Why am I gaining weight?
 

I am 19 years old, 5' 1, and my starting weight was 105 pounds. I know this is a healthy weight but I would still like to lose a few pounds of excess body fat and just tone up. I started dieting 3 weeks ago. For the 1st two weeks I ate around 900 calories per day and exercised for an hour per day. Over the course of 10 days my weight went down to 101 pounds. 4 days later though, at the 2 week mark, my weight shot up to 103 pounds without me changing my calorie consumption or workout regime. I read online that if you eat too few calories your metabolism slowing down causing weight loss to cease. After learning this I decided to up my calories to 1350 per day. This number is about 400 below what my maintenance calories should be. For the past week I have been eating 1350 calories per day and continuing to work out for an hour per day (cardio and weight lifting). I weighed myself this morning and the scale read 105.5 pounds! So, what is going on!? I should be losing weight but instead I am steadily gaining. I am so confused about what is happening right now and I am beyond frustrated.



I would appreciate any insightful tips. Thank you for reading.

Maybe you do not need to lose weight. Considering your height and your weight, your body may just be defending itself agaiinst a weight loss which is not necessary. I think the wise thing to do would be to eat healthily, to exercise and to stop obssessing... In the long run, you will keep thinner that way than if you start dieting at your age. What does the rest think?

It could be water weight, could be muscle gain, could be a number of things. Just keep doing what you're doing in order to get yourself toned up, unless someone else has some more insightful information that's what I would do!

More than likely it's muscle being bulked up from the weight training. In my opinion I think an hour of cardio a day is excessive for someone of your size and your body might also be going into starvation mode. I would focus more on the weights (to tone) and a little less cardio. I'm glad you kicked up your calories a bit, 900 is definitely not enough.

When eating near the minimum daily calorie amount, most people forget about net calories. Net calories are how many calories your body uses AFTER exercise calories are subtracted. For example, if you are eating 1350, but burning 400 calories during exercise, your net total is only 950. Your net should never be below 1200, so even though you are eating 1350, your still below the 1200 that your body actually needs.

Since you are probably only trying to lose 5ish pounds, toning might actually be what your body needs as opposed to cardio. It's amazing how two different people can weigh the exact same amount, but look completely different because one person has decided to focus on toning and build more muscle. If you start weight training and toning, you might gain a pound or two, but you will shrink and lose inches and look completely different (and look way better in a bathing suit!)

Also, when really close to your goal weight, losing pounds can be very very difficult. Since you are a good weight for your height, I would try focusing on weight training. Take measurements before hand and after a month, take measurements again and I am sure you will see that your body has lost inches and toned (even if you only lose 1 pound!). Less reps, higher weight is the way to go!

I highly doubt my weight gain is due to increased muscle mass. It takes females a lot longer than a few weeks to gain enough muscle to account for weight gain especially while on a calorie deficit. I do not do an hour of cardio per day at the gym. I do about 30 minutes of cardio and 30 minutes of weight lifting.

I think it is too soon to assess some real results. Just keep doing what are you doing, keep a close eye on your calorie intake and give it two more weeks. Then show us the results and maybe we can discover what is going on. ;)

Well, barring the muscle gain that you eschew as the reason for this, the only other unknown variable here to us is WHAT you're eating; could you give us an example of a typical day's meals?

this is a typical day:
breakfast: whole wheat oatmeal(150 cals)
Snack: fruit(80 cals), vegtable soup(150 cals)
Lunch: coffee with 1 sugar and skim milk (25 cals), Egg salad sandwich(350 cals)
Snack:nonfat cottage cheese(70 cals)
Dinner: usually some type of frozen dinner(350 cals).
Snack: cereal(150 cals)
Sometimes I will have 300 calories worth of chocolate worked into my 1350. I kind of have a weakness for chocolate.

I am in college and I am taking a nutrition class. We learned in class a few weeks ago that it doesn't matter what you are eating with regard to weight loss. Of course eating healthy foods is better for us due to vitamins and minerals but as long as we have a calorie deficit, we should lose weight. It doesn't matter where the calories come from.

As far as I know, muscle mass actually increases pretty quickly. Especially if you've never weight trained before.

Also by that logic, Julie, I should be able to eat a 1000 calorie burger a day with a drink and fries, and nothing else, and still lose weight. (while working out and building a deficit) Unfortunately, I doubt that's true.

Yes and no. Well it is true that most can lose on a calorie deficiency, the vitamins and minerals that help fuel the body do aid in weight loss. Some days I eat crap the entire day and stay at my calorie limit (1350-1600), others I eat healthy foods. However, if I was to eat crappy food all day everyday, even staying at my calorie limit, I probably wouldn't lose nearly as well due to the mineral deficiency, the excess carbs and sugars as well as the high sodium content.

