Of refeeds and diet breaks

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  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
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    Yes, water weight can be significant. I keep a fairly constant high activity level, and I can still see small fluctuations of 1.5 percent or so depending on intensity or progression.

    If the weather is warm when I'm exercising? That can add to the water retention as well.

    I don't think, as collectingblues said, that 5 pounds at your weight is unreasonable at all.
  • collectingblues
    collectingblues Posts: 2,541 Member
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    GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »
    Yes, water weight can be significant. I keep a fairly constant high activity level, and I can still see small fluctuations of 1.5 percent or so depending on intensity or progression.

    If the weather is warm when I'm exercising? That can add to the water retention as well.

    I don't think, as collectingblues said, that 5 pounds at your weight is unreasonable at all.

    It's also why I hate that whole idea of "your weight should be stable within a 5-pound range". Because depending on where you're starting from, that 5 pounds may be a lot (say, if you're 100-110 pounds) or it may be a drop in the bucket (if you're in the 200+ range). I think it's much better to find out what a normal *percent* fluctuation is, and then base adjustments/concerns off of that.
  • bmeadows380
    bmeadows380 Posts: 2,981 Member
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    thank you!

    It was really frustrating me because I'm yo-yoing right now, and I'm trying for a 1.5 to 2 lb loss a week - which can be completely masked by the darned water weight and make it hard to see what progress I'm making, especially when I've been struggling with a plateau for the last 4 months and with myself mentally because of it. I managed to lose 100 lbs last year, and had told myself that we'd shoot for another 50 lbs off this year; I didn't think that half the loss from the year before was unreasonable a goal for this year, but here we are into May, and I'm still stuck in the same 5 lb range I was in February. I'm still trying to figure out what changed to make my progress stall like this and how on earth I get back to where I was when I saw progress, and at this point, even 1 lb a week would help me mentally!
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    edited May 2018
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    The more your body is used to it, the less it sees it as a need to require so much water for repair despite still being a good workout.

    This is why most people after lifting for a while, as long as frequency is good - stop getting DOMS, or nearly as bad.

    It's also why more recent advice about ice baths and other attempts to short circuit what body is attempting to do is to just let body do what it wants, it'll get better at it, and the response won't be as bad in the future.

    It's a part of the whole stress/improvement cycle.

    Remember too the just plain old stress retained water weight, unrelated to workouts, but can be related too.

    You could hold water in joints & muscles needing repair - and the body was stressed enough from the activity it's also just generally having cortisol held water weight - so double whammy.

    Also don't forget as we go into summer and/or more active - body increases blood volume to handle cooling, reaching more muscles, ect.

    And if deficit is too great for your body causing stress held water (is 1.5-2 still reasonable this year, if 50 to lose, yes) - is that really the state you want your body in?
    Health issues in general could raise that stress level.
  • anubis609
    anubis609 Posts: 3,966 Member
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    Assuming intensity in activity increased, muscle recruitment pulls in water and scale weight fluctuation can vary. While it gets frustrating to see on the scale, remember wild jumps like that are not indicative of fat gain if your diet was in check. Much like having a high carb+sodium day, even at maintenance calories, aren’t going to be indicative of fat gain even if the scale jumps 5-10 lbs from water.

    It will settle out as fluid passes.
  • collectingblues
    collectingblues Posts: 2,541 Member
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    I'm glad that at least now, with the thyroid pieces seeming to get under better control, that at least the fluctuations are becoming more predictable.

    Running a half marathon? 2.5 percent. (Goes off completely in two to three weeks.)

    Ovulating and cycle start? 3.05 percent. (Goes off 10 days from start of ovulation or cycle.)

    Sodium? Usually 1.4 pounds. (Three to four days.)

    I'm going to have a new confounder in a couple of weeks -- I'm switching to an insulin pump that is a closed loop system. The literature says there's about a 1 percent gain upon switching, but some bloggers have lost weight, and my Cleveland-based endo says none of his patients have gained weight. So I don't know if I'm going to have that 1 percent, if it's going to be sharper because of the improved control, and thus more like what I saw when going on a pump for the first time, or if I'll lose more because I'm not treating hypos. (It shuts itself off and lowers the insulin dose when the glucose sensor tells it that I'm low or trending low.)

