Stalled in a weird place...
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born_of_fire74
Posts: 776 Member
I began weighing and logging my food around the end of January using the calorie intake assigned to me by the trainer at my crossfit gym based on my BMR plus a combo of HIIT and heavy lifting 5x a week. Even though I had to build up to attending 5x a week, which took 2 months, I lost a steady 3 lbs per month for the first 5 months. Since June though, I've been struggling a bit. I've added swimming to my exercise regimen (4000-5000m over the course of 3-4 sessions per week) and I haven't changed my calorie intake to a maintenance level but my weight loss has ceased. I'm even starting to gain--from a low of 124lbs up to 128lbs most days. This may not seem like cause for alarm as we don't maintain a specific weight but a weight range however I'm a little mystified.
My food hasn't changed much at all; I settled in very early on about half a dozen dinner meals that really work for me, I eat basically the same breakfast every day, basically the same snacks every day, and I'm exercising more than ever. As well, most TDEE's recommend +300 calories to my current intake for maintenance but, if I'm gaining now at what is supposedly a deficit, I shudder to think what would happen if I added those calories.
The first piece of advice for situations like mine is always to tighten up weighing and logging, which makes sense and I fully admit that I'm not super meticulous. I am skeptical though that I'm weighing and logging incorrectly to the tune of hundreds of calories a day when I am weighing and logging virtually the same foods with the care and attention equal to when I was losing 3lbs/month.
The second piece of advice is likely going to be to start paying attention to my measurements but I've been doing that all along. I've plateaued on neck, gluteal fold and hips, and my waist is increasing! In fact, the increase at my waist is what prompted me to finally post after being stalled for a couple of months now. I know I have to be patient and I can deal with plateauing but gaining both weight and on a measurement is alarming to me.
Obviously I am somehow over-eating and I've clearly got to improve with my weighing and logging but I wonder if there isn't something else I am doing to myself. My troubles coincide with the time that I added swimming. Could the cardio be back-firing on me somehow? Any other thoughts?
Edit: I should probably add that I don't log the swimming so never eat back the calories burned from my sessions. Shouldn't that put me even further ahead of the game rather than causing me to gain weight and/or girth. Argh!
My food hasn't changed much at all; I settled in very early on about half a dozen dinner meals that really work for me, I eat basically the same breakfast every day, basically the same snacks every day, and I'm exercising more than ever. As well, most TDEE's recommend +300 calories to my current intake for maintenance but, if I'm gaining now at what is supposedly a deficit, I shudder to think what would happen if I added those calories.
The first piece of advice for situations like mine is always to tighten up weighing and logging, which makes sense and I fully admit that I'm not super meticulous. I am skeptical though that I'm weighing and logging incorrectly to the tune of hundreds of calories a day when I am weighing and logging virtually the same foods with the care and attention equal to when I was losing 3lbs/month.
The second piece of advice is likely going to be to start paying attention to my measurements but I've been doing that all along. I've plateaued on neck, gluteal fold and hips, and my waist is increasing! In fact, the increase at my waist is what prompted me to finally post after being stalled for a couple of months now. I know I have to be patient and I can deal with plateauing but gaining both weight and on a measurement is alarming to me.
Obviously I am somehow over-eating and I've clearly got to improve with my weighing and logging but I wonder if there isn't something else I am doing to myself. My troubles coincide with the time that I added swimming. Could the cardio be back-firing on me somehow? Any other thoughts?
Edit: I should probably add that I don't log the swimming so never eat back the calories burned from my sessions. Shouldn't that put me even further ahead of the game rather than causing me to gain weight and/or girth. Argh!
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Adding the swimming may have caused water gain as it may have stressed some muscles you hadn't been stressing before. Don't stop the swimming, just continue swimming and all the other stuff and being patient. I know you are alarmed by the less-than-2% gain, and I know that you can see the difference on your small and athletic body. Data, data, data. Collect more data. Somewhere in your data, a spreadsheet if you will, is the answer waiting for you to find it. There are no holes in your knowledge of of what you are doing or should be doing. It's just that you're so close to perfect as to care a lot.
