How do you lose weight when your weight has stopped?

[ImperfectDVM]

Okay, I'm REALLY close to being the size my recruiter said to be before he let's me take the ASVAB. He told me I have to be 160 lbs before he lets me take it.

It the ONLY think keeping me back from entering the Air Force!

I am around 166-169 now, I have just a few to go.

But for some reason, no matter what I do, I can't seem to get lower than 166.

What do I do? I've done everything I can. Eating right, exersizing a few times a day, giving myself a rest day, EVERYTHING!

I've been doing this for about 3 months now, I'm in the best shape I've ever been.

I just need help going a little lower.

What do I do?

Do I have to starve myself? = (

[TheUglyOne]

OK, as I answered on another question. When you lose weight even fat, your base metabolic rate also drops, then you reach a plateau.

To break it, you need to break the equilibrium. This means cutting calories or increasing activity.

Start by journalling what you eat for a week, everything, even if its a piece of candy. Then review if you can cut any thing out.

If you're doing cardio exercises, try increasing the intensity, or even better, do what is known as High Intensity Interval Training. What you do there is do a moderate pace for a couple of minutes then for .5 - one minute, do nearly your max intensity, then immediately slow down to moderate, repeat until you do 30 minutes. Burns much more calories per minute, even post workout metabolic boost lasts longer.

Avoid all junk foods (if you aren't already), don't even allow yourself a cheat day during this period.

Also get your bodyfat % measured. I know in my day, they measured your fat % too, and if it was like under 20% for a man, they would let you in if you were overweight.

[ImperfectDVM]

What kind of exersizes do you do?

[TheUglyOne]

Two days a week I'll do the interval training. The other days I'll just do a hihg-modertate cardio, I prefer the cycle, followed by 15 minutes on the stairmaster. Weights 3 days a week.

[beastman88]

i don't see why you have to be a certain weight if your already in optimum shape. its the air force not a f***ing modeling agency

[ImperfectDVM]

I wondered the same thing. x S

[kdizzleforizzle91]

DON'T starve yourself. That'll make things worse. I'm on the Atkins diet. I'm not sure how much that differs from your current diet, but the basics behind it is to cut your net carbs that you consume, limiting it to about 20g of net carbs (grams of total carbs - grams of sugar alcohols & fiber = net carbs) per day. By limiting the carbs you take in for energy, your body has to use stored fat for energy. The process is called ketosis.

That may or may not work for you, because as other users have said, when you lose a lot of weight, your body has to adjust, so there may be periods where it's tough to lose weight or you stop losing anything for a bit. The thing is to not let that discourage you. I'm not a physical trainer or nutritionist by any means, so that's about as much advice as I can give you.

[ImperfectDVM]

Thank you!

[Anonymous]

Your weight dropping hasn't stopped, it just may not be as easy to lose those pounds as the first few.