Massive weight gain in two weeks

[nickychick]

Hi there

I just wanted to send a message out to the community and find out if anyone is finding it hard to maintain. I have finished re-feeding about 8 weeks ago and have just been on holiday and have found I have put on about 15kg's in two weeks. This seems VERY excessive weight gain to me for the food I was eating, my husband who is slim-medium sized ate the same food as I did but with added indulgences plus carb heavy beer and gained no weight.

Now I was on holiday so was more relaxed with my eating than usual but didnt eat the eqivilant to gain that amount of weight. As I was in the mediteranian I followed a similar diet to what they eat, below details the average day for me:

Breakfast
Bowl of greek yoghurt with sweetner, x1 slice of bread of toast with banana or bowl of fruit with oats soaked in low fat milk, raisins, nuts

Lunch
Grilled fish and Greek salad with olive oil and x2 slices of bread, fruit like strawberry's/cherries or peach

Dinner
Grilled meat- chicken/ assorted fish/ steak with salad of tomatoes and cucumber x1-x2 slices of bread
2-3 large glasses of wine (but not every day)

Dessert and snacks
Protien bar, dried figs, some chocolate nuts and gelato (but not everyday)


Now I know this isnt angelic but I cant reconcile how I could put on 15kg's from eating this way. I wanted to enjoy my holiday and was very active everyday (rock climing, swimming, hiking, kayaking, canyoning) so ate more than I would at home plus the added wine, nuts and gelato but cant figure out why my body would react so badly. I felt that I needed the extra carbs so I had the energy I needed during the day for the activity level I was achieving.

I am rather upset about the whole thing and was wondering if anyone could shed some light on the MASSIVE gain. It seems like my body has just freaked out and held on to everything (plus more) that I ate. Does anyone have any similar experiences or advice they can give?

xx nicole

[Kohinoor]

Hi Nicky,

Aww, that sounds pretty frightening, eh? Now, I don't know what might be causing this, but here's a bit of a checklist.

1. Did you FLY to/from your holiday destination? (Air travel is notorious for having your body hold water, upset your body balance, etc)

2. During Refeed, did ANY of the foods you listed provoke ANY kind of reaction when you added them? e.g. bloating, stomach pain, uptick in weight (by 0.5Kg or more - don't worry about 200g or so...)

3. If two doesn't apply, did your short time on Refeed allow you to try those foods (it is too short to try EVERYTHING, but that is what "baby steps into Maintenance" is all about )

4. If you didn't try all of those foods in Refeed, were any/some of them a "first time" on Maintenance, or had your tried them in the 6 weeks prior to your Holiday? On your first try, were there any body symptoms (bloating, etc) that can have you "watch out" for them in future?

5. Were you applying "Maintenance rules" when eating e.g. don't eat carbs first in any meal, don't eat sweets without having carbs first, and eat your sweet within a certain time-frame, etc.)

6. With all of that hiking, rock-climbing, it is LIKELY to have added weight anyway - some of it will be muscle, and some will be water (to help repair the muscles after a hard day hiking).

A BIG clue would be - how are your clothes fitting today? 15Kgs is 2.5 Sizes, so, if your Size hasn't changed that much, this may indicate muscle weight and not the "Fat Factory" kicking into life again...

7. Could it be "something else" as yet unknown? Is "the patter of tiny feet" a future likelihood for you and your family?

Keep in mind, that any new foods won't always show an adverse effect within 24 hours, Sometimes the symptoms show up 2 days later, or more.

Stress will affect adversely, so try to be calm about this - there could well be an explanation that is little to worry about,

Koh

[Kristine..]

Hi NickyChick

Welcome to the Forum

15 kilos in two weeks is certainly a lot of weight

You have been eating a high level of trigger foods but please tell us more about yourself

How obese were you before?

How many crispbread and how many fruits per day while on the weight loss program?

We are all recovering obesiacs http://newyouforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=3707 and the maintenance part of the program is akin to the physiotherapy required after, say, a compound fracture of the leg

We have to take it easy and it may take more than one attempt to get maintenance 'right' for us

If we try to run before we can walk we are asking for trouble. But the trouble is, we don't know the state of our healing until it is put to the test

Obesity is a disease, or at the very least, a malfunction. Just because we have lost the weight doesn't mean that we have 'healed' the disease, we have just got the weight under control

Putting on weight when we weigh 85 kilos is like 'pfft! Another 5 kilos, what a nuisance!' But putting 5 kilos onto a body weighing 60 kilos is a whole clothing size, highly visible and quite upsetting when we have taken weeks and months of diligence to lose that dratted 5 kilos in the first place

Did you know that the official weight measurement of clouds (in the sky) is in 'elephants'? As in, that cloud weighs 35.3 elephants.

