Gaining weight on recc. calories

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JessLLoser
JessLLoser Posts: 235 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Hi all, I`m new to this site but not new to dieting! My main problem is this. I have been recording faithfully my calories for 4 days on this program. I gained 2 lbs in that time.

No one wants to start a diet and gain weight right away.

A little history on me. I read all the newbie posts. I assume I wasn`t eating enough. By tracking my calories over the weekend I realized on my worst day, I might just go over my cal alloted by 100 or 200. But during the week I was probably under my calories.
( I like to drink wine on the weekend) A little over on Sat nite should not result in a 2lb weight gain.

I lost weight once a year ago by doing a VLCD. I gained half of it back over 6 months, stressing about it the whole time. Now I have been mindful eating and exercising hard. I like exercise and mix strength training with cardio. I use the x box kinect Your shape 2x a week for 60 min or more. Burning at least 500 cal per session. Other days walk about 45 min to an hour, and snowboard for fun on the weekends.

I have tried Lose It! for a year with no results, before that Curves to lose the baby weight. I went three times a week and worked harder than anyone, I walked there which is a six km round trip. I lost about 8 lb. in 3 years.

I was disappointed with that so I tried the VLCD.

I wont do it again, I realized how bad it was for me and I called it the torture diet, I was really unhappy on it. Also all the advice on this site, Fat2Fit radio, and LiveStrong, the only sites I trust for weight loss give opposing advice.

My problem is it is the only way I have lost the weight so far. Since I gained weight watching my calories this weekend I am disappointed before I have even got started.

In case I have been eating too little during the week, I may go under BMR on days I exercise? I just started this and eating back your exercise cal is anathema on other sites.

My weight usually goes up on weekends and down during the week. But I end up keeping a lb or two from the weekend about every other week. My weight keeps creeping up. I want to see it creep down.

I see all of you with your tickers going down and I think it`s wonderful. I wonder how can I make it happen to me? I have been unsuccessful for more than 10 years dieting.

I will follow the reccommended calories this week and see what happens, is that your advice too?

height 5'9"
weight 183
activity level active
reccomended base cal 1800

Hope at least you can add some hope or commiseration to my situation. It sucks to gain when you are actively trying to lose.
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Replies

  • IveLanded
    IveLanded Posts: 797 Member
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    My advice is to RELAX!


    A 2lb fluctuation over a few days is NORMAL. :)


    I think you should give yourself two weeks of faithful tracking, eating right, and working and and THEN that would be a much more accurate way to judge if you need to modify what you are doing.
  • robot_potato
    robot_potato Posts: 1,535 Member
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    Give it time. You body is adjusting. It takes some time. Also rember to weigh yourself at the same time of day and only once a week. Weight can fluctuate 5 pounds in a day. I weighed in at 160 yesterday a.m., by 3pm it said 165. This morning? 160. I only record my sunday morning weigh in. Also, take measurements, they mean a lot more than the scale does. I lost .5 pounds in 2 weeks, but almost 3 inches of fat.

    An overnight weight gain is not likely. Are you tracking sodium intake? If you are taking in a lot of sodium, you should also drink more water to help flush it out.
  • chevy88grl
    chevy88grl Posts: 3,937 Member
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    I agree. Just relax. Weight fluctuations are completely and totally normal (heck, I can fluctuate up to 5lbs in ONE day!). Give your body a chance to adjust to what you're doing. Continue tracking your calories. Workout. Drink water. Get enough sleep. Just be calm and patient.
  • spammyanna
    spammyanna Posts: 871 Member
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    My advice is to RELAX!


    A 2lb fluctuation over a few days is NORMAL. :)


    I think you should give yourself two weeks of faithful tracking, eating right, and working and and THEN that would be a much more accurate way to judge if you need to modify what you are doing.

