5 months of working out, 0 weight lost

micfitness9

1) Its not impossible to gain muscle @ maintenance calories it just takes longer

@6lbs of muscle in 5 months (5 x 4 weeks/month) 6 lbs/ 20 weeks = .34lbs/ muscle per week ..
Women can gain about .5lb of muscle per week so its not imposible

2) If you've lost inches that is notable, how many inches have you lost and where?

3) Did you measure your initial body fat percentage because if that has dropped obviously you are seeing results. Even if your body fat percentage were to remain the same you would still have gained muscle because for example

weight: 100 lbs, 10% bf = 90 lbs of lbm (lean body mass)
weight: 150 lbs, 10% bf= 135 lbs of lbm ..... therefore your lean body mass is being increased despite a change in body fat percentage

It is possible you were not in the best physical shape before starting to work out so consistently and as a result have changed your body composition ...

If you are eating 1700 calories a day and burning 400 your only netting 1300 which means you are (or should be) losing body fat.

It may also help to make your food logs temporarily public to receive more specific nutritional advice from others on calories you have logged, inaccuracies do happen but smalls changes can make logging much more accurate

deksgrl

So, you are eating 1700 calories but do not eat more for exercise? Do I have that correct? If that is the case then it does not matter how much you are burning for the sake of your food diary. Log exercise burned as "1 calorie", and eat the 1700.

If you are eating 1700 plus exercise calories, that is a different story.

I believe once you start weighing your food, you will realize you were eating more than 1700 cals.

Jordanrae1992

good thread.

just wanted to add that maybe you've added enough muscle and could move into more of a shredding fat type of phase. like, strength train to avoid loss of muscle, but lower your cals and up your cardio to take the fat off. this way you probably would not lose much muscle and would take off that extra 6 pounds. you already know what your maintenance is judging by your current stats. not sure if this would work or not, but maybe worth a try?

edit: also i've noticed that best fat loss for me seems to come from walking not running or more intense cardio. i've added walking back in over the last few days.

Thanks for the feedback! I do like walking, and since the weather has been nice I have been walking about 4 miles a day every Fri. Sat. and Sun. for the last month.

I will definitely start weighing my foods, lower my calorie intake, and up my cardio and see if I have any different results than what I'm seeing now! I'm living at the beach this summer and wanted to look my best!

Jordanrae1992

So, you are eating 1700 calories but do not eat more for exercise? Do I have that correct? If that is the case then it does not matter how much you are burning for the sake of your food diary. Log exercise burned as "1 calorie", and eat the 1700.

If you are eating 1700 plus exercise calories, that is a different story.

I believe once you start weighing your food, you will realize you were eating more than 1700 cals.

Right, I've only been eating the 1700, I don't eat more than that when I exercise. I'll start weighing my foods and hopefully see a difference.

Jordanrae1992

1) Its not impossible to gain muscle @ maintenance calories it just takes longer

@6lbs of muscle in 5 months (5 x 4 weeks/month) 6 lbs/ 20 weeks = .34lbs/ muscle per week ..
Women can gain about .5lb of muscle per week so its not imposible

2) If you've lost inches that is notable, how many inches have you lost and where?

3) Did you measure your initial body fat percentage because if that has dropped obviously you are seeing results. Even if your body fat percentage were to remain the same you would still have gained muscle because for example

weight: 100 lbs, 10% bf = 90 lbs of lbm (lean body mass)
weight: 150 lbs, 10% bf= 135 lbs of lbm ..... therefore your lean body mass is being increased despite a change in body fat percentage

It is possible you were not in the best physical shape before starting to work out so consistently and as a result have changed your body composition ...

If you are eating 1700 calories a day and burning 400 your only netting 1300 which means you are (or should be) losing body fat.

It may also help to make your food logs temporarily public to receive more specific nutritional advice from others on calories you have logged, inaccuracies do happen but smalls changes can make logging much more accurate

I've lost 1.5 inches around my waist, above my belly button, 2 inches around my hips, 1.5 around my ribs, and .5 inch around my waist where my pants fit, and none around my arms.

Sun_Wukong

I do do 3 reps of each exercise, I try to get my heart rate up and alternate between 2 exercises. So I'll do rows, then an ab exercise for example until I do 3 reps of 10-12 each. Normally dumbbells on arms day, 12.5 pound weights normally for my arm exercises. I do a lot on the yoga ball. I use the kettle bell a lot as well, and do ALOT of squats (different variations).

Sure hope you aren't using your HRM for weight lifting. They are terribly inaccurate for weight lifting and will over estimate your burn dramatically.

^^^^ how do you know this?

It is a widely known fact that HRMs are meant and designed for Aerobic exercise not
Anaerobic exercise, the algorithm used to calculate your calorie expenditure is designed for steady state cardio which strength training is not. Google it or talk to someone in a sports store.

dmenchac

I do do 3 reps of each exercise, I try to get my heart rate up and alternate between 2 exercises. So I'll do rows, then an ab exercise for example until I do 3 reps of 10-12 each. Normally dumbbells on arms day, 12.5 pound weights normally for my arm exercises. I do a lot on the yoga ball. I use the kettle bell a lot as well, and do ALOT of squats (different variations).

Sure hope you aren't using your HRM for weight lifting. They are terribly inaccurate for weight lifting and will over estimate your burn dramatically.

^^^^ how do you know this?

It is a widely known fact that HRMs are meant and designed for Aerobic exercise not
Anaerobic exercise, the algorithm used to calculate your calorie expenditure is designed for steady state cardio which strength training is not. Google it or talk to someone in a sports store.

Was just about to type this. Thanks for doing it for me

laurenawolf

Everyone pretty much covered everything.

One extra thing is to calculate the calories from the amount of carbs, fats, and protein you are eating each day. Sometimes the food you enter is not calculated correctly.

Carbs - 4 calories
Fats - 9 calories
Protein - 4 calories

So for example, today MFP says I'm eating 1,223 calories. But 114g of carbs, 40g of fat, and 123g of protein actually equals 1,308 calories. And no, I'm not done eating yet so this will increase. MFP might say you're eating 1700 but it could actually be much more or less. I hope that makes sense

sunshinelively

good thread.

just wanted to add that maybe you've added enough muscle and could move into more of a shredding fat type of phase. like, strength train to avoid loss of muscle, but lower your cals and up your cardio to take the fat off. this way you probably would not lose much muscle and would take off that extra 6 pounds. you already know what your maintenance is judging by your current stats. not sure if this would work or not, but maybe worth a try?

edit: also i've noticed that best fat loss for me seems to come from walking not running or more intense cardio. i've added walking back in over the last few days.

Thanks for the feedback! I do like walking, and since the weather has been nice I have been walking about 4 miles a day every Fri. Sat. and Sun. for the last month.

I will definitely start weighing my foods, lower my calorie intake, and up my cardio and see if I have any different results than what I'm seeing now! I'm living at the beach this summer and wanted to look my best!

awesome. :-)

quoting you here: "I've lost 1.5 inches around my waist, above my belly button, 2 inches around my hips, 1.5 around my ribs, and .5 inch around my waist where my pants fit, and none around my arms."

you've lost inches....converted fat to muscle. that's what you want. good luck if you decide to do a cardio shred! :-)

12by311

I just looked at your pictures, the scale may not have moved but you certainly look better. Keep doing what you are doing and watch your diet even more closely. May have to start measuring and weight your food. At 5'6', you are within your normal weight range even with the 5 pound gain.

I wouldn't worry about scale weight either. Agree with the above poster, you are doing something right because there's a definite change in body. Keep on keepin' on!