I have found that if I equate food and drinks to Mars Bars it falls into context / believability more easily

Each glass of wine is 1 x Mars Bar. Looking at your holiday food list, you were eating maybe 5 or 6 Mars Bars each day while on holiday. If you had kept the wrappers you would have a visible reminder, but eat, drink, and it's gone - except it hasn't, these high energy foods with their insidious insulin triggering properties have gone from outside your body to inside your body and have taken up residence - all 15 kilos of them, on your belly, your thighs and you btm.

I went to the Barossa Valley for a couple of days and put on 2.30 kilos. Wham! Just like that.

Our bodies are so trained to pour out the insulin which is so effective at converting food to liquid fat, and our ultra efficient liver roars into action, and we are left looking in horror at the scales saying 'OMG! What happened!!'

Mars Bars.

Read your Maintenance Guidelines thoroughly. Go back on to the program for 2 weeks and see how that goes for you. If necessary, you may need to stay on the program and lose the whole 15 kilos and do refeed again as well. It's no biggy.

But remember you are a Recovering obesiac. Not a Cured obesiac. I held my post program weight quite well and without any sense of deprivation until I started eating curry pies for lunch. My system simply cannot tolerate wheat. Any wheat product will trigger the insulin response, but if I am going to be drinking wine then I have learned how to prepare myself before I go drinking to minimise the damage (except witness the debacle of the Barossa!)

Maintenance Guidelines are easy and simple to follow and yes it is not open slather, but neither it would be if due to our obesity we developed Diabetes Type 2 or other obesity related diseases or food intolerances

Sorry that this weight gain has taken the edge off your holiday. A couple of weeks in the Mediterranean, what bliss!

But you will lose this weight and next time you will know how to guard against it

Hope this helps. Why not apply for a Diary and let us support you and cheer you on as you lose this 15 kilos - for the second time around!

Cheers
Kristine

[Collie]

Hi nickychick, welcome to this forum.......it is a wonderful place of support and advice.

I saw you over on the other forum........and hoping I'd see you over here too, if theres a fantastic place to be to get you through this, then it's the people round here. Listen to Koh and to Kristine.........they have much experience at this place and have much to offer for supporting you.

Many of us are second tim rounders.......me being one of them. So.....pick up your program, go back to the golden rules, grit your teeth.....and you'll get there. The diary idea of Kristine's is right. It's amazing what you get from your own writings and from the tit bits of info you'll receive from others.

Best of luck for your journey.......the second one.

[butterflydreamin]

Hi NickyChick,

Sorry to read about your higher than expected weight gain.

Looking at what you were eating there is quite a lot of carbs in there and your body may be very sensitive to them. Remember that wine is a carb (and wine is a pretty big carb - one small glass was equal to a slice of bread - so if you were having three large glasses, it could be equivalent to 6 pieces of bread just there). On top of the bread you were already having, with gelati, choc etc, it is a lot compared to our program and maintenance.

Part of your weight will definitely be fluid - when we eat more carbs, our bodies hold a higher water weight.

Your body did not have a long time to get used to maintenance before your holiday and it may be a little bit shocked. If you were very active, part of your weight may be muscle weight too.

Try not to freak out about it. That won't help. Just follow Kristine's very sound advice and go back on your plan and see how quickly your weight drops. I wouldn't be surprised if you find you drop 3-5kgs in the first week. Then you are 1/3 of the way there. If you are very active, you might find that your weights settles 2-3kg higher than your refeed weight due to muscle weight.

I notice that you said mentioned needing the carbs to get you through your activity. Just bear in mind that carbs are tricky little buggers - they make you think that you need them when you don't necessary do - they are addictive and craving little beasts. Probably what you really needed was higher protein amounts and more vege and a little bit of extra carbs. My consultant has always told me that we underestimate what we eat and overestimate what we burn off via exercise, so that is why it is more important to watch what we put in our mouth rather than how much we move.

I hope that you had a wonderful holiday. Try not to stress about the weight gain, you can get it off and probably more quickly than you expect.

All the best

Butterfly

p.s. Kristine - I tend to agree with you about wheat. I think a lot of people can be sensitive to them. I was sent an extract to a book (extract below). Don't know how scientific it is or if it is really backed up by data, but food for thought.....

When we asked cardiologist William Davis, M.D., what the worst food for your heart is, he didn't spend long thinking. His answer: Wheat.

Then he told us that it's also the worst food for your belly. In fact, because of this, he's actually coined a new term. "I call it wheat belly, though I could have just as easily called this condition pretzel brain or bagel bowel or biscuit face since there's not an organ system unaffected by wheat," says Dr. Davis, author of the new book, Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight. "But wheat's impact on the waistline is its most visible characteristic."

If you're carrying around excess belly flab, Dr. Davis's advice is clear: Give up the wheat. While that may sound drastic, he says that it doesn't mean never eating pizza, cookies, and cheesecake again. And that when you kick the wheat out of your diet, you actually quit craving wheat-filled foods.