    I *really* would have liked to start later, to only have one variable at a time, but one of the buttons on my current pump -- and, ironically, the most important button -- is only working if I press it in a certain place, and summer is usually really difficult for me because I'm much more active, and I'm much more insulin sensitive. So it's somehow become imperative to move sooner rather than later. But at least I'll have about three or four weeks of the new thyroid dose under my belt, and should keep seeing some improvement, before adding in the pump.
  • anubis609
    anubis609 Posts: 3,966 Member
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    MelodiousMermaid wrote: »
    I know this will be diverging from the given topic a bit, but I don't have the time and mental energy to spend for obvious reasons and I'm hoping you refeeding and diet breaking puppy and kittty lovers will forgive the divergence and hopefully have some amazing knowledge/resources to share. My requests are two-fold:

    (Part 1)

    My husband was struck by a vehicle as a pedestrian yesterday. Banged the back of his head on the street pretty badly and the vehicle ended up running over his right leg (lower). ER sent us home after x-rays showed no bone breakages in his head, neck, pelvis, and leg (astounding). Mostly managing pain and keeping him resting for the moment, with basic movement assistance as he needs (crutches are helping to get him around, of course). So at this point it looks like he managed to dodge the hard structural damage, but likely has a ton of soft tissue damage, especially in the leg. We'll be going to see a doctor and eventually a physical therapist.

    In the more immediate time, I want to get his nutritional support optimized for healing and retention of everything salvageable. The catch being it needs to be within budgetary constraints as best as possible, which just went into super lock-down mode as he's the breadwinner and we have no disability coverage, etc. I can try to find extra for "this and that" but won't be able to afford super-expensive supplements like the types that I vaguely recall hearing Lyle McDonald talk about on some podcast or other. I need info/resources for that.

    (Part 2)

    Although it is very possible indeed that I will need to alter my own training and nutritional regimen, I think I have the nutritional basics down for that. For me, it's going to be the fact that I will no longer be able to continue in the local gym, both for practical and financial purposes, in at least the next month or more through this recovery process. I was lifting heavy (relatively speaking) 2-3 times per week on primarily compound movements (SL 5x5 based with some focus tweaks that were recommended to make the program a bit more rounded/productive). I have zero equipment at home, and depending on the budget after taking my husband's nutritional needs into account, I may not be able to afford much/anything.

    My primary goal is to not lose lean mass as I work through my deficit. My secondary goal would be noob gains, as I'm still pretty green, all told. As mentioned before, I'm pretty comfortable with the macros side of things, but the actual training itself is where I'm stuck. I know there are bodyweight strength exercises, but lack a comprehensive resource/program.

    My other issue related to this is that I have a shoulder-ish injury (soft tissue, haven't gotten in for it) that I have tried to just be careful about, and part of that has been avoiding planks/push-ups. I can do overhead press with spot-on form well, and front squats seem to be OK. Tips/resources giving me more information about options I have to work around that would be stellar, if they exist.

    (End part 1/part 2 discussion)

    The more direct the link and the more concise the summary, the better chance I will have of taking it in and being able to implement it quickly. Thank you so much in advance for anything you can throw my way.

    Part 1 - I can't provide much other than Lyle's injury book. It's rather straightforward in optimizing nutrition for injuries, and supplements are just that: supplementary to a well-formulated diet. The diet itself does not need to be special or expensive in nature. Protein, carbs, and fat sources can be what fits your taste and budget.

    https://store.bodyrecomposition.com/product/optimal-nutrition-for-injury-recovery/

    Part 2 - There are various ways to perform calisthenic movements following progressive overload. You can actually follow this thread or use the OP as some suggestions:

    https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10332083/which-lifting-program-is-the-best-for-you/p1
  • MelodiousMermaid
    MelodiousMermaid Posts: 380 Member
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    Thank you for your reply, @anubis609 . I appreciate the resources -- I know they will be great, as you've gone through so much learning/research yourself. I will get Lyle's book right away and look into that post/thread. While I find it hard to keep holding firm, perhaps this will be what I need to keep pushing through.
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
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    MelodiousMermaid, so sorry to hear about your husband! Best wishes to you both during his recovery.
  • collectingblues
    collectingblues Posts: 2,541 Member
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    GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »
    Quick update on me - my thyroid is messed up. My endo was happy with my last numbers, I was not and I feel like crap and told her so.

