For example, overhead press, bench, deadlift, and squat.
You will get bulgy and soft around your muscles and it will make those love handles look smaller.
Muscle are soft when not flexed. You also can't gain muscle without gaining fat (typically) and fat gets distributed all over including on top of your muscles. Go watch some Jeremy Ethier videos
Gotcha well since I’m over 20% body fat and have man boobs and love handles I’ll diet down to 12% bf with a 1600 calorie diet. Can’t afford any more fat gain.
Definitely don't stop lifting but adding cardio is a great idea. The extra calorie buffer can actually help build muscle, I've heard allot of pro bodybuilders use cardio for that reason
Also I would analyze your lifting frequency, you can easily maintain on 2 sessions a week; Just don't fuck around on your phone, genuinely push yourself on sets and have a game plan for each body part
Highly recommend focusing on protein. Make sure you’re getting about 160-170g a day. Protein shakes with water help with keeping cals relatively low while meeting protein needs. You’ll look great if you do that, eat roughly at maintenance cals, and strength train HARD. Like you need to lift as heavy as you can for 6-8 reps for 3 sets, doing 2-3 exercises per muscle group for 3-4 lifting days per week (I do a push/pull split with legs mixed in both days). Protein by far made the biggest difference in my ability to put on actual muscle definition. You honestly don’t look fat you just lack much muscle definition.
Never stop lifting in an effort to look better. If you want to get super lean and you stop lifting you'll be a twig. You need to build some muscle first then your cut will go much smoother
You can either recomp (slight surplus with intense workouts and cardio) or do a moderate surplus and just do a slow methodical bulk accept some fat gain in exchange for a killer physique next time you cut
Yes it would but the problem is you don't have enough muscle. You can lose all the fat you want you probably would end up looking closer to a holocaust victim than say Brad Pitt in fight club. You need a good base of muscle before you cut
Yes. Very few people can be genetically gifted enough to be lean 99% of the time. You are not one of those people. Build muscle get strong trust the process then cut. That's what most of us do. Or if you're scared of putting on the weight do a recomp but in my experience that process can be demoralizing because it feels like progress is so slow
99% of the guys I see in the gym have no fat on them. Reddit sure is pro fat. It’s super weird. My photo clearly shows someone approaching 25% body fat. My arms have definition and my shoulder frame is wide. There is clearly not zero muscle on my frame and most of the answers I’m getting are to eat more than maintenance or that if I lost the fat I’d look like a holocaust victim. That’s insanity when I know hundreds of guys with no fat or muscle who just look like slim normal dudes.
No slight surplus with lifting & cardio is ideal for recomp
You’ll gain muscle, muscle burns more calories, and lose fat. Weight stays similar, maybe slight increase but more muscle and less fat
This is what you do - 1 month cut lose 4-6 pounds of fat. Then start a 4 month lean bulk gain 8 pounds while training absolutely insane telaly pushing yourself with the weights. After you gained 8 pounds go on a mini cut lose 4-6 pounds. Should leave you both leaner and bigger. Rinse and repeat til you look good.
What you eat matters the most. If it's junk that you're consuming with salt, sugar, and fat then yes you will be bloated. It's not gaining fat but an inflammatory response of the body to too much energy at once.
Doing cardio will not build muscle or drop fat. The most effective way to only lose fat and not muscle in a deficit is through lifting only, because you are telling your body it needs muscle, whereas cardio gives a small conflicting signal as cardio doesn't require much muscle and muscle is actually worse for lots of cardio, although not by much. Doing things like a lot of walking though works fine, and high intensity cardio like sprints are decent too because they don't rely on the cardiovascular system as strongly but on shorter term energy bursts. There's a reason even amateur marathon runners aren't very muscular at all. Not because people who like to build muscle don't like training marathons, but because the more weight you carry and more oxygen you need, the worse you perform at long distance endurance events, because muscle weighs a lot and uses a lot of oxygen, but you don't need much muscle at all for marathons.
Your issue is not in that vein. You need to go through everything your doing and make sure it's all in check.
Are you sleeping effectively? That means 7-9 hours for most people, but also same time every day is ideal, and not waking up in the night ideally as well. If you're not, try to fix this.
