trying to understand most recent loss - help?

pippaw21
pippaw21 Posts: 22 Member
edited November 8 in Health and Weight Loss
So for context, I have been pretty sick for the last 2-3 weeks and have been eating at maintenance or just over. I also haven't been working out as my asthma is really, really bad right now.

I'd seen the scale go up and was okay with this due to the circumstances. For reference, pre-being sick I was fluctuating at 107.5-208.5kg. Whilst sick I was at around 109.7kg. I weighed myself yesterday and it was 107kg - my lowest so far. I'm trying to understand why. And I wondered if anyone had any insight.

Things that I think are relevant are that I was pretty stressed whilst sick. And I'm not so much right now (and I know stress tends to stop my weight loss showing on the scale, so maybe it'd a delayed loss from before I started eating more calroies). Plus - tmi sorry - being sick had me seriously constipated, so maybe that contributed? My body also tends to not lose weight in constant gradual increments, but to plateau and then suddenly drop very few weeks, so perhaps that's also contributed to it.

Any thoughts? I'm hoping its not muscle loss just from a few weeks of not doing the gym :/

Replies

  • hgwill78
    hgwill78 Posts: 64 Member
    I had a similar experience in September. I was sick for a week and couldn't work out and lost 5 pounds. I ate the same so I can't really tell you. That was the most I had ever lost in a week. I suspect it was water weight, but it stayed off so I'm not complaining!
  • 999tigger
    999tigger Posts: 5,235 Member
    Youve answered your own question. Its just your body fluctuating. See if the weight stays off and if so then maybe you were eating less than you realised.
  • obscuremusicreference
    obscuremusicreference Posts: 1,320 Member
    Having a fever raises your BMR by as much as 7 percent. I've noticed unexpected weight loss after illness too, even when I wasn't running a fever.
  • SueInAz
    SueInAz Posts: 6,592 Member
    It could easily be a combination of all of the factors you listed except the muscle loss. I can't imagine you could lose that much muscle from one week off. I've taken weeks off here and there and it barely affected the weights I was able to lift the following week. I wouldn't worry about it too much one way or the other.
  • gle8442
    gle8442 Posts: 126 Member
    Like others have said, you burn more calories while sick, and you also don't absorb nutrients in the intestine to the same extent as you would when healthy. Your cholesterol levels temporarily go down and your glucose levels go up, basically everything get changed around as your body momentarily focuses on fighting the infection. And while some illness (like those with diarrhea and vomiting) might be dehydrating, others can cause people to retain water. So short answer, maybe you were sick enough that your body wasn't absorbing the food you ate very well.

    Here are some references... very dry reading, though!
    http://advances.nutrition.org/content/5/6/702.abstract
    http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/30/8/1236.full.pdf
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