I exercise and eat healthy - but get fatter

__nicole__

Hi there,

I hope that you can help me! I've got some questions concerning my exercise plan and my weight/body fat (I'm from Germany, so English is not my first language).

Here are some facts about me:
> 30 yrs old, 5'6
> I started eating healthy and exercising about one and a half year ago. I've never been chubby, I just wanted to get in shape. After some time, my body started to change in a positive way: I lost some weight (down to 125) and I went one jeans size down, body fat has been stable at 27 per cent.
> I've been eating pretty healthy: smoothie in the morning, vegetables/rice for lunch, chicken/rice/vegetables in the evening. I try to avoid bad fat and sugar. One cheat meal on Sundays.
> I've been exercising on a regular basis: Jillian Michaels (Ripped or Shred) 5 times a week, cardio 1-2 hours a week (mix of running and walking).
> Weight and body fat have been stable for about one year

> BUT NOW: Despite still eating healthy and exercising, my weight has gone up from 125 to 143 in the last five months, fat percentage from 27 to 32. I can even tell by looking in the mirror that it's fat... My flat stomach has turned into a flabby piece of fat. Huh??

Now I'm even bigger than before I started one and a half year ago. 1-2 jeans sizes up

My problem is that I can't understand why I'm getting fatter. I exercise and I eat healthy. My doctor has checked me from head to toe. Everything is OK.

So what's wrong?
Any suggestions?

Sabine_Stroehm

Are you carefully logging your calories?

kaotik26

Maybe you built up muscle under the fat? It tends to happen to me if I don't keep my lifting and cardio balanced well.

__nicole__

No, currently not. I did it for a while to get a feeling for how many calories/fat etc I eat, but I didn't do it here on myfitnesspal. I used another app.

I eat about 1300-1500 calories a day. Sometimes more. But I think I should definately not gain weight or even fat that way... I also don't think that I undereat...??

ashleycde

What's your BMR?
What is your average daily activity like?
Do you log your calories?
Do use a food scale?

brianpperkins

If you're not accurately tracking what you eat and drink then there is no evidence either way to confirm/deny if you're overeating or not.

SpockAdventures

I have been there, thinking that I was doing everything right and should be losing when I was gaining. What was really happening was I was deluding myself in thinking that as long as I was eating healthy foods, I just had to keep a relative count on calories. Fact of the matter is, at the end of the day I simply was eating too much. There were a lot of calories I was accounting for, serving myself larger than single portions but only counting single portion calories, etc.

If you are exercising regularly, the only thing that could be going wrong is that you're just eating too much. Sucks, I realize, and it's hard to retrain your body to need less food, and it's killer when you first cut back and your stomach has yet to shrink to a normal size again, but it's the only way you are going to lose weight. Doesn't matter how healthy you eat - if you eat 2000 calories of healthy stuff per day, but only need about 1500 per day to function, you're overeating by 500 calories per day. After 7 days, that's a whole pound of extra calories. It sneaks up on you like that.

Good luck, and I hope that you are able to get a hold of your struggles!

cityruss

If you are gaining body fat, then you are consuming more calories than you are using.

prattiger65

The simple science is, if you aren't losing weight, you are not in a calorie deficit.. Meaning, if your goal is weight loss, you are eating too much. You absolutely must know how much you are eating by weighing and measuring for accuracy. Start there and I will bet you will find your answer.

__nicole__

My BMI is 22.7

No, I don't use a food scale.

I'm a teacher. So I stand or sit during the day.

OK, so I should better start to track what I eat. I just drink water or unsweetened tea, sometimes one cup of coffee in the morning.

dave4d

Start tracking your calories. Everything you eat or drink....including the oils, marinades, and condiments that you use to cook or flavor your food and your cheat meal.

I've had cheat meals that set me back an entire week on my weight. Without properly tracking your diet, it is very easy to gain weight.

__nicole__

OK, then I'll start tracking my calories again. Hope that'll help!
Thanks guys

ashleycde

__nicole__ wrote: »

My BMI is 22.7

No, I don't use a food scale.

I'm a teacher. So I stand or sit during the day.

OK, so I should better start to track what I eat. I just drink water or unsweetened tea, sometimes one cup of coffee in the morning.

