Frustrated, please help me out

[flipican16]

Hey Girls!-
I am new to elite and wanted to get some input from ya'll. I just graduated from TSU and I am going to start at my new job in a few weeks.

I have lost 70 lbs. and want to lose another 10 lbs. to completely lean out. Problem is, I have been at a plataeu for 8 MONTHS!! I know that a plateau can last anywhere from 3 months to 1 1/2 years and I need to do something to lean out fast for credibility.

I have done everything: diet modifications, calorie rotations, changes in my exercise/training routine and nothing is working. I have even done the two weeks of rest to hopefully overcome my plataeu, but that hasn't helped either lol.....

I was debating on taking clenbuterol to help me lean out. Is there anything else supplement wise that will help me get rid of the last bit of body fat?!

I know how to diet and I know how hard to workout but the body is fighting me on the last bit of weight- ya'll know how it can be!! The last 10 lbs are the hardest to lose!!!!

I have been told that I will overcome my plateau in time, but time is running out. I wanna look good on the first day!!! LOL......
Thanks for any advice ya'll can give me, I appreciate it.

 

[the-short-one]

if you take clen, you will rebund and gain the weight back, maybe more along with it when you stop taking it.

how many calories are you taking in - and what is your current weight? also, please list your workouts/cardio.

 

[superqt4u2nv]

Welcome to Elite Post up your current diet please and bespecific as possible. Also list your current stats and training routine. Thanks

Example
8 am
6 egg whites
1/2 cup oatmeal

10 am
1 oz almonds
etc...

 

[Sassy69]

Congrats on your accomplishments so far. Please don't feel like you have to resort to stuff like clenbuteral - its overhyped and still it is ONLY a supplement to an already fine-tuned diet - its not the silver bullet and is not what will make the difference to what you are doing now. Your body is only responding to the fuel & stimulus reflected by your lifestyle - that means you have to tweak your lifestyle to get the results.

Can you tell us specifically where you are now - height, weight, bodyfat. "That last 10 lbs" doesn't really help me know where you are at. Also can you give an sample meal plan for a day (e.g. meal number, time you eat, what specificaly you eat & portion size) & your current training schedule?

 

[flipican16]

Thanks for the welcome!!

superqt4u2nv-thanks for the help!

Sassy 69 and the-short-one: Thank you for the info on clenbuterol. I am very hesitant on that stuff and I'm glad I am not the only one who feels that goals can be achieved in other ways. Like I said, frustration has kicked in and I am just getting desperate for some help. Hopefully ya'll will find something to change in the info proceeding. If I can get this dang body to work with me, then WOO HOO!!!! Thanks for the help gals!


Okay, so here's the 411 on me:
5'6"
160 lbs.
BMI chart says 25% but I had my body fat checked by the University and my actual Body fat: 23%

I have a athletic yet curvy physic; I am naturally muscular; I gain mass rather quickly.

My goal is to just allow myself to have a more lean look (hopefully all I need to lose is 2-3% body fat) and allow more definition to show. I don't want my body fat under 18% (don't want menses to cease) and I don't plan on having my body fat lower than 19% until I start competing next year (I'll have enough money by then hopefully- college makes you poor!!! LOL)

Here's a sample diet
6:00 a.m. Morning pre-workout: fat free yogurt (1/2 cup) I can't train on an empty stomach.

8:00 a.m. Breakfast :
Spinach and mushrooms with 3 egg whites to one yolk
whole wheat toast
Piece of fruit

11:00 a.m. Snack: Shake with skim milk

1:30 p.m. Lunch:
whole wheat, low fat turkey sandwich with tomatoes, lettuce, green peppers, olives, and oregano (no dressing- hate that stuff lol!!).
1 cup steamed veggies
Piece of fruit

4:00 p.m. Snack: shake with skim milk

6:00 p.m. Preworkout: Shake or fat free yogurt
Postworkout: Gatorade

7:30 or 8:00 p.m. Dinner:
Salmon or chicken with 1 tsp. olive oil
steamed broccoli (2-3 cups cooked- I LOVE broccoli!!!)
brown rice (1 cup cooked)

**My meals and snacks are eaten every two to three hours.
**I take in a lot of calcium because of my medication- it depletes my calcium stores.
If I'm still hungry or feel light headed, I will add 200-500 calories to my daily intake.

