Losing weight in the week, gaining it back in one day
RomyNelia
Posts: 5 Member
I'm not quite sure what to do!
I have focused on my diet and exercise religiously since mid march, I'm around 10 weeks into my 'programme'. In those 10 weeks I have gone from 132lbs to 138lbs and definitely gained weight (I.e not muscle, I look fatter and my measuraments have gone up).
At this stage I'm not sure about what to do. I started out eating around 1500/1600 calories per day as I also exercise most days, my TDEE is at around 1800/1900 depending on what exercise I'm doing.I figured 1500 would be low enough but I ended up gaining, slowly but surely. I have since cut to 1200 calories, to see if it would make a difference and it does through the week I lose 2 lbs and have a day with family on a Sunday where I'll eat probably closer to 2000/2500 depending on how many meals and I'll gain the 2lbs back that then take the entire week to lose again, and I put them back on on a Sunday and so on.
I'm pretty stuck. I resistance train 3x per week, burning 300 cals minimum and do 2x running a week at least burning abother 300 minimum, I wear a polar hear rate monitor strap so I know my expenditure is as accurate as it can be.
Eating 1500 and burning 300 made me gain and cutting to 1200/1300 and burning 300 makes me lose 2lbs a week but I have to not exceed this calorie limit AT ALL which is a pretty miserable existence.
My metabolism is quite damaged due to a long stretch of disordered eating so I was never expecting it to be a quick thing but gaining this amount of weight in 10 weeks is really discouraging. The only other thing that has occurred is I have changed contraceptive pill (coincidentally, around 2 weeks prior to starting this weight/calorie monitoring) and I'm a bit stuck with what to do!
I eat the same thing every single day for breakfast and lunch leaving roughly 500 calories for dinner because I know that way my calorie intake is accurate. I've figured out I can lose 2lbs comfortably eating 1300 max but it has to be consistent Monday to Sunday which is not sustainable for me, I have to have one day to look forward to! Over the week the deficit should even itself out but it doesn't seem to be doing that.
Does anyone have any idea as to what I can do to get out of this 'maintenance trap'? I don't look great, I definitely look worse than when I ate half the amount I do now and need to lose at least a stone to get to goal. Any ideas would be very much appreciated!!
I have focused on my diet and exercise religiously since mid march, I'm around 10 weeks into my 'programme'. In those 10 weeks I have gone from 132lbs to 138lbs and definitely gained weight (I.e not muscle, I look fatter and my measuraments have gone up).
At this stage I'm not sure about what to do. I started out eating around 1500/1600 calories per day as I also exercise most days, my TDEE is at around 1800/1900 depending on what exercise I'm doing.I figured 1500 would be low enough but I ended up gaining, slowly but surely. I have since cut to 1200 calories, to see if it would make a difference and it does through the week I lose 2 lbs and have a day with family on a Sunday where I'll eat probably closer to 2000/2500 depending on how many meals and I'll gain the 2lbs back that then take the entire week to lose again, and I put them back on on a Sunday and so on.
I'm pretty stuck. I resistance train 3x per week, burning 300 cals minimum and do 2x running a week at least burning abother 300 minimum, I wear a polar hear rate monitor strap so I know my expenditure is as accurate as it can be.
Eating 1500 and burning 300 made me gain and cutting to 1200/1300 and burning 300 makes me lose 2lbs a week but I have to not exceed this calorie limit AT ALL which is a pretty miserable existence.
My metabolism is quite damaged due to a long stretch of disordered eating so I was never expecting it to be a quick thing but gaining this amount of weight in 10 weeks is really discouraging. The only other thing that has occurred is I have changed contraceptive pill (coincidentally, around 2 weeks prior to starting this weight/calorie monitoring) and I'm a bit stuck with what to do!
I eat the same thing every single day for breakfast and lunch leaving roughly 500 calories for dinner because I know that way my calorie intake is accurate. I've figured out I can lose 2lbs comfortably eating 1300 max but it has to be consistent Monday to Sunday which is not sustainable for me, I have to have one day to look forward to! Over the week the deficit should even itself out but it doesn't seem to be doing that.
