How quickly does one lose muscle mass?

yoghurtand

I have lost a lot of weight relatively quickly for my size (gone from 137 to less than 130 in three weeks with no exercise) due to my illness and I'm sure that not all of this can be fat (although my measurements ARE going down steadily). I am not dehydrated whatsoever, so I know that it's not primarily water weight I've lost.

How do I know if it's muscle I'm losing, and how can I slow this down? Is it completely down to calorie intake or will eating more protein mean muscle wastage will decrease?

Sorry if it's a strange/silly question, but I don't understand the biology behind this.

Floricienta

Bump. No clue but I'd be interested to know

JennyJH

I would be interested in any replies.

I haven't been able to do any strength training for mearly four weeks due to a holiday and a foot injury. I did very little cardio either (a little swimming, walking and horse riding) and ate at probably at maintenace level.

But when I got to the gym, I was able to lift heavier than before I went on holiday. Don't get it.

bentobee

I'm not sure how quickly you can lose muscle mass, though I have tried googling for that info before.

To make sure my weight loss is fat loss and not lost muscle I bought this body fat monitor to measure my body fat %. I check it every few pounds I lose to make sure the % is going down (indicating lost fat, if I lost muscle the body fat % would go up). From what I've found online a healthy % to lose is 1% a month.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000FYZMYK?ie=UTF8&tag=funwithlunch-20&linkCode=shr&camp=213733&creative=393185&creativeASIN=B000FYZMYK&ref_=sr_1_1&qid=1313889600&sr=8-1

AZackery

I have created a thread under the Fitness and Exercise folder called Fat Loss vs Scale Weight Loss. If you all get a chance, check it out.

Yoghurtand, to see how much lean body mass you have lost. You would have had to know your body fat percentage , when you were 137 pounds. If you can get your body fat percentage at your current weight, you can see the next time, how much lean body mass you have lost.

You said that you had an illness? By any chance, does this illness causes you to drop weight fast? If so, you need to see your doctor.

yoghurtand

Oh, so really, consistently tracking fat percentage is the only way to do keep track. I've gone from about 26% to 25% going from an internet calculator, so around 3lbs of that was fat and 4lbs was lean body mass. So not great.

JennyJH, maybe that's because your muscles had time to fully recover and heal? Or you overcame a mental block that didn't allow you to lift that much before. Either way, must have been really satisfying

AZackery, it does, but there's nothing at the moment that can really be done to help, so I'll just soldier on. Thanks so much for the help and bentobee - I think I'll buy one of those for when I go to uni in september!

1_up

Losing weight at a slower rate (.5 - 1lb a week) will help preserve your existing muscle. Working out and higher protein in your diet will also help to preserve what muscle mass you have.