Weight gain after a massive loss.

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I wanted to ask this question about weight gain after dropping a lot of weight in one shot. (Sorry if there is a thread on this topic already but I did not see it) Over the past few weeks I have been dropping about 1.5 pounds per day, then all the sudden it stopped about two days ago and I am gaining at the same rate that I dropped. Nothing has changed in my eating habits, workout strategies or anything. Is this just a sign that I am about to hit my Wall again or is it a sign of a larger issues I need to take care of before it gets out of hand?

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  • Kalikel
    Kalikel Posts: 9,626 Member
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    I have no clue.

    Were you consistent with diet and exercise through it all?
  • linedawg
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    I have no clue.

    Were you consistent with diet and exercise through it all?

    Yep nothing has changed at all.
  • vismal
    vismal Posts: 2,463 Member
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    Water fluctuations. You were dropping at far to fast a pace for all the weight lost to be fat. 1.5 lbs a day would require a caloric deficit of 5250 so even if you ate zero calories, you'd probably have to burn quite a few in exercise to achieve that. What happened was that you lost a bunch of water weight and put some of it back on. Here's a tip for the way you look at daily weights that I give out a lot around here. It will help keep these PERFECTLY NORMAL scale fluctuations from driving you bonkers.

    My advice to you is to continue weighing daily but stop paying attention to day to day changes. Weigh daily right after you wake up after you pee, record those weights in a log. After 7 days, take an average. This number is slightly more meaningful then your daily weights but again, pay little attention to it. After a month start comparing the averages. This is much more significant and will show your actual progress. The advantage of averaging is if you happen to weigh in on a day where water retention is unusually high or low due to sodium or glycogen or any of the MILLION different things that cause fluctuations, you don't have to freak about the massive shift in weight. The averages will account for the high days and the lows days and give you an idea of what you really weigh. After a month goes by, your averages should go in the downward direction, if they do not then you need to either reduce calories, increase exercise, or both.