Reverse dieting help

TayTayDrenDren

Ive been having problems with restricting my calories and im trying to bring them back up to maintainance so that i can finally get back on track. I know you can reverse diet but ive heard that its mostly for people coming out of a cutting phase. My macros are roughly 45% carbs, 35% protein, and 25% fat. Can i still reverse diet or is there another way for me to do this?

sardelsa

Just want to clarify... you are currently not cutting/eating at a deficit? But you aren't eating at maintenance? Not sure if I missed something here. What are your goals?

TayTayDrenDren

sardelsa wrote: »

Just want to clarify... you are currently not cutting/eating at a deficit? But you aren't eating at maintenance? Not sure if I missed something here. What are your goals?

Right now im eating 1400 cals per day, im 5' 10", lift about 4-5 days per week, and weight around 114-115lbs so im definitely in a deficit. However, my goal is to find my maintainance again so that i can move on to putting on muscle.

sardelsa

TayTayDrenDren wrote: »

sardelsa wrote: »

Just want to clarify... you are currently not cutting/eating at a deficit? But you aren't eating at maintenance? Not sure if I missed something here. What are your goals?

Right now im eating 1400 cals per day, im 5' 10", lift about 4-5 days per week, and weight around 114-115lbs so im definitely in a deficit. However, my goal is to find my maintainance again so that i can move on to putting on muscle.

Why are you eating so little, please don't tell me you are trying to lose more weight? You are already very underweight as it is so you need to get out of that deficit for sure. You can slowly start adding 100-150 cals a week or so until you stop losing/start gaining, keep in mind that the scale will probably jump a bit (water, extra food) so it helps to track your weight on with a trend app to sift through the noise.

With your stats you need to put on weight I would recommend heading over to the gaining section for more info.

toxikon

Just throw your current stats into a TDEE calculator and eat what it tells you for maintenance. Weigh yourself and chart your progress every week and adjust as needed.

TayTayDrenDren

sardelsa wrote: »

TayTayDrenDren wrote: »

sardelsa wrote: »

Just want to clarify... you are currently not cutting/eating at a deficit? But you aren't eating at maintenance? Not sure if I missed something here. What are your goals?

Right now im eating 1400 cals per day, im 5' 10", lift about 4-5 days per week, and weight around 114-115lbs so im definitely in a deficit. However, my goal is to find my maintainance again so that i can move on to putting on muscle.

Why are you eating so little, please don't tell me you are trying to lose more weight? You are already very underweight as it is so you need to get out of that deficit for sure. You can slowly start adding 100-150 cals a week or so until you stop losing/start gaining, keep in mind that the scale will probably jump a bit (water, extra food) so it helps to track your weight on with a trend app to sift through the noise.

With your stats you need to put on weight I would recommend heading over to the gaining section for more info.

Im not trying to lose weight. I got scared of my weight fluctuations and ended up restricting myself. Im trying to come out of it. The only thing is what do i do about my macros? Do i increase all of them so they stay at the same ratio or do i just raise carbs or what?

sardelsa

TayTayDrenDren wrote: »

sardelsa wrote: »

TayTayDrenDren wrote: »

sardelsa wrote: »

Just want to clarify... you are currently not cutting/eating at a deficit? But you aren't eating at maintenance? Not sure if I missed something here. What are your goals?

Right now im eating 1400 cals per day, im 5' 10", lift about 4-5 days per week, and weight around 114-115lbs so im definitely in a deficit. However, my goal is to find my maintainance again so that i can move on to putting on muscle.

Why are you eating so little, please don't tell me you are trying to lose more weight? You are already very underweight as it is so you need to get out of that deficit for sure. You can slowly start adding 100-150 cals a week or so until you stop losing/start gaining, keep in mind that the scale will probably jump a bit (water, extra food) so it helps to track your weight on with a trend app to sift through the noise.

With your stats you need to put on weight I would recommend heading over to the gaining section for more info.

Im not trying to lose weight. I got scared of my weight fluctuations and ended up restricting myself. Im trying to come out of it. The only thing is what do i do about my macros? Do i increase all of them so they stay at the same ratio or do i just raise carbs or what?

This worries me. Do you currently or have you had an ED in the past? If so, this might be time to seek the help of your doctor or treatment team

I tend to keep protein and fat the same and increase the carbs.

TayTayDrenDren

I lived in New York for about 8 months last year while trying to pursue a modeling career. I fell into the whole stupid model crash diet fiasco and lost a lot of weight. After i learned about what happens to your body after you lose weight i kept my calories low. I brought them back up for a bit when i came back but they gradually went back down after i first tried to gain muscle because my weight spiked. Im not sure if this counts as an ED because im not scared of food but im scared of gaining fat.

sardelsa

Hmm I see.