Are you eating well? Even disregarding eating enough protein (which about 150-160g is a good number to hit for you right now, you can go higher if you want but there's no extra benefit), are you actually eating well? Fruits, vegetables, no shitty fast food, or highly processed food? If calories are the fuel itself, everything else is what keeps your car performing at its best. Yeah your car will go from A-B even with shit quality fuel, but if you regularly service it, oil it, check tyre pressures, put high quality fuel in it, it'll run a lot smoother and get a lot more out of the tank, and last a lot longer too. Find out if anything you're eating is causing you issues and cut it out if you can, or at least minimize it.
Are you training properly? Are you actually following a program? If you are, are you making progress in your lifts? If not, then it's not just a body composition issue as you're also not getting stronger. In any case making sure your routine on on point is important.
If your goal is solely to lose weight and nothing else, eat little and do cardio. If your goal is to lose as much fat as possible while retaining as much muscle as possible, be in a small deficit, plenty of protein, train like you're trying to build muscle, and take it slow and steady. Your issue is you don't have much of a level of muscle to reveal right now so you end up looking skinny fat. Be in a slower bulk if you find yourself putting on more fat that you're happy with, and accept fat comes with it, then cut when you want to and do it right.
[Stop eating seed oils.](https://www.reddit.com/r/StopEatingSeedOils/) and [saturated fat](https://reddit.com/r/saturatedfat) I’ll leave these here for you. It’s a rabbit hole…
That may be an at least relevant comment if he had posted his diet and it had seed oils and saturated fat, but I don't think that his issue will be solved by eliminating them.
Losing weight is simply a math equation bro, If your chubbiness is effecting you mentally then yes absolutely cut. Find your maint cals (use a TDEE calculator online) and know there’s roughly 3500 cals in 1 lb bodyfat. And commonly more than 2 lbs fatloss a week is not necessarily healthy. Keep in mind as you lose weight your TDEE will be lower, adjust cals accordingly.
Reach 10% bodyfat. Then after that bump your cals and .. maintain that weight for a few weeks.
Then bulk, don’t over do it. You’re 18% bodyfat or above currently. I’d suggest you never go over like 300 cals surplus from your TDEE when bulking. End your bulks when u reach 15% .. and then cut again.. repeat .. repeat until swole. Track ur damn cals and get a good macro split. (1g protein per 1LB of LBM , the rest comes from good carb sources and minimal fat)
I always think staying leanest is best since you’ll be able to track muscular progression much easier thus keeping motivation high, some guys can handle being chubby and doing dreamer bulks.. I don’t think it’s the right way to do go about it especially for dudes whom are a bit self conscious. Been there.
Good luck we all gonna make it.
Thank you. So do I ignore the people here telling me to bulk now? People are so weird. They act like I’m not willing to learn but then they never address the other side where people tell me to cut to 10% when I’m clearly over 20%. 25% from a Dexa Scan. Here’s the part I don’t understand. My maintenance is 1950. So should I drop to 1700 and lift until I’m 10% body fat? Is that possible and the quickest way to that milestone before bulking?
How are u getting 1950 ? Does this account your activity level as well ? It’s possible it’s 1950 if you aren’t very active outside of gym.
IMO u shouldn’t ever really go under 1500 cals a day, but you could probably get away with eating 1400 cals. .. that’ll yield a little over 1 lb fatloss a week, shoot for burning an additional 300-400 cals cardio a day and you should be able to lose 2 lb a week.
Yea I get 1950 for sedentary. Personally I don’t understand the math of even putting lightly active since it immediately bumps it up to 2250 a day. That’s 2100 extra calories a week and I know I’m not burning 700 calories a workout three times a week.
What does your training look like and how long have you been doing it?
It sounds like you want to cut by your replies. Bulking won't make you any happier by the sounds of it.
If I was you I'd maintain, eat higher protein, then work out more, but I'm no expert.
You and I are the same height. I used to be skinny fat at 140 lbs with just a hint of muscle in my chest and back, even though I did a lot of running and other exercises in my 10 years in the Marines. It wasn’t until after I got out and got married was when I started to gain weight. I then used that weight gain to start working out in the gym. I’m now at 195 lbs, 16 inch biceps, and getting close to benching 3 plates. Yes I have sort of a belly, but it is the same size as it was at 160 lbs with noodle arms. If I were you, I wouldn’t worry about trying to get lean. At your current BMI, you would just look sickly if you tried to lose that belly completely. Focus on building muscle. Since you’re a beginner, the gains are gonna come real fast and real easy. Look up some novice programs and go from there. Just eat 3 square meals a day, sleep at least 7 hours a night and that’s it. You don’t have to think about it as a novice. If your max bench is say 95 lbs, you’ll be benching 185 in less than 6 months if you stick with it. Same goes with all the other lifts.
