*Losing* muscle on T? What am I doing wrong?

[jmandrews74]

Hi all,

  I'm new to the forum, so I hope this is the right place for this question. I searched back several pages but couldn't see any recent posts asking this question.

I started 'T' back in 2012. My results have been pretty good in terms of voice change and hair growth. Muscle growth seems to be an issue, though, and I'm not sure what's going on. Now the first part was my fault. I went vegetarian and then vegan for a little bit last year. I noticed I was not only losing weight but muscle as well, so I stopped and went back to eating meat again, although not quite as much.

Even before I did that, I wasn't getting that great of results in terms of body shape changes or muscle mass. But since I did the stop/start thing with the vegetarianism, it's as if I can't even get back to where I was prior to doing it.

I don't know if I am still not getting enough protein or if it's that I need a far more intense workout regimen?  I know that I can't expect to just take T and have muscles sprout without doing anything, but I don't think that I should be weaker now on T than I was before I even started transitioning.

Anyone have any ideas? Suggestions?  All input is greatly appreciated!   
-Josh

[FriendsCallMeChris]

How much protein are you eating now?  I think  I read that it's 1 gram per body weight to maintain and it's 1.2 grams per body weight to gain but you need to check me on that.

I like these two sites for exercise/nutrition info.
http://www.nerdfitness.com/  (love this site--they are into non-strict paleo but still good info regardless)
http://www.muscleforlife.com/  (this one sells products but still seems to have good info.)

Chris

[darkblade]

If you go vegetarian, and especially vegan, you should make sure you get the protein your body needs. You can't build muscle without sufficient protein, and you can't maintain it for long on a deficient diet either.

If you want to bulk up, you need even more protein than you'd normally require (I hear 30% of your daily caloric intake is great), which doesn't seem easy at all for me, but I try to keep at 25-30%. It might be that you're not eating enough? Or maybe as you started taking T whatever extra food your eating hasn't translated into more protein to feed into building your muscles? I'd think maybe if your switch into vegetarian/vegan happened to coincide with you starting T, that might've resulted in a significant drop in protein as a percentage of your daily intake.

I think it's 1.2g per kg of bodyweight to maintain, 1.5-2g per kg to gain? not really sure, but as long as you're under 35% daily caloric intake you're safe health-wise. I personally try to eat about 1.7g per kg.

[Kreuzfidel]

To be honest, I wouldn't be looking at "working out" until you'd put on some body weight first.  Eat, eat, eat - protein, yes - but remember that you have to have a fully balanced diet. 

If you're working out and not eating correctly, you may well be actually burning through your muscle gains. 

[adrian]

I second Kreuz! I'm pre-t and a hard gainer, but what took me ages to understand is that I needed a calorie surplus to gain muscle. I mean, it's not hard to understand really, but I always thought "But I'm eating enough?!" -- until I started counting calories. I don't eat meat, dairy or eggs -- fish only occasionally, because I also can't do soy and gluten (my diet is a result of a mix of food sensitivities and ethical concerns, it's a bit weird).

So for me it kind of clicked now. I try to take in about 2,000 calories (I'm 6 ft, around 66 kilos at the moment). Protein intake is between 30 and 60 grams per day, a lot of my calories come from fat (I eat coconut oil by the spoonful [emoji14]). I work out twice a week with functional exercises, weights; I swim once a week.

I have managed to gain about 3 kilos since September but without increasing my body fat (it's around 20-21%, so def in a female range and I don't want it to increase by any means). But normally what would be effective is to bulk up, gain some fat along with muscle mass, then shed the fat and look awesome . This is much easier on t though, so it's not for me at the moment .

[Ayden]

To be honest, I wouldn't be looking at "working out" until you'd put on some body weight first.  Eat, eat, eat - protein, yes - but remember that you have to have a fully balanced diet. 

If you're working out and not eating correctly, you may well be actually burning through your muscle gains.

Very good advice. I had this problem when I was trying to build muscle after surgery. I had some eating issues for years and I had to retrain myself to realize that eating was important. I had to add carbs back in before I saw a change.

[Bran]

It does sound like a diet problem, especially protein.  You can definitely get enough protein without eating meat, but it's harder, and you have to make sure you use protein complementarity so you're getting complete proteins. 

The limit on the body's ability to make protein is actually less the amount of protein consumed, and more the *quality* of the protein.  Protein is made of amino acids (don't know how much biology you remember), and most amino acids the human body can make for itself, from fat and carbohydrates.  But there are a few essential amino acids that we can't make, and need to get from food. No one plant protein has all the essential amino acids, so you have to eat a variety of plant proteins to get a "complete" protein with enough of all the essential amino acids to support muscle mass.  If you're eating any animal protein at all, as part of a lacto-ovo vegetarian diet, it's not usually an issue, since animal proteins generally have all the essential amino acids in themselves.  And if you have a reasonably balanced vegan diet you don't have to worry about it.  It's not like you need to get all the essential amino acids at the same meal.  But if you had a fairly limited vegan diet with most of your protein from one source-- say beans, or tofu-- then you might not have been getting enough of some of the essentials on a regular basis.   

The nutrition.org article looks reasonably accurate: http://www.nutrition.org/asn-blog/2011/03/protein-complementation/

[adrian]

Beans and rice here. Every day in one form or another

[jmandrews74]

Thanks, guys!  It looks like I'm one of those people who doesn't lose weight easily and doesn't gain muscle easily. Yay me! Seriously, though, I think you are right about the protein. I am trying to get back to getting enough calories, too, but without gaining weight. It's hard because I work an office job and I tend to cut back when I've had to sit all day. I will check out the sites you mentioned.  Again, thanks for the advice!

[adrian]

JM, gaining muscle without gaining weight will likely not work. You need a calorie surplus and muscle is just heavier than fat. It's hard to accept (I know what I'm talking about), but you will gain weight if you build muscle.