    This! Your body is adjusting to your new lifestyle. Give it time to work. I went up almost 5lbs last week, and today I am down to the lowest I've ever been. Lots of things can affect your weight, sodium intake, muscles retaining water, poop, full bladder, yada yada. Be patient, it will happen for you.
  • Aussiemel175
    Aussiemel175 Posts: 2
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    Alcohol can screw with your insulin and cause weight gain, higher sugar ones like wine are the worst, avoid alcohol where possible or if you feel you need a drink and you like spirits have it with diet sodas...
  • ilikejam33
    ilikejam33 Posts: 252 Member
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    If your activity level is set to active then it will significanlty increase your calorie goal, if you are not actually as active as the site thinks then you could be eating too much.

    I would recommend that you set your activity level to the lowest and then manually add your excercise calories using an HRM for the most accurate calorie goal.
  • Crazy4Healthy
    Crazy4Healthy Posts: 626 Member
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    I agree with what everyone has said, I sometimes find myself chasing the same lbs as well, but overall I do lose. I know this is something you may not want to hear, but I do find that alcohol (even in small amounts) can definitely throw off my weight by a few pounds. You tend to retain more water from drinking. If you are drinking on the weekends and you find that is when you gain the weight, try a weekend without any alcohol and see if it makes a difference. I found over the holidays when we had parties and stuff, I was always chasing the weekend alcohol weight the week after.
  • cakeums
    cakeums Posts: 231 Member
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    I agree, it sounds like a normal weight fluctuation to me. I went all out on St Patrick's Day, and had a lot of sodium that Monday. On Tuesday I was up 6lbs from my weigh-in, 4 days earlier. By Friday it was back under another 0.4lbs from the week before. It can be too much sodium, hormonal fluctuations (TOM and ovulation), muscles retaining water from exercise, etc.
  • alexsmith01
    alexsmith01 Posts: 350 Member
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    Could be water retention - from what I hear too much sodium can cause it, or when you exercise your body can retain water to repair itself?

    I've just started weighing myself only once a week (Saturday morning) as soon as I get up - I think this is the best for me cos it shouldn't fluctuate too much, I don't exercise on a friday generally (as I am travelling) and it's before I eat anything. At this stage I've recorded gains - but this was expected as I've been going over even maintenance calories - but will hopefully start losing from now on!
  • sherilynn65
    sherilynn65 Posts: 26 Member
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    dont let it get to you. i worked hard to lose my 5 pounds then this past weekend i went out the girlfriends to red lobster, thought i was eating good but......then we ended up going to pizza hut for supper then the next night to dairy queen, by sunday morning the scales said i had gained back 4 of those pounds, sunday i went back to eating good and counting my calories and now this morning (monday) i am back down to my 5 pounds lost. i am having some health issues but i will not let that get me down!!! just keep at it and be positive.....thats the best advice i can give. good luck
  • cristianxb1983
    cristianxb1983 Posts: 5
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    Just an advice... I weigh myself every morning as soon as I wake up, I go to the bathroom for number 1 and then I step on the scale... You will be surprised how your body changes its weight from night to morning... When you go to bed maybe you are 2 or 4 lbs up of the weight you had registered that same morning... and in the next morning you check the scale again and those 2/4 lb are gone... So.. take it easy... check regularly (every day) but take in account the weight you see every monday or sunday etc...depending on the day you want to pick...
  • cbbn11
    cbbn11 Posts: 125 Member
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    I agree, your body's weight can fluctuate all day. I find that weighing in once a week and taking measurements at the same time of day (usually when I first wake up). I really don't care about the scale as much as I do the measurements. If my inches are going down and my clothing is getting looser then I am good.
  • sugarbone
    sugarbone Posts: 454 Member
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    1) Set your activity to Sedentary. Unless you're a daily athlete it's probably true.
    2) Drink enough water and not too much sodium - water retention is evil.
    3) Don't weigh yourself more than once week, otherwise poop or food or water in your system will make you think you've gotten fatter.

