Yet Another Extended Plateau

[rch02474]

kakiebean said:

rch02474 said:

kakiebean said:

Whenever my progress halts, I check that I'm in nutritional ketosis, tightening my diet if necessary. I rely on keto-mojo to measure. Should that fail, I fast for a few days. It appears to be effective.

Right now I'm in the middle of a 3 day fast. It's been a few years since my last one, despite regularly doing OMAD and staying in nutritional ketosis. Water weight really is strange. After my Wednesday evening workout, I had a "snack" at about 9pm. Thursday morning the scale showed 277. All day yesterday I only had black coffee, water, and 0 cal electrolytes, then this morning it read 278.2 lol. I get that water weight goes up and down and that weighing every day has its downsides—I just figured it might lift my spirits. Instead, it did the exact opposite!

Water retention really can happen without an obvious cause! Be sure your water and electrolyte intake is sufficient. Odd as it sounds, when you're dehydrated, your body holds onto water instead. Dandelion tea is a gentle option if you want a mild diuretic. For me, eating after 7 pm leads to a higher number on the scale the following morning. Daily weighing seems okay in my view, since it makes trends easy to see. The trick is not to read too much into day-to-day ups and downs. Best of luck!

Separately, have you ever monitored how various peptides influence fasting glucose and blood ketone readings? I wrote something about this in a different part of the site, but MOTS-C appears to push my ketone levels well above what they normally are. Right now I'm running a trial with oral 5-amino-1mq and I'll find out what effect that has.

 

[kakiebean]

rch02474 said:

kakiebean said:

rch02474 said:

kakiebean said:

Whenever my progress halts, I check that I'm in nutritional ketosis, tightening my diet if necessary. I rely on keto-mojo to measure. Should that fail, I fast for a few days. It appears to be effective.

Right now I'm in the middle of a 3 day fast. It's been a few years since my last one, despite regularly doing OMAD and staying in nutritional ketosis. Water weight really is strange. After my Wednesday evening workout, I had a "snack" at about 9pm. Thursday morning the scale showed 277. All day yesterday I only had black coffee, water, and 0 cal electrolytes, then this morning it read 278.2 lol. I get that water weight goes up and down and that weighing every day has its downsides—I just figured it might lift my spirits. Instead, it did the exact opposite!

Water retention really can happen without an obvious cause! Be sure your water and electrolyte intake is sufficient. Odd as it sounds, when you're dehydrated, your body holds onto water instead. Dandelion tea is a gentle option if you want a mild diuretic. For me, eating after 7 pm leads to a higher number on the scale the following morning. Daily weighing seems okay in my view, since it makes trends easy to see. The trick is not to read too much into day-to-day ups and downs. Best of luck!

Separately, have you ever monitored how various peptides influence fasting glucose and blood ketone readings? I wrote something about this in a different part of the site, but MOTS-C appears to push my ketone levels well above what they normally are. Right now I'm running a trial with oral 5-amino-1mq and I'll find out what effect that has.

Right now reta is the only peptide in my routine. Every day I check FBG along with ketones. Since beginning reta, I've seen myself sitting in somewhat deeper nutritional ketosis, even though what I eat hasn't changed.

 

[SapphireGlitch60]

Slaine said:

SapphireGlitch60 said:

Slaine said:

SapphireGlitch60 said:

Hi all,

I've dropped 78 lbs across 2 years, but now I'm stuck in yet another lengthy plateau. Since mid-July there's been zero movement, and even before that my average was only 1lb per month. A 4 month stall happened last fall, and I really don't want to repeat that! For the past year I've been taking 12-15 of tirz. In June I added 1.5 of Cagri, which changed nothing. 3 weeks ago I brought in reta while lowering tirz, and right now I'm at 10mg tirz, 2.5mg Reta, and 1.5 Cagri. My intention was to move off tirz and over to Reta, since it feels like tirz has taken me as far as it can. But should I stay on it instead? I'm unsure. This is incredibly frustrating—I still have 30-35lbs to lose and nothing I try makes a difference.

I exercise 3-4 days each week, do heavy lifting, and track calories (1300-1500 per day). Protein ranges from 100-150g, varying by day. I'm out of ideas.

I'd really appreciate tips from other slow losers who ultimately reached the finish line.

There are a lot of factors at play here:

1) Are you using the correct compounds?

2) Is your nutrition on point? A clean diet, avoiding ultra-processed foods, and keeping inflammation, glucose, and insulin in check, etc.

3) Are there other medical issues involved, such as thyroid or hormonal problems, etc.

4) Perhaps you could stick with just reta out of your current stack and introduce aod and/or motsc and/or a growth hormone peptide such as cjc/ipa or tesa

5) Are you getting proper sleep?

