sarbobar's Journal, 27 May 2008

well it could be several things: - your calorie estimates could be a little off (overestimated activity and underestimated eating), that can be easily remedied. - your metabolism could be slowing down because the deficit you're creating is too big. if you've got less than 20lbs to lose your deficit shouldn't be more than 500 calories. The body fights against too much weight loss by slowing down the metabolism, it become more "effective" in it's energy storage, essentially in the form of fats. Possible solutions: I've never tried it before but you can try one of those calorie zig zag/cycling schemes for a week or two in order to boost up your metabolism. But ideally, I would suggest adding some resistance training to your running so you can build more muscle mass, people with more muscle have a more active metabolism and that way you don't risk getting stuck in a weight loss plateau again. In any case, a weight loss plateau doesn't usually last more than a few weeks, your body will eventually have to stop fighting the weight loss and if you keep following your diet, you'll start losing again soon enough. Good luck! 

Although it should be about calories in and calories burned, there is alot more to losing weight than that. You also have to take into account your age, genetics, sodium in foods, exercise (water retained in muscles due to exercisem stress levels, hormones, etc. Also the kinds of food you are eating can also have an effect on weight loss. How much water are you drnking every day? People also have a tendancy to underestimate their caloric intake by up to 20%. Also, unless you wear a heart monitor, it's easy to overestimate the calories burned for exercise. Machines aren't always that accurate. Maybe try to stick to lean proteins, fruits and veggies. Stay away from too many processed foods. Try varying your caloric intake everyday. One day eat 1200, the next 1600, etc. Good luck!