How Dose A Female Build Muscle? Help

I have also heard that it is better to build muscle and not just lose weight... a trainer once told me "you don't wanna be flabby skinny do you, or would you rather have some muscles and be skinny" Makes sense to do it right the first time around! Build muscle and lose weight Not sure on all the rest unfortunately

1)How often should I lift weight
A) Every other day to every third day, to give muscles some recovery. You could also do it every day, but work different groups
2) Do I need more reps or higher weights? I want to be defined and have endurance, not bulk.
A) More reps. Shoot for 15 or so reps before the muscles exhaust, then rest a minute and try 15 more.
4) How much protein should I have where I do not want to bulk and have a lot of fat to lose? Is the default protein number enough?
A) The default protein is probably fine, but going up by 5% wouldn't hurt, and may help if you find you remain sore for several days after work-outs.
5) Is there such a thing as too much protein?
A) Absolutely! Too much protein will cause constipation and put your body into ketosis (which is the goal of high protein, low carb diets, but is horrible over the long-term.)
6) What time of day should I have a protein shake if I need one?
A) Within an hour after working out.
7) Should I only have protein on days I work out?
A) Your body needs recovery protein every day.
8) I know muscle weighs more then fat but should I still see a weight loss number on the scale where I need to lose fat?
A) You should still lose weight most of the time. You may see weeks here and there with no loss, but with measurement changes.
9) Is building muscle a smart idea when trying to lose fat?
A) Definitely! As someone else said, being flabby skinny is not really that much better than fat.

You will build a little muscle by lifting heavier weight and doing fewer reps. But, you won't build much if you're at a calorie deficit. You need tons of protein and you need to eat more than maintenance to actually build a lot of muscle.

Your muscles don't know your sex but.... varying hormones from men do require small differences in routine.
Typically, a female will require longer recovery time and more intense workouts.

Depending on what routine you choose, 4 sets of 8 to 12 reps of a weight equaling 75% of your max capacity for upper body, and 4 to 6 sets of 10 to 16 reps for lower body.

I would also suggest the simplest routine composed of mostly compound exercises. A workout stretching routine, and post workout cardiovascular.

A good starter routine would be;
Day 1- chest, & back
Day 2- shoulders, arms, & forearms
Day 3- thighs, calves, & lower back

If you are going to a gym, use whichever machine you feel comfortable with for each muscle group. At least 48 hrs rest between group specific muscle groups, and try out lower impact on cardiovascular exercises. I stick with stationary bikes.

A note on the amount of weight; not all sets need to be the same weight. For example, let's say you go to the gym on chest and back day and find the most you can bench press is 100 pounds. That means your working set will ne 75 pounds. Does that mean all your sets are 75 pounds? No. Your first set would be 12 reps of 30 pounds, second set; 10 reps of 60, third; 8 reps of 75, fourth; 8 reps of 75.

Now, in practice it isn't that simple. It will be difficult to complete that work out as I have written, maybe impossible.... BUT that is the point. As time progresses, you will gradually be able to complete that routine. Then you can increase weight, or even out the number of reps to, say 8 sets of 8 to maintain your magnificent figure.

If you have any questions about specific muscle groups or exercises, I will do all I can to help.

I am soooooooo happy you decided to do weight training!!!!!

Before I joined this site I was working out with a personal trainer because I had a lot of weight to lose (and ended up losing over 20lbs with him). I'll share what we did and what he told me and try to answer the questions you posted to the best of my knowledge.

