Weight fluctuations can be so frustrating
Addictead
Posts: 66 Member
I've been trying to lose some regain from maintenance for about two weeks now, All was going fine I got down to 132 from 133.6. Then I had a maintenance day where I ate 1700 which isn't unusual for me, I've done it many many times before without issue because it's maintenance. Since then I've rapidly gone back up to 133.2/133.4 and have been there for several days
Not my first rodeo I KNOW it's water fluctuations, I KNOW I didn't eat enough to gain almost 2 pounds. but it's been 4 days and it's not going away which is super annoying because it looks like I haven't lost anything and I'm back to my starting weight
. I also feel smaller it's just the scale won't agree!! Maybe TOM will be early this month because I always retain a pound or two before PMS, I dunno going to try to drink lots of water today and see how it goes
Not my first rodeo I KNOW it's water fluctuations, I KNOW I didn't eat enough to gain almost 2 pounds. but it's been 4 days and it's not going away which is super annoying because it looks like I haven't lost anything and I'm back to my starting weight
. I also feel smaller it's just the scale won't agree!! Maybe TOM will be early this month because I always retain a pound or two before PMS, I dunno going to try to drink lots of water today and see how it goes 6
Replies
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I would love to say you get used to it, but I haven't yet lol. I've been maintaining +/- 3lbs for some time now and it's still disheartening at times to see the extra weight, but like you said, I know it isn't fat. That increased water takes care of it pretty quickly for me.0
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My advice...though it’s hard to do? Remain calm. Fluctuations play with our minds. In my case, eating more carbs than usual or something salty adds weight and it takes forever to drop again. I’ve begun using Happy Scale again. It calms the fluctuation and lets me breathe! 🤷🏼♀️
I was told that since our bodies are machines weight fluctuates by the hour.... wish it weren’t so, but that’s the way. Do your clothes feel tighter? If not, I think the 2 pounds are of little concern.... 5 or more, I’d be logging religiously again and cutting back.3 -
Keep in mind that you will eventually be the weight you've earned. Just not necessarily on the day you earned it.
Weight gain, aside from temporary water weight fluctuations from, as you mentioned, a woman's cycle or a higher sodium meal, can also be influenced by retained water for muscle repair after exercise, or something as simple as the weight of food/waste in your digestive system.
Here's a link that might be helpful:
http://physiqonomics.com/the-weird-and-highly-annoying-world-of-scale-weight-and-fluctuations/2 -
trend weights can be really helpful is situations like this. At least I think so.
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oh I SO empathize with this! I'm heavy enough to be able to set my loss at a 2 lb/week rate, and yet, even though i've been doing very well at sticking to calorie goal for hte last few weeks, the weight is only inching off. But the proof came this morning that it's water weight - I dropped 2 pounds over night and came in this morning where I'd expect my rate to be.
But even knowing its water doesn't help the frustration levels! I can only guess that a lot of the retention has to do with the heat and high humidity we're experiencing right now - I've never done well with high heat or humidity.3 -
It was helpful for me to start thinking of maintenance as a range instead of one specific number. As long as I'm within my 5 pound range there's no reason to stress or do anything differently. When I go over my 5 pounds, I know it's time to tighten up my eating habits. This mindset change eased my anxiety and frustration tremendously.6
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YES. I had 5 pounds of vacation and hormone water weight that took a month to go away.0
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Y'know, my impression is that in maintenance my water weight from an over-goal day(s) tends to hang around a little longer than it used to when I was losing. Maybe it just seems that way because there isn't offsetting fat loss happening behind the scenes, maybe it's my imagination, maybe it's some other weird thing. Dunno.
Personally, I don't care that the water-weight/digestive-contents drop that used to take a couple of days now seems to take 3 or 4, now that I've seen it enough times to know that it's my current normal. Bottom line: If I didn't eat enough calories to gain the pounds, they're not fat pounds, and they'll leave.
Arguing with or getting fussed about how reality works just adds stress, without any compensating benefits. It's optional, so I'm not gonna do it.
"People are disturbed not by things, but by the views which they take of them." - Epictetus6 -
I feel your frustration! Trend tracking can help, but I know for my body, oftentimes extra water weight can take upwards of 5+ days to go away - that's long enough to completely throw a trend out of whack.
My best advice is to just "trust the process" but I can completely relate to the frustration when it day after day, too!0 -
'Tis no rhyme or reason to daily weight fluctuations. Best to just take them in stride and accept them as the inscrutable nature of weight loss.
