muscle loss?

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ZiezieO
ZiezieO Posts: 228 Member
in Fitness and Exercise
I haven't been to the gym in 6 days. In that time I have dropped 2.6 lbs.

I want to know how fast muscle loss happens? I lift every time I'm at the gym and have been trying to build muscles but since I haven't been there, am I losing it?

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  • Greenrun99
    Greenrun99 Posts: 2,065 Member
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    You didn't lose any muscle in 6 days.. it takes weeks/months to lose significant muscle.. most likely water weight from your muscles due to them not needing it to repair them from you not lifting for a week.
  • littlebutlean
    littlebutlean Posts: 2,159 Member
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    ^^ Yup!

    There's zero chance you've lost 2.6 lbs of muscle in 6 days. People in general are very ill educated when it comes scale fluctuation. Water retention and/or glycogen can dictate scale fluctuation to a great degree and even bowel movements. Think MMA fighters, they are literally able to drop 15-30+ lbs of water in 24 hours. There's that much excess water retention in our bodies at times due to carbohydrate consumption.

    While it's not an exact science, for every 1 gram of carbohydrate ingested, when stored as glycogen in the muscle, the body will pull in and retain around 2.7g of water. Essentially 2.7g of water is literally bound up in the carbohydrate molecule. Now vice versa, if your diet just by accident for a few days is less carbs, 2.7g of water is excreted from the body and lost and the scale will reflect that. For example, if you decide right now, today to use up 200g of carbs through strength training and/or exercise as well as in your diet through a low carb diet you'll essentially drop around 500-600g of water which is almost 2 lbs. I've dropped 13 lbs in 5 days purposely of water via carbohydrate manipulation.

    Don't fret! Also worth noting, the longer you train in the gym and the body adapts, the harder it is to actually lose that muscle due to non-exercise. :drinker: :tongue:
  • ZiezieO
    ZiezieO Posts: 228 Member
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    Awesome! Thanks all. I don't really have any one to talk to about health related things besides my doctor… and I don't feel like paying for every time I have a little question.

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