Is it possible that a frequently consumed food has been changed by the manufacturer and you're still re-using the same database listing you had used before such change? For that matter, is it possible that someone has screwed up the database listing of the foods you have used? I found this morning that someone had gone in and screwed up the pinto beans. The vitamins and minerals component of the database is now wrong. That does not affect the calorie listing of the beans, but it does illustrate a risk.
Maybe double-double check by comparing your mfp foods to the self.com database.
I'm not going to suggest TOM. You've clearly got enough data to recognize when that happens.4 -
Have you been adjusting your calorie goal down as you have lost weight to accommodate a lower BMR?8
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Has anything changed in your life? Like did you used to walk to work but now you take a vehicle? Or did you hand wash all your dishes and recently get dishwasher to do it for you? Anything that would alter your daily activity.
Is swimming interfering with a rest day? If you have been swimming since June it is a little long for water weight gain to stick around.
Have you noticed in the past if your weight changes seasonally?1 -
quote " I'm even starting to gain--from a low of 124lbs up to 128lbs most days. This may not seem like cause for alarm as we don't maintain a specific weight but a weight range however I'm a little mystified."
This is well within the +/- 5 pound weight range. And if you are NOT a meticulous food weigher and logger, yes this over a period of time (since June?) could be adding calories each week that equates to a small gain or keeping you out of the deficit.. not sure what your deficit is supposed to be to lose weight. If you have not adjusted calorie goals at each 10 pounds might want to look into this as well.
How long are you at 4 pounds gain? has it been 7 - 10 days per se, and you know that you have gained real fat back? Have you considered trending your weight using a 28 day or weekly trending app? Female hormones can be horrid on the scale two time a month, sodium, carb intake, how well you are staying hydrated through the day every day, and muscle muscle repair/glyogen as well, getting enough sleep and keeping stress at bay.
There can be several things, but monitoring all things mentioned above can clue you in on what is happening.
eta: just another thought... What is your activity level setup in MFP (not including exercise)... Are you moving less in your day to day activities? You might have less NEAT now than you did before..Sometimes when we diet and other things going on in our lives when we were much active during weight loss we might become less active or not moving as much as we were.
The exercise you used to burned at a heavier weight, might not be burning as many calories. Changing up exercise volume and intensity from time to time helps too. If you eat any of these calories back, might want to look at that as well.1 -
To answer a few questions:
nowine4me, I plug my info into a few TDEE's about once a month. They never say the same thing so I take the average, more or less. Most TDEE's have me at maintenance around 2000 calories and my current intake is 1688 calories, so I should still be in deficit. The last time I calculated my BMR, it was around 1250 calories and a couple of the TDEE's tell me my minimum calorie intake should be 1500. Like I said, most TDEE's say I should add 300 calories to be at maintenance but I can't imagine doing so if I'm gaining now at 1688.
bioklutz: I haven't been keeping records long enough to know if my weight changes seasonally. Nothing much has changed in my life aside from the addition of swimming to my exercise regimen. Same job, same hobbies, same chores, same gym, same everything I can think of--I lead a pretty dull life. Rest days from swimming are Friday, Saturday and Sunday, rest days from the gym are Saturday and Sunday. Oh! I did add a BCAA supplement to my diet at the beginning of August but it's supposed to help burn fat (L-carnitine is one of the amino acids in it). It doesn't have any nutritional information on the package so I haven't been logging it. Guess I better figure that out and start logging it. I hope it doesn't have hundreds of calories though!
RoxieDawn: I've been up 4 lbs for a couple of months now. I was hovering between 124 and 126 at my lowest weight (my scale weighs in 2lb increments) and I hover between 128 and 130 these days. My activity setup is for moderate exercise as I work a mildly physical job and reliably attend the gym 5x a week. I have never logged my swimming or eaten back the calories. I do have a swim watch that tells me I burn ~300 calories each session so I should be between 900 and 1200 calories ahead of the game each week in theory...