Here is a chart of my calories consumed during the past 30 days.
Few additional notes: On most days, I did 25-35 minutes of cardio at the same level of intensity as every other day. Second, as per doctor's suggestion, I keep my sodium pegged around 2,000 mg per day. Finally, everything I eat either has a nutrition label or is weighed on a scale which is accurate to 1 gram and every morsel is logged. Meals are eaten at the same time every day: 11 am and 7 pm, with IF through to the next 11 am meal.
In other words, I eat and exercise consistently. I'm a creature of habit and routine, Our 3 cats and I are very in sync on the desirability of every day pretty much being the same..
Now, here is my MFP weight loss chart for the same period (with a trend line in red, which I inserted). I weigh in at the same time everyday, by the way. I lost 10.2 pounds, which is, interestingly, within 0.3 of a pound of what MFP said it would be based on their CICO formulas (I should've lost 9.9 according to them). However, notice the erratic daily fluctuations.
So a good question would be, why did my weight suddenly shoot up 4.2 pounds one day, when I was eating the same amount of calories with the same amount of sodium at the same time (7 pm)? The answer is "who knows?" Over a month or longer, the weigh-ins converge to what MFP predicts, but over 5-6 days anything can happen. Up, down, sideways - it's pretty random.
Ergo, better to just roll with the punches day to day and trust the plan. The plan works.18 -
183lbs yesterday>180.2lbs this morning. Couldn't help but think of this thread lol.4
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I've been doing a couple of weeks now (only 8 days using MFP though) and noticed the same. Up, down, up, down. But inevitably it keeps going down after the odd spike, which is the most important thing. It's definitely due to drinking more water, as I'm exercising a lot more than usual. Still, yeah it's bloody annoying.
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What I'm most frustrated with is the seeming inconsistency of my bathroom scale.0
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There has been a lot of threads about scale positioning on the floor, make sure the floor is dead flat0
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OMG this is my life right now! My holiday weight has barely gone down because I’m constipated, I have inflammation, I have DOMS and I’ve eaten a lot of carbs. That’s a lot of water weight. I was meant to be in a 500-600 calorie deficit because I’ve got 30 lbs to lose and I ended up being in a 350 calorie deficit! No wonder the rate of loss is so slow plus annoying weight isn’t going down. I have a party in 3 weeks which I want to lose some weight for. Some how we’ll get through this...0
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Consider using a trending app like Happy Scale or Libra. You enter your Weight daily and it gives you a trend line to smooth things out.0
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Try 1600 and cleaner food....9
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This is why I have decided to stay off the scale for a couple of months. My fluctuations last weeks on end and then I just give up.2
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I hear you. So many things can affect our weight and it can be difficult to ignore. I use Trendweight and I still get frustrated from time to time. On July 13th, I weighed 114.8 pounds but this morning I weighed 121.1 pounds; a 6.3 pound "gain" in eight days. I know I didn't eat that many calories over maintenance but it's still annoying especially when the fluctuation is so wild.2
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Do any of these apps also graphically track carbs, protein & calories?0 -
Maxematics wrote: »I hear you. So many things can affect our weight and it can be difficult to ignore. I use Trendweight and I still get frustrated from time to time. On July 13th, I weighed 114.8 pounds but this morning I weighed 121.1 pounds; a 6.3 pound "gain" in eight days. I know I didn't eat that many calories over maintenance but it's still annoying especially when the fluctuation is so wild.
Newer MFP user. Started out tracking protein, trying to up those calories... yesterday, ate at a deficit (as typical) ... gained 1.2 pounds.
Yes, carbs up to 200-210G ... is that considered a lot for a 240-280 pound man trying to lose? What's a realistic low-carb goal - 100G per day? I started out eating too little, with the adjustment carbs jumped.
(Reading here I realized the 3G of H2O that attach to the 1G of carbs really multiplies the effect on weight, likely causing the 1.2# gain.)
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TallGent66 wrote: »Maxematics wrote: »I hear you. So many things can affect our weight and it can be difficult to ignore. I use Trendweight and I still get frustrated from time to time. On July 13th, I weighed 114.8 pounds but this morning I weighed 121.1 pounds; a 6.3 pound "gain" in eight days. I know I didn't eat that many calories over maintenance but it's still annoying especially when the fluctuation is so wild.
