Can You Gain 5lbs in a Day?

sherisse5
sherisse5 Posts: 14 Member
edited November 25 in Health and Weight Loss
Yesterday morning I weighed 211. This morning, almost 216!! I know I had a BAD day of eating, there was some fried chicken and fries and there may have been some chips and dip and half a coke, but Still, 5 pounds?!! Really? I feel like I've been set back a month because of one bad Day!!

Replies

  • kgirlhart
    kgirlhart Posts: 5,188 Member
    You didn't have a bad day. It does sound like you had a high sodium day which can certainly lead to water retention and 5 pounds is not that unusual. Don't worry. It will come back down and you really haven't set yourself that far back.
  • RoxieDawn
    RoxieDawn Posts: 15,488 Member
    what they said^^^

    That's not a bad day at all. You had a nice meal or day of eating. A varied diet is good, just remember weight fluctuations and why they happen.
  • TynaBaby17
    TynaBaby17 Posts: 56 Member
    It definitely sounds like water weight, because you can't gain 5 pounds of FAT in a day.

    Also you definitely should not be weighing yourself EVERYDAY, for exactly this reason. You're going to see fluctuations from eating different foods and doing different activities and a lot of the time those tiny daily changes can be very discouraging and disheartening. Try to weigh yourself once a week, in the morning when you wake up. You'll see more stable changes that way and feel more accomplished and encouraged!
  • stanmann571
    stanmann571 Posts: 5,727 Member
    Last summer I gained 10 or 12 lbs in one day. High sodium, High fat, high nitrate, sun exposure.

    2 weeks later the water weight finished falling back off.

    It's just water.
  • Silentpadna
    Silentpadna Posts: 1,306 Member
    sherisse5 wrote: »
    Yesterday morning I weighed 211. This morning, almost 216!! I know I had a BAD day of eating, there was some fried chicken and fries and there may have been some chips and dip and half a coke, but Still, 5 pounds?!! Really? I feel like I've been set back a month because of one bad Day!!

    It might not have even been a bad day. Focus on what's true. What's true is that you could not have eaten 17,000 calories above maintenance to gain that much fat.
  • Aaron_K123
    Aaron_K123 Posts: 7,122 Member
    edited March 2018
    Yeah you can, in water weight. My guess would be you had a lot of salt in your diet the previous day relative to normal and as a result you ended up retaining a lot more water. It is temporary...you didn't gain 5 pounds of fat in a day.
  • deannalfisher
    deannalfisher Posts: 5,600 Member
    AnvilHead wrote: »
    TynaBaby17 wrote: »
    It definitely sounds like water weight, because you can't gain 5 pounds of FAT in a day.

    Also you definitely should not be weighing yourself EVERYDAY, for exactly this reason. You're going to see fluctuations from eating different foods and doing different activities and a lot of the time those tiny daily changes can be very discouraging and disheartening. Try to weigh yourself once a week, in the morning when you wake up. You'll see more stable changes that way and feel more accomplished and encouraged!

    Or you can weigh yourself daily, understand that fluctuations are perfectly normal and to be expected, and use those data points in a weight trending app to get a better understanding of why they happen and what the actual overall picture of your progress really is.

    JINX :)
  • Ziggy2875
    Ziggy2875 Posts: 28 Member
    If it’s that time of the month I can easily gain 5 pounds overnight even if I stayed on plan. Don’t worry about it we all have bad days. I had one yesterday. It is only truly bad if you give up. Try to learn from what you did for next time if you didn’t plan it. Otherwise you ate fried chicken yesterday if you enjoyed it that’s good, move on to today.
  • sherisse5
    sherisse5 Posts: 14 Member
    Thank you everyone for the advise. And knowledge. I feel better about the whole gain thing now. Well, I don't feel better, but I do have a better understanding of it and I'm not worried about it anymore. I do obsess with the scale though, so maybe it's time I hid it for awhile. :)
  • Arsenal1919
    Arsenal1919 Posts: 212 Member
    I'm sure that, at some time in the past 25 years before my gastric sleeve surgery, I would have gained 5 pounds (or 2.3kg) in a 24 hour period. I used to eat a lot of 5h1t once upon a time.
  • CSARdiver
    CSARdiver Posts: 6,252 Member
    Human body weight is ~50-60% water weight. 16 oz of water weighs approximately 1 lb. I day of high salt will result in increased cellular uptake - water weight.

    My water weight fluctuates ~5lbs throughout the day.

    Math is your friend ~3,500 kcals/lb of fat. So unless you ate a surplus of 17,500 kcals - you're ok.
  • acorsaut89
    acorsaut89 Posts: 1,147 Member
    psuLemon wrote: »
    TynaBaby17 wrote: »
    It definitely sounds like water weight, because you can't gain 5 pounds of FAT in a day.

    Also you definitely should not be weighing yourself EVERYDAY, for exactly this reason. You're going to see fluctuations from eating different foods and doing different activities and a lot of the time those tiny daily changes can be very discouraging and disheartening. Try to weigh yourself once a week, in the morning when you wake up. You'll see more stable changes that way and feel more accomplished and encouraged!

    If you like more statistical points of analysis, weighing daily is better. Because its possible, that you tend to always weigh more on one day where you weight is its highest (for me that is Saturday).

    Weighing once a week also gives you a chance of the greatest amount of variability, especially if the night before you ate more foods, more carbs, more sodium, etc....than usual.

    As long as OP isn't battling some form of ED (where weighing could be compulsive and unhealthy in her relationship with food/herself) I completely agree daily weigh ins can really help pinpoint certain trends, days where your weight is higher, and, women, how our TOM affects our weight trends.
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