Reverse dieting?¿

itsgradyy

So I just recently stumbled upon something called "reverse dieting". It produced amazing results for this one girl that I saw. But I don't exactly understand what it is and who it's for. To me it just seems like you gain weight to lose it again in order to get your metabolism to be high. Does anyone know how this process works or has anyone tried it before? It's tempting to try because of her amazing results.

battybecks

I've only come across it as a way of getting to maintenance slowly. In for info!

IllustratedxGirl

Well.. I plan on doing a cutting and bulking cycle. Basically, once I finish the cutting phase and get down to 130lbs-ish, I plan to start a bulking phase where I eat a surplus and add more weights to my strength training to gain more muscle. Following this will be another cutting phase where I lose the fat I have gained while building muscle

I know this method has been pretty widely adopted and other have been successful with it.

xenu01

I did some googling and came across this article:
http://corinanielsen.com/livefit/?p=1802

I've been reading it and it's pretty amazing. Basically, her interpretation seems to be working out 6-7 days a week and 1300 calories makes your body fight back and store fat to defend itself against the onslaught and keep you alive.

Instead, you eat a reasonable amount of calories. I guess the "reverse dieting" part comes in if you've been restricting yourself and working out too much...you basically stop working out so much and up your calorie intake.

Shauna2626

bump

tmblack79

First, let me clarify that I'm not a fitness competitor, but I do work out regularly (mostly weight training & HIIT). I too, like many women, have tried numerous calorie-restrictive diets that only work in the short-term. You can't maintain it (or at least I can't - I like food too much). And, once you hit a plateau, that's it. Your body essentially has adapted to this new daily calorie amount as 'maintenance'. Now, who wants to keep adding hours of exercise to break through a plateau? A few months ago, I discovered Reverse Dieting and am now up to nearly 2000cals/day and have maintained my weight! I'm increasing calories at a rate of about 25-35 daily calories per week. I track my macros with MFP, using an IIFYM / flexible dieting approach.

All that said, I'm certainly no expert. If you want to learn more about reverse dieting, check out Dr. Layne Norton's video logs on YouTube. He's a wealth of information, and has the science to back it all up. Yes, he's a bodybuilder and so most of his examples are based on fitness competitors... But this is working for me, and I'm just your average 36yr old mother of 2. Other good resources that I've found are EM2WL and as mentioned above... Corina Neilsen's blog.

Hope this helps! And best of luck!

galgenstrick

With all the crap advice and stupid diets out there, there are a few things that actually have some benefits. Reverse dieting is one of those things. When you're in a calorie deficit for a long period your metabolic rate will slow down. Sometimes dieters will slash their calories too far, starve themselves, then binge eat at the end. This is one of the worst things you can do because your metabolic rate is slowed, then you increase your calories significantly and put on all the fat you lost and then some. Reverse dieting is a way to increase your calories slowly so your metabolic rate can increase with it. For one, many people aren't going to know where their TDEE is at after being in a deficit for a long time, it will usually be lower than what the calculators will tell you and you don't want to overshoot, because if you do you'll undo some of your progress.

Also others said, a good approach is to add 50-150 daily caloric intake each week until you hit maintenance. Work out what your macros will be at the higher calories, and do the math to see where to add your calories in the increments.