6) Are you exercising too much or too little?

Adding some H.I.I.T. would certainly be beneficial if you aren't already incorporating it.

I keep my diet quite clean. Alcohol isn’t something I drink, I prepare the majority of my own meals, and processed foods seldom make it onto my plate. One of the biggest issues, I believe, is how little I move on the days when the gym isn’t on the schedule. I faithfully show up 3 days per week, while the remaining 4 days are only average in terms of activity. I’m trying to improve that, though it isn’t easy.

On the sleep front: I’m a 47 y/o perimenopausal woman raising a 5 & 6 year old. Sleep? What even is that?

I get it — with 3 kids (ages 2, 4 and 6, plus a fourth on the way soon), sleep is.... . If getting to the gym isn't possible, could you maybe use a treadmill, stepper or stationary bike?

I do own a treadmill, but getting my kids to get along while I use it is such a hassle that it hardly seems worth the effort!!

Still, you're right—I really ought to put in more effort

 

[JoonyO]

SapphireGlitch60 said:

JoonyO said:

SapphireGlitch60 said:

Hi all,

I've dropped 78 lbs across 2 years, but now I'm stuck in yet another lengthy plateau. Since mid-July there's been zero movement, and even before that my average was only 1lb per month. A 4 month stall happened last fall, and I really don't want to repeat that! For the past year I've been taking 12-15 of tirz. In June I added 1.5 of Cagri, which changed nothing. 3 weeks ago I brought in reta while lowering tirz, and right now I'm at 10mg tirz, 2.5mg Reta, and 1.5 Cagri. My intention was to move off tirz and over to Reta, since it feels like tirz has taken me as far as it can. But should I stay on it instead? I'm unsure. This is incredibly frustrating—I still have 30-35lbs to lose and nothing I try makes a difference.

I exercise 3-4 days each week, do heavy lifting, and track calories (1300-1500 per day). Protein ranges from 100-150g, varying by day. I'm out of ideas.

I'd really appreciate tips from other slow losers who ultimately reached the finish line.

I realize this may not come across as rational, but loosening the reins and increasing my intake for roughly a week ended up kickstarting things again for me. My theory is that when calories stay low for a long stretch, the body adjusts and clings tightly to whatever fat remains... holding onto it as a kind of emergency stash. I had gotten far too lean. I was eating 1500 per day, then raised that to about 2500. These days I land somewhere between that and 3200 daily. If I feel like eating, I eat. I'm lifting weights to add muscle. That's my current situation.

Then again, what do I really know?

People tell me this all the time, but my body just doesn't work that way. If I eat too much for 1 day, I put on 5lbs. Not once in my life has anyone called me skinny

In the gym I'm clearly getting stronger and I like building my body up. Once the flab is gone, I'm eager to see more muscle!

Alright, I get what you're saying. But are you also arguing that you've never tried increasing your calories for 1 week because of what 1 day did? That's a "reset" for how your body burns fuel. If you put on 35 lbs during that week, then I'd be inclined to agree with you, but you can't be certain until you GET OFF THE SCALE and spend at least 1 week eating at "maintenance" calories. Eggs. I absolutely F'N HATE them! And yet eggs and sardines were the only protein I ate for the first 3 days.

 

[SapphireGlitch60]

And here's an update, for anyone who's curious!

I stopped Cagri 2 weeks ago and shifted around the days I take tirz & Reta. Sundays are now 10mg tirz, and Wednesdays are 2.5mg Reta. This combo is turning out to be a winner - the scale has started moving again, and over 2 weeks I'm down 2 lbs (which for me is a miracle!) plus my energy is way up now that Cagri is gone.

I've also been using up some of my compound tirz stash, and I'm 100% convinced one of the pharmacies just didn't sit right with me. Right now I'm on my final vial of compound without additive and went from 15 down to 10, and life is good. That vial should last me 2 more weeks or so, and after that I switch to my grey supply. Fingers crossed it goes just as well!

 

[fatjacked]

kakiebean said:

Right now reta is the only peptide in my routine. Every day I check FBG along with ketones. Since beginning reta, I've seen myself sitting in somewhat deeper nutritional ketosis, even though what I eat hasn't changed.

rch02474 said:

Separately, have you ever monitored how various peptides influence fasting glucose and blood ketone readings? I wrote something about this in a different part of the site, but MOTS-C appears to push my ketone levels well above what they normally are. Right now I'm running a trial with oral 5-amino-1mq and I'll find out what effect that has.

Lately I've been coming across more discussion about ketone tracking, and I'd like to know how you actually do it and what you take away from the readings. For example, what numbers are you watching for, what's the goal you're working toward, and how do you establish your baselines? I've done some googling, but nearly everything that comes up is about diabetes, which isn't relevant in my case.