Well you will need to get back up to a reasonable weight, and you will gain some fat, since even if you are trying to gain muscle, fat will come with that. It is going to be a tough road if some fluctuations are already messing with your head, so maybe you should talk to someone who can help. Otherwise you will keep doing what you are doing (gaining, restricting etc) and getting nowhere and be at the same place you are now.

didas1

Raise calories slowly 100_200 a week until u reach ur maintenance calories. With such a low calorie diet make sure your vitamins and minerals are on track!!

fbchick51

TayTayDrenDren wrote: »

The only thing is what do i do about my macros? Do i increase all of them so they stay at the same ratio or do i just raise carbs or what?

Your macros are pretty good for muscle gains, with protein being the important one in that area. Also, running numbers (though I guessed on age since that wasn't stated) you don't look like you are too far off from maintenance anyway. Most placed you around 1500 cals for maintenance.

sardelsa

fbchick51 wrote: »

TayTayDrenDren wrote: »

The only thing is what do i do about my macros? Do i increase all of them so they stay at the same ratio or do i just raise carbs or what?

Your macros are pretty good for muscle gains, with protein being the important one in that area. Also, running numbers (though I guessed on age since that wasn't stated) you don't look like you are too far off from maintenance anyway. Most placed you around 1500 cals for maintenance.

Wow that is really low for someone of her height and activity level. Are you sure that is maintenance or her BMR? Besides she said at 1400 she is in a deficit, so I doubt 1500 would be her maintenance.

fbchick51

That was her maintenance. I used an age of 25 (since she claimed to have been sucked in by modeling crowds, which tend to be young) and used sedentary for activity level since she posted she primarily lifts. But regardless of her height.. it's her maintenance level for 115lbs. On Bodybuilding.coms calculator, if I bump her activity level to moderate (intense workouts, sedentary job), her maintenance jumps up to 1750

If it were me, with the goals she stated. I'd take a "before" pic, lock the scale away and bump my cals up to 1500 and try to increase the intensity of my lifting workouts. Keep that up for about 4 weeks. Take an after pic and compare to the before pic. Decide how you feel about the pic before pulling out the scale. Then weigh. If the weight went down at all, repeat above process but add another 150 cals a day. If weight stayed pat and you like the progress you see, repeat above process but add only 50-100 cals a day. If weight went up, but happy with results, add another 50 cals a day and repeat. If weight went up, but not happy with results, stay pat, but up protein to 40% and reduce carbs (fat should stay where it's at). If weight went up and happy with progress but want to move faster... I'd gamble with upping cals by 150-200, shift the protein to 40% and shift back to weekly weighins. I'd continue this cycle until I gained a good 10-15lbs.

AnnPT77

Here's what I did to get to maintenance after being in a deficit for around a year, and it worked pretty well for me:

First, I took steps to figure out my probable maintenance calories based on my recent weight loss history. Example (with simpler numbers than in reality): Let's say I was eating 1500 net calories a day, and losing a pound a week. That meant that my actual net calories to maintain were likely to be in the area of 2000 (roughly 3500 calories in a pound, divided by 7 days in a week = 500 calorie daily deficit).

The point of this was to figure out how many calories add back initially (first increment - my intention was to add gradually). If the deficit was big, it would make sense for the first increment to be a little bigger. So, let's say with the 500 calorie "gap" to fill, maybe I'd add 200 daily calories to start.

Then I'd monitor my weight, for a week or more, until I was certain (independent of random weight fluctuations) that I was still losing. If I was, I'd add another 100 daily calories, and monitor again. Rinse & repeat until weight stabilizes.

Before starting this process, I set not only a goal weight, but a range around that weight that would encompass daily fluctuations. Since it was rare for me to see a daily fluctuation greater than 3 pounds, I set my goal 1o 120 pounds (goal weight) plus or minus 3 pounds.

If I stayed above the top end (123) for more than a day or two for no obvious reason (like a big salty-food fest within goal calories), it was time to decrease eating a little, or increase activity a little. If I went below the low end, increase calories a bit.

This is basically a reverse dieting approach. One may still see a pound or two of water weight gain upon hitting maintenance calories, but it won't be huge (and if one's still calorie tracking, it will be obvious that that's what it is).

What's the worst that could happen if this goes wrong? Not much: If that last 100 calorie daily add puts one over maintenance, it'll take a month to gain a pound at that level. Meh - I know how to lose a pound.

You can do this!