Does anyone have any idea as to what I can do to get out of this 'maintenance trap'? I don't look great, I definitely look worse than when I ate half the amount I do now and need to lose at least a stone to get to goal. Any ideas would be very much appreciated!!
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Replies
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First, if you have a long history of disordered eating, aiming to lose 2 lbs a week is probably going to make you go backwards, especially if that is a current picture. I suspect you are close to a normal weight and only need to "tighten up".
With that said, you are eating more than you think by looking at your diary. You aren't logging every day. I would also ask if you use a food scale? On MFP, the two biggest issues are accuracy and consistency. Address those and you will have a greater understanding of how much you are actually eating.
Also recognize that weight loss needs to be looked at over 4-6 weeks as a normal body will fluctuate daily.
I think you are over complicating things a bit too? How do you know your TDEE is 1800/1900 (actual tracking or online tool)? How are you determining calories burned?
If your TDEE is 1900, the only way to lose 2 lb a week is eating 900 calories. That is how the math would work out. I would never advise a lean person to aim for 2 lbs a week. Ideally, you should aim for 1% of your mass a month, continue to progressive lift (BTW, if you aren't doing a structured lifting program, i would suggest you start), and try to get 100g of protein daily.5 -
Everything that the above poster mentioned
I am used to working with kg but I will give this a go using lbs...
3,500 calories equals about 1 pound (0.45 kilogram) of fat. So you have to eat this amount OVER your maintenance to put on 1 pound of fat.
You say you ate (on one particular day) at 2000-2500 (which is 500-1000 calories over) and from that you put on 2lbs. Does that even make sense to you? To put on 2lbs you would have eaten 7,000 calories OVER on that day. Did you eat 14,000 calories on that day? Of course not! The 2lbs could be food weight, water weight or sodium retention.
As for the rest of the week... I agree with the poster above, you probably are not tracking, weighing or logging your intake properly. You can't be because the Maths says you aren't.2 -
Why is it not letting me edit? I meant 7000 calories not 14,000.1
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You didnt mention if you are weighing everything on a food scale? I used to be against the food scale (not sure why just lazy probably) and once I started using it my weight gradually has decreased every week for the last 15 weeks.2
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I focus on your breakfast because that is the one with the banana. You log the same 75g of banana every day yet you don't really put a ruler on a banana and chop 7.5" every morning, do you? The assumption I make is that you're getting an additional 50-90 calories every day from eating the whole banana. Indeed, that banana is not helping at all except to meet your calorie goal. Could you possibly replace your breakfast with a singe protein powder drink? The calories would be about the same and you'd get dozens of grams of protein which is way more useful to your body than the banana is on your restricted calorie diet.
Your lunch features tuna every day. You know tuna in a 6oz can is 2 servings? Are you eating the whole can? Just checking. You're ok with the mercury ingestion risk? You can't find any way to vary that protein source?
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JeromeBarry1 wrote: »I focus on your breakfast because that is the one with the banana. You log the same 75g of banana every day yet you don't really put a ruler on a banana and chop 7.5" every morning, do you? The assumption I make is that you're getting an additional 50-90 calories every day from eating the whole banana. Indeed, that banana is not helping at all except to meet your calorie goal. Could you possibly replace your breakfast with a singe protein powder drink? The calories would be about the same and you'd get dozens of grams of protein which is way more useful to your body than the banana is on your restricted calorie diet.
Your lunch features tuna every day. You know tuna in a 6oz can is 2 servings? Are you eating the whole can? Just checking. You're ok with the mercury ingestion risk? You can't find any way to vary that protein source?
The good news is, your body has a filtration system that can eliminate things like low levels of mercury. BTW, you would be surprised at how many foods contain some levels of metals. Fish is extremely healthy for you and can help improve cholesterol.
But agree on all of the weighing food items.3 -
How tall are you?0
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Given your current weight, 2 pounds a week loss is too ambitious.
Likely you are under estimating your eating and over estimating your expenditure.
You are not eating 7000 calories over your maintenance on Sundays. You simply aren't. So, where is the WEIGHT coming from? Water. Eating more food requires more water to process it (Your intestines need lots of water to process food). Additionally, simply by eating more, you're likely getting more sodium than normal which will also cause water retention thus weight gain.
