibre and low in carbs so have decided to have one slice a day, has anyone else tried this? Looking forward to the whoosh effect I can say I don’t wake with night sweats now so maybe that is me working from the inside, I must have an H… of a lot of visceral fat!

Hi WeeScot……….question…………you haven’t mentioned exercise in your post…..I only ask because weirdly I was exercising a lot (well for me anyway) at the beginning of the diet and wasn’t losing anything and sticking rigidly to it. When I reduced my exercise it started coming off……………I have now lost my first stone (this is my second time around by the way) in 3 weeks. I can only agree with the others, persevere, this is a strange diet and looking back at my diary last year the thing which became evident, and amazingly so, was the longer I stuck to the diet the more the weight seemed to come off as opposed to a ‘normal’ diet when you end up losing 1/2 a lb a week if you’re lucky. My body did seem to eventually ‘get it’ and losing weight became fascinatingly simple the longer I did it HOWEVER a holiday in the sun broke my diet and stupidly I did not go back to the right way of eating afterwards…………….stupid, stupid, stupid BUT do stick with it and btw a headache is usually a sign of detoxing I believe!

Last year I did step up the exercise the longer I went on with the dieting which did help but certainly not at the beginning last year or this! Good luck

Hi WeeScot,
I’m sure others will post this, but … exercising with the diet is going to convert fat into lean muscle, which is a good thing, but will not show up on the scales. Don’t let the scales dominate or mess with your head.

I’m starting week 2 and hate exercise (unless it is dancing). I deliberately did no extra (read ‘any’) exercise last week. This week I will do a pilates class. Next week I will try to do more and so on because I don’t want to affect my bone mass and I want to make my muscle mass leaner.

I was going to do the 800, the high intensity exercise (HIT) and the squeezing thing for blood pressure all together, but I think on the SBS Insight program on TV he said that the HIT was not a good idea while doing the 800, or that was the meaning I took.

He also said that the exercise was great for keeping the weight off, but not necessarily for getting it off (see para 1 of this post).

Good luck. Onward and upward. Drink oceans of tea.

Crabbycams

I walk but that and a bit of gardening are my only exercise and my walking is not too far at the moment due to dodgy knees, I am 68 but feel more like 98 at the moment. So things like Pilates are not for me at the moment. Thank you for your support I think all the hype had me thinking I would be watching the weight drop off. Tallyhoo you are doing brilliantly. I know that exercise is good to keep weight off and am in the situation of – if I can get the weight off I should be able to walk more as my knees won’t have to carry around so much weight. Also due to being prediabetic I am feeling very tired it’s all a bit of a catch22. I am starting again today, having had a day off with more veg in my diet and will give it more time, but it is weird that I am not seeing any weight coming off yet.

Hi WeeScot………….Thanks for your support, I don’t feel I’m doing brilliantly I feel like it’s damn hard work this time round but still persevering! Have you thought of your local swimming pool? I know the idea of being in a cossie is just awful but my theory is that it’s such a short walk from changing room to pool and once you’re in people just see your happy smiling face – unless you can’t swim in which case they can see your panic as you drown so not a good idea ha ha! Aqua aerobics is really good and no worrying about knees not supporting all those bags of sugar which will be soon dropping off our waists and other parts…..just a thought! Takes courage admittedly if you haven’t been for a while.

Good idea on the aqua aerobics Tallyhoo, I will definitely look into that!

Hello WeeScott. Like many of us here, I have lost weight numerous times over the years. I have often found that when I am not losing weight, but I know I am following a plan and doing the right things, the weight loss will eventually catch up. Don’t give up. Do exercise. I run which I find marvellous but any activity is good. If you’re following the low carb regime, the weight will eventually drop. Keep the faith!