BMR is different from BMI. Your basal metabolic rate (BMR) is how many calories you would burn just staying in bed all day. In addition to these calories burned, you also burn calories from normal daily activity. Try this calculator to determine both.

To lose weight you need to burn more calories than you consume. A pound of stored fat is about 3500 calories, so you would need to be in a calorie deficit of 3500 calories per week to lose 1 lb each week. I would suggest a deficit of 0.5 lbs a week (or 1750 calories) based on your current weight and weight loss goal.

I suggest getting a food scale to accurately measure calories. As an example, the cream cheese on my morning bagel looks like 2 tablespoons (30 g) but when I weight it, ends up being more like 45 - 50 g, a difference of 40-53 calories. Meat, if not weighed, is very difficult to gauge as well. All these calories add up, and can put you in a calorie surplus if you're not careful.

Sabine_Stroehm

__nicole__ wrote: »

My BMI is 22.7

No, I don't use a food scale.

I'm a teacher. So I stand or sit during the day.

OK, so I should better start to track what I eat. I just drink water or unsweetened tea, sometimes one cup of coffee in the morning.

I'd say it's time to recalibrate. Track what you *normally* eat to see what went wrong, THEN adjust.
And, given that you're at a healthy weight, opt for 0.5LBSs a week.

brianpperkins

Weight at its most basic is comparative math. Calories in versus calories out. When you eat more than your body uses, weight gain occurs. When you eat less than you use, loss occurs ... keeping that deficit in check, hitting macronutrient goals, and exercise can help preserve lean mass during weight loss.

segacs

Um, I don't mean to be personal here, but is there any chance you might be pregnant?

Sabine_Stroehm

segacs wrote: »

Um, I don't mean to be personal here, but is there any chance you might be pregnant?

oh my. Good question.

AmandaHugginkiss

You are underestimating your calories and overestimating you exercise calorie burn. Are you doing any kind of strength training? You should be. If you diet and don't do strength training, your body fat percent is going to go up. The higher your body fat percent, the fewer calories you burn at rest. You have a high body fat percent for someone of your body weight.

Start strength training, start worrying about your body composition, up the protein and get a food scale.

NRSPAM

What you're eating sounds healthy, but portion sizes are very important. Rice can be very high in calories if you're eating more than you are supposed to. Weigh/measure your foods. If you're not logging what you eat, it's easy to forget those little slip ups. Basically, what everyone else said....log your food, and don't forget to measure/weigh it also! Don't forget to look at those food labels either.

ninerbuff

One doesn't gain fat weight without a surplus (and some possible hormonal issue). You're eating much more than you think.


A.C.E. Certified Personal and Group Fitness Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 30 years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

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SergeantSausage

I got 50 pounds fatter eating healthy, organic food from my back yard garden. No "junk". For years on end nothing but the freshest, healthiest produce, grains, and fruit I grew with the sweat of my own hands.

When it comes to weight, there is no "healthy" and "healthy" may be masking the true, hidden fundamental problem known commonly as "eating too damned much", right?

"Healthy" means nothing to weight loss.

__nicole__

No, I know for sure that I'm not pregnant

Maybe I'm really underestimating my calorie intake and overestimating my burned calories (although I use a HRM). I've just installed my app again to track everything

The Jillian Michaels DVD is a mix of cardio and strength training. I've done the programm for several times and it has worked with visual results every time.

remnantkin

"eating healthy"....
"eating healthy"....

As others have said, start quantifying this. Calories. Numbers. Tracking.

The science is sound and the numbers don't lie. The sooner you start measuring your input vs output in regards to calories, the sooner you'll start to figure out where the problem is.

Then you can adjust and start losing weight again.

Simple maths is all that's required to work out your approximate calorie limits. Current weight (in lbs) x10 = max daily calories for loss/deficit, x14 for sustain, x16 for gain. Work out whatever calories you burn through physical exertion each day and add that to give you your total max limit for the day.

I.e. My current weight, 218lbs, my calorie limit = 2180. 5k run = ~550 calories; Walk to work 350 calories. New max limit: 2180 + 550 + 350 = 3080. If i eat under this, I'll weigh less the next day. If i make sure that I've eaten an appropriate amount of protein that day, more fat will be lost than lean muscle.