Being closer to your goal weight generally means having to give it 110% just to lose the last few pounds (which sucks). When our body is lacking in particular food areas, it will hold onto body fat, even when eating the correct number of calories. So yes, you aim for a calorie deficiency, but no, you can not just eat crap all day, still eat the right number of calories, and except to lose regularly.

However, in most cases when people are trying to lose weight and are good at tracking their calorie intake, they usually also eat healthier foods as well because if they don't, they reach their calorie limit way to quickly.

Ha ha. I won't argue the point, as simplistic as it sounds- I'll just point out that apparently, your body doesn't agree with the school's hypothesis. So, maybe you should do a bit of confirmation bias!

As for your foods of choice, I'm going to have to be blunt and say they're terrible (from a nutrition as well as a weight-loss standpoint). To make things a bit more "college bound" for you, I will break down the problems (with solutions) with the example diet you have provided:

breakfast: whole wheat oatmeal(150 cals)- No no no! First and foremost, nutrition-wise the balance of Omega 6s to 3s in oatmeal is a dastardaly 30:1. Oatmeal has been long touted as great for heart health, but more and more studies are coming out confirming the damage of such imbalance, and the glycemic load of grains is not good for heart health, blood sugar, or weight gain. You should take on a better adage, i.e. "breakfast is the most important meal of the day." If you're not doing some ridiculous workout when you're awakening, you should make this your most calorie-dense meal of the day (that doesn't mean go crazy, but you don't seem to have a problem with that as you limit calories, anyway) A better choice would be two eggs with some manner of leafy greens or leafy green salad. That way you get the fiber (or more than the fiber) you'd be getting with oatmeal without the high glycemic load and omega imbalance of oatmeal. Plus, the added COMPLETE protein will assist in weight loss and you'll be at about the same amount of calories you were before (150); though again, I'd personally do more for the "most important meal of the day."

Snack: fruit(80 cals), vegtable soup(150 cals); this is actually fine, just be sure the vegetable soup (if not homemade) is not filled with a bunch of hard-to-pronounce preservatives or, is as especially the case in commercial soup brands, sodium. One other commenter mentioned water retention; ills of that like come about in the company of excess sodium. Still, fruit is a great choice.

Lunch: coffee with 1 sugar and skim milk (25 cals), Egg salad sandwich(350 cals); Don't think I have to give a lecture on coffee, as we all know what caffeine does to adenosine receptors in our brains now don't we? Add the sugar to that, and well...you know. The egg salad sandwich could be good and could be bad, depending on its components. Again, grains are definitely not only the enemy to weight loss, but to general overall health. You'd be better (hate to sound redundant) using leafy greens as your carb of choice. Better in nutrients, fiber, and calories than any bread will ever be, from white to whole wheat 1000-grain (or whatever they're advertising these days to make people think bread is healthy)

Snack:nonfat cottage cheese(70 cals); Just have the full-fat variety, really. The efficacy of low fat, low cholesterol diets has even been called into question by the "officials;" the American Heart Association published a study (will furnish if necessary) likening certain illnesses (amongst them atherosclerosis) to lowfat low-cholesterol diets. I know you're trying to keep kcals down, but honestly; the difference in a serving isn't enough to affect your weightloss goals.

Dinner: usually some type of frozen dinner(350 cals); again, NO. Too many preservatives. Even the organic type foods have a certain amount of potentially harmful preservatives allowed in them. Plus, it's highly dependent on the type of carb, type of meat (if you can call whatever is in those things meat), and the glycemic load or fat content is in the particular meal. In general, you want to avoid these things. Better option? Boil or broil some fresh fish and half of a sweet potato, maybe even with some curry or turmeric or something to up the anti-inflammatory value while helping you with weight loss.

Snack: cereal(150 cals); Nope. Again, grains. They almost instantly metabolize to glucose, and excess glucose is excess glycogen. Excess glycogen gets stored as fat for cell-fuel later. Go instead for a 150-calorie serving of macadamia nuts. Good omega 3 to 6 value, hunger-satisfying fat, and doesn't metabolize to junk within seconds.

Sometimes I will have 300 calories worth of chocolate worked into my 1350. I kind of have a weakness for chocolate; No judgment here, I completely understand as a sweet-tooth myself! My suggestion is to do what I have done (Hear me out, this may seem impossible); I buy 100% unsweetened baking chocolate (Ghirardelli or whatever you have available). I've found that by itself, a couple of squares is actually surprisingly good, but I also sometimes have a square or two with a dab of (heavily flax-seed supplemented) peanut butter, or eat it together with a banana slice. I think you'll concur that 300 calories of sugared chocolate isn't agreeing with your weight loss efforts.

