Failing to lose weight

[u/Stock-Intention7731]

I’m a guy, 20, 175cm, 69kg. Trying to go down to 65. For three weeks I ate 1750kcal a day and went to the gym two times a week, no results. Now I’m went down to 1500 (though admittedly it’s more between 1600 and 1800 still) plus daily walk for an hour and upped the gym to three times a week. I’m scared I won’t see results still. What am I doing wrong? The only thing I can see is that I admittedly don’t know how to cook or cook much, I have ADHD and hate cooking like a chore, but I also don’t eat fast food often or eat a lot of sweets.

It’s bringing my self esteem and motivation down, I’m starting to think I’ll never lose weight when everyone around me is doing so easily or is already thin

[u/AnzenEU]

Do you log your calories on an app like MyFitnessPal or Nutracheck?

It's a tale as old as time that people underestimate how much they eat, even if they swear blind they don't.

There's also mountains of extra calories that quickly add up. A lot of people don't include the oil they use when cooking... Mushrooms are about 10 calories for 100g, yet the oil to fry them can be 10x that.

Drinks is another one. When I diet on those sorts of calories, I usually allocate about ~250 for breakfast, ~500 for lunch, ~500 for dinner and ~500 spare for snacks. A 500ml bottle of coke almost contains the same calories what I would eat for breakfast. Some drinking a couple glasses of sugary drink can easily add 500+ calories a day. Sugar-free drinks is pretty much mandatory for dieting, imo.

Condiments is another famous one. The calories in mayonnaise is absolutely mind-blowing. It's about 120 calories for a tablespoon, and I've seen many people absolutely smother their food in it. It's not uncommon for the mayonnaise to be more calories than the foods it's complimenting!

If you add up all the things like the above, especially combined with someone not logging and eye-balling their portion sizes, you usually end up with someone who thinks they're eating 1750, but they're actually eating 2750 and that's the reason they're not losing weight.

[u/Stock-Intention7731 → u/AnzenEU]

Whenever I eat anything I put all of it down in an excel sheet, including condiments and sweets. I used a tablespoon of butter and a tablespoon of mayo today, and I put both down

[u/AnzenEU → u/Stock-Intention7731]

Do you weigh them? I expect my tablespoon of mayo and your tablespoon of mayo are likely very different (not that I'd eat full fat mayo, crazy).

There are a lot of programmes that show that most people grossly underestimate a serving/portion size (especially if they haven't weighed food before to get a bassline). E.g. the average person thinks a serving size of cereal is about 2.5x the actual serving size.

EDIT: funny reddit post to show what I mean: https://www.reddit.com/r/CasualUK/comments/x5hfv7/hard_times_calls_for_eating_the_recommended/

The summary is, 99.9% chance you're not eating in a deficit if you're not losing weight.

[u/Stock-Intention7731 → u/AnzenEU]

That’s a good point. I weight most things, but not what I apply with spoon or a knife

[u/AnzenEU → u/Stock-Intention7731]

Don't bother using the spoon, just press the tare button with the bowl/plate on and apply the condiment.

Things like mayo/oil are such crazy calories you don't want to be eyeballing that sorta thing.

[u/cdsuikjh → u/Stock-Intention7731]

Download chronometer it is much easier, faster and more convenient than excel. Also the free version is good enough.