hi fellow ladies :d_tongue:

awhile back, i remember stumbling upon a post in the women's forum about having problems with metabolism. i don't remember who posted originally, but she was frustrated because she was maintaining on 1600 calories a day and wanted to be able to increase her maintainance level.

i'm having a very similar problem at the moment, and i'm being courageous and upping my daily cals from 1200-1500 to 1800-2000 this week (and taking somewhat of a break from working out... i'm pretty burned out at the moment and hitting a sort of plateau, but i'm still moderately exercising). what i'm wondering is if the poster from that thread of any of you females have been in a similar situation? what did you do to increase your slowed metabolism and did it work?

thanks ahead of time from a frustrated girl who doesn't want to have to run 7 miles a day and hardly eat a thing to maintain weight!!! :eek:

ps- if it helps to know this, i'm still eating clean and trying to keep a macro ratio somewhere between 50/30/20 and 40/40/20 this week. i'm not being overly obsessive about the dieting part (i'm going to be travelling a lot and going to 4th of july parties, so it'll be tough, but i'm going to allow some room to breathe during the holiday as far as food is concerned).

i lift.
and i still have a relatively low maintanence. about 1800ish by last calculations.
i lift a lot. 5 days a week actually.

i find it helps. i don't do a lot of cardio, i'm just not that kind of girl.

i also find myself every few months taking a few weeks off to "maintain" so as to not be utterly completely and totally burned out.

if you don't lift, i suggest doing so. upping your lean mass will greatly increase your metab, and by only doing cardio you are kinda cutting into your lean mass as it is.

if you do lift, i suggest perhaps looking at your routine and perhaps changing it up some. you can do less every day to get in more days, if you'd like. hell, 4 of my lift days are just one superset. (5x5s with a warmup)

and do stuff that is fun. in addition to sports, if you just take a walk every evening you will be doing wonders for yourself.

:gl:

This is not just a female issue.

Lift and do cardio.
I had three days straight with tons of junk in addition to my normal diet. I was so surprised when I woke up Monday morning and looked at myself in the mirror. Wasnt much of a difference! I dared to go swimming that day! Didnt use to be this way tho.
Build some mass and your maintanence will be around 2000! (no, no need to look like a bodybuilder)
Programs like BFL work to speed up your metabolism. Check it out.

This is not just a female issue.

Lift and do cardio.
I had three days straight with tons of junk in addition to my normal diet. I was so surprised when I woke up Monday morning and looked at myself in the mirror. Wasnt much of a difference! I dared to go swimming that day! Didnt use to be this way tho.
Build some mass and your maintanence will be around 2000! (no, no need to look like a bodybuilder)
Programs like BFL work to speed up your metabolism. Check it out.
What is BFL???? Sorry to sound so uneducated. I also have this problem, I am wondering what I could do to up my metabolism. Before I could maintain 140 if I ran like a mad woman at around 35-40 miles a week and only eating 1500 calories. You think your metabolism is slow, try mine. The worst part is that I do lift, so what do I do??????

body for life (http://www.bodyforlife.com)

I am slowly upping my calories in a zig zag fashion. My maintenance level is probably around 2K-2200 calories, but I was taking in 1400-1500 for weight loss. Was still losing (slowly), so my metabolism had not yet shut off :) .

Now I'm upping the weights a bit, decreasing the cardio a tad, and increasing the calories (1700 one day, then 1400 on a non weight day, then 1800, 1400, 2000 (weekend) etc). I'd like to lose a little more fat, but as I seem to have missed my TOM this month, I'm concerned about overdoing it and am going up to maintenance for a while.

Hope that helps. :)