Anyway, hope all this helps! Also hope I don't come off as pompous or condescending, but tough love; y'know? Your weight really sounds fine, though your food choices should take a bit more consideration in my vainglorious opinion. Ha ha.

I personally do not see anything wrong with grains (from a personal and nutritional point of view) as long as you are not eating white bread, nor eating a whole loaf a day. Having an egg sandwich on two slices of whole wheat bread is not going to cause you to gain weight, not lose weight, or go into cardiac arrest. If you make your own bread or buy bread with minimal processing, I think it can aid in weight loss as this has worked wonders for me. If I had to cut out all my grains and eat leafy greens only instead, I'd go on a giant binge. A lot of people do cut out grains completely, which is great for them, but I don't think telling someone that their diet sucks because they decided to have oatmeal (which you will find nearly half of the people on this forum eat oatmeal for breakfast and have lost a significant amount of weight) or an egg sandwich is helpful unless they are posting about how to cut out grains from there life.

I appreciate your advice but saying my diet is terrible is a huge exaggeration. Its not like I am eating nothing but french fries and milkshakes all day. I am trying hard to be healthy. I live in a college dorm and I don't have a kitchen. I only eat foods that have nutrition labels on them so I can count my calories accurately. So, my diet basically consists of anything i can cook in a microwave like oatmeal and frozen dinners(I always eat the "Amy's" organic frozen dinners which aren't as unhealthy as other brands and are preservative free), the prepared sandwiches at the dining places(like egg salad sandwiches, turkey sandwiches and, veggie wraps), salads, yogurt, and cottage cheese.
What is wrong with grains? Everything we eat turns to glucose in our bodies. If grains were so awful, why would the USDA recommend that we consume about 6 servings per day? According to my nutrition textbook, there is no real evidence suggesting that consuming low gi foods contribute to weight loss or consuming high gi foods contribute to weight gain.
As for the coffee, I forgot to mention that I drink decaf. I don't like the affect caffeine has on me. Also, 1 serving of sugar isn't going to harm me as it has only 16 calories and 4 grams of sugar.

Muscle weighs more than fat. Don't go off of solely your weight. Go off of how fit you are and how healthy you are. Weight is not always the answer.

Okay, okay; I figured I'd get some anger from some folks. Let me rephrase a few things.

First off, we're talking infinitesimal weight changes here; i.e. you're trying to shave off a few pounds where you already have a trim/acceptable figure. That in mind, most of what I said may seem exaggerated, but in an effort to "do everything we can" to assess the situation and hopefully help you lose weight, we have to look at all these things. I didn't mean to come off like you are "eating french fries all day," as you aren't coming close.

Grains: Sorry, folks, you can't show me any grain product that is going to beat a vegetable, particularly a leafy green one, in calories, dietary fiber, glycemic index, and omega 6 to 3 value (which again, is absolutely awful in oatmeal). I'm not saying a slice of bread here or there's going to kill you, but hey; you're trying to trim the fat and what you're doing isn't working for you. Just because the "USDA says so" doesn't make it agree with one's body. The USDA is often well behind the curb, and definitely so in this case as it not only advocates 3 servings of dairy, but 3 servings of low-fat dairy, of which I'm certain there are plenty of studies damning the casein and opiates of milk for allergies and addictions they cause, as well as (again) the inefficacy of low-fat and no fat diets in ending obesity, diabetes, et cetera. Omega imbalance, for one, hasn't even hit their radar. If you look at a scatter plot of difference in American rates of heart disease and say, Inuit and eastern respective rates of heart disease in that last category (omega fats), you'll see the regression line has very little variance. Seems like the USDA oughtta get on such powerful evidence. Rant off, do you honestly think 6-11 servings a day of bread is a healthy choice?

Perhaps there isn't any causation currently linking glycemic index and obesity, I'd have to go look at some studies, but there certainly is an inverse relationship between weight and consumption of low glycemic foods.

As for the "not having a kitchen," I must say (maybe rudely, ha ha) that I find that a cop out. Macadamia nuts and most fruits and vegetables are pretty ready-to-eat, and if you have a microwave you can steam them and even fish for that matter. There's tuna and sardines in cans, you know, whatever. I just think frozen, packaged food is a no-go. I might have an Amy's meal now and again, as well, but I'm not sure I purchased them for their ease of use when, in all honesty, fruits and vegetables are easier. Not that I don't trust Amy, but you're definitely going to see something on that ingredient label that you wouldn't have put in there had you made the dish yourself. All of this is pretty unrelated to weight loss I guess, me rambling about my hard-arsed view on nutrition mostly, but hey.

