Weight Lifting Caused Weight Plateau

melifood

Hello, I haven't lost any weight, but that's because I started a new weight lifting routine and I'm trying to convince my weight loss partner that soon we'll start seeing weight loss. So my question is, if you plateaued when you started lifting weights, in your personal experience how long after did you start seeing weight loss?

Neither of us have lost weight literary the second we started weight lifting, about 2 weeks ago.
Thank you!

Dogmom1978

Well, lifting will cause some water retention as muscles repair themselves. That said, make sure you are accurately tracking your calories and not overestimating your workout calories earned either.

I go with a VERY conservative estimate for weight lifting as it’s not something that burns a bunch of calories.

I would say within a month or so, if you track accurately, the weight will start to go down again assuming you eat in a deficit. CICO is still king for weight loss, but exercise is fantastic for health.

AnnPT77

This may sound like a cop-out, but it depends on how much water weight you individually add when lifting (it varies), and how fast your fat loss is progressing (in real life, not as estimated by MFP or some other calculator). Since you're female, it can also matter where you are in your menstrual cycle (if you have those). For anyone, it can matter whether their level of dietary sodium/carbs is reasonably consistent (at any level, just consistent), whether one is fighting a minor infection or head cold, and much, much more. (All of those other things affect water weight.)

Personally, experience tells me I usually add about 2 pounds when I resume weight lifting, and that amount sticks around until I drop weight lifting out of my schedule again. Most recently, I've been losing a few vanity pounds in maintenance, very (Very!) slowly, like half a pound or less per week. I resumed reqgular weight training at the beginning of July. My weight trending app thought I was *gaining* weight for about 3 weeks and my daily weights didn't drop to new lows again for around 6 weeks, maybe a bit more.

If you gain more water weight for muscle repair than I do, it could mask more fat loss temporarily on the scale. If you're losing fat faster than I am, any given amount of water weight would be unmasked faster than it was for me.

If you know you're on target with calorie intake, I'd say wait at least one full menstrual cycle (if that's relevant to you) and ideally 2, before getting too stressed about it. If menstrual cycles aren't in the picture, wait maybe 4-6 weeks. I'm not saying it'll take that long, just that I wouldn't recommend losing faith before that, because it *could* take that long.

Best wishes!

IronIsMyTherapy

Forget worrying about weight, look at FAT loss. Take measurements and photos and forget about the scale. Who cares what the scale says if the image in the mirror is going a direction you're happy with?

melifood

I am too obese not to worry about the scale. I'm 5'6 and 250lb. That's the scary part, the fear of not knowing if what I'm doing will help my health in the long run. I'm not sure if people my size should even lift in the beginning, I've seen women lose the weight first and then lift. I don't know if I should take that approach instead. Either way thank you for the responses.

AnnPT77

melifood wrote: »

I am too obese not to worry about the scale. I'm 5'6 and 250lb. That's the scary part, the fear of not knowing if what I'm doing will help my health in the long run. I'm not sure if people my size should even lift in the beginning, I've seen women lose the weight first and then lift. I don't know if I should take that approach instead. Either way thank you for the responses.

FWIW, I've seen a bunch of people here say they wish they'd started lifting sooner. I don't think I've ever seen anyone say they wish they'd waited. I'm not saying it never happens, but I don't think it's the common case.

And I say that as a woman who really doesn't like lifting much herself. 😉 Good for a gal, though.

Of course you can lift now, if you choose to. Start from wherever you are, and progress gradually. That will work fine.

Best wishes!

Dogmom1978

melifood wrote: »

I am too obese not to worry about the scale. I'm 5'6 and 250lb. That's the scary part, the fear of not knowing if what I'm doing will help my health in the long run. I'm not sure if people my size should even lift in the beginning, I've seen women lose the weight first and then lift. I don't know if I should take that approach instead. Either way thank you for the responses.

Ditto to never seeing anyone say they wish they had waited to start lifting. If you enjoy it, go for it. If you decide you hate it, obviously you should try to find something else that you enjoy instead.

kshama2001

melifood wrote: »

I am too obese not to worry about the scale. I'm 5'6 and 250lb. That's the scary part, the fear of not knowing if what I'm doing will help my health in the long run. I'm not sure if people my size should even lift in the beginning, I've seen women lose the weight first and then lift. I don't know if I should take that approach instead. Either way thank you for the responses.

My own scale went up 7 pounds when I started weight lifting again, so you're doing good just being in a plateau for 2 weeks (which is not actually long enough to be considered a plateau.)

My weight started dropping again in a few weeks.

I would argue that lifting is a better exercise than forms of cardio which could put too much stress on your knees.

I will ditto the comments that I've never heard of anyone being unhappy about starting to lift "too soon."

JessiBelleW

I went straight into weight lifting when I started losing, I don’t own a scale so it’s hard to judge how many lbs I was losing, but I lost inches so fast!
Start paying attention to how your clothes fit (or become baggy) and don’t look at the scale

springlering62

SW 222, began lifting at about 175. Wish I’d started earlier.

I’m holding steady at 131-132, but started losing size again when my gym reopened in July, even though I cranked up my calories. I’m fixing to hand on some leggings that have gotten too big around the waist.

Learn as much as you can about your body, the calories it uses, get reliable calorie counts from devices, just study study learn learn to know what’ll work for you. It’ll take more than two weeks to “read” a trend.

BTW, Apple Watch gave me 190 calorie burn on the gym treadmill this rainy morning (would far rather have been outdoors!). The treadmill’s electronic count was over double that. Be mindful of those tricky critters. There’s always something or someone ready to mess with your head!

ShredWeek1

I think weight lifting is a long term investment in your weight loss.

I've weighed 140 and worn a size 6.

I've weighed 140 and worn a size 10 in the same brand.

The difference was that I did MFP and weight trained seriously 3x a week. My body at a size 6 was 18% bodyfat, my body at a size 10 was 27% bodyfat.

'And, in addition, since I had more muscle as a size 6, I could actually consume more calories because muscle is more metabolically active (this doesn't mean 1,000 extra calories a day...but enough to give me a cushion.)

ShredWeek1

melifood wrote: »

I am too obese not to worry about the scale. I'm 5'6 and 250lb. That's the scary part, the fear of not knowing if what I'm doing will help my health in the long run. I'm not sure if people my size should even lift in the beginning, I've seen women lose the weight first and then lift. I don't know if I should take that approach instead. Either way thank you for the responses.

Let me also add this: We all want to lose weight at one time or another, but the big challenge is keeping it off. I know that diet fatigue sets in and that's when I start slowly backsliding on good habits. When I've lost weight while weight training, weight training always keeps me motivated.

Weight lifting is interesting. Truly. There are all kinds of routines you can do to mix things up, there is bodybuilding.com which has routines for older women..it is, to me, a lot more interesting than my cardio routine (I don't run but I do the elliptical with interval training.)

Even if all you do is a simple 15 minute routine a day using 3 lbs weights, you'll be amazed because you gradually move up and then before you know it, you're lifting a weight you never thought you could lift before.

I cardio for my heart, I weight train for my mind and motivation.