    Remember... if you don't eat more than your body needs then it is impossible to gain fat. Period. Unless you have something like hypothyroidism which is still overcome-able. If you do all these things and are still gaining weight (and I mean like.. you look and feel bigger, you don't just have a 1lb poop in your colon) then it's simple... MFP has overestimated your daily expenditure and you need to eat less.

    Remember also that starting a new exercise regime will store water in your muscles until you get used to it.
  • Marll
    Marll Posts: 904 Member
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    If you lost before on a VLCD, what is so bad about going that route? Why do you say that it is torture?
  • Masterdo
    Masterdo Posts: 331 Member
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    The fluctuation is normal. The regular approximation is 3500 kcal for a pound of fat. It's pretty unlikely that while actively counting you forgot to write down 7k kcal...

    Somewhat related too, I am not really sure how MFP counts your TDEE based on those 4 categories of activity, since it doesn't seem to count exercice as part of it, but maybe putting "active" is not the best option for you to choose when setting your goal. Even if it isn't, there is no way this is to blame for the 2 pounds, more like something to think about for the long term. MFP seems to base that daily goal only on your job. The other activities you log and eat calories back on a daily basis.

    In all cases, give it some time, and good luck :)
  • bloodbank
    bloodbank Posts: 468 Member
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    1) Like others have said, fluctuations are normal. No biggie. Do what MFP tells you to do, and weigh yourself in a couple of weeks to get a picture of what's happening.

    2) When you set your profile to 'active', were you taking into account your proposed exercise or not (ie. are you 'active' in your daily life, not including exercise?) - if that setting DOES take into account the exercise you plan to do, you would not need to log your workouts and eat those extra calories (but on the flip side, if that doesn't take into account your workouts then yes, add them and eat your exercise calories.)

    3) Unless you ate 7000 calories over your maintenance, you didn't gain 2 lbs of fat. See #1.

    :flowerforyou:
  • marycmeadows
    marycmeadows Posts: 1,691 Member
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    I've lost 108.6lbs -- want to know my 'trick'? you won't believe it, it's so simple.

    eat right - eat smart - and eat enough. Low cal doesn't eat healthy. packaged stuff is not a good choice, real food is best. Minimum 1200 calories for women, usually more. I typically eat 1600-2000 calories a day.

    exercise. strength training 2-3 days a week & cardio at least 2 hours a week.


    sw 303.4 (1/1/11)
    cw 194.8
    gw 160
    29 y/o, 5'6''
  • packersfn7
    packersfn7 Posts: 62 Member
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    Don't worry about it. Stick with it and the weight will come off. It does get frustrating sometimes. I have only lost about a pound in the last 2 weeks even though I am exercising like crazy! But I can tell my body is getting smaller and that's all that counts!
  • Chickiebabe151
    Chickiebabe151 Posts: 59
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    I'm sure it's just water weight. I gained 6 pounds this week and I was way under my calories and I worked out everyday. When I work out (lifting weights) I gain a few pounds while I am sore. I guess my body holds on to water to repair itself. Also, wine will put up to 5 pounds on the scale for a few days. Go workout and drink a lot of water with lemon and you will see the scale back to normal in a day or two.
  • cakeums
    cakeums Posts: 231 Member
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    Alcohol can screw with your insulin and cause weight gain, higher sugar ones like wine are the worst, avoid alcohol where possible or if you feel you need a drink and you like spirits have it with diet sodas...

    Actually, wine is not very high in sugar by volume. I've looked into this before, for my own curiosity, and came across this well-written wine blog: http://www.elementarywine.com/. In one post, they explain how wines are classified based on their sugar content: dry wines as having less than 4g/L, medium-dry as 4-12g/L, medium-sweet as 12-45g/L, and sweet as more than 45g/L. (Their example given of a medium-sweet wine is white zinfandel - which I personally think is gross, lol - and on average it contains 20-30g/L.) One company who has sugar information posted on their website is Yellowtail; they say that their reds have about 2g of sugar per 6oz glass.

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