An "am I eating enough" question/TDEE

cstexas2012

Hi guys!

I recently did a metabolic reset for 8 weeks, which left me with a few extra lbs (started at about 112, made it up to 117, mostly because of going over on the holidays). At the beginning of January I started making attempts to eat at my TDEE -10 (possibly even less than 10% depending on what calculator I use) and I started lifting three days a week. I lift three days (I'm a beginner) and run three days per week, and my TDEE is based on 3-5 hours per week of moderate activity (because I don't run or lift for very long each day). However, I'm starting to wonder if I'm eating too little. A little under 2 weeks ago I got much more serious about sticking to the TDEE -10 number but I was stuck exactly at 116.5 for the entire time. This morning I "whooshed" to 113.9. I'm sure some of this is water weight that will return, but I also think some of it is "whoosh" water weight from losing fat but retaining water for a bit that I won't gain back. If that's the case, this seems like a concerningly big loss for someone who's trying to avoid the not eating enough problem and should be losing less than half a pound per week.

Any advice on what I should do? I never want to go back to accidentally starving myself, and I would prefer to lose weight at a slower pace rather than risking that, but I dunno how much I should up my calories by, if any.

ldrosophila

How tall are you?

cstexas2012

5'3

myofibril

I don't think that's long enough to be indicative of a trend or draw solid conclusions from.

Keep what you are doing for the next few weeks. If your weight continues to drop in this way then up calories accordingly etc.

cstexas2012

cool, thanks! Just overly paranoid about the eating situation so I thought I'd check early.

myofibril

cool, thanks! Just overly paranoid about the eating situation so I thought I'd check early.

Perfectly understandable.

If weight continues to drop sharply than raise calories by say 150 calories per week until you hit a sweet spot. It will probably plateau out though.

d3mon4ngel

If you are lifting, I would suggest eating at maintenance at least so you can build those muscles. At 5'3" and 113lbs, I would say that you don't want to be losing any more weight at all. I would even suggest putting weight on, which lifting might very well do. Don't stress if it does by the way, as you should be going more on how you look now, rather than how much you weigh.

Just my opinion :flowerforyou:

myofibril

If you are lifting, I would suggest eating at maintenance at least so you can build those muscles. At 5'3" and 113lbs, I would say that you don't want to be losing any more weight at all. I would even suggest putting weight on, which lifting might very well do. Don't stress if it does by the way, as you should be going more on how you look now, rather than how much you weigh.

Just my opinion :flowerforyou:

That's excellent advice in my opinion....

cstexas2012

thanks for the advice! I thought a lot about that before I started the deficit, and it's part of the reason I'm doing such a small deficit. I theoretically want to gain muscle, but I would prefer to lose a bit more fat first so that I can actually see the muscle gains, rather than abs covered by a not insubstantial layer of fat. In hopes of maintaining what little muscle I do have, I'm eating a really high protein diet, and as I said, my deficit is quite small. I wasn't really eating on the deficit to lose scale weight, I just weigh out of habit. I just want to get to a point where I feel like I have slightly lower body fat than I have now before I go back to maintenance.