I guess I was mainly trying to determine if adding swimming to my regimen was somehow hurting my progress more than anything else. It seems this is unlikely so I'll have to do a better job of weighing and logging foods. That's really the only thing left at this point. Thanks for taking the time to offer me some assistance guys, I really appreciate it.0 -
Could it be that you need a little bit more calories to fuel the addition of the swimming? I am not sure of the science of it all but it seems to me that your body may be needing some additional fuel to keep up with the swimming. However what do I know? That is the only thing I could think of!2
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born_of_fire74 wrote: »To answer a few questions:
nowine4me, I plug my info into a few TDEE's about once a month. They never say the same thing so I take the average, more or less. Most TDEE's have me at maintenance around 2000 calories and my current intake is 1688 calories, so I should still be in deficit. The last time I calculated my BMR, it was around 1250 calories and a couple of the TDEE's tell me my minimum calorie intake should be 1500. Like I said, most TDEE's say I should add 300 calories to be at maintenance but I can't imagine doing so if I'm gaining now at 1688.
bioklutz: I haven't been keeping records long enough to know if my weight changes seasonally. Nothing much has changed in my life aside from the addition of swimming to my exercise regimen. Same job, same hobbies, same chores, same gym, same everything I can think of--I lead a pretty dull life. Rest days from swimming are Friday, Saturday and Sunday, rest days from the gym are Saturday and Sunday. Oh! I did add a BCAA supplement to my diet at the beginning of August but it's supposed to help burn fat (L-carnitine is one of the amino acids in it). It doesn't have any nutritional information on the package so I haven't been logging it. Guess I better figure that out and start logging it. I hope it doesn't have hundreds of calories though!
RoxieDawn: I've been up 4 lbs for a couple of months now. I was hovering between 124 and 126 at my lowest weight (my scale weighs in 2lb increments) and I hover between 128 and 130 these days. My activity setup is for moderate exercise as I work a mildly physical job and reliably attend the gym 5x a week. I have never logged my swimming or eaten back the calories. I do have a swim watch that tells me I burn ~300 calories each session so I should be between 900 and 1200 calories ahead of the game each week in theory...
I guess I was mainly trying to determine if adding swimming to my regimen was somehow hurting my progress more than anything else. It seems this is unlikely so I'll have to do a better job of weighing and logging foods. That's really the only thing left at this point. Thanks for taking the time to offer me some assistance guys, I really appreciate it.
So you are using TDEE method with a % off for deficit?
Swimming would not be causing you maintain or gain weight at any time if you are in a true calorie deficit, but you said you have not moved calories up to your maintain level, BUT you are maintaining with/or with out a slight (tiny) gain hense where you are with weight today.
Look at this way, your rate of loss at the 1688 is not working. So this tells me that you are most likely eating more than you think or perhaps the TDEE you are at is wrong... which means you are still eating more than you should be to meet your goal.
Swimming would only cause you some temporary water weight gain in the form of muscle recover/repair especially when increasing the volume or intensity of those work outs.
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I use several TDEE's to prevent getting a single wonky result, RoxieDawn, and take the average of them after I discard any outliers. For example, three calculators tell me to maintain at 2100, 2000 and 1900 respectively with another tellng me to maintain at 2450. I discard the 2450 and go with 2000, the average of the others. I always err on the low side of the recommendations but have yet to actually start eating 2000 a day because I'm maintaining (with a tiny increase) at my current intake.