 

[rch02474]

fatjacked said:

Lately I've been coming across more discussion about ketone tracking, and I'd like to know how you actually do it and what you take away from the readings. For example, what numbers are you watching for, what's the goal you're working toward, and how do you establish your baselines? I've done some googling, but nearly everything that comes up is about diabetes, which isn't relevant in my case.

Of course. To avoid cluttering OP's thread and their great progress updates any further, I'll add it to my other post about blood work/labs testing.

 

[kakiebean]

fatjacked said:

Lately I've been coming across more discussion about ketone tracking, and I'd like to know how you actually do it and what you take away from the readings. For example, what numbers are you watching for, what's the goal you're working toward, and how do you establish your baselines? I've done some googling, but nearly everything that comes up is about diabetes, which isn't relevant in my case.

If you're not following a ketogenic or carnivore way of eating, tracking ketones probably isn't necessary. My own reason for tracking is twofold: it keeps me more compliant, and it tells me how the previous day's food shifts my metabolic state. Plus I'm a data geek, and I won't apologize for that. I picked up a keto-mojo meter along with their glucose and ketone test strips. Using them is simple, though measuring every day gets expensive — roughly a dollar per day for the strips. I watch trends too. Being in deeper nutritional ketosis clearly does me good: more energy, a clearer mind, less hunger, less pain and stiffness, a better mood, and fat loss. I was already keto before I started reta, so I'm able to see whether adding reta speeds up weight loss and deepens ketosis (it does), or whether the drug mainly works by making me eat less. It also lets me pin down the absolute minimum effective dose for myself. When breakthrough hunger shows up, I can review all the parameters I track and adjust different spots instead of sliding into the "I'm hungry, so maybe it's time to increase the dose" loop. Data geek, like I said. Hope that helps.

 

[GLiPtest]

ladyj779 said:

There's also this: people spend basically their entire lives being told by "the experts" that 2000 calories per day is the average they should eat. So when they're told they need to eat less than that just to "be healthy" or simply to avoid being fat, it comes across as both unfair and unreasonable.

Yet much of what passed for nutrition and food science across the past hundred years or so is largely nonsense, and it was shaped in no small part by economic forces — agriculture, fuel, war, and so on.

On top of that, plenty of that guidance assumed a population that, on average, did far, far, far more physical labor than most people do now. And today's food differs enormously from anything before it in human history, in what it's made of and in how easily we can get it.

Setting aside all these modern shifts, there's another plain fact: with age, even the strongest among us lose muscle, metabolism gets slower, and all of that adds up to needing fewer calories. Be it at 45 or at 70, time eventually catches everyone.

I know I'm rambling, but lately I've also been turning over this thought: watching most civilizations worldwide grow heavier and heavier across three or four decades, I genuinely believe that those of us — the majority — are probably the metabolically normal humans. We're driven to eat constantly, and our bodies store fat efficiently. That would have made us the ones who flourished when food was briefly abundant, and therefore survived the scarce stretches — which, across year after year and age after age, was most of human history. Meanwhile, the people who "forget to eat" are the ones who, most of the time, fared worst — which also explains why there are fewer of them.

In the west, food is so wildly abundant that we subsidized much of the developing world for fifty years, and the result is lots and lots of fat people, even in very poor areas. I think that's how humans evolved — keep hunting for food, eat it the moment you find it, since you never know when famine will strike.

Blah blah blah, sorry for the essay

Looking at it through an evolutionary lens, that does appear to hold up.

Beyond the fairly recent and unmatched situation of basically endless calories being within reach of almost everybody at any hour, there's another element: fructose and other liquid sugars have been added to the food supply on a wide scale.

The setting we evolved in had fruit that would all become ripe at the same time. The idea is that fructose may disrupt the usual appetite signals. In essence, when fruit was briefly plentiful, it paid off to override the normal limits on appetite so those extra calories could be used, and fructose served as the switch.

Jump ahead to the late 1960's, when fructose and high fructose corn syrup (HFCS) began to be used as an inexpensive sweetener across many staple foods. Everything from cereals to bread, and even deli meats. The first generation of kids grew up with constant fructose exposure. Nothing any human population had experienced before. Especially (and still today) HFCS kept spreading into more and more foods, "turning off" satiety signalling, blocking the sense of fullness, and obesity rates climbed in step with rising HFCS.

The most revealing part is that the same upward pattern in obesity rates showed up roughly a decade after HFCS (or other fructose based liquid sugars) made their way into the industrial food supply of other nations. The UK, Mexico, Germany, etc.

In any case, it remains only a hypothesis, yet it is clearly far more believable than some total breakdown of "willpower" that humanity supposedly kept intact for the previous 10,000 years.