Darn you, visceral fat!!

[jennageah]

Wanting some advice about my goals. I started at a weight of 85kg/187lb at the beginning of the year, and through a combination of exercise, research, calorie counting and recently changing to a Paleo style diet, this morning I weighed in at 65.1kg/143lb. I'm about 177cm/5"10 and moderately active, and I've stopped counting since paleo but I had been eating consistently between 1300 and 1600 cal per day for the last few months. My goal weight when I started was 65kg/143lb, which I have now (almost, damn that 100g!) lost, and although I'm happy and proud of my achievement, I don't yet have the body shape I had visualised when I set my goals earlier in the year.

So my question is, how many of you have had to 'reset' your goal weight after achieving what you originally wanted? I do realise that body fat is the issue here rather than the number on the scales, as 65 could be a perfectly reasonable number for me if I dropped in body fat but built some more muscle, but the area I'm disappointed with is my middle, where the last of my unwanted body fat seems to have fallen back to in some kind of desperate last stand. My real goal is to 'look good' in my bikini for the up coming Aussie summer, and I'm happy with my body except for the slight 'love handles/muffin top' that subbornly remains on my hips. Is that just the toughest fat to lose, the last to bugger off?

Would love to hear anyone's thoughts on readjusting goals. In a support sense, I've told my friends and family that my goal was 65kg, and now that I'm there I feel like my dissatisfaction could be viewed as unhealthy. It's not a numbers thing, I know, but numbers are a convenient vehicle for examining results and I've had mixed success with tracking body fat in the past other than visually.

[Avistew]

I think it's because we don't have a clear idea of what a difference muscle can make. You're 65 and you feel you still have a bunch of fat, but you could be 70kg and feel fine if you had less fat and more muscle. When you start losing weight, because it's harder to develop muscle and lose weight at the same time, a lot of people end up losing more than their target weight, then regaining the difference in muscle.

My first goal was 150lbs. I'm still far from it, but I've already decided to add goals of 145 and 140 (I'm 5'5"). However it's with the understanding that once I lose enough fat, I'll regain in muscle. Maybe I'll end up going as low as 130, and then go back up to 150, for all I know.

The idea of people never being happy and always wanting to lose just a bit more is indeed unhealthy. But if you tell your friends that you want to lose fat and gain muscle, they should understand that you're not trying to starve yourself.

I have to admit that my own change of goal weight is mostly due to not realising what my weight was in kg after so long spent in lb countries. I thought 150 was maybe 65kgs, turns out it's more than that. Either way, goals are guidelines, and they're meant to be adapted when you get closer and have a clearer idea of what they represent.

As long as you don't become perfectionist and you're willing to say "okay, stop, I'm healthy, no matter what I look like" at some point, you should be fine.

Still, maybe now it's time to set non-weight goals. Maybe a pants size, or a weight you want to be able to lift. The scale isn't going to be as useful or mean as much anymore.

[jennageah]

That was really helpful, thanks. I has been surprising me lately how my perceptions of what it was going to be like at 65 are different from the reality. In good ways as well as disappointment too, because I was trying on size 8 pants at the stores last week, and I never EVER thought I'd be a size 8; I always figured that was the size of really lithe elf like short people (no offense anybody, I'm pretty tall for a girl haha). The weight loss is really starting to challenge my sense of identity in small ways like that. I am a perfectionist, but I think once I can make a dent in this abdominal fat I'll be in a really 'happy, everything else is gravy' kind of mindset. I've been 'a bit' overweight almost my whole adult life (since I was about 15 and I'm now almost 25), so a lot of my feelings will go away once I get through the transitional period I think.

The best part of the journey is that I've really been focusing on maintenance lately and not so much my end game, so I feel pretty committed to make good choices in the long term, rather than feeling like I'm just going to put the 20kg straight back on again. So pretty chuffed overall

[Maleficarum]

http://www.marksdailyapple.com/gender-differences-in-fat-metabolism/#axzz24Gz3KYdc

You may find this enlightening.

[Lizifer]

Everyone's body comp is different, so maybe you're just gonna have hips no matter what. Maybe you work your obliques, ab/aductors more and clean that up some. I mean, we all know we can't spot-reduce, but making the muscle there stronger and mo' better won't hurt, right?

In the meantime, maybe you shift your focus into fitness goals instead of weight-related goals when discussing with others, to avoid that "oh, now you're verging on unhealthy" thing.

[thecrutch]

I agree--you should focus on adding some muscle. Proof that everyone has a different body composition: I am 5'9" and 145 and I would say that I don't have much belly fat at all. However, I have a pretty muscular legs, so naturally my 145lbs will look much different than your (possibly?) less muscular 143lbs.

That said: your calories per day seems low for a moderately active person! This calculator says your maintenance should be over 2000 calories and fat loss should be 1600-1700 with exercise 3x/week. I would focus on building muscle where you want to lose fat. Squats are excellent, so are push-ups!

[Lizifer]

Also: yay for tall girls! (I'm a short tall girl, at 5'8" - I'm currently at 145, trying to figure out what is a proper weight for me - I can't seem to find a consensus on what's optimal)

[jennageah]

That said: your calories per day seems low for a moderately active person! This calculator says your maintenance should be over 2000 calories and fat loss should be 1600-1700 with exercise 3x/week. I would focus on building muscle where you want to lose fat. Squats are excellent, so are push-ups!

Lol I might have agreed with you if I didn't suspect my calories have skyrocketed since going paleo - now I eat a lot of meat, nuts, and high fat foods like avocado. (eg: I just had Bacon and Avocado salad with bacon dripping dressing for dinner, and it was pretty effing awesome!) I think my high protein diet will support muscle gain, but I will trial and error it a bit. Thanks for the feedback though!

In the meantime, maybe you shift your focus into fitness goals instead of weight-related goals when discussing with others, to avoid that "oh, now you're verging on unhealthy" thing.

Yeah, that's good advice, that seems to be the way I'm heading. I even got a bit of respect with the guys at work today because I was asking them about pull ups and free weights and talking about how I want to build some strength in my core and back

...and yeay for tall girls, woo!

[Go Kixxy]

I think women tend to lose weight around their mid-section last. For me, once I hit a short term goal, I re-evaluate my cal intake and tweak my diet from there. And ditto on adding lifting and using free weights

[CMB27]

It sounds to me like your fat is Subcutaneous, not visceral (if you can pinch it, it's SubQ) and SubQ fat is a lot more stubborn to get rid of than visceral. You may find the below articles helpful.

http://blog.metaboliceffect.com/2012/04/04/facts-about-belly-fat/

http://jillfit.com/2011/11/29/absolutely-incredible-midsection/

http://blog.metaboliceffect.com/2011/11/15/pack/