1400, lifting and gaining weight

Hello!

I'm eating 1400 calories, weight lifting and I've gained about 10lbs in the last 5 weeks.

I used to be at 1200 and I've tried to fix what I diagnosed as a "starved metabolism" by increasing daily calories by 50-100 each 7-10 days. I've scoured internet/forums and know that a lot of people report water weight. But 10 lbs in 5 weeks!? I'm starting to not fit into my clothes and my body looks different so I know it's not muscle gain.

Help please. I'm considering going back to 1200 to lose this weight, but I'm worried that won't even work!

Thank you so much!

Replies

kimny72

Can you make your food log public for us?
Do you use a food scale?
What is your height and weight?
Did you gain the 10 lbs in a short time, or steadily over the 5 weeks?

TavistockToad

Let's start with stats and why you think you have a starved metabolism?

Maxxitt

In addition to stats, what kind of lifting program/frequency of lifting have you been doing?

FlyingMolly

I second all of the above, and especially the food-scale question.

kshama2001

Please change your Diary Sharing settings to Public: http://www.myfitnesspal.com/account/diary_settings

LKArgh

Ereberi wrote: »

Hello!

I'm eating 1400 calories, weight lifting and I've gained about 10lbs in the last 5 weeks.

I used to be at 1200 and I've tried to fix what I diagnosed as a "starved metabolism" by increasing daily calories by 50-100 each 7-10 days. I've scoured internet/forums and know that a lot of people report water weight. But 10 lbs in 5 weeks!? I'm starting to not fit into my clothes and my body looks different so I know it's not muscle gain.

Help please. I'm considering going back to 1200 to lose this weight, but I'm worried that won't even work!

Thank you so much!

Open your diary. If you are not used to logging properly your 1200 calories could easily be 1600 and your 1400 calories 2000, explaining perfectly well the gain.

Ereberi

Thank you so much for the responses! My log is pubic now. It feels very vulnerable to share something like this in public! But I’m grateful for all your time and help

Answers to the question:
Yes I use a food scale.
Last I weighted myself (on Thursday) I was 152, 5’5 (I don’t track my weight on MFP, so that information if you can see it isn’t reliable)
I gained the 10lbs steadily over 5 weeks (great question, didn’t think of that!)

I think I have a starved metabolism because eating 1200 (going hungry) and exercising I’m still not getting leaner. I think I'm not eating enough for how much I exercise, I even feel lightheaded at times when I eat 1200 for more than 1 day, but going higher leads to gains.

Exercise: Right now I’m doing a mix of plyometrics, heavy weight lifting, and HIIT. 4 days a week for one hour, 1 day a week for 30mins.

Thank you again!

Ereberi

Also, for context this isn't the first time I try to increase my caloric intake. I did it earlier this year and went from 131 to 139. I wondered if
1: I had increased my caloric intake too much (I got up to 1800 net calories)
2: I didn't increase it slowly enough
3: I didn't workout the right way.

So this time around I:
1: Increased calories more slowly
2: I'm following Natacha Oceane's CUT workout program
3: I'm still at a max of 1450 net calories.

Thanks!

cerise_noir

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

nutmegoreo

cerise_noir wrote: »

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

Just to add to this, I would even weigh the olive oil. It is calorie dense at 9 calories per gram. It doesn't take much to get way off. The only stuff I don't weigh is water, milk, and soda pop.

kshama2001

cerise_noir wrote: »

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

It was a sad, sad day when I started weighing peanut butter :'(

cerise_noir

nutmegoreo wrote: »

cerise_noir wrote: »

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

Just to add to this, I would even weigh the olive oil. It is calorie dense at 9 calories per gram. It doesn't take much to get way off. The only stuff I don't weigh is water, milk, and soda pop.

Very true! I have an atomizer so I weigh the bottle before and after sprays.

kshama2001 wrote: »

cerise_noir wrote: »

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

It was a sad, sad day when I started weighing peanut butter :'(

I know, right?

Also, oatmeal and other grains. It’s nuts (pun intended).

gdhanoa4977

Surely you are not carefully measuring your macros. Do you know what's your maintenance macro? if you want to loose fat you need to be in deficit, unfortunately there is nothing as slow/ starved metabolism.

nutmegoreo

cerise_noir wrote: »

nutmegoreo wrote: »

cerise_noir wrote: »

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

Just to add to this, I would even weigh the olive oil. It is calorie dense at 9 calories per gram. It doesn't take much to get way off. The only stuff I don't weigh is water, milk, and soda pop.

Very true! I have an atomizer so I weigh the bottle before and after sprays.

kshama2001 wrote: »

cerise_noir wrote: »

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

It was a sad, sad day when I started weighing peanut butter :'(

I know, right?

Also, oatmeal and other grains. It’s nuts (pun intended).