Just how powerful is this wheat-free approach? "When my patients gave up wheat, they lost an average of 26.7 pounds each," says Dr. Davis. This isn't an isolated finding: According to a Mayo Clinic and University of Iowa study, test subjects lost an average of 27.5 pounds each on a wheat-free diet.

Of course, you're probably wondering: Why is wheat so bad for my waistline? The answer is simple: Because it's not really wheat anymore, says Dr. Davis. He explains that in the 1960s, a small group of scientists in Mexico set out to make wheat easier to grow and more pest resistant. That was good for the farmers, but bad for your health and your weight. The reason, according to Dr. Davis: Genetic engineering transformed wheat into a super carbohydrate that wreaks havoc on your body and makes you fat. And yes, says Dr. Davis, this even applies to the so-called "healthy" whole wheat that nutritionists say you should eat.

In Dr. Davis's new book, Lose the Wheat, Lose the Weight, you'll learn the history of how wheat became the single-worst food for your belly. More importantly, you'll discover all of the health benefits that go along with dropping it from your diet. Dr. Davis says you'll slash your cholesterol, blood sugar, and triglycerides, as well as other markers of heart disease risk—such as inflammation. Plus, you'll get his complete guide to eating a wheat-free diet, which includes dozens of delicious recipes. It's truly a cardiologist-approved eating plan.

[nickychick]

THANK YOU all so much for your responses! I cant tell you enough how much I appreciate your advise and being able to be part of this community.

I have been super busy of late but when I get a moment will respond to all your advise and keep you updated on the weight-loss now since I have been back on plan (day five today).

xx nicole

[battler]

Koh, thanks for always giving us things to think about!! On reflection I can now see that my problem regarding staying back on the program is that I just haven't given it enough "time" to change my hormones back to where they should be. My niece had been out somewhere and the discussion at her table from some ex cohenites about how they couldn't get back on the program and that diets never work etc etc also made me think a bit. This program does work and no one is going to tell me it doesn't. It has been honest from the very beginning that it is a lifestyle change and if we go back to our old habits then of course we are going to put the weight back on...........all of it if we don't nip it in the bud very quickly! The rules are there for a reason. I too have found it difficult too. Of course it is! We let our hormones go whacky again. We like food, right?? The wrong kind of food, the wrong quantities. I too have lasted about 2 weeks then go off the rails and say I can't do it anymore. (cop-out) I can..... and I have before and, I can do it again. I just have to give my body TIME to re-adjust and kick- in so that the cravings don't get the better of me. Also I liked your tip, Koh about maintenance rules. After all this time I had set them aside and completely forgot some of them! ( I am 60 so I guess that comes with age!!) No wonder I had put on those unwanted kilos. This has made me relect on what I did when I first started the program. 1. I used the planner sheets and wrote EVERYTHING down as soon as I ate it. 2. I read the instructions and stuck to them!!! 3. I NEVER deviated no matter what came along. 4. I stayed linked to support on the forum! 5. I planned ahead and had pre-cooked frozen meals in case time didn't allow me to start from scratch or I felt too lazy to cook. 6. I always had a small tin of tuna in the car so, if, I didn't get home in time, I could go out to eat and ask for a small salad without any dressing and open my little poptop tuna tin. Prepare for the unplanned
It was easy then and can be easy now too........ especially when I only have a few kilos to lose. Its a head thing I think. Just gotta get that in the right place and everything else is easy. I now have my worksheet out ready to go. Frozen meat is all labelled in the freezer and today will go get some fresh stuff to have precooked frozen meals at the ready. My amounts are on the fridge and I will be getting out the maintenance rules and putting them up on the fridge ( and a smaller version in my wallet) so that I don't forget the "rules" again and start gaining and wondering, how did THAT happen!! And I will make a point of checking out the forum to keep me motivated
Good luck out there. Hope this helps you along your journey Iknow that being here on the forum again will help keep me motivated. Thanks again for the wisdom that Koh keeps giving us all!

[Kohinoor]

Hey Battler,

So good to hear that those thoughts are "turning on a light" for you

This place just goes from strength to strength. Butterflydreamin's comment about WHEAT was quite an eye-opener too.... Did you read through that? If true (and it could well be....) what are we doing??? All this food modification that just stuffs up our lives.

I'd also heard that many of the tablets that are recommended today (e.g. glucasomine) are done so because our food no longer contains what it used to (and they cite the example of over-processing, so that we no longer get all of the good stuff in our diet that were part and parcel of an earlier age). In all, it's hardly a surprise that Overweight is the new Normal, and Obese is the new Overweight !! again

Anyway, its good to hear from you again, Battler. Don't forget too, as a maintainer, you may be better served to "Maintain your way back to Normal" rather than going on plan - but that is up to you of course Check this out - it might help :-
http://newyouforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=6408

Do read through all of the thoughts in all of the posts of that linked thread - there are seriously good ideas out there....

Hugs,
Koh