Gaining weight

[dszumera]

Edit: I found out I was eating about 1000 calories on PBJ with milk. 400 Calories with the amount of peanut butter I was putting. I was drinking 2 glasses of milk. Which equaled to 3 cup of milk=360 calories. Not including the 2 slices of bread or the jam. I was overeating without realizing on my breakfast alone. Thank you everyone for your advices.

30m, 200 pounds, like 25-30 percent body fat.
Truck driver

I’m not able to post pictures but I calculated my calories online through a Reddit post.
It says I need to eat 2500 calories just to maintain my weight. So that’s not even including bulking.

I’m eating around 2500 calories and working out 3-4 times a week. I workout till I can’t push it or my body feels like jelly. I stopped getting stronger and I’m gaining fat.

I’ll eat

Breakfast
PB&j with milk
Like 500 calories

2nd meal
200g of chicken breast
100g of rice
500 calories

3rd meal the same thing
500 calories

Small bag of chips ( the 50 cent ones) with coke zero 280 calories

4-5 ounce Salmon and 100 grams of rice
400-500 calories

Protein with milk.
Like 300 calories.

I don’t understand. All I keep reading is “don’t eat more than 1g of protein per pound” so I eat rice. But then I’ll see in another post. Don’t eat a lot of rice.

30

 

[matrixdream]

@dszumera A lot of people make the mistake of thinking “I’m X weight so I need X calories to maintain weight.”

Example. At 6’ and 100kg my maintenance was 2650 cals. For some people it would be 3500 or 4000.

 

[jeanasmall]

@matrixdream I am 6' and 90 kg right now, trying to recomp and I seem to be gaining weight at 2400 / 2500... So frustrating.

 

[matrixdream]

@jeanasmall The good thing is we can bulk on low calories. Cutting on the other hand, is a nightmare.

 

[jeanasmall]

@matrixdream Yeah I wouldn't even know where to eat less and don't even feel like I eat much, while I am gaining weight (albeit slowly).

I didn't even want to gain weight haha - cries.

 

[footprintsinthesand90]

@matrixdream 6'4 and 92kg. My cut is around 2700 calories, bulk 4000. Working a physical job and training 5x per week helps a lot lol.

 

[matrixdream]

@footprintsinthesand90 Yeah man, I’d love to bulk on 4000 and cut on 2700. The dream!

 

[braynman]

@dszumera There's no way of knowing EXACTLY how many calories you need to maintain.

There's no way of knowing EXACTLY how many calories you're eating.

And it changes if your level of activity, stress, sleep, etc., changes.

It's not hard for both to be off by 100 or so and whaddayaknow, you are unknowingly on a caloric surplus.

What is for sure is that if you are gaining weight, then you are on a surplus and you need to lower your calories or increase your activity to lose weight.

Also how much are you gaining and over how long? Cause it can fluctuate wildly due to water weight, you can't trust the numbers you get from one day to the other, you gotta compare over weeks and months.

 

[dawn16]

@dszumera As a former truck driver myself, sitting in that chair for 10 hours every day will cause havoc on your body if you let your diet get out of hand. Are you OTR, local, and home every day/night? You stated you are 200 lbs at 25-30% bodyfat? You are obese. Considering you are gaining fat weight (don't kid yourself, it isn't muscle), you ARE definitely eating too many calories. Base your tdee caloric level for 150 -160lbs, not 200.

Calories in vs calories out is important, but eating chips, soda, rice, and other bad carbs is not going to get you where you want to be.
Why 6 meals? I guarantee you will consume too many calories doing that. Cut your meals to 3x a day, 4 max. Cut out the truck stop foods, unless you can find actual healthy foods in one. Again, don't kid yourself thinking the cube steak, potatoes, and gravy meal at the truckstop "is healthy." If OTR, assume you have a fridge in your cab? Stop at a supermarket and grab healthy food, including fruits and vegetables.
Where do you work out 3-4 times a week? How long pervsession. Weight training? bodyweight exercises? Jogging?
As a truck driver who sits a lot, either you actually get serious about the foods you eat or resign yourself to being overweight.

And just so you know, I ate a peanut butter sandwich with 16 oz low fat milk and a banana almost every day. Even retired, I still eat the same almost daily. I loved Smucker's all natural chunky peanut butter. Stirring it wad a pain in the ass, but worth it. Living in the Philippines, the healthiest I can find is Skippys crunchy. It will fit into your macro's if you eat healthy foods at other meals. I am 5'9"and 170 lbs at 60 years old. Still have some fat, and at my age, the metabolism is slowing. It's all about the foods/calories you eat vs. what you burn.