1. & 2. I worked out with him only 2 or 3 times a week because that's what my schedule (er, and wallet) settled on. You could do more I'm sure. We'd do weight training exercises and he usually chose a weight so that if I did 3 sets of 12 reps, I was definitely feeling it in the third set, but wasn't overdoing it from the beginning. This falls into the "less weight, more reps" philosophy. I say "usually" because once a month he'd mix it up and shock my body during one workout by adding a lot more weight. He said he was trying to keep my body from getting used to the routine and plateauing.
His workout plan was also based on interval training: after every 2 or 3 weight lifting exercises, we'd go over to the elliptical or treadmill and I had to power through 2 minutes of cardio, going as fast as i could handle, then we'd go back to a few weight lifting exercises. This kept my heart rate up throughout the whole workout. We also went directly from one machine to another, from one muscle group to another instead of sitting around and waiting in between reps; the next machine you go to IS when your first muscle group gets to rest. This maximized the amount I worked out in the 45 minute time frame (instead of having me sit around a lot, like most people in the gym seem to do). I was supposed to go in on my own outside of the training sessions and do some cardio, to help with the weight loss aspect.
I'd voice my concern about getting too buff to him and he always said that i'd need more testosterone to really bulk up or would have to have little to no body fat so all the muscles would show and that I wouldn't need to worry... and in the end I didn't bulk up even though I definitely got stronger and lost fat too... people just saw a leaner me.
4. He gave me a rough meal plan where an example of lunch would be 3 oz of chicken, a pear, and 6 almonds ( to get the serving of protein, fat, and good carbs). I had 3 meals per day plus 2 snacks (that had to include protein, like low fat yogurt). Note that the plan was for me specifically, but in general he tried to have me eat protein, good carbs, and a tiny bit of good fat (6 almonds or a tablespoon of avocado) per meal. I kind of cut out most breads and focused on getting carbs from fruits and veggies. Trust me, I got bored with this plan and still went out to eat, but tried to keep my meals within 250-300 calories. Note also that everyone recommends not dropping below 1200 calories per day.
5. Too much protein? My trainer's answer was no, but he was definitely a body builder guy whose every 5th word was "proteeeeeeinnnnnn." Might have to google the correct answer. His opinion was that your body would get rid of excess protein instead of turning it into fat, but I am not so sure about that...
6. Um... Not sure. If you see my number 4, I'd have some protein with each meal and would have a protein rich snack like yogurt. He'd definitely get mad at me if I hadn't eaten anything at all for hours before my workout, and would suggest I go have a snack after my workout too. He (and I) preferred real food over protein shakes (and I had no problem with getting protein because I love sushi, especially sashimi) and he only told me to eat the meal replacement shakes if I had nothing else around to eat.
7. No, have protein every day, with all meals. Protein helps repair the lean tissue you are essentially tearing and building back up during your workouts. Your body won't just burn the fat when you are starving (which you are essentially doing to get your body to lose weight), it will also eat the muscle, so protein is supposed to help prevent that.
9. YES! More muscle in your body = higher metabolic rate = burning more calories while resting. My trainer would tell me that a lot of girls just go to the gym and do a little cardio and they stay skinny looking, but their body fat % can still be really high because they have no muscle on them. My friend is a victim of that. She called me crying because her doctor told her she was obese (she is very skinny looking but because she doesnt have much muscle her body fat % fell into the "obese" category).
10. Don't focus on weight as a number; if you can, measure your weight AND body fat percentage (I bought a scale with a built in body fat % calculator but it is junk... never matched the measurements from the little handheld device my gym had). You can use the body fat % to calculate how many pounds of fat you have, so as you keep weighing yourself and calculating how many of your pounds are fat, you can see if you are losing fat or something else (muscle, water, etc) each week. Whenever I seemed to be losing weight that wasn't fat, my trainer would tell me to check my eating habits and make sure I had proteeeeeeeeinnnnnnn.

i'm going to do a big disagree with those saying 15 reps.

to build you need a calorie surplus and more protein and heavier weights at 8-10 reps so that on that one it's really hard to lift but you still maintain form.

Weight or strength training will do it. Join a gym or club and learn how to use the weights. Most of these give a free introductory session to help you set up a personal program. That is important so that you don't injure yourself. Also remember that muscle weighs more than fat! So if you are building muscle and losing weight at the same time, remember that. You will feel toned and trim as the muscle replaces the fat.