Anyway, not trying to turn this into the debate it has turned into. Hope you will take me up on some of the suggestions, and lose those (or maybe "that") pound(s) you're tryin' to! I'll take back the "terrible," in any case.

I found no real evidence stating that diets lower in omega 6 fatty acids and diets higher in omega 3 fatty acids contribute to weight loss. I read a lot about how omega 3s help with inflammation therefore lowering the risk of heart disease and helping with joint pain. There are tons of possible benefits of omega 3s but a lot of the "benefits" are not confirmed. And I can't steam vegetables or eat macadamia nuts, sardines, and tuna. I am on a meal plan so I can only buy foods that the food store at my school sells. The store happens to have Amy's frozen dinners.

Oh, I didn't mean to imply omega 3s have anything to do with weight loss; you're right, they're more targeted toward controlling inflammation. I just wanted to caution you against eating a food like oatmeal, as a general rule of health.

By all means, eat the Amy's; I really am unsure why you can't go to a store and buy the simple things I mentioned, but I do know what being in college is like (budget, budget, budget) so I could see variables that might be stopping you.

I think we're at square one again, though; either your body simply refuses to get any more spindly with the healthful amount of calories (deficit be damned) or you're taking in more chocolate than you're telling us; heh heh. Wouldn't blame you, but if it's the prior (especially if you're weight training at the gym) then I wouldn't bother trying to force it.

Have you considered high-intensity interval training?

I don't have any money. That is why I can't go to a store and buy food. I am stuck with the stuff I can get with my "points". (Money allotted to me to spend on food that my school offers).

I am definitely eating 1350 calories per day with maybe 250-300 of those calories being devoted to "junk food". Maybe the nutrition labels I am reading are inaccurate, but there isn't really anything I can do about that. And I do interval training on the elliptical. 2 minutes at 60-70% effort followed by a minute of 80-90% effort.

i don't know. I am just going to keep doing what I have been doing for the next few weeks. I find it hard to believe that i shot my metabolism by eating 900 calories for 2 weeks but, maybe my metabolism is still recovering.

You dropped 4 pounds within 10 days because you were eating far less than usual-- hence, less water weight and food weight in your body. Most of this loss would not have been fat. When you started eating more, the water weight & food weight was back, pushing the scale weight back up. Additionally, when you first begin weight training, you are apt to retain water in your muscles while they repair themselves, and because you were eating more, you would have increased glycogen storage in your muscles... All of this would cause you to weigh more in terms of scale weight.

Three weeks is no time at all. Fat loss when you are already small takes more time. Step back and take a breath and trust that results will come eventually! (And yes, as you know, calories in/calories out is what it boils down to, so keep at it.) Also, taking measurements is a good idea (waist, hips, bust, etc), as well as photos. Measurements going down or looking better in pics is a good indicator of progress.

If I can add my own 2 cents, if I were you, I wouldn't be dieting right now. If you want to "tone up," I assume that what you want is to build a little muscle and lose a little fat. If you are just starting weight training for the first time, or first getting serious/consistent about it, you're likely to have a 6-month window at the beginning where you can build muscle more easily than people who have been training for longer (these are the so-called "newbie gains"). You will gain more muscle if you're eating at maintenance than if you eat at a deficit (at a deficit, you're likely to build very little, if any; you could even lose muscle, if you're not lucky, and if you're not eating enough protein). Frankly, I'd spend at least a few months eating more, to maximize newbie gains, then work on losing the fat after that. Sometimes we want to drop weight NOW, but I think it's worth it to see the bigger picture-- what's 3-6 months? It'll be gone in a flash.

Final thought: don't know what you're doing with weight training, but a well-structured, consistent exercise plan will yield the best results. If you're just doing "whatever" in the gym, you might look for a good plan. :) Good luck!

Oh, and one more thing: if you're not weighing/measuring your food, you may be taking in significantly more calories than you think you are. A good primer:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JVjWPclrWVY

So if you continue to not see results (and I mean in a month or two), you may want to consider that as a possibility.

Thank you for your advice. I watched that video and I was surprised that a serving size is actually a little under the 1/2 cup measuring cup. I thought if you fill the measuring cup exactly to the top, that would be the proper serving. Why do the grams and measuring cup not correlate exactly?