I place the container on the scale, spray or pour (depending on which I'm using) and then place container back on the scale. I'm as lazy as can be. :laugh:

And yes, peanut butter is the saddest thing ever.

cerise_noir

gdhanoa4977 wrote: »

Surely you are not carefully measuring your macros. Do you know what's your maintenance macro? if you want to loose fat you need to be in deficit, unfortunately there is nothing as slow/ starved metabolism.

It appears OP isn’t weighing some of their solid foods in grams. It’s true that to lose fat, one has to be in a calorie deficit, but macros are purely individual.

Cahgetsfit

ahhh olive oil... yeah ages ago when I started my weight loss, I'd pour on olive oil on my salad and not log it because I had no idea that olive oil was a massive calorie bomb - like seriously - I had NO IDEA. I was still losing weight (i was on a plan that a coach gave me, and I didn't log everything all the time anyway coz it was a meal plan with options like eat x grams of this, this or this for meal #1, etc).

Anyway, I was losing but nowhere near as much as the coach was predicting - which wasn't huge btw, it wasn't one of those starve and lose 20kg in 12 weeks things, but i'd see her at my month check-in and sometimes I wouldn't have lost my 1-2 kilos or whatever that I was meant to have lost.

So after I realised that one tablespoon of olive oil is a billion calories and stopped actually using it on my salad (or else just using ONE tablespoon measure out instead of tipping the bottle upside down and swirling it around), I actually started losing weight at the predicted rate.

And the peanut butter thing too... sad sad day when you realise one tablespoon of peanut butter is actually NOT a tablespoon of peanut butter!!!

CharlieBeansmomTracey

Ereberi wrote: »

Thank you so much for the responses! My log is pubic now. It feels very vulnerable to share something like this in public! But I’m grateful for all your time and help

Answers to the question:
Yes I use a food scale.
Last I weighted myself (on Thursday) I was 152, 5’5 (I don’t track my weight on MFP, so that information if you can see it isn’t reliable)
I gained the 10lbs steadily over 5 weeks (great question, didn’t think of that!)

I think I have a starved metabolism because eating 1200 (going hungry) and exercising I’m still not getting leaner. I think I'm not eating enough for how much I exercise, I even feel lightheaded at times when I eat 1200 for more than 1 day, but going higher leads to gains.

Exercise: Right now I’m doing a mix of plyometrics, heavy weight lifting, and HIIT. 4 days a week for one hour, 1 day a week for 30mins.

Thank you again!

no such thing as a starved metabolism what it could be is adaptive thermogenesis but since you arent weighing everything, then you are eating more than you think.10lb in 5 weeks is 2lbs a week which means you are eating 1000 calories over your maintenance calories. some of it MAY be water weight though but dont think all of it would be.

Danp

You're logging seems to be inclusive in that you're individually entering everything you're eating which is a good start. In addition to the tsp/cup inaccuracies that have already been mentioned the impression I get (and it's just an impression) is that you may be unconsciously fudging the numbers in your favour.

Are you maybe choosing the lowest possible database entry that matches what you've eaten? Take a look at some alternatives entries and see if there might be a more accurate item. The 'best case scenario' database entry is unlikely to be accurate.

It also seems like perhaps there's some rounding down on measurements. For example, quite a lot of entries are exactly 100g or 150g or exactly 4oz etc. For example, Samosa - 100g, then there are chicken breast entries for 100g, 150g and 200g. Unless you're cutting and dividing your food and discarding the excess to get that exact figure, it's pretty rare that the servings you're using will be exactly round numbers like that. Try and be as accurate and honest as possible with your logging. If the chicken breast is 178g then log 178g.

Just some food for thought. G'luck

PAV8888

nutmegoreo wrote: »

cerise_noir wrote: »

I just took a peek at your diary.. I see a lot of cups and spoon measurements for foods such as cheese, peanut butter, oatmeal, grains. Weigh your eggs. Weigh everything that isn’t a liquid/can be poured. Spoons and cups for liquids only. Weigh everything, even the bread slices and prepackaged foods.

Just to add to this, I would even weigh the olive oil. It is calorie dense at 9 calories per gram. It doesn't take much to get way off. The only stuff I don't weigh is water, milk, and soda pop.

I weigh my milk

I also note that olive oil weighs a bit less than 1g per ml, so it is closer to 11ml for 10g

And the rest of the wise observations above.

Condiments and some zero calorie products too are worth watching. Non US based entries often have 100g values which present a different reality for my 50g portion as compared to the "zero calories" for a 1.7g portion food label.