You'll need to really hunker down and log everything as accurately as possible with weighing. For me, personally, I know I underestimate many times, and forget to log every little snack (hand full of peanuts randomly, 5 jelly beans etc.) so I put my goal calories lower to compensate.2 -
First, if you have a long history of disordered eating, aiming to lose 2 lbs a week is probably going to make you go backwards, especially if that is a current picture. I suspect you are close to a normal weight and only need to "tighten up".
With that said, you are eating more than you think by looking at your diary. You aren't logging every day. I would also ask if you use a food scale? On MFP, the two biggest issues are accuracy and consistency. Address those and you will have a greater understanding of how much you are actually eating.
Also recognize that weight loss needs to be looked at over 4-6 weeks as a normal body will fluctuate daily.
I think you are over complicating things a bit too? How do you know your TDEE is 1800/1900 (actual tracking or online tool)? How are you determining calories burned?
If your TDEE is 1900, the only way to lose 2 lb a week is eating 900 calories. That is how the math would work out. I would never advise a lean person to aim for 2 lbs a week. Ideally, you should aim for 1% of your mass a month, continue to progressive lift (BTW, if you aren't doing a structured lifting program, i would suggest you start), and try to get 100g of protein daily.
Thank you for commenting! I use a weighing scale so the amount in grams I log is 100% accurate, there are things I don't log like last night I grabbed 7 almonds before going to bed but as I didn't log my workout, I kind of thought it would even itself out. During the day my breakfast and lunch and naked bar snack are the same each day and I don't eat anything aside from those at all as I'm at work, and have no access to more food! My dinners 9 times out of 10 will consist of a stir fry pack with some kind of fish, it's what I eat most days even if I forget to log it on here (I had stir fry with salmon the day before yesterday) yesterday's entry is pretty much what each day looks like. If I don't fancy fish I'll have a weird bean/ryvita/philadelphia mix to make it up to 500 calories ish. I don't have anything else in my house really for me to eat apart from the stuff mentioned above.
I restricted quite heavily for a long time and didn't allow myself carbs so I knew there would be a period of time where my body would react to the sudden increase in calories/carbs and I'd gain weight, I just didn't think it would be this severe and for this long.
I wear a polar watch so I know roughly I end up at around 1900 calorie burn each day, which is round about what an online calculator puts me at as well for the amount of activity I do each day (which isn't a lot in the grand scheme of things). I wear the heart rate monitor strap for every workout and aim for a burn of between 300-400 calories and don't eat those back.
I'm honestly trying to think if I eat anything on the go or grab food before bed mindlessly but I don't, I don't have very much food in my house apart from what I eat for my main meals so I can't figure this out.
Exercise wise I follow the BBG (the kayla itsines guide) as it's something I can fit around work and only about 45 minutes 3x a week. So it's structured but not as much as something a PT would put me on if I had their guidance I guess.
On a Sunday it's a free for all to be honest. This weekend I had bread and crisps and olives and chocolate and gin! All the things I never have. I know it's a lot of salt and carbs which explains the spike in weight on the following day, but each week I seem to be gaining a pound from the weekend weight gain that doesn't come off and carries on to the following week. I do honestly eat a lot on Sundays and don't move at all, so I'm not sure how possible it is for that one day to have that much of an effect overall..?
My weight has been varying between 135 to 138 for weeks as I lose and gain the same pounds each week but since starting the BBG and eating more it has definitely moved a good 6 pounds upwards at least. My water intake isn't great, I average about 1 litre a day but I'm trying hard to rectify that. I also sleep an average of 5hrs per night and have a very stressful job, how much of an impact do these things really have on weight loss? I know they say it isn't good, but surely not to this extent?
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JeromeBarry1 wrote: »I focus on your breakfast because that is the one with the banana. You log the same 75g of banana every day yet you don't really put a ruler on a banana and chop 7.5" every morning, do you? The assumption I make is that you're getting an additional 50-90 calories every day from eating the whole banana. Indeed, that banana is not helping at all except to meet your calorie goal. Could you possibly replace your breakfast with a singe protein powder drink? The calories would be about the same and you'd get dozens of grams of protein which is way more useful to your body than the banana is on your restricted calorie diet.