    We went over options including running more bloodwork, but she decided to just run with treating my symptoms and we decided the best course right now would be to add Cytomel to my current Synthroid dose rather than trying to play around with fine tuning the Synthroid dose since it's sort of at a weird point as it is already.

    I am hoping to see some improvement soon because my energy levels have tanked. I am satisfying myself for now with just maintaining until all of this is straightened out.

    I'm sorry that you're going through this, too, but I hope the Cytomel helps.
  • anubis609
    anubis609 Posts: 3,966 Member
    edited May 2018
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    You're welcome @MelodiousMermaid. I understand this period is and will be stressful, there's no way around it, but my suggestion would be to try and minimize as much of it as possible. Don't over-complicate how you choose to approach your and your husband's diets. While he's healing, he will need to be at least at maintenance calories + stress factor (including pain) and properly rehab as prescribed, to tolerance.

    Per Lyle's book, he can slightly accelerate the rehab, by increasing the frequency (adding an extra day of rehab throughout the week), but the key is to modulate inflammation periodically throughout the day vs doing all sets and reps in one go just once a day; eg: 3 sets of 20 reps of ankle flexion, spread out with 1 set in the am, 1 set in the mid-afternoon, and 1 set in the evening.

    As for yourself, you don't need to make your deficit steep, as mental stress + a steep deficit + exercise are all stressors on your body, and if you're not achieving results you're looking for, it can compound more stress. To retain muscle mass, the simplistic rule is to just focus on intensity. If the work is intense enough each session, your muscles will be stimulated to grow/retain mass. I believe intensity would be defined as the amount of work force exerted in a given set, not necessarily volume. Meaning even though 10 x 1 vs 1 x 10 is still 10 total reps, doing all 10 in one set creates more intensity due to the rate of exertion. I could be wrong, but that's how I understand it.

    Noob gains can always be had even if you had a couple of years of training. I say this because some isolated muscles may be lacking from focusing on compound movements; i.e. biceps don't see much stimulus when doing rows, calves don't see much in squats, etc. and those muscles can actually grow relatively faster if you focused on them later even after having built up the compound movements.

    Alternatively, if you were to focus on bodyweight/calisthenics movements for a while, then suddenly moved onto weighted training, you may also see relatively fast growth in strength and development simply because the stimulus has changed.

    So all in all, try to keep things as simple as possible. Eat as much as you can to still lose weight/body fat; exercise with purpose and intensity; manage and prioritize your time as needed.
  • MelodiousMermaid
    MelodiousMermaid Posts: 380 Member
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    Thank you again. I honestly was loving working with free weights (45 lb bars + weight depending on exercise for most of it, but dumbbells for some of the isolation work). With the need to stay at home for the next unknown period of time crossed with the lack of budget... Yeah. So bodyweight/calisthenics seem to be where I'm going to be at least in the immediate short term. The reps x sets thought is worth some good consideration though -- I'd heard it before, but forgotten. Thank you for the mention on that, as I think it will help a lot!

    As for the eating, I've come to the (disappointing) conclusion that you're spot on... I'm not going to be as successful with the aggressive 2-refeed/5-deficit schedule I was on before since I'm not going to have the hearty calorie buffer I had before this week. Maybe I'll succeed with a day or two here or there, but I guess it is what it is. Sometimes it just kind of bites being a short woman. :neutral:

    Also on the eating front, the husband part won't be so bad. I was trying to have him on maintenance anyway (he's only got like 3 pounds excess fat). I'll have to quick skim the book to see if I can find the info on determining stress factor and such. Or is there a "quick dirty" method for this to get started? 125% for instance? (And thanks for the over-complication note. I'm definitely that kind of person.)

    Additional note: Thank you @GottaBurnEmAll for the wishes.
  • AnvilHead
    AnvilHead Posts: 18,344 Member
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    Not sure if somebody has already shared this one, but Alberto Nunez (of Eric Helms' Team 3DMJ) recently wrote an article about diet breaks. It's a bit more specific and purpose-driven than the rest of the general conversation here, but has some relevant observations and is worth a read: http://3dmusclejourney.com/diet-break-101/
  • heybales
    heybales Posts: 18,842 Member
    edited May 2018
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    @MelodiousMermaid
    Lyle's comments on maintaining what you got from lifting - since it may be difficult for you to make it more difficult.
    Don't forget water filled milk jugs on a long piece of pipe - can add a lot to workout.

    https://bodyrecomposition.com/training/weight-training-for-fat-loss-part-1.html/

    I’ll simply say here that the high tension stimulus that builds muscle is the exact same high tension stimulus that will maintain muscle mass when you’re dieting.

