Thinking about maintaining but....

shorty35565

If I was in your shoes, I would work my butt out to create a little more curve there. That will create some heavy muscle and if your weight maintains the same it means you lost fat elsewhere.

I do squats w/ 50lbs on my shoulders. But I dont believe it's going to give muscle unless I'm eating a surplus. I've always heard u must eat a surplus to build muscle.

CymruBiology

If I was in your shoes, I would work my butt out to create a little more curve there. That will create some heavy muscle and if your weight maintains the same it means you lost fat elsewhere.

I do squats w/ 50lbs on my shoulders. But I dont believe it's going to give muscle unless I'm eating a surplus. I've always heard u must eat a surplus to build muscle.

Your right, you do. Like others have said if you want to keep losing body fat you need to eat at a deficit (so not maintaining).

katevarner

You can do this. Eat at a very slight deficit (200-300 cals below maintenance) and continue lifting. Make sure you are adding weight to the bar each week. Do this for a few weeks and keep taps on both your measurements and your scale weight. You can do cardio once or twice per week if you feel you need to scoot the process along a little bit.

When I last did this (my personal term for it is "consolidation") I did it for 3 months and lost only about 3 lbs total. But I lost 4+ inches off my waist along with lowering my BF% and looked significantly different at the end. It should work for you as well.

I have a bodymedia that tell me my TDEE & I've been eating ab 200 or 300 below that number, sometimes only 150 and I lost almost 1lb last week. I thought my weight loss was gonna slow down like a 1/2 lb or something. Is it possible I am burning more than my bodymedia says?
I've been doing 3 sets 7-10 reps each, is that good? Or do you recommend something different. I can't up my weight for my upper body every week like that. I took me 3 wks to get from 30 to 35lbs on my bench press. My upper body is weak

I have a bodymedia, too, and I'm only eating about 150 under and still losing weight, 6 lbs. in the last 3 months with less heavy lifting than you. Just keep monitoring. I'd suggest a little HIIT cardio or at least walking in addition to the weights to help with fat burning, but keep eating more until either you stop losing or you start losing much more slowly. I have my goals on bodymedia set at 2100 burn and consume, but on workout days I burn more than that and try to eat more than that as well. I'm 5'3" and 109. BMR of 1226, TDEE about 2000 (I have it figured as a average between moderately and very active--workout 5-6 times per week, only 3 days of which are weights, plus I walk around a lot at work--I also do Spin twice a week, but about to start training for a half marathon, so may cut those out). Oh, and I'm 47, but I'm about 20% body fat.

shorty35565

You can do this. Eat at a very slight deficit (200-300 cals below maintenance) and continue lifting. Make sure you are adding weight to the bar each week. Do this for a few weeks and keep taps on both your measurements and your scale weight. You can do cardio once or twice per week if you feel you need to scoot the process along a little bit.

When I last did this (my personal term for it is "consolidation") I did it for 3 months and lost only about 3 lbs total. But I lost 4+ inches off my waist along with lowering my BF% and looked significantly different at the end. It should work for you as well.

I have a bodymedia that tell me my TDEE & I've been eating ab 200 or 300 below that number, sometimes only 150 and I lost almost 1lb last week. I thought my weight loss was gonna slow down like a 1/2 lb or something. Is it possible I am burning more than my bodymedia says?
I've been doing 3 sets 7-10 reps each, is that good? Or do you recommend something different. I can't up my weight for my upper body every week like that. I took me 3 wks to get from 30 to 35lbs on my bench press. My upper body is weak

I have a bodymedia, too, and I'm only eating about 150 under and still losing weight, 6 lbs. in the last 3 months with less heavy lifting than you. Just keep monitoring. I'd suggest a little HIIT cardio or at least walking in addition to the weights to help with fat burning, but keep eating more until either you stop losing or you start losing much more slowly. I have my goals on bodymedia set at 2100 burn and consume, but on workout days I burn more than that and try to eat more than that as well. I'm 5'3" and 109. BMR of 1226, TDEE about 2000 (I have it figured as a average between moderately and very active--workout 5-6 times per week, only 3 days of which are weights, plus I walk around a lot at work--I also do Spin twice a week, but about to start training for a half marathon, so may cut those out). Oh, and I'm 47, but I'm about 20% body fat.

I'm just a online student/housewife, so I'm pretty sedentary. There isn't much to do around here. I have 3 lifting days, 3 non lifting days and 1 rest day normally. On my non lifting days, I walk, do intervals and walk/run. I WISH i was 20%BF. I'm about 26-27% I think *sigh*

katevarner

I am very fortunate that I build muscle pretty easily, even at 47. Maybe you can just walk more when you are not busy in order to burn more calories, if you really feel you need to. Otherwise, I think you should just up your daily calories by about 50 to 100 this week and see what happens. Keep lifting. Keep doing cardio intervals. Maybe do some body weight stuff? Crunches, planks, squats, lunges.

Good luck! Feel free to add me and we can figure out this maintenance thing together.