HIIT and calorie deficit makes me gain weight??

collingmommy

Here is my dilemma. Im a 31 year old female who has lost almost 100 pounds. I started at 257 and was one pound from 157! my calories are 1900 a day ( i was eating 1750 a day, but that stopped 4 weeks ago when i noticed i was not loosing anymore weight, so i bumped up closer to my tdee. so i figure if my tdee is 2300 and my bmr is 1600, that 1900 would be a good number for weight loss. HERE is where the issue falls. it seems like every time i add hiit or cardio to my workout regimen, that i end up holding onto weight and inches!! i give it two weeks before i freak out. i figure that the scale and tape measure should be forgiving after that time and i never weigh in on the day after i do exercise, (the ugly water weight and all) so my last workout is friday and i weigh in on Sunday morning. Is this something anyone else has seen? i cant be alone in this.

AJ_G

What makes you think that if you're not losing weight at an intake of 1750 calories a day that increasing to 1900 calories a day will help you lose weight?

ndj1979

What makes you think that if you're not losing weight at an intake of 1750 calories a day that increasing to 1900 calories a day will help you lose weight?

yea, that makes no sense.

If you were losing on 1750 and the plateaued the reason is that if you want to keep losing you need to recalculate TDEE at your lower weight level, which, I assume, would give you a lower number. You might want to reduce to 1500 or something..the reason you are gaining is because you are eating an extra 150 calories a day…

also cardio/HIIT will lead to water retention….

1princesswarrior

Are you sure you're eating 1900 calories? There are a lot of tbsp and cup measurements in your diary. Unless you are using a food scale those values can really be off. The first thing to try might be a food scale, weigh all of your solids and measure all of your liquids. Make sure you're drinking a lot of extra water on workout days, maybe an extra 4 cups to help.

adcede19

The responses above say most everything I would.

Also, if water weight bugs you that much, buy a scale that has metal probes on it; those scales can sense your fat %, water %, and bone %. Then in excel, multiply your weight and the fat % to get the weight of all the fat in your body, and do the same for your water % and bone % to get your water weight and bone weight. (The leftover weight is muscles and organs).

Plotting them over several days or weeks can be very illuminating. Last week my weight was stagnant at best, with a few increases. But with the plot of all different types of weight, I realized that most of the problem was water weight; I actually was losing fat weight. My bone weight stays consistent, my water weight bobs up and down, but my fat weight has a general decrease.

This might help you feel better about your progress and despise water weight a little less. Feel free to message me any further questions.

MsWallwoman

Could you maybe be gaining muscle as you are dropping body fat... therefore the scale is not moving but but your body composition is changing? How are your progress pictures looking? What do your measurement comparisons? How are your clothes fitting? What are your strength and endurance and over all fitness gains like?

Weight is a fickle thing... maybe looking at a bigger picture to judge progress might help. :huh:

Good luck with your journey.

Zoejohnse91

She upped her calorie because if shes fallen too low her body will start clinging onto the stuff she is eating. Its a proven method, EatMoreWeighLess and so on.

AJ_G

She upped her calorie because if shes fallen too low her body will start clinging onto the stuff she is eating. Its a proven method, EatMoreWeighLess and so on.

It is in no way a proven method, it's complete nonsense...

meshashesha2012

She upped her calorie because if shes fallen too low her body will start clinging onto the stuff she is eating. Its a proven method, EatMoreWeighLess and so on.

this is by far my favorite scientific explanation i've ever seen on mfp

heybales

If your logging is sloppy and perhaps not accurate, use your diary to find a sloppy inaccurate 250 calorie to leave out on a daily basis. Something.

You can keep logging sloppy.

Or else start weighing everything and find out how much you are really eating, that's your TDEE, and take 10% off that value.

If you are happy with your logging method, I'd just stick with that, and lower it 250.

While it may look like 1500, you'll know it's a sloppy 1500, and closer to who knows what, but higher no matter what.

Since your BMR also does literally change through the month, you really need a months worth of data to see what is really happening. And that almost total carb burning workout is just begging your body to store more carbs, which stores with water.
Besides if doing it right the muscles will retain water too.

The only time the eating more could work is if you've noticed your current deficit has left you lethargic and lacking energy many times, compared to times in the past.

In that case, your body will easily adapt to a big deficit by slowing down your spontaneous daily activity so there isn't as much of a deficit there.
May take a month to really find out how much you got, and you don't want false water weight gain in that math.

If that was indeed the reason, that's worthy of a diet break anyway. Good idea no matter what.

collingmommy

What makes you think that if you're not losing weight at an intake of 1750 calories a day that increasing to 1900 calories a day will help you lose weight?

what makes me think that if i bumped up wuld help? that is what happened the last time, i got stuck at 186.. for almost 6 months i was eating close to 1400/1500 calories a day. the "clean method" and i just couldnt break the plateau. the minute that i kicked up to 1650, i went from 186 to 184 in a week, and have continued to drop atleast a half pound a week from then. now i am stuck at 162 AGAIN! so i sit here this morning and ponder....

heybales

What is the timing of those events?

How long in a plateau lately when did you stop losing weight?

What was the amount lost for those last few weeks of that time period you were losing, still losing 1/2 lb weekly up to the end?

How long were you eating 1650 (from results your TDEE was about 1900 then, 1650 + 250 for 0.5 lost weekly)?
Sounds like for 186-162 = 24 lbs so 48 weeks?

You may have prevented little if any loss of LBM, so your BMR may have stayed the same, but you moving around less mass would have caused your TDEE to go do too, unless you started moving more because of moving less, which does indeed happen to many I've noticed that have compared their FitBit or BodyMedia's.

collingmommy

I feel like a dumbass! I just ran my numbers threw the fat2fit radio BMR calculated using the information from when I weighed 184.. The numbers say my BMR was 1610. So' by that logic, it explains why I wasnt moving the scale till I upped to 1650. I want even eating at BMR! So.. Thank you all for the help. We will see where these newer numbers get me in 2 weeks.