Workout for the week is usually:

Monday: 45 min am cardio high intensity
45 min pm cardio high intensity

Tuesday: 45 min am cardio moderate intensity
chest/back pm workout

Wednesday: 45 min am cardio moderate intensity
legs pm workout

Thursday: 45 min am cardio moderate intensity
arms/shoulder workout

Friday: 45 min am cardio high intensity
45 min pm cardio high intensity

Saturday: One weight workout (work either legs, arms/shoulders, back/chest)- I will alternate every week.
40 minutes cardio moderate to low intensity and 20 minute intervals to finish

Sunday: Rest
**I've been an athlete most of my life, so my body is used to this type of routine. But once a month, I'll take Saturday and Sunday off to rest. I love working out!! It's such a great stress reliever!!!



Thanks ya'll!
I appreciate all of the help!

 

[Sassy69]

First - you are about my height / weight, I've got a lower bodyfat but I've also got a solid (post bodybuilding competition) muscle mass base. It looks like you are all about the 'right direction', so should really be a very easy tweak to your diet & training.

To start, if you don't already, put the meal plan you listed into a food counts program like www.fitday.com so you know what the total calories are and the macro nutrient breakdown - % protein / fat / carb. IMO you might want to do a change in your diet to dump some of the fruit & the bread and do sort of a 'cutting diet' that will help you get over the hump. I'm going to guess your body has acclimated itself to this diet and doesnt' respond to it so much anymore. Once we know the total cals & macronutrient breakdown, we can suggest some changes there.

Training-wise - again I'm willing to bet your body has acclimated itself to the cardio you do. You might want to change that up. Not sure how yet, but change something because it doens't respond so much to what you are doing now because it has been conditioned for it.

If you do just cardio in the morning, I might suggest you do empty stomach cardio or consider eating maybe egg whites instead of that yogurt to start with. If you do real training (not cardio but lifting) then I'd suggest a real meal prior to that.

Those are my suggestions - will depend on your current total cals & macros and then looking at the best way to tweak them.

Also I wanted to say that weight is not the only way to track progress. You may be at a point where your bodyfat / body composition needs to change some but the weight won't reflect that. To illustrate - last Jan I came off a "fat episode" where I got rather tubby in response to a move across the country, a new job, and a lot of other life stresses. So I started prepping for another bodybuildign competition in Jan 05. My body's 'set point' - the weight that it tends to settle at is about 160-165 lbs. But I was 24% bodyfat. Lots of muscle, lots of fat. So between Jan & Mar I dieted & trained - dropped 9% bodyfat and 2 lbs (164 lb to 162 lb). So if I went by what the scale said, I'd probably jump out the window in frustration at "lack of progress". After March, I changed up my diet & training again to go into the last 2 month stretch for competition & dropped another 15 lb of mass (mostly fat) and in the last few days another 5-7 lb of water and another 8% bodyfat for show day. Now I'm back up to around 160 lb and prob 18%-ish bodyfat.

Anyway -- those were my suggestions - sometimes it takes a focused change to get over what your body is conditioned for. Its just another phase of manipulating your body to respond to what you want for your goals.

And again things like clen and AAS and even other thermogenics are NOT the "difference' in reaching your goals or not. Just learning how to modify what you do to get your body to respond.

 

[flipican16]

First - you are about my height / weight, I've got a lower bodyfat but I've also got a solid (post bodybuilding competition) muscle mass base. It looks like you are all about the 'right direction', so should really be a very easy tweak to your diet & training.

To start, if you don't already, put the meal plan you listed into a food counts program like www.fitday.com so you know what the total calories are and the macro nutrient breakdown - % protein / fat / carb. IMO you might want to do a change in your diet to dump some of the fruit & the bread and do sort of a 'cutting diet' that will help you get over the hump. I'm going to guess your body has acclimated itself to this diet and doesnt' respond to it so much anymore. Once we know the total cals & macronutrient breakdown, we can suggest some changes there.

Training-wise - again I'm willing to bet your body has acclimated itself to the cardio you do. You might want to change that up. Not sure how yet, but change something because it doens't respond so much to what you are doing now because it has been conditioned for it.

If you do just cardio in the morning, I might suggest you do empty stomach cardio or consider eating maybe egg whites instead of that yogurt to start with. If you do real training (not cardio but lifting) then I'd suggest a real meal prior to that.

Those are my suggestions - will depend on your current total cals & macros and then looking at the best way to tweak them.

