Gaining weight while eating under calorie goal

I don't have any real advice to offer, but thank you for your post. I am dealing with this same issue this week -- gaining 3 lbs and not having an explanation why that happened. If I had blown off the whole week, I would understand, but like you, I had one lousy cheat meal and BAM! Like I said, I can't offer any advice at this point, but just know there are others out there dealing with the same issue. I am trying to just be consistent and patient, but it is SO HARD! :sad: :laugh:

Few questions that may help some of us direct you. Why have you chosen Paleo as your strategy? How have you determined your caloric intake? What are you goals? How much do you wish to lose each week? Why have you not included a workout program?

Your assumptions were way off, my TDEE is 2538 and for my deficits my daily calories should be 1320 for a two pound a week weight loss. I thought the same thing about the weight coming off but the cheat meal was on Tues, so it should have come off by now, hence my frustration. I've had other cheat meals, heck even a cheat weekend, and bounced back. But thanks for the input and advice.

If your TDEE is 2538, then your daily calories should be 1538 for a two pound a week weight loss.

I've always wondered why people say you're supposed to eat back your work out calories. Now if I'm going to go to the gym and do a big workout or go on a hike I'll eat a bigger breakfast than normal for more energy, but why eat back the calories I just worked so hard to burn? Right now the only exercise I do is on my work days where I usually get between 4-5 miles in on a 12 hour shift.

Because MFP has the deficet you need already built into your calories. You will lose weight on those ...you add in exercise and you have a bigger deficet...and have burned a lot of your fuel for the next workout...or not eating enough fuel for the next workout.

That is why you need to eat some of those exercise calories back.

The other thing you mentioned you are an ER Nurse...make sure your activity level is set correctly...to at least lightly active if not more to ensure you are accounting for that as well.

I have it set to sedentary with 3 workouts a week, since my work days I clock approx 4 miles a shift but my days off I don't do much...yet. So right now I'm counting my work days as my workouts if that makes sense.

There's the confusion - which MFP doesn't help.

There is your DIET goal - with activity level and weight loss amount goal.

There is your FITNESS goal - with hoped for frequency, duration, and calories burned goal. It only shows on your Exercise Diary.

The Fitness goal has NOTHING to do with the diet goal.

Nothing with fitness is done until you log it. That is exactly why your eating goal goes up.

As others have said, you have a deficit built in with NO exercise expected.

You tell MFP sedentary and 1 lb goal loss or 500 calories off, it calculates your maintenance as say 2000 - with NO exercise account for. You eat that, no gain or loss, hence maintenance.

(but you aren't sedentary are you, not by a long shot with your job - were you honest with that?)

2000 - 500 = 1500 eating goal on non-exercise days.

You exercise 600 calories one day. Your maintenance for that day just went up.
2000 + 600 = 2600 (if you ate that, no gain or loss)

2600 - 500 = 2100 eating goal for that day.

See - same deficit in place.

If you think a bigger deficit is better - why don't you just stop eating until you've lost all the weight?
Probably because you realize that is dumb.

Do you have ANY experience with calorie levels outside what MFP assigned per your selections?
Did you ever log what you used to eat that got you in to trouble to see how much that was - likely without the same exercise being done now.
How do you know reasonable or not without something to compare too?

So, I can tell you've been using the tool wrong (selecting sedentary, really?).

What happens at work when tools are used incorrectly? At the least, it doesn't do what it was expected to do, unless pure lucky. At worst it can cause harm.

Guess which one you are getting using this tool wrong?

I have it set to sedentary with 3 workouts a week, since my work days I clock approx 4 miles a shift but my days off I don't do much...yet. So right now I'm counting my work days as my workouts if that makes sense.

There's the confusion - which MFP doesn't help.

There is your DIET goal - with activity level and weight loss amount goal.

There is your FITNESS goal - with hoped for frequency, duration, and calories burned goal. It only shows on your Exercise Diary.

The Fitness goal has NOTHING to do with the diet goal.

Nothing with fitness is done until you log it. That is exactly why your eating goal goes up.

As others have said, you have a deficit built in with NO exercise expected.

You tell MFP sedentary and 2 lb goal loss or 1000 calories off, it calculates your maintenance as say 2320 - with NO exercise account for. You eat that, no gain or loss, hence maintenance.

(but you aren't sedentary are you, not by a long shot with your job - were you honest with that?)

2320 - 1000 = 1320 eating goal on non-exercise days.

You exercise 600 calories one day. Your maintenance for that day just went up.
2320 + 600 = 2920(if you ate that, no gain or loss)

2920 - 1000 = 1920 eating goal for that day.

See - same deficit in place.

If you think a bigger deficit is better - why don't you just stop eating until you've lost all the weight?
Probably because you realize that is dumb.

Do you have ANY experience with calorie levels outside what MFP assigned per your selections?
Did you ever log what you used to eat that got you in to trouble to see how much that was - likely without the same exercise being done now.
How do you know reasonable or not without something to compare too?

So, I can tell you've been using the tool wrong (selecting sedentary, really?).

What happens at work when tools are used incorrectly? At the least, it doesn't do what it was expected to do, unless pure lucky. At worst it can cause harm.

Guess which one you are getting using this tool wrong?

My weightloss goal is 2lbs a week, not one. So my TDEE is 2215-2542 depending if my level is couch potato or light exercise. So to lose 2lbs a week I need a 1000 calorie deficit per day which puts my calories at 1215-1542. As for my "exercise" yes I get some walking in but that's over a 12 hour period so I'm not going hard. MFP has my calories per day at 1320 right in the middle of what it should be so how am I using this tool wrong? I didn't get to 268 by eating right or even acknowledging how much I was eating so I didn't count those calories. I think it would have broken me to actually see how many calories I was eating a day, safe to say it was easily 3000 or more. How is my diet not reasonable? How am I causing myself harm? Your post comes across pretty harsh so I'm trying not to be too defensive here, I really want to know why you think I'm harming myself.

I used 1 lb as an example for the math. In case that incorrect value made you skip understanding it, I've redone the math above to review so it fits better for you, might reread if you did skip understanding it.

You said in prior post you have MFP set to Sedentary level for your non-exercise daily activity. That is described as desk-job.

What was your work again?
What do you do?
And for how many hours a week?

No, 1320 is NOT right in the middle of what it should be.

Were you exercising when you used to eat around 3000, or just the active job?

So do you log and eat back your exercise calories now?
You seemed to have said no or perhaps a slightly bigger breakfast on those days in prior posts.

Are you aware of what you can do to your body with extreme deficits?

Well, your body will adapt, and it won't be so extreme anymore. Do it really well, and you could have no deficit anymore.
Now you have to eat even less and less to show any loss.
How low can you go? And how ugly do you want your maintenance to be if you finally get there?

http://www.myfitnesspal.com/blog/heybales/view/reduced-metabolism-tdee-beyond-expected-from-weight-loss-616251

Wasn't meant as harsh, but I was sensing by reading many posts at once a definite tone to your posts, the idea that certainly you couldn't be do anything wrong.
And at least 2 simple things stood out as very obviously using the tool wrong.

Also, don't get TDEE method confused with what MFP is doing. non-exercise TDEE is what they do. So it is correct only for someone doing no exercise. But at least MFP lets you say what rest of the day outside exercise is like. Those TDEE tables with 5 rough levels speak to only exercise, no increased work like you do.

If you want to count workdays as exercise and still go for Sedentary, then you still aren't logging and eating it back, those are actually your lightest eating days according to you.
But honestly, 4 x 12 is easily Lightly-Active if not more actually. You aren't standing much I'd wager, but actually moving and lifting, ect. You are Active.