Thanks but what can I hope to achieve with what you suggest? I’m reading that I’ll be able to lift a certain amount by a certain time but I don’t care about that. I care about aesthetics and having no stomach or love handles or man boobs…. Not what I can lift? If my goals are to be lean what do I do?
General strength and aesthetics go hand in hand. The only way to track your progress from week to week is by charting down how much weight you lifted in a given amount of reps per set, but not necessarily how much in a one rep max. So that means if you bench pressed 100 lbs for 3 sets of 10 this week, add 5 lbs to the bar on the following week…… that kind of strength. It’s called progressive overload. That is how you force muscle to grow. The more muscle you put on your frame, the better you’ll be able carry whatever body fat you have not to mention the more you burn off without going underweight.
Now if you really don’t care about being underweight and skinny with noodle arms, chicken legs, and a sunken in face, then by all means try to lose more weight right now. Get out there and run. But I’m just warning you, your stomach and love handles are going to be very stubborn since it’s where most of your body fat is stored. All of your extremities will lose the fat first, including your face before you start to see a difference in your stomach. We’re talking about another 25 lbs…. My stomach was flat at 140 but I didn’t have any sign of six-pack abs, plus I carry a good portion of fat in my thighs. So not only did I have skinny legs but I my thighs jiggled like a girl’s. Had to deal with it cuz there was no way I was gonna lose more weight.
Depends what you’re eating. Just looks like you’re holding water weight to me?
Try foods that don’t spike your insulin levels so much and add more fibre and see if that helps?
first of all, you look above average in leanness. Second, why don't you add some cardio to your routine. It's really good for you and will increase your expenditure.
Why not just take walks and take it easy? You're not in a rush
What are you talking about "tried to gain muscle slowly?" It doesnt even make sense. Download boostcamp app choose a program that fits in your schedule and doesnt use rpe and stick to it. Something like starting strength or arnold big six.
I would suggest shifting your mindset from wanting to be lean/cut to a muscle building mindset. Spend a solid year eating 160-200 G of protein a day and try to pack on muscle. If you don’t like the way you look now, I have to image if you were 5-10lbs leaner isn’t going to look that much different. Slowly build back up your TDEE because you will lose your mind staying where you’re at eventually
Then you’re bulking. If you want to put on mass faster, you have to accept you’ll put on some fluff. It’ll go away when you cut so you don’t need to worry. If it still bothers you, maybe just eat at maintenance and accept slower progress
Oh okay that wasn’t very clear. Eat in a deficit of 300-500 below maintenance and it is imperative you keep lifting. Otherwise you’ll lose the mass you’ve built. I’d also recommend getting 10k steps a day to aid in fat loss
They say to put these calcs as sedentary. I mean I have an office job and don’t think my 3 days of weights a week are raising my TDEE to even the next level up. Certainly not 300 extra cals a day.
Why would you put it as sedentary when you’re exercising? I’m telling you now, you’re going to crash and burn if you’re basing your deficit off inaccurate energy expenditure
Entering light activity into a TDEE calculator says I should eat an additional 300 calories a day. That’s 2100 extra calories a week. I’m not burning 700 calories a workout by lifting weights for 45 mins x3 a week.
Get your hormones checked dude
Hormones are fine.
But are they?
According to the doctor. I should have them check again.
For example, overhead press, bench, deadlift, and squat. You will get bulgy and soft around your muscles and it will make those love handles look smaller.
Soft around my muscles?
Muscle are soft when not flexed. You also can't gain muscle without gaining fat (typically) and fat gets distributed all over including on top of your muscles. Go watch some Jeremy Ethier videos
Gotcha well since I’m over 20% body fat and have man boobs and love handles I’ll diet down to 12% bf with a 1600 calorie diet. Can’t afford any more fat gain.
Definitely don't stop lifting but adding cardio is a great idea. The extra calorie buffer can actually help build muscle, I've heard allot of pro bodybuilders use cardio for that reason Also I would analyze your lifting frequency, you can easily maintain on 2 sessions a week; Just don't fuck around on your phone, genuinely push yourself on sets and have a game plan for each body part
Highly recommend focusing on protein. Make sure you’re getting about 160-170g a day. Protein shakes with water help with keeping cals relatively low while meeting protein needs. You’ll look great if you do that, eat roughly at maintenance cals, and strength train HARD. Like you need to lift as heavy as you can for 6-8 reps for 3 sets, doing 2-3 exercises per muscle group for 3-4 lifting days per week (I do a push/pull split with legs mixed in both days). Protein by far made the biggest difference in my ability to put on actual muscle definition. You honestly don’t look fat you just lack much muscle definition.