Also I wanted to say that weight is not the only way to track progress. You may be at a point where your bodyfat / body composition needs to change some but the weight won't reflect that. To illustrate - last Jan I came off a "fat episode" where I got rather tubby in response to a move across the country, a new job, and a lot of other life stresses. So I started prepping for another bodybuildign competition in Jan 05. My body's 'set point' - the weight that it tends to settle at is about 160-165 lbs. But I was 24% bodyfat. Lots of muscle, lots of fat. So between Jan & Mar I dieted & trained - dropped 9% bodyfat and 2 lbs (164 lb to 162 lb). So if I went by what the scale said, I'd probably jump out the window in frustration at "lack of progress". After March, I changed up my diet & training again to go into the last 2 month stretch for competition & dropped another 15 lb of mass (mostly fat) and in the last few days another 5-7 lb of water and another 8% bodyfat for show day. Now I'm back up to around 160 lb and prob 18%-ish bodyfat.

Anyway -- those were my suggestions - sometimes it takes a focused change to get over what your body is conditioned for. Its just another phase of manipulating your body to respond to what you want for your goals.

And again things like clen and AAS and even other thermogenics are NOT the "difference' in reaching your goals or not. Just learning how to modify what you do to get your body to respond.

Hey Darlin'!! Thanks for the help. I will definitely do the fitday.com macro. analysis. I do a food diary already, so that will help with analyzing what I've been eating the past few weeks.
I'm alittle unsure about my exercise; that is, how to change it. I usually change my routine every two months because otherwise I get REALLY bored!!! LOL....
More trial and error is the best thing to do I suppose.

You are dead-on about the scale!! I hate looking at numbers. I go by the way my pants fit. I weigh more now than I did in high school, but my body looks better now than it did then

I appreciate all the help and hopefully I will see a transformation soon!!

 

[Sassy69]

Even just to get a set of data points as to total cals & macros really helps. To cut for competition my cals stay the same but I manipulate the hell out of my carbs and can still cut to 7% bf.

I'm 41 yrs old and in better shape than I was at age 20 and probably in better shape than 90% of my graduating class. I'm bigger but I also sport a nice big fat bicep peak that I wouldn't trade for the world

Hey Darlin'!! Thanks for the help. I will definitely do the fitday.com macro. analysis. I do a food diary already, so that will help with analyzing what I've been eating the past few weeks.
I'm alittle unsure about my exercise; that is, how to change it. I usually change my routine every two months because otherwise I get REALLY bored!!! LOL....
More trial and error is the best thing to do I suppose.

You are dead-on about the scale!! I hate looking at numbers. I go by the way my pants fit. I weigh more now than I did in high school, but my body looks better now than it did then

I appreciate all the help and hopefully I will see a transformation soon!!

 

[Daisy_Girl]

I HIGHLY second FitDay. It is amazing - even if you are writing everything down, once you actually SEE the breakdown, it can change the way you eat.

Nothing much else to add that has not been said already .....

~Check the STICKIES out at the top of the board - they can help with new training ideas and diet ideas.

~One thing that struck me with your initial post was that you said plateaus can last from 3 months to 1.5 years .... I am not so sure about that. If you have hit a plateau, then that is a hint that something needs to be changed. Then, you manipulate things, one by one, until you find what works. Yes, this can take time ..... But I have NEVER had a plateau last for more than a couple weeks while I fine-tuned things. If you have plateaued for 8 months, then you have not fine-tuned or changed things enough. JMO.

~ All that steady state cardio .... Jeez O Peets. Why not try some HIIT (High Intensity Interval Training)?

~ And it is a myth that your period will stop below 18% BF - a HUGE MYTH. SOme people's will stop - but it varies for everyone. Some people here get competition-lean (around 10% BF) and STILL get a monthly period. AT my lowest, 15%, I was still menstruating. Don't pick a ramdom "lowest BF I want" simply because of what some book says.

 

[Hams]

My fellow Texan,

El Paso on the clen.

I second what Daisy said about the cardio. But I'm also curious to know what you mean by "low", "moderate", and "high" intensity. You can make a lot of improvement by doing sprints 2-3x a week. Warmup 10 min, start with 3-4x100m (80-100% effort) w/3min rest between reps, cooldown 10min. Rest.

I was a runner, runner, runner in high school. Lost the period at 10-12%bf. It came back when bf went up. No big deal. Just gotta watch out for osteoperosis. Fortunately, weights help with bone density.