Let’s say you have the flu and you lose 10 lbs over a week or so due to not being able to eat much. Why do you regain it, especially if you’re eating under maintenance/in a deficit normally?
It can’t all be water if you don’t eat for a week right? That’s a huge deficit.
In: Biology
Assuming a usage of 1500 calories per day (when sick you will probably be laying in bett and doing nothing so it will be lower than your usuall) and 7 days strictly no eating that would be 3 pounds of fat lost though you will also lose muscle. So if you lost 10 pounds 7 pounds is just water. Also you might have been in a deficit with 10 pounds more you might not be with 10 less so you start gaining again depending how big your deficit was.
You’ve essentially stretched your fat cells, so they want to be full again. Once capable, they fill back up to capacity. It takes diet and activity to prevent that from happening.
If you’re down for a week the bulk of your weight loss is water and the rest is likely muscle degradation from lack of movement. Once you start eating and walking, you’ll start retaining water again in your lower half and your muscles will bounce back within a week or two.
It really do be mostly water and glycogen. You don’t use much energy while sick so despite not eating much the calories deficit really isn’t that big
The majority of it will be water and stored glycogen, these rapidly replenish when you start eating properly again
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