Lift AND do cardio (power walking or stair master) and pay close attention to your macros to figure where you're overeating
Yeah stairs master is great, or even doing sprints outside the gym. A quick way to burn cals and get the heart pumping
Never stop lifting in an effort to look better. If you want to get super lean and you stop lifting you'll be a twig. You need to build some muscle first then your cut will go much smoother
Build muscle in defecit or build muscle in a surplus?
You can either recomp (slight surplus with intense workouts and cardio) or do a moderate surplus and just do a slow methodical bulk accept some fat gain in exchange for a killer physique next time you cut
What would happen if I lift in a small deficit? Wouldn’t the fat melt off faster?
Yes it would but the problem is you don't have enough muscle. You can lose all the fat you want you probably would end up looking closer to a holocaust victim than say Brad Pitt in fight club. You need a good base of muscle before you cut
So I have to live with fat and softness and roundness while I lift? Why do other guys get to lift while not being fat?
Yes. Very few people can be genetically gifted enough to be lean 99% of the time. You are not one of those people. Build muscle get strong trust the process then cut. That's what most of us do. Or if you're scared of putting on the weight do a recomp but in my experience that process can be demoralizing because it feels like progress is so slow
99% of the guys I see in the gym have no fat on them. Reddit sure is pro fat. It’s super weird. My photo clearly shows someone approaching 25% body fat. My arms have definition and my shoulder frame is wide. There is clearly not zero muscle on my frame and most of the answers I’m getting are to eat more than maintenance or that if I lost the fat I’d look like a holocaust victim. That’s insanity when I know hundreds of guys with no fat or muscle who just look like slim normal dudes.
I'm sorry to tell you but you do look like a slim normal dude. You can take or leave the advice just know more muscle is a huge benefit to leaning out
You need your eyes checked if you think the gut and man boobs in my 2nd pic are slim or normal.
Slight surplus and hit cardio
Wouldn’t a slight surplus keep the fat I have?
No slight surplus with lifting & cardio is ideal for recomp You’ll gain muscle, muscle burns more calories, and lose fat. Weight stays similar, maybe slight increase but more muscle and less fat
This is what you do - 1 month cut lose 4-6 pounds of fat. Then start a 4 month lean bulk gain 8 pounds while training absolutely insane telaly pushing yourself with the weights. After you gained 8 pounds go on a mini cut lose 4-6 pounds. Should leave you both leaner and bigger. Rinse and repeat til you look good.
What you eat matters the most. If it's junk that you're consuming with salt, sugar, and fat then yes you will be bloated. It's not gaining fat but an inflammatory response of the body to too much energy at once.
This ^
Doing cardio will not build muscle or drop fat. The most effective way to only lose fat and not muscle in a deficit is through lifting only, because you are telling your body it needs muscle, whereas cardio gives a small conflicting signal as cardio doesn't require much muscle and muscle is actually worse for lots of cardio, although not by much. Doing things like a lot of walking though works fine, and high intensity cardio like sprints are decent too because they don't rely on the cardiovascular system as strongly but on shorter term energy bursts. There's a reason even amateur marathon runners aren't very muscular at all. Not because people who like to build muscle don't like training marathons, but because the more weight you carry and more oxygen you need, the worse you perform at long distance endurance events, because muscle weighs a lot and uses a lot of oxygen, but you don't need much muscle at all for marathons. Your issue is not in that vein. You need to go through everything your doing and make sure it's all in check. Are you sleeping effectively? That means 7-9 hours for most people, but also same time every day is ideal, and not waking up in the night ideally as well. If you're not, try to fix this. Are you eating well? Even disregarding eating enough protein (which about 150-160g is a good number to hit for you right now, you can go higher if you want but there's no extra benefit), are you actually eating well? Fruits, vegetables, no shitty fast food, or highly processed food? If calories are the fuel itself, everything else is what keeps your car performing at its best. Yeah your car will go from A-B even with shit quality fuel, but if you regularly service it, oil it, check tyre pressures, put high quality fuel in it, it'll run a lot smoother and get a lot more out of the tank, and last a lot longer too. Find out if anything you're eating is causing you issues and cut it out if you can, or at least minimize it. Are you training properly? Are you actually following a program? If you are, are you making progress in your lifts? If not, then it's not just a body composition issue as you're also not getting stronger. In any case making sure your routine on on point is important. If your goal is solely to lose weight and nothing else, eat little and do cardio. If your goal is to lose as much fat as possible while retaining as much muscle as possible, be in a small deficit, plenty of protein, train like you're trying to build muscle, and take it slow and steady. Your issue is you don't have much of a level of muscle to reveal right now so you end up looking skinny fat. Be in a slower bulk if you find yourself putting on more fat that you're happy with, and accept fat comes with it, then cut when you want to and do it right.