Repeat until target weight (I've been losing 2lbs a week since November)

Keep it simple. Don't over think things. Limit your calories and use the macros to control how you feel, i.e. protein to quell hunger, carbs to give you energy. The weight should gradually fall off if you stick to this.

Measuring calories burned through exercise is trickier. The calculations on this site aren't always the most accurate but when used in combination with other online calculators, can give you a bit of clearer idea of how much you've burned.

Also, if you're standing all day as a teacher, wear a pedometer. Chances are you'll clock up a good few hundred calories of exercise from all the walking about throughout the day.

__nicole__

Oops, I misread. My BMR is 1430, the Active Metabolic Rate 1870 (calculated some weeks ago (140 lbs))

segacs

__nicole__ wrote: »

The Jillian Michaels DVD is a mix of cardio and strength training. I've done the programm for several times and it has worked with visual results every time.

It's possible it's just too easy for you, now. Are you increasing the weights that you use on it each time?

__nicole__

Hmm, I think if it was too easy, my weight would simply stay the same...
I increased the weights when I started, but not right now. Need to get new dumb bells...

Wearing a pedometer is also a good idea.

What about the heart rate monitor? Is it accurate and quite reliable? I got one from Polar...

remnantkin

After 3 months of tracking the effort/weight/calorie burn on machines at the gym, it seems to me that even if you find it a lot easier than when you started, the difference in calorie burn for say 40 mins of cardio is negligible (like within the realm of 50 calories).

As long as you're doing the exercise correctly and in a consistent manner, it should be fine.

Heart rate, i've never paid too much attention to. Calories will burn no matter what heart rate you get up to. The more time you spend doing an exercise, the more calories you'll burn.

Sure there's probably an optimum burn point and whatever, but as far as I'm concerned, you're already over-thinking things when you get to that point. Maybe think about that stuff when you're trying to min/max some miniscule bodyfat percentage or something after you've gotten down to the weight range you want.

brianpperkins

__nicole__ wrote: »

Hmm, I think if it was too easy, my weight would simply stay the same...
I increased the weights when I started, but not right now. Need to get new dumb bells...

Wearing a pedometer is also a good idea.

What about the heart rate monitor? Is it accurate and quite reliable? I got one from Polar...

They can be accurate under certain circumstances but are widely used outside of their design and programming.

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/Azdak/view/the-real-facts-about-hrms-and-calories-what-you-need-to-know-before-purchasing-an-hrm-or-using-one-21472

NoelFigart1

I am not saying this to insult you, so don't think I'm trying to imply you're not an intelligent or self aware person, or anything.

But chances are extremely good that you're not as accurate on your intake as you think you are. Please understand this is coming from someone who has been dieting off and on since she was TWELVE. I know that a serving of meat is supposed to be about the size of a deck of cards, I know that serving of pasta is half a cup which is about half the size of a tennis ball -- all that smack.

If you do not measure (and I mean use a scale rather than volume measurement) every damn gram that goes in your mouth, you cannot be sure of your intake.

The handful of raisins you eat because you're starving when you get home from work while you're prepping dinner... That counts and needs to be weighed. The creamer in your coffee counts. (IF you're like me and use half-n-half that does add up quick). The oil you use to sautee those very healthy veggies -- totally counts and needs to be accounted for in your diet.

If I am making this out to be a tedious, obsessive pain in the butt... Well, you're right. It totally is. But after doing that for a period of time, you WILL have a much greater and more accurate understanding of your caloric intake.

(I say this as someone who would have sworn on a stack of Bibles I had to exercise a million hours a week and eat less than 1,200 calories a day to lose weight. Not really true. I do work out about five hours a week, true enough, but I am losing a pound a week pretty steadily at an average of 1773 calories a day and I'm a short, middle-aged yo-yo dieter!)

ana3067

__nicole__ wrote: »

No, currently not. I did it for a while to get a feeling for how many calories/fat etc I eat, but I didn't do it here on myfitnesspal. I used another app.

I eat about 1300-1500 calories a day. Sometimes more. But I think I should definately not gain weight or even fat that way... I also don't think that I undereat...??

You are eating more than you realize if you are not tracking calories.