Newer MFP user. Started out tracking protein, trying to up those calories... yesterday, ate at a deficit (as typical) ... gained 1.2 pounds.
Yes, carbs up to 200-210G ... is that considered a lot for a 240-280 pound man trying to lose? What's a realistic low-carb goal - 100G per day? I started out eating too little, with the adjustment carbs jumped.
(Reading here I realized the 3G of H2O that attach to the 1G of carbs really multiplies the effect on weight, likely causing the 1.2# gain.)
If those carbs didn't take you over a calorie deficit and beyond maintenance, you didn't gain fat, just water weight.
For health, body composition, and energy level, good nutrition matters: Enough protein, healthy fats, veggies & fruits.
If you're diabetic, managing carbs may be important. If you're one of the people for whom eating more carbs spikes appetite, managing carbs may be important. If you're one of the people whose energy level tanks with insufficient carbs, managing carbs may be important.
Water weight isn't fat, so I'd suggest ignoring it as meaningless, and letting it fluctuate. And unless you're a person who has a reason to manage carbs, I'd suggest just focusing on eating the things you need for good nutrition, and letting carbs fall where they may.
I'm 5'5", weight in the mid-130s, year 3 of maintenance. I eat around 200g of carbs most days, though I don't have any particular goal for carbs (I target protein, fat, and veggie/fruit servings minimums, plus calorie goal). Given that, I don't see anything per se wrong with 200g or so of carbs for someone much larger.
Just my opinion.4 -
I hate the scale! Just this morning, I got up and weighed. Then I drank a cup of coffee. Just for grins, I weighed again. 3 pounds heavier. It's crazy.1
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TallGent66 wrote: »Maxematics wrote: »I hear you. So many things can affect our weight and it can be difficult to ignore. I use Trendweight and I still get frustrated from time to time. On July 13th, I weighed 114.8 pounds but this morning I weighed 121.1 pounds; a 6.3 pound "gain" in eight days. I know I didn't eat that many calories over maintenance but it's still annoying especially when the fluctuation is so wild.
Newer MFP user. Started out tracking protein, trying to up those calories... yesterday, ate at a deficit (as typical) ... gained 1.2 pounds.
Yes, carbs up to 200-210G ... is that considered a lot for a 240-280 pound man trying to lose? What's a realistic low-carb goal - 100G per day? I started out eating too little, with the adjustment carbs jumped.
(Reading here I realized the 3G of H2O that attach to the 1G of carbs really multiplies the effect on weight, likely causing the 1.2# gain.)
At your weight, fluctuations of 1.2 lbs are nothing, really. Could just be a bit more food in your intestines waiting to come out Or a slightly cooler night with less water weight loss while sleeping. Or a bit more stress during daytime, higher temperatures in general, a bit more salt, longer public transport ride, and any other reason.
I just came back from a music festival. Ate fairly normal, probably at maintenance. Yeah, instead of my mostly veggie-based food I had rather salty Lebanese barbecued chicken and hummus. And a bag of crisps when I came home. That's no actual fat reason to be 700gr heavier
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Sorry, I completely missed this. Libra does not and I only use mfp for tracking macros and calories...TallGent66 wrote: »
Do any of these apps also graphically track carbs, protein & calories?
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I swing back and forth now that I'm closer to goal weight which doesn't make a lot of sense. I overate on the 4th and went up 6lbs for a couple weeks and ended up having a large whoosh at the end. I was getting real discouraged so I stopped weighing every day. If the scale is up despite doing everything right and it's getting to me I take a break from it.0
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Maxematics wrote: »I hear you. So many things can affect our weight and it can be difficult to ignore. I use Trendweight and I still get frustrated from time to time. On July 13th, I weighed 114.8 pounds but this morning I weighed 121.1 pounds; a 6.3 pound "gain" in eight days. I know I didn't eat that many calories over maintenance but it's still annoying especially when the fluctuation is so wild.
Just to update, it's been two days since I've posted this and I'm already back down to 118. I agree with @Katmary71 about the swinging being more back and forth at goal weight. When I started losing weight at 139 pounds, I saw a decrease on the scale every day; it wasn't until 121 pounds that I finally saw a day with no change. Everyone is different with regard to that though. I personally never had fluctuations, especially such wild ones, until I hit the 11X weight range. Now I'm all over the place depending on what I eat and what part of my menstrual cycle I'm in.1
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