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Upped the weight on some of the lifts I did last night and while at the time I felt I could have added more ... omg am I tired this morning!
Also, I need to listen to my own advice. :D When people complain about not losing weight on their eating plan, I suggest adding more calories, not less, because they're usually not eating enough, and their body is slowing down their metabolism by starting to chew up muscle.* So, naturally, I've been frustrated by being on a plateau for the past four months and it hadn't occurred to me to add more calories until last week. :) So I adjusted my target up in CalorieKing, and it's starting to come off again.***
It hadn't occurred to me before to add because back in 2007 I was losing weight at right about the calorie level I was eating until recently. I had a serious "duh!" moment this morning when walking to work and musing on the weights I lifted last night - in 2007 I was exercising very lightly, using only the recumbent bike and usually not breaking a sweat. It's not resistance exercise, so I was building endurance, not strength. This year and last, I've been exercising much harder, breaking a sweat, and doing more load-bearing exercises like the Wii Fit, the Kinect, walking, and the weights. I know during the 4-month plateau I was adding muscle (and losing some fat) because while my weight hardly changed, my measurements went down a little bit.
So add in exercising much harder, and you get the realization that duh! I need more calories than last time! So now I range from 1750-2000 calories/day. (Which, to people used to traditional dieting, seems like quite a lot! And sometimes, especially since I'm currently off sugary sodas, I actually have trouble meeting that! Here's to the bags of pecans my mom gave me at Thanksgiving, which help a great deal at almost 200 calories/ounce.)
Although I have a bit of a headache today, too, from waking up in the middle of the night and not getting back to sleep for a bit, which means the exhaustion may also be migraine-related. Toby's picking me up for lunch and I suspect we'll go to Greek House and I'll get the chicken souvlaki or a gyro and a giant thing o'fries. Or maybe the fried mushrooms. Mmmmmmmm.
* Muscle costs more, calorie-wise, than fat to maintain, so if you're eating too little your body starts reducing your muscle to reduce the number of calories you need to operate. This is how you can fuck up your metabolism by yo-yo dieting and years of very-low-calories diets. And is why you don't want to diet, in fact: it's why you work out what someone of your height, age, and activity level should be eating at your target weight and aim for that.**
** As the guys at Fat2Fit Radio point out, if you're very overweight, that final caloric point may be below your current basal metabolic rate (BMR). So you don't aim for that - you pick an intermediate goal weight whose caloric needs are above your BMR and re-adjust as you start closing in on that.
*** Where by "come off" I mean at a 1-2 lb/week rate. I don't want to lose quickly, as that's hard to maintain and is harder on your body, as you tend to get a higher proportion of muscle loss than you do when losing slowly.
Also, I need to listen to my own advice. :D When people complain about not losing weight on their eating plan, I suggest adding more calories, not less, because they're usually not eating enough, and their body is slowing down their metabolism by starting to chew up muscle.* So, naturally, I've been frustrated by being on a plateau for the past four months and it hadn't occurred to me to add more calories until last week. :) So I adjusted my target up in CalorieKing, and it's starting to come off again.***
It hadn't occurred to me before to add because back in 2007 I was losing weight at right about the calorie level I was eating until recently. I had a serious "duh!" moment this morning when walking to work and musing on the weights I lifted last night - in 2007 I was exercising very lightly, using only the recumbent bike and usually not breaking a sweat. It's not resistance exercise, so I was building endurance, not strength. This year and last, I've been exercising much harder, breaking a sweat, and doing more load-bearing exercises like the Wii Fit, the Kinect, walking, and the weights. I know during the 4-month plateau I was adding muscle (and losing some fat) because while my weight hardly changed, my measurements went down a little bit.
So add in exercising much harder, and you get the realization that duh! I need more calories than last time! So now I range from 1750-2000 calories/day. (Which, to people used to traditional dieting, seems like quite a lot! And sometimes, especially since I'm currently off sugary sodas, I actually have trouble meeting that! Here's to the bags of pecans my mom gave me at Thanksgiving, which help a great deal at almost 200 calories/ounce.)
Although I have a bit of a headache today, too, from waking up in the middle of the night and not getting back to sleep for a bit, which means the exhaustion may also be migraine-related. Toby's picking me up for lunch and I suspect we'll go to Greek House and I'll get the chicken souvlaki or a gyro and a giant thing o'fries. Or maybe the fried mushrooms. Mmmmmmmm.
* Muscle costs more, calorie-wise, than fat to maintain, so if you're eating too little your body starts reducing your muscle to reduce the number of calories you need to operate. This is how you can fuck up your metabolism by yo-yo dieting and years of very-low-calories diets. And is why you don't want to diet, in fact: it's why you work out what someone of your height, age, and activity level should be eating at your target weight and aim for that.**
** As the guys at Fat2Fit Radio point out, if you're very overweight, that final caloric point may be below your current basal metabolic rate (BMR). So you don't aim for that - you pick an intermediate goal weight whose caloric needs are above your BMR and re-adjust as you start closing in on that.
*** Where by "come off" I mean at a 1-2 lb/week rate. I don't want to lose quickly, as that's hard to maintain and is harder on your body, as you tend to get a higher proportion of muscle loss than you do when losing slowly.
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I have definitely craved more protein from lifting.
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Which reminds me to go eat some nuts or something as I just finished lifting and it was extra-hard today. :D
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I'm kind of leaning towards c) with b) as the next most likely option. I'm horrible at counting calories, so it's entirely possible that I'm eating more than I think I am, and I am definitely eating more than I was before starting to lift weights, but I'm also much hungrier. Muscles want more protein!
It does feel really weird sitting around thinking, "hey, I think I'm gaining weight instead of losing it -- I should eat more food!" though. ::g::
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It does feel really weird sitting around thinking, "hey, I think I'm gaining weight instead of losing it -- I should eat more food!" though. ::g::
Yes! It's very odd!