Keeping the weight

I am currently keeping a journal in which I write down my weight both when just waking up and right before going to bed. Yesterday night I weighed 142.6 lbs and upon waking up today I weighed 139.7 lbs. So basically I lost 2.9 lbs overnight. I do realize that even when sleeping one burns calories (and considering all the liquids I am consuming now a days, I got up to go to the bathroom once or twice as far as I recall) so some recomend profiting to drink a quick shake or have a midnight snack in the middle of the night in order so that your body has something more to consume.

Also the thing is that this week I have not done any exercise (weight training) in order to profit to fill myself up somewhat in order to have something to burn when I actually begin (next week). Is excercise neccecary in order to maintain the weight (kind of like converting the nutrients into muscle before they are simply converted into waste)? Also I would find it quite annoying to prepare myself something in the middle of the night, so is there some recomended meal or snack I should consume right before going to bed which would keep the sleep time calorie burning to the minimum?

You are thinking this through too hard..you are not burning 3lbs of fat overnight..your body may be a lean mean burning machine but its not that efficient. The simple fact is that your weight will fluctuate during the day and typically you are 2 or 3lbs heavier in the evening..its waterweight , nothing more, nothing less....either get used to the fluctuations or choose a time of day ( or even once a week ) and weigh yourself then...most people opt for first thing in the morning after a pee..that way you will always be comparing like for like

exercise will compromise the weight gain because you'll have to eat more to make up for the deficit you create. so, now you don't need to nor should you exercise while attempting to gain.

i would have something carb heavy if i were you right before bed, maybe a clif bar, luna bar, or other energy bar. they are about 200-300 calories and loaded with nutrients. hope that helps :)

thank you for your promt responces.

kezza: Yep, I know im going slightly overboard with this, but alas, I have way to much free time on my hands at the moment, so I figured I would give this my topmost priority.. and considering my extremist way of being, I seem not to be concentrating on anything else other than "weight gain" :p Yes, you are correct in that most of this is water weight. I am going to the bathroom more now than if it were a night out at the pub. The thing which annoyed me now is that yesterday morning (likewise just getting out of bed), I had a weight of 140.2 lbs, so I did indeed end up losing weight even though I consumed at least 3300 calories that day.

chrissy: this is where it gets tricky. I know that excercise will help in the burning of calories. The thing is of course that I am looking towards high intensity free weights rather than cardio which in my case would be the most counter productive thing I could do. Still as you say any activity will cause me to burn, therefore I will be forced to have an additional protein shake before and/or after the excercise period in order to make up for it. The question is (since im ignorant in the case), where does muscle appear from? Meaning.. does excercise turn fat into muscle or how does it come into being? If so, then does muscle take longer to decompose than fat (if that were the case), so that the weight loss would be minimal from one day to the next? Will be purchasing some energy bars tommorow in order to give them a try. cheers :)

Original Post by bombacho:

thank you for your promt responces.

kezza: Yep, I know im going slightly overboard with this, but alas, I have way to much free time on my hands at the moment, so I figured I would give this my topmost priority.. and considering my extremist way of being, I seem not to be concentrating on anything else other than "weight gain" :p Yes, you are correct in that most of this is water weight. I am going to the bathroom more now than if it were a night out at the pub. The thing which annoyed me now is that yesterday morning (likewise just getting out of bed), I had a weight of 140.2 lbs, so I did indeed end up losing weight even though I consumed at least 3300 calories that day.

chrissy: this is where it gets tricky. I know that excercise will help in the burning of calories. The thing is of course that I am looking towards high intensity free weights rather than cardio which in my case would be the most counter productive thing I could do. Still as you say any activity will cause me to burn, therefore I will be forced to have an additional protein shake before and/or after the excercise period in order to make up for it. The question is (since im ignorant in the case), where does muscle appear from? Meaning.. does excercise turn fat into muscle or how does it come into being? If so, then does muscle take longer to decompose than fat (if that were the case), so that the weight loss would be minimal from one day to the next? Will be purchasing some energy bars tommorow in order to give them a try. cheers :)

muscle is built when we overexert the muscle and cause it to tear, it then has to repair those tears which causes new muscle fibers to grow and old muscle fibers to develop further. fat doesn't turn into muscle, ever. we burn fat, we may replace fat, but we don't turn it into muscle. however, in order to gain muscle you have to have enough energy, i.e. calories, otherwise you don't have sufficient "material" to build the muscle. muscle doesn't take more time to be broken down than fat, in fact if you go on too low calorie of a diet, your body will catabolize and start using it's muscle for energy.

so, if your goal is to build muscle and not simply gain weight then yes weight lifting while eating A TON...is recommended. however, you will inevitably gain fat in the process. you must eat enough though or else you won't gain a thing. hope that makes sense.

I think you're weighing yourself way too often. Even weighing once a day you're likely to see daily fluctuations based on the balance of water, food and waste in your body. You only need to weigh yourself once a week to track progress.

Also, if you are eating enough throughout the day there's no need to get up in the middle of the night to eat.

Exercise is not recommended for underweight people until you reach a BMI of 20, which provides a little buffer for relapse before you get seriously underweight again.

What can I say merylwhite and kezza. You are right about the constant fluctuations. Yesterday I must have eaten a bit less than both previous days and when I woke up today I had gone up an entire pound. (of course this makes me happy), But it proves your point. Will be paying less attention to the daily changes and keep a weekly weight log to attain to a more averaged result on my changes. Thanks for your input on this subject :)

Chrissy, didnt find any luna or clif bars here (I wish we had the diversity of products here that you have at your disposal), but I did find myoplex bars which contain a decent amount of carbs and proteins, so I will begin taking one a night starting today :)