    So perhaps you can guess what happens to muscle mass when you reduce weight on the bar to use higher reps and shorter rest intervals. When you remove the high tension stimulus, you remove the signal to build (or in the case of dieting, maintain) muscle mass. What do you think happens next? Right, muscles get smaller.

    https://bodyrecomposition.com/training/weight-training-for-fat-loss-part-2.html/

    The basic conclusion, again from both research and practical experience is that both volume and frequency of training can usually be cut by up to 2/3rds (that is, to 1/3rd of what you did to improve it) but with one massively important caveat: the intensity of that training must be maintained.

    Put another way, you could maintain volume and frequency at the same level but if you cut intensity, you will lose the adaptation. Basically any combination that’s ever been looked at only works if intensity is maintained.

    Let me put this into more practical terms. Let’s say you’ve just finished a hypertrophy phase where you were training to gain muscle. On average let’s say that you were performing 6 heavy sets of 6-8 repetitions per muscle group twice per week (say an upper/lower split as discussed in my article on Training Frequency for Mass Gains).

    Based on the 2/3rds rule, you could conceivably cut back to 2 heavy sets of 6-8 reps (maintaining the same weights you finished the cycle with to the best of your ability) once per week and maintain your strength and size. That is, both volume (6 sets becomes 2 sets) and frequency (2 workouts becomes 1 workout) can be reduce by 2/3rds but ONLY if intensity (weight on the bar) is maintained.

    Yes, 2 heavy sets.
  • MelodiousMermaid
    MelodiousMermaid Posts: 380 Member
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    Thank you, @heybales . That is enlightening indeed. I am going to have to look around and see if I can get creative to allow myself to maintain the intensity. But if worst comes to worst, at least I know I can gain it back later. So frustrating, but I guess that's life.
  • GottaBurnEmAll
    GottaBurnEmAll Posts: 7,722 Member
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    collectingblues wrote: »
    GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »
    Quick update on me - my thyroid is messed up. My endo was happy with my last numbers, I was not and I feel like crap and told her so.

    We went over options including running more bloodwork, but she decided to just run with treating my symptoms and we decided the best course right now would be to add Cytomel to my current Synthroid dose rather than trying to play around with fine tuning the Synthroid dose since it's sort of at a weird point as it is already.

    I am hoping to see some improvement soon because my energy levels have tanked. I am satisfying myself for now with just maintaining until all of this is straightened out.

    I'm sorry that you're going through this, too, but I hope the Cytomel helps.

    Thanks. I know this is just the beginning of a slog, but at least we're starting with something concrete. More bloodwork in 2 months.
  • bmeadows380
    bmeadows380 Posts: 2,981 Member
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    GottaBurnEmAll wrote: »
    Quick update on me - my thyroid is messed up. My endo was happy with my last numbers, I was not and I feel like crap and told her so.

    We went over options including running more bloodwork, but she decided to just run with treating my symptoms and we decided the best course right now would be to add Cytomel to my current Synthroid dose rather than trying to play around with fine tuning the Synthroid dose since it's sort of at a weird point as it is already.

    I am hoping to see some improvement soon because my energy levels have tanked. I am satisfying myself for now with just maintaining until all of this is straightened out.

    Is Cytomel the T3 synthetic? It sounds familiar.

    I struggle with energy levels myself and have for a long time, even when my doctor had my levels suppressed super low up until this spring. She's allowed my numbers to be brought up to about 0.5, but I still have no energy. I struggle with pretty bad cases of depression a lot, though, and my quality of sleep isn't the greatest (I've found that I sleep best between 3 am and 7 am, but unfortunately, I have to be in to work by 7 am, so I have to be up and moving no later than 5:45 am) and I have a very sedentary job, so I've never been able to figure out if my low energy levels were due to the thyroid and me not having one, or if the low energy was due to the depression (or even if the thyroid was a factor in my depression problems).

    I've wondered if the T3 would help me, but I'd have a hard time getting my endo to consider something like that.

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