Frustrated With Strength Training

Start taking measurements. When you start building muscle, you get smaller but may not lose as much weight because muscle is denser and weighs more than fat. I actually weigh more after a killer lifting session. After some time you'll see major changes and start feeling strong and awesome. Wait.... just wait.
Check out New Rules of Lifting for Women.

I'd agree with the comment about water weight. The lifting will make you retain some water and, especially if you are sore, your body is holding onto some fluid most likely. Give it some time to level out and see how it goes. Over a longer period of time as you start to build some muscle, you also may find that the weight loss plateaus as you get more lean.

I highly recommend taking measurements and especially progress pics. It's really hard to see changes week to week or month to month in a mirror. Comparing pictures and measurements really help to see where you are making progress, or not.

bringingsexyback2007 wrote: »

I've been losing weight since January. Every week when I weigh myself, I have always lost weight. A few weeks ago, I started adding in a very light amount of weights a few days a week and I haven't lost a single pound since. My eating is 100% the same as when I was losing and so is my exercise, other than adding weights. I haven't gained any weight, but that's all I have going for me at this point. It is super frustrating and really turning off my desire of using weights. Any advice?

There are a bunch of things that could be at play here. If you are only weighing weekly, are you weighing the day after your weight training? I really only experienced fluid retention the day after and usually just leg day. I don't know what it is about leg day, but, they sure like to hold water for a day or so after.

Another option, do you log your strength training and eat back those calories? If you do, try switching it up and just eating half those calories back if you are eating them. If you aren't eating them, no reason to start.

Have you lost around or more than 10% of your starting body weight? Some people experience a bit of a metabolic slowdown right after that particular landmark. It's usually not too much, just a couple hundred calories or so, but if that coincides with around the time you started strength training than it could be a combination of the two. For me it tends to happen right around the 10% mark, but, easy enough to counteract either with a bit more activity or a smidgen less food.

Did you change a food you eat? I know you said it's the same, but, sometimes food products have inaccurate label information. If you switched brands of a food you eat regularly, that could be the case. (Had it happen to me with some frozen chicken I was eating, should have been suspicious that it was magically 50 calories less than similar stuff)

Light strength training really shouldn't cause much water retention at all. However, strength training may mean that you are retaining lean tissue you might have lost otherwise. Lean tissue is what uses most of the calories, so you want to keep as much of it as possible. You usually can't add new muscle at a deficit, but, you can keep more of what you do have. If you sacrifice a couple weeks of weight loss to start a new habit that causes you to retain more lean tissue, then, it's really a win in the longterm. A lot of people don't realize that when you lose weight for awhile, you typically lose some muscle mass along with fat and water weight.

Don't try to change too much at once. I would give it another week at what you've been doing to eliminate the likelihood that it's just water retention. After that, I would be tempted to cut a couple hundred more calories or add another couple hundred calories of activity, whichever works best for you and see what happens.

Of course, all of this is a shot in the dark as I have no idea what you are eating or how low your calories are already set.