Women with successful recomp

balancedbrunette

Hi, so I wasn't sure should I post this in the general section/maintaining or not and then figured here might be the right place seen as it is success stories.

Actually just looking for some opinions from other females who got down to desired weight but then worked on recomp/shaping their body to what they desired. I know this is a long slow process, I'm in the situation now where I've got down to my desired weight, overall reasonably happy with my body but out of love of challenging myself and working on my health/fitness I would like to work on recomp a bit. Have been doing strength sessions.

Just wondering women who have accomplished this how strict do you have to be on diet (abs are made in the kitchen and all that). Reason I ask is i'm usually quite adherent to eating nutritious foods as i've worked on changing my lifestyle as I lost the weight but i'm not going to lie I do enjoy a treat now and then, I try to take 80/20 when eating but sometimes I have more of the bad stuff, life I guess, what i'm wondering is for recomp do I need to cut such foods? (chocolate, biscuits) that sort of thing.

burtnyks

I'm currently working on a recomp...but more of a bulk. A recomp is where you try to lose fat and gain muscle at the same time which I have heard is possible but its better to focus on one or the other. I have chosen to focus on muscle building. I've lifted weights for several years and always thought I was "bulky." Turns out I was just fat lol! I just started reverse dieting after losing close to 30 lbs. I was adding 100 calories per week all through November and am currently sitting at 2000 cals now through December to assess whether or not this is maintenance.

If you truly want to reshape and build muscle you need to eat enough to fuel muscle growth which would be slightly above maintenance. Muscle can't grow out of thin air, so you can think of the extra calories as the building materials. But its a fine line where you want enough excess calories to grow muscle, but not so much that you end up also gaining a lot of fat (there will be some fat gain regardless which is kind of hard to come to terms with). This is where I'm having a hard time right now. With the holidays coming I am sticking with 2000 cals/day and then allowing 1-2 cheat meals per week which should help get me over my maintenance calories. I follow IIFYM (if it fits your macros) which basically allows you to eat anything you want as long as you hit numbers for protein/fats/carbs and stay within the allotted calories. Now some people go crazy with IIFYM since in theory you can eat anything, but I try to still make healthy choice with what I eat. I know sugar is a trigger food for me so I choose to avoid it for the most part because it will just cause me to crave it more. I tend to look at if I want a brownie for 200 calories or do I want chicken and a sweet potato which will hold me off longer. But some days I might choose the brownie and I don't worry about it. I guess long story short, you don't have to make any foods off limits. If you want abs to show you have to eat less calories to lose fat fat that is covering the muscle, but if you don't have muscle built up you won't see them. I guess you need to assess your body and decide where to focus. Hope some of this long winded answer helps! :-)

balancedbrunette

If you truly want to reshape and build muscle you need to eat enough to fuel muscle growth which would be slightly above maintenance. Muscle can't grow out of thin air, so you can think of the extra calories as the building materials. But its a fine line where you want enough excess calories to grow muscle, but not so much that you end up also gaining a lot of fat (there will be some fat gain regardless which is kind of hard to come to terms with). This is where I'm having a hard time right now. With the holidays coming I am sticking with 2000 cals/day and then allowing 1-2 cheat meals per week which should help get me over my maintenance calories. I follow IIFYM (if it fits your macros) which basically allows you to eat anything you want as long as you hit numbers for protein/fats/carbs and stay within the allotted calories. Now some people go crazy with IIFYM since in theory you can eat anything, but I try to still make healthy choice with what I eat. I know sugar is a trigger food for me so I choose to avoid it for the most part because it will just cause me to crave it more. I tend to look at if I want a brownie for 200 calories or do I want chicken and a sweet potato which will hold me off longer. But some days I might choose the brownie and I don't worry about it. I guess long story short, you don't have to make any foods off limits. If you want abs to show you have to eat less calories to lose fat fat that is covering the muscle, but if you don't have muscle built up you won't see them. I guess you need to assess your body and decide where to focus. Hope some of this long winded answer helps! :-)

Hey, thanks for the advice, your answer definitely makes sense! Sounds like you've got good focus with your goals well done. Also following IIFYM and yea guess that is where my question was coming from about diet, is it okay to have the odd sweet thing IIFYM and still be able to accomplish your goals. I find IIFYM really good for a healthy, balanced diet...has really helped me in maintenance, guess I just need to reassess whether I want to bulk at the moment or slowly work on recomp, thanks for replying and good luck with your goals.

burtnyks

Thanks! Good luck to you as well! :-)