Venting - One Week, 8400 calorie deficit, 6 pounds gained.

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mojohowitz
mojohowitz Posts: 900 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
My BMR is 2000 calories a day. For seven days I have reduced my calories and increased my exercise for a total calorie deficit of 8350. That should be around 2.5 pounds. My sodium is in check and I've even thrown in a few rounds of light weightlifting but not enough to stress my muscles or cause soreness or water retention. Everything else is still the same. Please don't ask about my bathroom habits because that's not it.

It's stuff like this that really really irritates me and makes me want to go back to eating boxes of oreo's as appetizers.
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Replies

  • astronomicals
    astronomicals Posts: 1,537 Member
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    you didnt gain 6 pounds of tissue... i doubt you gained any fat... that deficit is extreme and is most certainly crash dieting

    ETA: Your diet lacks fruits and vegetables whicgh probably results in some deficiencies of micronutrients. You're probably not burning that many calories no matter what the treadmill, HRM, or fitbit say. You eat out a lot and I wouldnt be surprised if you're grossly underestimating some things you eat due to that. Im not saying your deliberately messing up the numbers, but, I am saying its quite possible that they are far off.

    silver lining... you still probably lost some fat this week...

    you need to get your diet in check... its poor
  • Carol_L
    Carol_L Posts: 296 Member
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    The only time I've seen that kind of weight gain was when something was whacked. In my own case, I'd gone 2 days without my thyroid meds and gained 8 lbs....once I got back on my meds and otherwise carried on as normal, 6 of them dropped off within days.

    Considering that you've basically put yourself in a daily deficit in the range of what some people eat, your body probably thought something catastrophic was happening and reacted accordingly. It could have thrown your endocrine system for a loop. If you haven't already done so, you might want to figure out what your TDEE and BMR are and take a look at what you're deficit put you at relative to those numbers. If you were below your BMR, you might want to try upping things so that you're at least eating that much.
  • Jonesingmucho
    Jonesingmucho Posts: 4,902 Member
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    Don't give up. Keep going! It will go the other way.

    Diet and exercise. Cals in and cals out. It works. Try to focus on how your clothes are fitting and not the scale.

    Venting helps! LOL Venting also feels better tomorrow than eating a package of Oreo's.

    You got this! Big hug!
  • nomeejerome
    nomeejerome Posts: 2,616 Member
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    Is it possible you are over estimating your calorie burn with exercise?

    I only looked at a couple of days, but your burn states 900 + per day and yesterday was around 1400 calories burned through exercise??
  • LifeJacketWaterJogger
    LifeJacketWaterJogger Posts: 231
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    Press on eating those Oreos will only result in you feeling worse later, we all experience set backs..
  • AbbeyDove
    AbbeyDove Posts: 317 Member
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    Ugh! That sucks! You poor guy! Sometimes our bodies stall. Still, that's quite a deficit. Are you eating a lot of carbs, by any chance? You could try reducing them to below 100 g per day and see if that helps. If you do eat out a lot, that can be really hard to accurately estimate, unless you're eating at chain restaurants that publish nutritional content. But don't give up--I'm rooting for you. Next week you'll surely drop weight.
  • JTick
    JTick Posts: 2,131 Member
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    According to your diary, you are eating about 1700/day. What are your stats? Age, height, weight? What is your TDEE? You are likely not eating enough.
  • poohpoohpeapod
    poohpoohpeapod Posts: 776 Member
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    Its a good thing. You are scale obsessed. You are gainig muscle which in result will allow you to eat more. Losing numbers on the scale is NOT always fat. Therefore after a while of eating right and activity we gain muscle. Especially men. Have your body fat checked much more of an indication that a scale.
  • poohpoohpeapod
    poohpoohpeapod Posts: 776 Member
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    you didnt gain 6 pounds of tissue... i doubt you gained any fat... that deficit is extreme and is most certainly crash dieting

    ETA: Your diet lacks fruits and vegetables whicgh probably results in some deficiencies of micronutrients. You're probably not burning that many calories no matter what the treadmill, HRM, or fitbit say. You eat out a lot and I wouldnt be surprised if you're grossly underestimating some things you eat due to that. Im not saying your deliberately messing up the numbers, but, I am saying its quite possible that they are far off.

    silver lining... you still probably lost some fat this week...

    you need to get your diet in check... its poor Agreed alot of sugar fast food and fat. Not much real food or veg and fruits.
  • nomeejerome
    nomeejerome Posts: 2,616 Member
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    Its a good thing. You are scale obsessed. You are gainig muscle which in result will allow you to eat more. Losing numbers on the scale is NOT always fat. Therefore after a while of eating right and activity we gain muscle. Especially men. Have your body fat checked much more of an indication that a scale.