It's the damn food. I just have to do better. Audit the entries I use as jarome suggested and be more vigilant about my weights and measures. Boo! I was hoping for an easier, less labour intensive fix lol4 -
As I think you have realised; it comes down to your accuracy and consistency with tracking. Also TDEE calculators are estimates and it will be more beneficial for you to use your calories consumed and weight loss to back work your TDEE.0
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I do think that our bodies get more efficient at the exercise we regularly do, and therefore need to burn less calories to do it as we get fitter. I started off losing pretty consistently logging all my exercise and eating the majority of my exercise calories back, but over time I found that I had to reduce the estimated calorie burn from exercise to compensate for this effect. Perhaps try setting your activity level lower on MFP? I have a desk job, but I'm pretty active otherwise - I walk briskly for an hour a day, run 5k twice a week, gym (cardio & weights) 5x per week - but I've set my activity level to sedentary on here, with no regular workouts, and just input my exercise separately so that it doesn't double count the 'calories out' side of the equation. I have also recently taken to underestimating the number of calories my workouts/runs are burning and am maintaining very nicely as a result. Maybe worth a try if your food logging is as tight as it's going to be? Good luck.3
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trigden1991 wrote: »As I think you have realised; it comes down to your accuracy and consistency with tracking. Also TDEE calculators are estimates and it will be more beneficial for you to use your calories consumed and weight loss to back work your TDEE.
Trouble is that I've been at 1688 from the start so I don't really have any data to work back with. I lost at this intake until I stopped losing >.<
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born_of_fire74 wrote: »trigden1991 wrote: »As I think you have realised; it comes down to your accuracy and consistency with tracking. Also TDEE calculators are estimates and it will be more beneficial for you to use your calories consumed and weight loss to back work your TDEE.
Trouble is that I've been at 1688 from the start so I don't really have any data to work back with. I lost at this intake until I stopped losing >.<
I weigh about what you weigh, and 1688 is only about 100 calories short of maintenance for me. You're not eating back your swimming calories, but you're not logging super accurately either, so these two are probably negating each other. You could be eating around maintenance without realizing it (as you're discovering). I'd drop your calories down to 1400-1500, tighten up your logging, and be patient for a few more weeks.3 -
OP the exact same thing happened to me... losing steadily until I started running instead of walking (for the same amount of time each week). I had to stop after a while but switched to walking uphill (up to 10% incline) instead of flat.... Haven't lost a pound since and I haven't changed anything else either.
I actually gained a couple pounds back too, but lost 2 last month again without changing much either so I'm not really sweating it.0 -
OP the exact same thing happened to me... losing steadily until I started running instead of walking (for the same amount of time each week). I had to stop after a while but switched to walking uphill (up to 10% incline) instead of flat.... Haven't lost a pound since and I haven't changed anything else either.
I actually gained a couple pounds back too, but lost 2 last month again without changing much either so I'm not really sweating it.
Well, poop, that's not terribly encouraging. Maybe, hopefully, I'm recomping by accident here. I don't really need to lose any more weight, I'm a big-boned girl, and I was about ready to start working at exchanging fat for muscle anyway...
My swimsuit is getting a little loose too so that's a good sign I think. I'll keep you all posted
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the only thing that scares me a bit about this is that you got thicker in the midsection. Not all midsection thickening is fat, esp if your clothes are looser elsewhere. I would go to the doctor and have a pelvic exam and get checked out abdominally, noting any digestive changes or monthly changes or just anything that is different from your norm.4
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Did you say how tall you are?0
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born_of_fire74 wrote: »OP the exact same thing happened to me... losing steadily until I started running instead of walking (for the same amount of time each week). I had to stop after a while but switched to walking uphill (up to 10% incline) instead of flat.... Haven't lost a pound since and I haven't changed anything else either.
I actually gained a couple pounds back too, but lost 2 last month again without changing much either so I'm not really sweating it.
Well, poop, that's not terribly encouraging. Maybe, hopefully, I'm recomping by accident here. I don't really need to lose any more weight, I'm a big-boned girl, and I was about ready to start working at exchanging fat for muscle anyway...
My swimsuit is getting a little loose too so that's a good sign I think. I'll keep you all posted
Yeah I should mention that I lost 2 inches off my hips and 1 off my waist in those 2 years.1 -
rhtexasgal wrote: »Could it be that you need a little bit more calories to fuel the addition of the swimming? I am not sure of the science of it all but it seems to me that your body may be needing some additional fuel to keep up with the swimming. However what do I know? That is the only thing I could think of!
this.
With so much exercise, maybe up them cals a bit to 1800 and see what happens?0 -
Why would I add calories if I am gaining weight and girth at my current intake?0
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