Your lunch features tuna every day. You know tuna in a 6oz can is 2 servings? Are you eating the whole can? Just checking. You're ok with the mercury ingestion risk? You can't find any way to vary that protein source?
Thank you for commenting! I weight all my food out so I weigh 75g of chopped up banana, and as I make my other half's breakfast the same as mine I throw any excess that I can't have into his bowl! So all my grams are accurate. I didn't think of drinking a protein shake, that's a really good suggestion, I don't eat meat (only fish) so I'm really trying to hit the protein goals but I do find it quite tough. I also don't drink milk so I'll have to try to find a protein shake that can be mixed with something else that also doesn't taste vile! Thank you though, I'm definitely going to try to do this, my diet ends up being really carb loaded by default and I struggle to get my protein in each day, there is only so much fish I can handle each day!
I know about the Mercury but I didn't really factor it in to be honest, trying to get my lean protein in! Each can has about 100g of tuna so it says on the can it's about 100 cals give or take a couple each side depending on the brand.
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Given your current weight, 2 pounds a week loss is too ambitious.
Likely you are under estimating your eating and over estimating your expenditure.
You are not eating 7000 calories over your maintenance on Sundays. You simply aren't. So, where is the WEIGHT coming from? Water. Eating more food requires more water to process it (Your intestines need lots of water to process food). Additionally, simply by eating more, you're likely getting more sodium than normal which will also cause water retention thus weight gain.
You'll need to really hunker down and log everything as accurately as possible with weighing. For me, personally, I know I underestimate many times, and forget to log every little snack (hand full of peanuts randomly, 5 jelly beans etc.) so I put my goal calories lower to compensate.
Thank you for this! I know I have a lot of sodium/carbs on a Sunday so the weight gain is to be expected on a Monday but it does take around 5-6 days of eating at 1200 ish again to come off which is really long and by the time it does, it's Sunday again. So slowly but surely I've been on an upward trajectory over the last 10 weeks.
The only snacks I dont tend to log that I have are either 7 almonds (7 I don't know why, but it's always 7) or 10 green grapes or 1x chocolate digestive (I logged that one yesterday) but I know that because I set my calories to 1200 and don't log my exercise I have some leeway with those particular snacks (which I don't have every day mind!) If I have anything different from that, I tend to log it just for my own sanity.
I was eating at 1500/1600 cals most of that time, I only dropped it down to 1200 for the last 2 weeks to see if that would make a difference and it has throughout the week but that pesky fat Sunday surely comes around again. I figured that if I was eating as low as 1200 the 7 almonds wouldn't make a difference really as I don't eat back aby exercise calories anyway...so I know 1500 is too much, but 1200 feels really little (probably because I'm greedy). I'm struggling with finding that calorie number that will keep me satisfied but also allow me to lose steadily, I don't even care if it's half a pound a week as long as it's going downwards overall.
My body likes to be at 140lbs realistically, that's the barrier I really struggled with before and it seems it's heading back to that checkpoint. To stay in the 130s I really really restricted and my body feels a bit out of sync currently. I don't feel healthy at 140 it's too heavy for me but staying in the 130s is really tough! I have to consciously and constantly be on the ball for it to not creep up to 140 again (probably due to the way i treated my body to stay under that for so long) but at 5ft4 I should be able to head into the 120s comfortably which is what I'd like. The maths really confuses me so I know I'm doing something wrong! Just trying to figure out how to break out of this cycle and start on the downward trajectory again..0 -
On a Sunday it's a free for all to be honest. This weekend I had bread and crisps and olives and chocolate and gin! All the things I never have. I know it's a lot of salt and carbs which explains the spike in weight on the following day, but each week I seem to be gaining a pound from the weekend weight gain that doesn't come off and carries on to the following week. I do honestly eat a lot on Sundays and don't move at all, so I'm not sure how possible it is for that one day to have that much of an effect overall..?
If you have a very small deficit, it can absolutely undo your work (and in your case, reverse it). Why not just aim for a smaller deficit everyday and work in a few of the things that you like to eat on Sundays?
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