I plateaued with my weight loss and now it’s creeping back up. What am I doing wrong?

5wrrr8rmst

I am 44 female and initially lost 8lbs after changing my diet and increasing my daily protein. But in the last week after having plateaued, the weight is starting to creep up and I am not entirely sure as to why or what to do. Any suggestions?

yirara

Water weight: menstrual cycle, a bit more salt, new exercise
Poop weight: being constipated
other factors: Do you use a food scale and make sure the database entries you use are correct?
also: how often do you weigh yourself?

wm3796

Plateaus are normal. Body weight can definitely fluctuate. I like to weigh daily to see trends. Just be very meticulous about weighing and measuring your food. Don’t just eyeball it. Avoid eating out. Don’t forget about added oils and sauces. In the beginning weight loss can happen fairly quickly then the less you have to lose the longer it can take, especially those last 10 pounds or so. You started this just keep going for success!

loulee997

5wrrr8rmst wrote: »

I am 44 female and initially lost 8lbs after changing my diet and increasing my daily protein. But in the last week after having plateaued, the weight is starting to creep up and I am not entirely sure as to why or what to do. Any suggestions?

Do a body check?

• Are you retaining water?
• Constipated?
• PMS?
• Eating more salt
• Did you change your exercise routine?
• Did any of your food change without you knowing? Companies change ingredients, change portion sizes--and you just don't see it.
• Did you lose enough to push you into a slightly lower calorie category? 148 pounds and 140 pounds might have a different calorie gap.

Give it three to four weeks--if you are still stuck or gaining, then it's time to really dig into it. A week or so--that's pretty normal.

Good luck!

AnnPT77

How long has it been to lose the 8 pounds?

A very common pattern, with changes in eating and activity, is to drop a surprisingly big amount pretty quickly. That initial drop is typically partly fat loss, partly shifts in water retention, partly different amounts of food residue in the digestive tract on its way to becoming waste.

Following that quick drop, the next phase of the pattern is a seeming stall of scale weight while water retention rebalances (i.e., water weight comes back on). If calorie intake is on point, fat loss is still creeping along nicely in the background, but it's hidden on the scale by the increased water retention.

If that's happening for you, your actual fat loss will show up on the scale by changes in your weight range on average over 4-6 weeks (whole menstrual periods for those who have them).

The first couple of weeks to a month of weight loss can be atypical and even misleading because of this kind of thing. Changes in water retention are part of how a healthy body stays healthy. It's not smart to try to interfere with that. Best to learn about it, and understand how it affects scale weight.

As a general rule, if one is being fairly consistent with calorie intake and activity level, a multi-pound change over a small number of days is water retention shifts or digestive contents. Fat loss is a gradual, small thing going on in the background, playing peek-a-boo with the bigger water/waste variations. Muscle mass gain or loss, in a generally healthy person, is even more gradual than body fat changes, and unlikely to mask changes in body fat.

It's useful, during weight loss efforts, to have a clear understanding of how water (and waste) affect the scale, and why. You can learn about that by weighing daily (if it's not too stressful) and learning about your personal patterns over many weeks/months. This thread, especially the article linked in the first post, can be helpful in understanding what you observe:

https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10683010/the-weird-and-highly-annoying-world-of-scale-fluctuations/p1

It's likely that things are going fine in your fat-loss efforts. Wait it out for a total of at least 4-6 weeks on the same routine (whole menstrual cycles) before tweaking what you're doing. All that frequent switches do is give you confusing feedback about what's truly going to work.

Best wishes!