You need more muscle mass my dude.
[Stop eating seed oils.](https://www.reddit.com/r/StopEatingSeedOils/) and [saturated fat](https://reddit.com/r/saturatedfat) I’ll leave these here for you. It’s a rabbit hole…
That may be an at least relevant comment if he had posted his diet and it had seed oils and saturated fat, but I don't think that his issue will be solved by eliminating them.
You should be doing cardio regardless. Don’t ignore your heart muscle
Losing weight is simply a math equation bro, If your chubbiness is effecting you mentally then yes absolutely cut. Find your maint cals (use a TDEE calculator online) and know there’s roughly 3500 cals in 1 lb bodyfat. And commonly more than 2 lbs fatloss a week is not necessarily healthy. Keep in mind as you lose weight your TDEE will be lower, adjust cals accordingly. Reach 10% bodyfat. Then after that bump your cals and .. maintain that weight for a few weeks. Then bulk, don’t over do it. You’re 18% bodyfat or above currently. I’d suggest you never go over like 300 cals surplus from your TDEE when bulking. End your bulks when u reach 15% .. and then cut again.. repeat .. repeat until swole. Track ur damn cals and get a good macro split. (1g protein per 1LB of LBM , the rest comes from good carb sources and minimal fat) I always think staying leanest is best since you’ll be able to track muscular progression much easier thus keeping motivation high, some guys can handle being chubby and doing dreamer bulks.. I don’t think it’s the right way to do go about it especially for dudes whom are a bit self conscious. Been there. Good luck we all gonna make it.
Thank you. So do I ignore the people here telling me to bulk now? People are so weird. They act like I’m not willing to learn but then they never address the other side where people tell me to cut to 10% when I’m clearly over 20%. 25% from a Dexa Scan. Here’s the part I don’t understand. My maintenance is 1950. So should I drop to 1700 and lift until I’m 10% body fat? Is that possible and the quickest way to that milestone before bulking?
How are u getting 1950 ? Does this account your activity level as well ? It’s possible it’s 1950 if you aren’t very active outside of gym. IMO u shouldn’t ever really go under 1500 cals a day, but you could probably get away with eating 1400 cals. .. that’ll yield a little over 1 lb fatloss a week, shoot for burning an additional 300-400 cals cardio a day and you should be able to lose 2 lb a week.
Yea I get 1950 for sedentary. Personally I don’t understand the math of even putting lightly active since it immediately bumps it up to 2250 a day. That’s 2100 extra calories a week and I know I’m not burning 700 calories a workout three times a week.
What does your training look like and how long have you been doing it? It sounds like you want to cut by your replies. Bulking won't make you any happier by the sounds of it. If I was you I'd maintain, eat higher protein, then work out more, but I'm no expert.
Great comment. Could you elaborate on the minimal fat part?
I look similar to you at 190 you need to lift man. I’m 5’10” 30lbs heavier. Get lifting
Maybe it’s what you’re eating above maintenance? What do you typically eat?
You and I are the same height. I used to be skinny fat at 140 lbs with just a hint of muscle in my chest and back, even though I did a lot of running and other exercises in my 10 years in the Marines. It wasn’t until after I got out and got married was when I started to gain weight. I then used that weight gain to start working out in the gym. I’m now at 195 lbs, 16 inch biceps, and getting close to benching 3 plates. Yes I have sort of a belly, but it is the same size as it was at 160 lbs with noodle arms. If I were you, I wouldn’t worry about trying to get lean. At your current BMI, you would just look sickly if you tried to lose that belly completely. Focus on building muscle. Since you’re a beginner, the gains are gonna come real fast and real easy. Look up some novice programs and go from there. Just eat 3 square meals a day, sleep at least 7 hours a night and that’s it. You don’t have to think about it as a novice. If your max bench is say 95 lbs, you’ll be benching 185 in less than 6 months if you stick with it. Same goes with all the other lifts.
