Water weight

kenziedriscoll

This might sound like a silly question, I don't know since I'm new to this heathy lifestyle. I've been doing this for 2 weeks and a couple days and have lost 6.5lbs (yay!)... Likely water weight. My question is, if I *wasnt* in a deficit, say I was eating the wrong amount of calories (Eating more than I think), not logging/weighing correctly, would I have lost that water weight? I'm still learning on weighing the corrects foods and if I should eat more/less calories (I'm on 1530 a day). Did I confuse anyone yet? Basically had I been eating too much the last 2 weeks, i wouldn't have lost the initial 6.5 water weight, right? Oh lord.

malibu927

Since water weight fluctuates constantly, it's hard to say. Probably not 6.5 pounds, but you would see a fluctuation regardless, even if you were in maintenance.

eringrace95_

If you're eating at a caloric deficit, you lose weight.

As for water weight, if you're new to the lifestyle it's very common that you lose a ton of water weight right off the bat as your body is adjusting

CattOfTheGarage

The big water weight loss at the start of a calorie reduction is usually because you are eating less carbs (sugar and starch) than you were.

This has nothing to do with "low carb" diets - it's just because you've reduced what you're eating overall, so inevitably the amount of carbs you eat has reduced too.

Carbs are not bad, they don't make you fat, but to digest and store them takes water. Think of the water as "packaging" for the carbs.

So when you eat less carbs, that water isn't needed any more and gets peed out, meaning you get lighter. If you eat more carbs again in the future, more water will be taken on and you will get a bit heavier again.

So to answer your question, yes, you have shed water  because you are eating less. If you were still overeating, you probably would not have lost that water weight, unless you were overeating purely on protein, fat and veg, which isn't very likely.

Keep in mind that water weight is NOT a bad thing. It comes and goes. If you have a day when you stick to your calories but eat a lot of high carb foods like bread or pasta, you will take on water immediately; if you have a day when carbs are low you will shed it. If you do heavy unaccustomed exercise, or injure yourself, you will take on water to help the healing process and shed it again when the healing is done. You take on water when you're ill, at certain points in the menstrual cycle and for other reasons so complex I don't really understand them so I'm not going to try and explain.

So what does all this mean? Just that your weight is not an exact number and will vary in a range of up to 10lb depending on what your body is doing with its water at that moment. So don't let the scale scare you, it will go up and down. As long as you're seeing a general downward trend over time, you're going in the right direction.

kenziedriscoll

CattOfTheGarage wrote: »

The big water weight loss at the start of a calorie reduction is usually because you are eating less carbs (sugar and starch) than you were.

This has nothing to do with "low carb" diets - it's just because you've reduced what you're eating overall, so inevitably the amount of carbs you eat has reduced too.

Carbs are not bad, they don't make you fat, but to digest and store them takes water. Think of the water as "packaging" for the carbs.

So when you eat less carbs, that water isn't needed any more and gets peed out, meaning you get lighter. If you eat more carbs again in the future, more water will be taken on and you will get a bit heavier again.

So to answer your question, yes, you have shed water  because you are eating less. If you were still overeating, you probably would not have lost that water weight, unless you were overeating purely on protein, fat and veg, which isn't very likely.

Keep in mind that water weight is NOT a bad thing. It comes and goes. If you have a day when you stick to your calories but eat a lot of high carb foods like bread or pasta, you will take on water immediately; if you have a day when carbs are low you will shed it. If you do heavy unaccustomed exercise, or injure yourself, you will take on water to help the healing process and shed it again when the healing is done. You take on water when you're ill, at certain points in the menstrual cycle and for other reasons so complex I don't really understand them so I'm not going to try and explain.

So what does all this mean? Just that your weight is not an exact number and will vary in a range of up to 10lb depending on what your body is doing with its water at that moment. So don't let the scale scare you, it will go up and down. As long as you're seeing a general downward trend over time, you're going in the right direction.

Great info, Thank you. Makes perfect sense...And I must say, I'm pretty darn happy that the scale has gone down, water weight or not. Zing!