Am I over thinking this plateau? Thoughts?

I've essentially been experimenting with rolling 72s and 48s for 3 weeks. The scale hasn't moved in a little over a week. I am very strict to making it at least to 48 hours. I eat to the point of satisfaction and cleanly. I'm not going over my TDEE. I try to at least match it, but if I feel satisfied before I reach it I stop. I have a 4 hour eating window from 10 to 14. Very low carb, high protein and fat. It's pretty consistently chicken eggs and leafy veggies. I don't mind chicken because I'm kinda a penny pincher. My job involves a lot of walking around from place to place and I exercise daily. Mostly weight lifting. I feel really great actually. I wouldn't say I feel more energetic. But my energy levels are more steady throughout the day. The thing that is worrying me is maybe I've slowed my metabolism. I've essentially only eaten 6 times since 08Feb. Like I said I feel fine. I'm just curious if 3 weeks is enough time to maybe alter my metabolism in a way that fat is no longer being consumed? Also the scale not tipping has me thinking. I don't really see how it could be possible to have gained enough muscle to compensate for fat loss. I don't think I could even eat that much protein to have it available for my body. Would switching to OMAD for a week maybe help? Or should I just keep trucking along with my rolling 48s? I have noticed my days where I eat I feel extremely strong. I am not lean enough for my body to not "have enough" fat stores to draw from or anything like that.Thoughts would be appreciated. Thanks!

Answer

I am also in the same position. I’ve been doing rolling 48s for about 1.5 months . I believe my body is getting use to my routine. So, I have two options:

Increase the length of the fast (which I did and finally broke my plateau 🥳)
OMAD for two weeks (which I plan to do in April so that my body doesn’t adapt)

Also remember even if the scale moves slow, you’re still burning fat. No food - low insulin - fat burning !

Answer

This is typical in prolonged fasts! I fasted for two weeks and right into the 3rd week, I lost close to nothing. Some people in the fasting community call it shrink week! I would highly recommend measuring yourself like your waist and arms and legs instead, even though the scale isn’t moving, you could be losing inches because your body is shrinking to accommodate for fast weight loss. I didn’t lose weight but all of a sudden clothes i hadn’t been able to wear were fitting!

Answer

Are your clothes fitting loser? I fluctuated 2kg in 1 day and even though I am a scale addict (so dumb, I know) my tight clothes are lose now (with very little change on the scale). Don’t let those numbers negate all of your hard work, you are doing great, specially while working out! (muscle definition requires s o m e water retention)

Answer

Yeap, the scale is an inaccurate measuring tool of your progress when it comes to short term numbers, so it’s not gonna properly reflect what’s going on inside your body. Your body also replaces burnt fat cells with water and keeps them there for a while, so it’s possible to retain or even gain a bit, and then suddenly you drop all that water (whoosh effect).

This isn’t to say the scale is useless! It’s actually a good measuring tool for long term data. I log in my weight every day at the same time (after waking up and going to the bathroom), and keep as many variables out as possible (for ex. using the same clothes when I weigh), so the data of a whole month can show you how you’re doing. While I have ups and downs and stalls, the weigh overall is still going down.

Like others mentioned, use other measuring tools along the scale to help you out, getting your body measurements is one way, you can also get a non-stretchy piece of clothing, and see how it gets looser on you over time.

You might want to also switch what you eat, add a bit of beef or salmon here and there, not just chicken (eggs are good with all of them, I make sure to eat eggs every eating window), just to keep the body on its toes, I also recommend pushing your fasts a bit, like go 80-90hrs, then go for a 48hr, and so on. The fasts ARE working, it’s a matter of diligence and patience to trust the process at this point.