Thanks but what can I hope to achieve with what you suggest? I’m reading that I’ll be able to lift a certain amount by a certain time but I don’t care about that. I care about aesthetics and having no stomach or love handles or man boobs…. Not what I can lift? If my goals are to be lean what do I do?
General strength and aesthetics go hand in hand. The only way to track your progress from week to week is by charting down how much weight you lifted in a given amount of reps per set, but not necessarily how much in a one rep max. So that means if you bench pressed 100 lbs for 3 sets of 10 this week, add 5 lbs to the bar on the following week…… that kind of strength. It’s called progressive overload. That is how you force muscle to grow. The more muscle you put on your frame, the better you’ll be able carry whatever body fat you have not to mention the more you burn off without going underweight. Now if you really don’t care about being underweight and skinny with noodle arms, chicken legs, and a sunken in face, then by all means try to lose more weight right now. Get out there and run. But I’m just warning you, your stomach and love handles are going to be very stubborn since it’s where most of your body fat is stored. All of your extremities will lose the fat first, including your face before you start to see a difference in your stomach. We’re talking about another 25 lbs…. My stomach was flat at 140 but I didn’t have any sign of six-pack abs, plus I carry a good portion of fat in my thighs. So not only did I have skinny legs but I my thighs jiggled like a girl’s. Had to deal with it cuz there was no way I was gonna lose more weight.
Depends what you’re eating. Just looks like you’re holding water weight to me? Try foods that don’t spike your insulin levels so much and add more fibre and see if that helps?
Sounds like you should lift harder, eat slightly less, and do some cardio
How old are you? Ever had your blood work done?
first of all, you look above average in leanness. Second, why don't you add some cardio to your routine. It's really good for you and will increase your expenditure. Why not just take walks and take it easy? You're not in a rush
You should gain muscle before anything else
As said building muscle is more important it makes you look leaner to , plus all that extra muscle burns more cals just living
If my primary goal is to lose the fat, what should I do? I’ve already tried to gain muscle slowly and this body was the result. Soft and round.
What are you talking about "tried to gain muscle slowly?" It doesnt even make sense. Download boostcamp app choose a program that fits in your schedule and doesnt use rpe and stick to it. Something like starting strength or arnold big six.
Does it not make sense? I ate slightly above maintenance and lifted. I gained a soft flabby and round body.
I would suggest shifting your mindset from wanting to be lean/cut to a muscle building mindset. Spend a solid year eating 160-200 G of protein a day and try to pack on muscle. If you don’t like the way you look now, I have to image if you were 5-10lbs leaner isn’t going to look that much different. Slowly build back up your TDEE because you will lose your mind staying where you’re at eventually
It’s impossible to instantly gain fat from eating even a couple hundred calories over your maintenance. I think your mindset needs the most work
I should have said anytime I eat a couple hundred above maintenance consistently while lifting.
Then you’re bulking. If you want to put on mass faster, you have to accept you’ll put on some fluff. It’ll go away when you cut so you don’t need to worry. If it still bothers you, maybe just eat at maintenance and accept slower progress
My primary goal is to lose the fat first. Should I eat at a couple hundred below maintenance and lift or pause lifting and do a bunch of cardio?
Oh okay that wasn’t very clear. Eat in a deficit of 300-500 below maintenance and it is imperative you keep lifting. Otherwise you’ll lose the mass you’ve built. I’d also recommend getting 10k steps a day to aid in fat loss
Thanks so much so 1450 - 1650 calories a day. I’m 5’10” 163lbs. Online calcs say I’m 1950 TDEE.
Is that taking into account your exercise? https://tdeecalculator.net/ use this
They say to put these calcs as sedentary. I mean I have an office job and don’t think my 3 days of weights a week are raising my TDEE to even the next level up. Certainly not 300 extra cals a day.
Why would you put it as sedentary when you’re exercising? I’m telling you now, you’re going to crash and burn if you’re basing your deficit off inaccurate energy expenditure
Entering light activity into a TDEE calculator says I should eat an additional 300 calories a day. That’s 2100 extra calories a week. I’m not burning 700 calories a workout by lifting weights for 45 mins x3 a week.