    :huh: you do not gain muscle while eating at a deficit
  • Coraddy
    Coraddy Posts: 26
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    My only advice to you is to never ever give up on your goal.If you never give up you'll get there!Sometimes you just gotta adjust things to figure out what works for you and what doesn't!It takes time,patience and perseverance!Don't eat the cookies dude!
  • mojohowitz
    mojohowitz Posts: 900 Member
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    Is it possible you are over estimating your calorie burn with exercise?

    I only looked at a couple of days, but your burn states 900 + per day and yesterday was around 1400 calories burned through exercise??

    I am very suspect of the calculations that MFP comes up with. If I run 6 miles in one hour, MFP says I burn 993 calories. If I run 9 miles in 90 minutes it says around 1400.
  • mojohowitz
    mojohowitz Posts: 900 Member
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    Its a good thing. You are scale obsessed. You are gainig muscle which in result will allow you to eat more. Losing numbers on the scale is NOT always fat. Therefore after a while of eating right and activity we gain muscle. Especially men. Have your body fat checked much more of an indication that a scale.

    :huh: you do not gain muscle while eating at a deficit

    Let's all play nice. I wish it were muscle but I would have to be on some serious steroids to gain 6 pounds muscle in one week with minimal weight training. My body fat is still hovering around 25% according to my $40 department store scale. I have my doubts about its accuracy but it hasn't changed.
  • mojohowitz
    mojohowitz Posts: 900 Member
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    Stats:
    Male
    6'5"
    219-225 lbs Down from 300
    38 yo
    Desk Job
    I run about 5-6 hours a week. 10min/mile
    Light weights 2-3x's a week.


    This weight gain is a recent phenomenon. I will admit my nutrient intake looks pretty terrible but I typically do not log the salad, cauliflower and carrots I snack on. I do add my fruit because of the sugar.

    Ugh, looking back this past week has sucked for nutrition but not bad for calories.
  • mojohowitz
    mojohowitz Posts: 900 Member
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    you didnt gain 6 pounds of tissue... i doubt you gained any fat... that deficit is extreme and is most certainly crash dieting

    ETA: Your diet lacks fruits and vegetables whicgh probably results in some deficiencies of micronutrients. You're probably not burning that many calories no matter what the treadmill, HRM, or fitbit say. You eat out a lot and I wouldnt be surprised if you're grossly underestimating some things you eat due to that. Im not saying your deliberately messing up the numbers, but, I am saying its quite possible that they are far off.

    silver lining... you still probably lost some fat this week...

    you need to get your diet in check... its poor

    Ugh. You are right on both counts. I am suspicious of the exercise calorie count from MFP. My diet does suck.
  • CandiQueen
    CandiQueen Posts: 57
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    I doubt that your gain has to do with fat, but at the same time your diet is horrible and although you are staying within your calorie range, you are eating mostly junk food. I know they say a calorie is a calorie, but at the same time if you are not getting the proper nutrients your body may be holding onto everything it gets because it is not getting a replacement of vital nutrients. I am not really one to talk because I save calories at the end of my day for some junk food, but when you are going to fast food restaurants everyday and sometimes 2 in a day, you are not feeding your body what it needs to thrive.
  • mojohowitz
    mojohowitz Posts: 900 Member
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    Thanks to everyone. You have shed light on an area I subconsciously did not want to see.

    I just went through my food from last week and I am horrified at how crappy I have been eating. It's one thing to track everything but it means nothing if you don't go back and look at it. Holy crap! I was lulled into this false sense of satisfaction that I was eating well by watching my sodium and calories. That may or may not not account for the weight gain but at least I see some areas I can remedy.

    Things to fix:
    Less crap food. More macros.
    Find a better way to calculate calories expended.

    Thanks again! Your replies have really really helped me!!!
  • srfinaz
    srfinaz Posts: 2
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    I manually update my calories burned on MFP - I decrease the number to 25 percent if what it says, So if I run 10.5 miles and it says I burned 1000 calories -- I under report it to 250 calories. I also do NOT eat back the exercise calories
  • TavistockToad
    TavistockToad Posts: 35,719 Member
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    I've even thrown in a few rounds of light weightlifting but not enough to stress my muscles or cause soreness or water retention.

    can i ask what the point of this was?

    if you're not stressing the muscles you're not doing anything.....
  • joekleinert
    joekleinert Posts: 23 Member
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    Just a few things to note and I apologize if any of these are repeats. There are two major culprits that will affect your scale (weight) results.

    1- Not drinking enough water
    2- To much sodium in your diet. I have this problem sometimes when I'm really going hard on the protein.

    Both will cause you to retain water.

    Water in - water out. Drink bottle after bottle throughout the day to help flush your system. If your body sees water going in there won't be a need for the body to hold on to it's stores and you will urinate more.

    Whenever I talk to people who work out and do not lose weight and are eating healthy or within their calories this is usually the reason they don't see the weight loss on the scale. As many have said..you didn't gain the weight in fat.

    Stick with it. This is a long term thing. You will have bumps in the road. Keep on driving :-)

    Joe

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