6 month plateau stalled at 500 cal/day

I have plateaued with still 40 more lbs to loose. I have cut back to less than 600 cal/day for the past 2 weeks and in the past 2 days have eliminated anything that wasn't protein. My Dr warned me that this very low calorie diet would lower my metabolism but eating 1200 cal/ day didn't help me loose the wt either.  I am not exercising, but shouldn't I still expect to be loosing  with such a low calorie intake? How much longer should I be expecting to stay on this plateau?

That sounds frustrating.  I think eat more, maybe fluctuate calories - higher some days and lower others, and incorporate some exercise into your day.  I don't know why, but for me, it helps greatly.  Even a 30 minute walk, which technically doesn't burn that many calories seems to boost my weight loss.  I personally am not anti-carb and have eaten them through my entire journey (healthy carbs).  Good luck and I hope the scale moves for you soon!  

Hmm. This sounds like advise that a trainer gave me several years ago. He talked about changing the calorie intake every 3 days to trick the body into not adapting to a low calorie diet. Thanks for reminding me of this. Maybe I'll do 600 cal one day, 1000, the next day and 1200 the 3rd. It really does seem less hopeless when one has a plan.

Thanks for your post.

I've had good luck and fast weight loss with fluctuating daily calories. Another thing that I find helps weight loss is to give yourself a window of 8-10 hours per day to eat those calories, and fast for the rest of the day. Right now I am only taking in calories between 10 AM (or sometimes noon) and 8 PM and I find it very helpful. There is some science to back this kind of eating up:

http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/01/15/a-12-hour-window-fo r-a-healthy-weight/?_r=0

This works well for me also.

In addition to fluctuating daily calories, do you also change up the 8-10 hour window? 

Just a little. I always close the window at 8 PM, but I may open it at 10 AM, 11 AM, or noon, just depending on how my day is structured and how I am feeling. Today I had my first food at 11 AM, only water and black coffee before that. And for some reason, I feel physically and emotionally better when I structure my eating like this. Maybe it's because I'm a control freak and this is a way for me to control things.

I'm not big into exercise either but every time I stall I do 30 minutes of cardio a day until the scale starts moving again. It helps boost your metabolism and I find it helps get rid of any excess water weight that lingers (I have trouble reaching my water goals and have had issues with it since surgery)

I feel for you. I am 5 months out today and have only 12 more to goal, but I am losing so slowly it is painful. I started at 266 in 2010, got a sleeve, lost to 194, revised to sleeve Aug 2014, started at 214. So I am a lightweight and really close to goal.

I find I can not do 800 calories a day any more and bumped to 950. I am going to start walking more and ride my bike more. I am not a believer that exercise necessarily equates to weight loss or a revved up metabolism, but this close to goal I know I need to do it. I do think not only for maintainance , but also since I am 63 it will be important for me to get more regimented exercise.

Good luck, hopefully some of the pro's will come help us.