Did really well this week, yet gained weight?

hhumphries578

This week I did really well with exercising off my excess calories and reaching my Net goal of 1200. I stayed within the limit each day (except today). How come the scale went up?? What are reasons for gaining weight despite doing everything right? I haven't been drinking very much water this past week, could my body just be retaining water?

vismal

There are a million reasons scale weight can go up even when you are doing everything right. Don't worry about it and focus more on your weight trends over the long run rather then week to week.

Blacklance36

Are you weighing yourself at the same time each day?
The best time is in the morning, before you eat anything, and if possible after voiding.

If I weigh myself this way in the morning and then check again at night there can be 6 lbs. difference.

Oxmarqt

It could be water retention, it could be "female" related (if you know what I mean), and it could be nothing. As was said the trend is the thing to watch. I lose small amount pretty steady and then nothing for like 4-5 days and then a few pounds at once then small amounts then nothing, repeat the cycle. Seemed odd at first but I am now used to it.

UmmSqueaky

lizzynewm

if you haven't been drinking a lot of water, it could totally be water retention, especially if you had an especially salty meal the day/night before. also, if you're sore from working out, you could retain water. if you're having your sharkweek times or they're around the corner, you could be retaining water. pretty much, it could be anything, haha. if you know you're doing well, don't stress about it, because our weight can fluctuate randomly all the time.

another thought: a net goal of 1200 has always seemed a little low to me, and i feel like MFP just assigns that when someone who doesn't have a lot of weight to lose sets their goals to losing a lot of weight per week. sometimes it can help to change up the calories, and even though it seems counter-intuitive, you could try eating a little more once in awhile.

best of luck, i'm sure you're doing great!

erickirb

most likely water weight retention due to a number of possible reasons.

Do you weigh solid foods and measure liquids? If not you may be eating 10-50+% more than you think
How are you calculating cals burned? You may be burning less than you think you are, be cautious here and just eat back 50-75% of what the machine or MFP tells you.

silentKayak

I recommend an app called "Happy Scale". You track your exact measured weight each day, and it reports back a 7-day moving average so you can ignore the fluctuations and see the actual loss. I feel like I'm not losing when my weight "goes up"
2 lbs from the day before, but I can see that actually what happened is there was one day my measured weight was really low (probably due to dehydration), so it looks like I gained when actually my average weight for the week is a loss compared with the previous week.

itsbasschick

are you eating most of your exercise calories? i ask because generally MFP, most apps, online calcs and even HRM exaggerate the number of calories burned during exercise. i eat back about half my exercise calories and lose about a pound a week, and i'm also eating 1200 net.

Liftng4Lis

Water retention due to increased exercise, TOM??

Kalikel

Too much sodium, getting your period, additional workouts - so many things can have an effect on water retention. Weighing at different times or on different scales will give you different numbers.

Scales go up and down all the time.

If you're planning to lose 80 pounds, get used to scale fluctuations.

Hang in there. If you take in less than you burn, it will go down.