Weight Loss with Atkins Fat Fast

Question
Hello Melissa,

Thanks for this service that you provide.  I am a 38 year old female, 5' 3" and
127lbs.  I have been trying to lose 10-15 lbs for the past 2 years, to no avail.
I used to be able to lose 10lbs in a couple of months with just diet and
exercise.  

Presently, I exercise 6 days a week; 5 days of cardio, 2 days of weight training
plus two days of tennis per week.  I was only eating about 800 cals per day
for several years, and was unable to lose weight on that regimen.  For the
past two years I have tried several diet plans; nutrisystem, medifast, high
protein etc.. and nothing has worked. I have consulted nutritionists and had
my metabolism( BMR) checked (in addition,I wear a bodybugg and my average
calorie burn per day is about 2200 cals)  I am very regimented and write
down everything that I eat.  I feel like I am at the end of my rope right now.  I
wish someone could just give me plan that would work; I'd have no problem
following it.

My questions are as follows:
1) How come I cannot lose any weight on a 800 calorie plan when I am
burning about 2000 cals per day?

2) I am thinking of doing Atkins' Fat Fast (about a week of 90% fat and 10%
protein ...no carbs/perhaps 5 g per day as an incidental amount in cheese
etc..) The caloric limit is 1000 per day.  Do you think that this plan will work
for me.  Is is safe?  If this works, can I keep doing it indefinitely, or should I
switch to Atkins' Induction after a certain amount of time?

3)  Regarding Ketostix; If I do the Fat Fast, and use Ketostix to monitor
Lipolysis (fat buring), isn't it possible that the ketostix are just reading the fat
in my diet (since it will be so high at (90%) and not really the burning of body
fat? I've read that Ketostix cannot distinguish between high fat in the diet and
fat burning.  Is there anyway to be certain that I am actually burning body fat
as fuel?

Sorry that this is so long.  I truly appreciate you helping me out!  Thanks
again.

Sunita

Answer
Sunita,
You're probably familiar with the idea of percentage of body fat by now, and if you have bodybugg, I bet you know what your body fat is.

I'm going to guess that a hard exercising 38 year old has a body fat of 20-25%. Most Olympic athletes have a body fat of 15-18% or so. Most women's menstrual cycles will stop with a body fat below about 18%.

So bear with me.

You weigh 127, of which 25% is fat. So  you're carring 32 pounds of fat, and 95 pounds of bone/muscle/brain/etc.

If you want to lose 10-15 (let's say 12) pounds of fat, and not bone/muscle/brain, then you're telling me that you'd like to carry 95 pounds of bone/muscle/brain, and 20 pounds of fat. That would put you at 17% body fat, in the range of Olympic athletes... that's close enough to physically impossible that I wouldn't worry about it.

And remember, I guessed your body fat at 25%, so you can repeat the math with the real percentage to get better results.

Essentially, though, the only way you're going to lose significant weight is by racheting down the exercise and losing some muscle, because you just don't have 10-15 pounds of fat to lose. These skinny girls walking around at 5'3" and 110 pounds do NOT work out and have no muscle. They maintain by simply not eating. Enjoy your health, and accept that as you near 40, things will not be like they were when you were 20.

Melissa

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