Deviette

Chances are you're eating more than you think. I'm just going to go through Sunday's dinner:

Sunrise - Medium Firm Tofu, 340 grams (1/5 package) - Did you weight this exactly, or did you eyeball 1/5th of a package?
Endangered Species - Dark Chocolate Almonds & Sea Salt, 1 square - 1 square can massively vary in size, weigh that square
Onion - Onion, 50 grams - Looking through I can see lots of entries for onion at 50g. Somehow I doubt that every single onion you use is exactly 50g. Don't fudge the numbers, put in exactly how much it weighed
Mushrooms, white, raw, 1 cup, pieces or slices - How tightly packed are your mushrooms? Weigh them
Cheese - Parmesan, grated, 1 tablespoon - Wonderfully dense cheese. Is that a heaped tablespoon? or flat? Also 27kcals for a tablespoon of cheese seems very low. Honestly I'd expect that to be more like 100kcals (if not more)
Egg - Egg, 1 large - You can weigh your eggs. Also 72kcals seems a little low for a large egg
Irish on the Vine Tesco - Tomatoes, 2 tomato - How big is a tomato? Weigh it
Sauce, fish, ready-to-serve, 1 tbsp - Don't use a generic entry, use the entry that matches the brand that you're using.
Peanut Butter, 2 tsp(s) - Peanut butter is very calorie dense, and is notoriously often under logged. Weigh your peanut butter. Chances are you're eating at least double (if not more) the amount you think you're eating

So just looking through that one meal I can see lots of places where your logging could be stronger.
(fyi, taking a look at your numbers, I could expect that this meal is probably more like 855kcals as opposed to the 549kcals that you've logged. This is only one meal and that's an additional 316kcals)

Oh and I've seen multiple entries for 0.66tbsp of olive oil. Do you have a 0.66 measure or are you eyeballing that? Because that seems like a really random number, and honestly, it makes me wonder if you're being honest with yourself and your logging.

nutmegoreo

Deviette wrote: »

Chances are you're eating more than you think. I'm just going to go through Sunday's dinner:

Sunrise - Medium Firm Tofu, 340 grams (1/5 package) - Did you weight this exactly, or did you eyeball 1/5th of a package?
Endangered Species - Dark Chocolate Almonds & Sea Salt, 1 square - 1 square can massively vary in size, weigh that square
Onion - Onion, 50 grams - Looking through I can see lots of entries for onion at 50g. Somehow I doubt that every single onion you use is exactly 50g. Don't fudge the numbers, put in exactly how much it weighed
Mushrooms, white, raw, 1 cup, pieces or slices - How tightly packed are your mushrooms? Weigh them
Cheese - Parmesan, grated, 1 tablespoon - Wonderfully dense cheese. Is that a heaped tablespoon? or flat? Also 27kcals for a tablespoon of cheese seems very low. Honestly I'd expect that to be more like 100kcals (if not more)
Egg - Egg, 1 large - You can weigh your eggs. Also 72kcals seems a little low for a large egg
Irish on the Vine Tesco - Tomatoes, 2 tomato - How big is a tomato? Weigh it
Sauce, fish, ready-to-serve, 1 tbsp - Don't use a generic entry, use the entry that matches the brand that you're using.
Peanut Butter, 2 tsp(s) - Peanut butter is very calorie dense, and is notoriously often under logged. Weigh your peanut butter. Chances are you're eating at least double (if not more) the amount you think you're eating

So just looking through that one meal I can see lots of places where your logging could be stronger.
(fyi, taking a look at your numbers, I could expect that this meal is probably more like 855kcals as opposed to the 549kcals that you've logged. This is only one meal and that's an additional 316kcals)

Oh and I've seen multiple entries for 0.66tbsp of olive oil. Do you have a 0.66 measure or are you eyeballing that? Because that seems like a really random number, and honestly, it makes me wonder if you're being honest with yourself and your logging.

The .66 Tbsp of olive oil would be 2 teaspoons. It took me a minute when I saw that.

Ereberi

Thank you everyone for your help.

I think I'm pretty precise with measurements and often will round up the numbers, but maybe I have let myself go easy. So I'm going to weight every single item, liquid included, for 2 weeks and see what happens.

As for some of the specific questions:
.66 tbsp is 2 tsp
I cut food until I get to precise measurements (like 4 oz or 100 grams)
I never eyeball, I use a scale
I use measuring spoons as normal spoons
Its true I dont always use the right brand when it's something generic but I make sure the calories match what's on the package

So I'll start measuring everything by weight and will report back. Wish me luck! Thank you! 🤞🏼

CharlieBeansmomTracey

Ereberi wrote: »

Thank you everyone for your help.

I think I'm pretty precise with measurements and often will round up the numbers, but maybe I have let myself go easy. So I'm going to weight every single item, liquid included, for 2 weeks and see what happens.

As for some of the specific questions:
.66 tbsp is 2 tsp
I cut food until I get to precise measurements (like 4 oz or 100 grams)
I never eyeball, I use a scale
I use measuring spoons as normal spoons
Its true I dont always use the right brand when it's something generic but I make sure the calories match what's on the package

So I'll start measuring everything by weight and will report back. Wish me luck! Thank you! 🤞🏼

measuring spoons should be for liquids only. and every measuring spoon will be different than other ones. I have 3 sets and they all are different by a little bit. the 1 cup size ones all have different measurements on them too its odd. you would think all of them would have the same number on them(one has like 235ml,another has 230ml.another has something like 236ml.so yeah.so that shows how much measuring cups and spoons can be off. and always weigh in grams as its more accurate than oz