 

[snailking]

@dszumera Soda and chips? why? Cut bk on rice also. Maybe try half. Your body will tell u when it's enough of a cut bk. Soda and chips? . Jelly? WOW. Just wow

I'm wondering if you are being serious here

 

[rugden]

@snailking Nothing wrong with it if it fits in your calories.

 

[dawn16]

@snailking Not that I recommend those foods, but they can fit into a diet, depending on your caloric intake and activity. Not everyone believes the Holy Grail is Chicken breasts and rice.
As a former truck driver myself, I know he is not burning many calories above his BMR maintenance calories, unless he drives flatbed and is setting up and strapping his loads.

 

[dszumera]

@snailking I am being serious.

Can you explain it to me?

I’ll read a Reddit post saying
Calories is calories when trying to gain muscle. I eat one of those small 50cent bags of chips.

You tell me to cut on the rice. But I’ll read a post saying only eat 1g of protein per pound of weight.
So what do I eat other than carbs to make up for the calories?

https://reddit.com/r/Fitness/s/KDOiEB2X2L

Here’s the post I got my plan from.

If you have a link to where I can get the info, that will help.
I’ll cut on rice and stuff but like I said I read information on Reddit and on this sub specifically to eat 2-3 cups of rice.

 

[lahyormie]

@dszumera Nothing wrong with soda and chips if it fits your macros. I'll eat two Ramens for 1k calories. I just have to drink 3 or 4 protein shakes to make up for no protein in Ramen. And this is while cutting and going from 245lbs to 220lbs. It's not the healthiest food long term but every once in a while is fine.

 

[snailking]

@lahyormie Mmmmm ramen! Haven't had that in a while! Am type 2 diabetic. Have to watch the carbs. And especially Reese's.

 

[taikoo]

@lahyormie Lol calories are not calories. Read Glycemic index and slow digestive foods. Natural foods are the only solution. I gained 50lbs in 4 years but will have real food. No processed food. Rice also is not good, use it for moderate use. I would pick bananas, sweet potatoes and oats over any other carbs. Weight gain is a border term, here you are talking about mass gain right ? We need good mass, not extra fat or water.

 

[asperd]

@dszumera

Calories is calories

Weight gain/loss/maintenance really does come down to calories-in, calories-out. The problem you ran into is that you relied on some sort of TDEE calculator on a reddit post to calculate your TDEE. And the TDEE calculator you used over-estimated your actual TDEE. There's also the outside chance that the nutrition labelling for the food you ate was wrong (restaurants are especially bad at nutrition labelling accuracy) or you didn't count all the calories. But I would go with the assumption that the TDEE calculator got your TDEE wrong.

The easiest cut I see there is the 280 calorie chip bag. Do without the chips (if you want to eat chips, you have to cut something else and make it fit your macros. I would aim to get 1.8g protein per kg of bodyweight. You could get away with even less if you're overweight/obese), weigh yourself every morning after urinating and before you eat or drink anything. And see which direction your 7-day moving average weight is going. Coke Zero has zero calories so I think its fine. Yeah, yeah I know aspartame bad. But if one can of Coke Zero per day is going to help you stay sane during your cut, then by all means. Personally I don't drink artificially sweetened soda every day. For me its something I'll have once in awhile when I'm having a burger or a pizza or something.

 

[tanon77]

@dszumera You might meet calorie goals, but you'll not be healthy. I don't know whats going to convince you or if you want to change your mind but eating refined sugar everyday isn't good for you. It's a fast trip to metabolic conditions like diabetes, gut issues, heart issues .... fill up with fresh whole foods from the vege section and grains.

Poor diet, no cardio and your going to seriously effect your health as you get older. Many Elite bodybuilders do rest garbage too fill up, they also tend to die at 50 years old. You can get reasonably big, very strong and ripped, and still run 5-20mi per day.

 

[rodgersbestgen]

@dszumera Probably one or more of the following are true:

• Your recovery is bad (inadequate sleep, drug abuse, some health issue)
• Your exercise programming is not suitable for your current fitness (too much volume, not enough volume, not enough specificity)

Try posting your workout plan. Which days, which exercises per day, how many sets per exercise, how long you have been training.

 

[jedimasteradi]

@dszumera Do calisthenics, burpes, personal weight squats u will be a new man. Don’t need weights and once you get body and mind connection and lost some weight now your ready for the weights. Gotta understand your body first.