Watching what I eat, healthy choices, STILL gaining weight :-(

caitbear430
caitbear430 Posts: 2 Member
edited November 23 in Health and Weight Loss
I have been making better choices with how I eat and instead of losing weight, I am gaining and I don’t know why or how....

I have a meal replacement protein shake, good earth chocolate raw organic shake, with coconut milk and a splash of black coffee, for breakfast. Lunch is usually lighter in calories, fruit/veggies and a cheese stick with a turkey stick. Dinner is chicken breast with rice....

I do walk a lot. Taking my dogs for walks, etc. about 40 minutes a Day..

I’m 20. 5’5. 190lbs. Which this is the heaviest I’ve been.. I don’t like it. I need to make a change but I’m not sure what else I could do.

Any advice would be great!!!

Replies

  • cmriverside
    cmriverside Posts: 34,454 Member
    How long have you been logging your food and staying close to your calorie goal? How many calories a day are you eating?
  • snowflake954
    snowflake954 Posts: 8,399 Member
    Are you weighing and measuring all your food and drink? Using a digital food scale? Eating healthy doesn't mean you'll lose--lowering your calorie intake is key. Plug your stats into MFP and see what daily calorie goal it gives you. Try to stay within that goal everyday. 40 min walks are good, but don't burn much. I did 2 1/2 hours yesterday.
  • Jingsi84
    Jingsi84 Posts: 126 Member
    Are you logging? Typically people overestimate their workouts and underestimate their food intake. If you are at a deficit you will lose weight short of some medical problem.
  • jsminer827
    jsminer827 Posts: 62 Member
    Have you calculated your caloric needs? Are you tracking your intake to understand where the variance might be? If you keep a log and you're consistently coming in at or below your goal over the course of four weeks then you might want to see a doctor and rule out any medical issue.
  • Lounmoun
    Lounmoun Posts: 8,423 Member
    caitbear430 wrote: »
    I have been making better choices with how I eat and instead of losing weight, I am gaining and I don’t know why or how....

    I have a meal replacement protein shake, good earth chocolate raw organic shake, with coconut milk and a splash of black coffee, for breakfast. Lunch is usually lighter in calories, fruit/veggies and a cheese stick with a turkey stick. Dinner is chicken breast with rice....

    I do walk a lot. Taking my dogs for walks, etc. about 40 minutes a Day..

    I’m 20. 5’5. 190lbs. Which this is the heaviest I’ve been.. I don’t like it. I need to make a change but I’m not sure what else I could do.

    Any advice would be great!!!

    Weight loss is about havimg a calorie deficit not type of food. Are you tracking calories?
    How long have you been following your plan? What sort of weight gain (steady increase or up and down)?
    What is your activity level without exercise? Are you using some kind of activity tracker? Are you logging exercise?
    Are you weighing on the same scale at the same time of day under the same conditions?
    If you are female are you near ovulation or your period? Is pregnancy a possibility?

    If your weight is going up and down it may be normal fluctuations and waiting while following your plan should sort things out eventually.
    If you are gaining steadily then you are probably eating or drinking more calories than your maintence level or you have a medical issue.
    You may have your calorie goal wrong to start with. You may be wrong about how many calories you are taking in. You may be overestimating how many calories you burn. Tell us more about these things. Open your diary.

    Log everything you consume as accurately as you can. Use a food scale. Check that the database entries are correct- they are user entered and some are wrong. If you cook something from scratch use the recipe builder to log it not someone else's homemade food entry.
  • sccamero
    sccamero Posts: 164 Member
    I would look at the calories of the protein shake. I started doing shakes and they are higher in calories especially if you go over 8 oz. On top of that exercises more if you can.
  • Lesscookies1
    Lesscookies1 Posts: 250 Member
    What matters is calories if you don't have a food scale buy one, and start tracking your food intake. Eat the calories that MyFitnessPal tells you.

    Good luck!
  • ITUSGirl51
    ITUSGirl51 Posts: 191 Member
    Unfortunately 40 min walking doesn’t burn a lot. Maybe 175 calories. I walked 53 minutes yesterday (about 3 miles) at a brisk pace and my Apple Watch gave me 217 calories. I only weigh 13 lbs less than you.
  • Tracy430
    Tracy430 Posts: 24 Member
    I'm not sure if someone mentioned this and you may already know this but be sure to weigh yourself at the same time of day. I sometimes weigh 5 lbs more right before bed than I do first thing in the morning before breakfast.
  • murp4069
    murp4069 Posts: 494 Member
    As everyone already said, it's about calories no matter what type of food you are eating. If you aren't tracking calories, you might be surprised. Also take a close look at the shake you are drinking. Shakes are always touted as healthy, but in reality I would never be able to regularly fit any kind of shake into my calorie goals, and I haven't found one that is both tasty and actually "healthy." I'm not familiar with the one you are using, but I've seen shakes in the hundreds of calories all over the market. Especially for women who may have smaller calorie goals (and I assume you are female based on your post and your screen name) those calorie heavy shakes can be killers.
  • jgnatca
    jgnatca Posts: 14,464 Member
    How long have you been following this meal plan? Have you been weighing that shake?
  • srk369
    srk369 Posts: 256 Member
    Also, where are you in your cycle? There are time of the month that no matter what you do, you are going to gain water weight. That's one of the reasons they say give it at least a month...a full cycle...to see your weight loss. Good luck!
  • caitbear430
    caitbear430 Posts: 2 Member
    Hi all, thank you so much for your responses! I completely blanked on including that I do log, because I just assumed that everyone did.. lol. But I do. My calorie goal for sedentary is 1300 I believe. Which I usually am about 1200-1300 calories daily. So I track everything. Scan it in and all.

    It’s been about 2 weeks. So I get that I’m impatient
  • Mithridites
    Mithridites Posts: 600 Member
    Keep in mind some of your healthy choices are suprisingly calorie-rich. Coconut milk and cheese, for example.
    Good luck on your journey.
  • Lesscookies1
    Lesscookies1 Posts: 250 Member
    edited January 2018
    caitbear430 wrote: »
    Hi all, thank you so much for your responses! I completely blanked on including that I do log, because I just assumed that everyone did.. lol. But I do. My calorie goal for sedentary is 1300 I believe. Which I usually am about 1200-1300 calories daily. So I track everything. Scan it in and all.

    It’s been about 2 weeks. So I get that I’m impatient

    Honestly, food labels can underestimate by 20%, so you could be eating more calories than you think. Do you use a food scale to measure your food? Since you mentioned you're gaining weight that tells us you're not really eating 1300 calories but more than your normal maintenance calories. If you keep going with this trend you'll continue to gain weight.

    I've lost 40 pounds so far, so I can tell you having a solid plan does work. I can gain weight eating chicken and rice, and protein shakes if I'm not eating at a deficit.
  • Momepro
    Momepro Posts: 1,509 Member
    Definitely use an actual scale instead of measuring cuos and serving sizes. It makes a HUGE difference. Bulky food gets underestimated, and fine food gets overestimated unless you are weighing.
    If you are still having issues it doesn't hurt to get a check up. Sometimes issues like low thyroid or prediabetes can affect how efficiently your body burns calories, or how you feel with more or less food, so it doesn't hurt to get them ruled out.
  • brendanwhite84
    brendanwhite84 Posts: 219 Member
    Lesscookies1 wrote: »

    Honestly, food labels can underestimate by 20%, so you could be eating more calories than you think.

    This is an interesting point I just recently learned about after two years of calorie counting - at least in the USA (which isn't where I am) the FDA does indeed allow that 20% margin of error on labels.

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