Gaining

I started gaining a few years ago. Went from about 140-220lbs. Then I had some life craziness and couldn't keep active gaining. I ended up losing down to about 170-180.

Well, I'm finally starting gaining again. I usually go all in. Have heavy cream daily, which helped a lot last time. My question is for those who have regained after losing weight. Was regaining easier? Faster? Did you regain more than you lost? I hear those are all possibilities. Would love to hear people's experiences. Thanks!

I'm curious about this as well as I'm currently trying to lose some weight to try and get rid of my 'ball belly' to regain later hopefully with more softer fat.

From what I've read, there are those who say regaining can lead to 'softer' bellies but then there are those who say they had the opposite, so I don't know how much e.g. diet vs genetics Vs previous weight might be at play.

I definitely have a softer belly now than I did before, but I have also noticed that it seems like my gaining has become slower the second time around

I can contribute to this with my own experience because I've been through the cycle twice.I've gained and then lost a fair amount of weight two times (around 80lbs up, and then 40lbs down each time). The first time was when exercising to train for something that I really wanted to do, and the second was from life complications and a bit of non-serious illness.

The effects of weight loss are largely down to your genetics in the same way as weight gain, however what I found was when I did lose the weight, the visceral fat burned off in higher quantities. The softness remained. This happened both times.

I now purposely have a cycle of losing some after hitting a goal, to get rid of harder fat, and then regaining past that original goal. It looks and feels better that way, and it's also better for you to lose some of the visceral fat too.

I finally decided to regain. I will be gaining intentionally using heavy whipping cream and will let you know how that goes.

I'm starting off even lighter than my starting weight the last time I gained. I had previously made it up to 295 pounds, so I have a lot of catching up to do.

For me regaining was always quicker than gaining in the first place. It was like the pounds were just waiting to fill back out

Yes, in my experience with myself and my wife - the regain is much quicker and is much softer.

When I first gained I went from 200 to 300lbs. I've then lost, regained, lost, regained over the years. Although I never got back to the original highest weight, each I time I went back over 220lbs I'd notice my belly was softer compared to the same weight the last time. I'm back on a small gaining stint and notice the same - it also helps getting older!

I’ve gained and lost the same 80 lbs or so like twice and this third trip back up the scale I can definitely tell my fat composition has changed. I’m a lot squishier and doughier kind of across the board than I was last time.
I’m not sure if that’s luck of the draw, hormonal changes due to being almost 40, or what.

I'm regaining weight while on estrogen, which I didn't have access to the first rime around. There's definitely a lot of noticeable changes. The fat seems to be distributing more evenly all-over rather than being primarily in the belly. All of the fat is much softer too. Not to mention, I have cellulite on my butt and legs this time around.