Dieting, working out more....gaining...

[Anonymous]

I'm probably eating 1500 calories, clean diet. No starches or processed food. Little to no caffeine and no sugar.

I've been at the gym 4-6 times a week doing weight training, pilates, yoga and biking.

Yet I'm gaining weight....wtf

[Anonymous]

"Probably" won't cut it. Measure your food.

[Anonymous]

Me too, OP. Doing MyFitnessPal, counting calories and measuring all food. I lost the first two weeks but not since. My only guess is its adjusting too high for my exercise (through FitBit). Not really sure I can cut too many more calories and stay sane. I'm eating 1600 calories a day but am very overweight.

[Anonymous]

The only thing that makes me slimmer is skipping dinner. I exercise regularly, but since turning 35, I need to skip dinner to remain the weight I like, or to lose. I do this two or three nights a week. It doesn't seem to matter how much I eat earlier in the day or how much I exercise, but going for that stretch between late lunch and breakfast is key. I learned this from my Russian whip-slim Russian cleaning lady. Try it: you can eat whatever you want before about 2 pm.

[Anonymous]

I weigh myself every morning and every night. Sometimes the difference is 4 lbs due to water retention and other factors, such as the scale being moved to a different part of the floor (which has more or less 'give'). Basically, if you are looking at anything +/- a few pounds I wouldn't consider it "gaining weight" so much as a normal fluctuation.

Have you been regularly weighing yourself enough so you have a 'trend' established? Something that shows a long term uptick? You need many data points to get things very accurate.

[Anonymous]

Stop going to the gym. Eat less calories. Do this for a couple months.

[Anonymous]

Did you have muscle before? If you didn't have much muscle before and you weren't really heavy, just not in shape, you might see some weight gain as you build muscle.

1,500 calories wouldn't be enough for most people. I'm 5'8" and normally 140 (I'm a muscular 154 right now) and if I don't *net* at least 1,500 calories after adjusting for exercise, I feel like I'll pass out. In a typical day, I eat closer to 2,500 calories and burn off 300-700 with exercise, plus 1-2 miles of walking.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The only thing that makes me slimmer is skipping dinner. I exercise regularly, but since turning 35, I need to skip dinner to remain the weight I like, or to lose. I do this two or three nights a week. It doesn't seem to matter how much I eat earlier in the day or how much I exercise, but going for that stretch between late lunch and breakfast is key. I learned this from my Russian whip-slim Russian cleaning lady. Try it: you can eat whatever you want before about 2 pm.

I've heard this, or variant on this, a lot. Dinner by five or just no dinner at all.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Stop going to the gym. Eat less calories. Do this for a couple months.

When I was hanging out with a (slender, beautiful) new friend, she showed me a video of a grossly obese woman. She said "That was me last year !" I couldn't believe it. She did not work out - all she did was portion control. She went from over 200 pounds to 130.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Stop going to the gym. Eat less calories. Do this for a couple months.

When I was hanging out with a (slender, beautiful) new friend, she showed me a video of a grossly obese woman. She said "That was me last year !" I couldn't believe it. She did not work out - all she did was portion control. She went from over 200 pounds to 130.

Was she 4'5? One does not go from "grossly obese" to slender in seventy pounds...

If you lose weight exclusively through portion control, you will lose more of your lean muscle mass. If you work out and maintain your muscle mass as much as possible you will be able to maintain your new, lower weight with higher calorie intake. I'd rather just not lose weight at all than have to eat 1400 calories a day to maintain the lower weight. It's also difficult to do, which is why people keep gaining and losing.

I'm doing a body recomposition at about 2200 calories a day (I'm about 30 lbs overweight and weightlifting, and tall), losing fat and adding muscle.

OP, throw in metabolic training circuits. Lift heavy 2-3 times a week, and do 1-2 metabolic workouts. Eat lots of protein. Packing on five pounds of muscle will burn off 25 lbs of fat in a year.

[Anonymous]

Yes do not stop working out. The benefits are so worth it. I was doing an exercise class twice a week and recently started jogging 2-3 times a week as well. Just adding in more frequent activity is helping me lose weight and feel energized.

[Anonymous]

For me, wine is the downfall. I have stopped drinking all alcohol, but that's because I'm pregnant, so now I'm going to be gaining weight even without the alcohol!!
But seriously, after a few days without drinking I am starting to miss the wine less, and I think if I would have had less wine on a regular basis, I could have stayed skinny into my late 30's instead of gaining 10 lbs!

[Anonymous]

Remember, muscle weighs far more than fat. If you want to see if a diet is working, you're better off measuring your waist than you are the lbs.

[Anonymous]

How do your clothes fit op?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:The only thing that makes me slimmer is skipping dinner. I exercise regularly, but since turning 35, I need to skip dinner to remain the weight I like, or to lose. I do this two or three nights a week. It doesn't seem to matter how much I eat earlier in the day or how much I exercise, but going for that stretch between late lunch and breakfast is key. I learned this from my Russian whip-slim Russian cleaning lady. Try it: you can eat whatever you want before about 2 pm.

+1. I know it will get shot down here, but I have tried everything and this is the only thing that works for me - going to bed semi-hungry.