Cheat meal weight gain still hasn't come off

kellymcdonald7912
kellymcdonald7912 Posts: 4 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
So I had a meal on Saturday that only went over my calories by 500/600 and to this day on Wednesday I am still up almost 3lbs I have been eating and exercising within my calorie deficit I weigh everything I eat I know that eating a cheat meal or going over your calories can cause water weight but I would have thought 4/5 days later it would have sorted itself out any advice? P.s it's not my TOM

Replies

  • Hiawassee88
    Hiawassee88 Posts: 35,754 Member
    edited July 2022
    There was more talk around Cheat Meals when the keto protocol was very popular. You can do a search for Cheat Meals and find many threads. Here's one.
    https://blog.myfitnesspal.com/the-problem-with-cheat-days/

    Many members reached a point when they no longer wanted to undo their progress on a weekly basis. The best strategy was to work the foods you love into your daily goal. Then you don't feel the need to cheat. Planned cheat meals can easily become planned food benders when you get discouraged. Cheat meals turning into cheat days and lo and behold, giant chunks of time have flown out the window.

    Don't stress. You'll scare it. The weight gain. I could give you another thread but suffice it to say, stress just makes everything hold on tighter. Relax and get right back into your groove.

    You can't lose weight looking at the scale every day. It scares the fat when you check frequently and it holds on tighter. The stress response is real. The body will not release fat until it knows you're going to feed it enough to support it. Make sure to devote time to active recovery.

    You may think I'm kidding but all this matters. ;)
  • AnnPT77
    AnnPT77 Posts: 34,204 Member
    Lots and lots of things can cause a 3 pound variation in body weight on the scale, via water retention or changes in digestive contents en route to becoming waste. One of those things is not eating 500/600 calories above a calorie goal that (I'm guessing) already included a deficit (below maintenance calories) for weight loss.

    Over some small period of time, if you didn't eat roughly 10,500 calories above your maintenance calories (not just above your goal calories), or move more than 10,500 calories less than usual, or some combination, it can't be 3 pounds of fat weight, and it will drop off eventually. Sticking around for 4-5 days isn't unheard of.

    Also, it's not TOM per se (i.e., the actual period) when women can see weight gain. Patterns are individual, but it can be if the actual period is near, if it's late (even without pregnancy), at ovulation, or maybe some other time. Bodies are weird. If you haven't been at this for several months, tracking long enough to know your personal patterns, it's hard to say that it isn't hormonal.

    A few other things that can increase water retention: Head cold, allergy, other minor illness; minor injury healing; new exercise or increased exercise duration/intensity/frequency; hot weather/environment; more salt or carbs than usual (even if a perfectly sensible amount of either); . . . and much, much more. Constipation or just increasing dietary fiber can do it on the waste-in-transit side of things.

    If you haven't read it, this is good:

    https://physiqonomics.com/the-weird-and-highly-annoying-world-of-scale-weight-and-fluctuations

    Lots of other MFP-ers discussed their experiences with it here:

    https://community.myfitnesspal.com/en/discussion/10683010/the-weird-and-highly-annoying-world-of-scale-fluctuations/p1

    Give it more time, couple of weeks to a month even, if you know you didn't change eating/moving enough for it to be a fat change.
  • SueInAz
    SueInAz Posts: 6,592 Member
    You'd have to eat nearly 10,000 calories over your allotment to gain 3 pounds of fat. Your three pounds are likely water gain due to excess sodium. Just keep drinking water and watch your salt intake for a few days.

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