BCAA + Creatine weight flux

[blyon1990]

ok rly quick and possible stupid question. My diet is high prot high fat low carb. the only time i eat starch is post workout with my measured amount of oats (bout a cup now). ive been trying to find a maintenance lvl for calories and i believe i have found it cuz for the past month my weight has remained the same until i removed my post w/o whey shake (21g prot) and started taking BCAA instead. I also started creatine about three weeks ago. also to keep cals the same i replace those prot cals with a lil more oats.

Since doing this i have gained about a steady half pound every week. workout out has not change at all and neither has activity. could this weight gain be do to the new supplements and the water fluctuation do to my muscles starting to take up the extra water?

[snorkelman]

removed my post w/o whey shake (21g prot) and started taking BCAA instead. I also started creatine about three weeks ago. also to keep cals the same i replace those prot cals with a lil more oats.

You made a basic error. You made multiple changes at the same time. This makes it hard to know whether the creatine is causing the change (desirable) or whether adding more carbs is causing the change.

[blyon1990]

ya i was afraid i did that. any advise on what i should do?

[snorkelman]

Well, if you want to be 100% sure that you are responding to creatine, then you would need to stop supplementing with creatine, and allow it to wash out of your system. Assuming that you have been taking 5 grams per day for three weeks, you are probably 75% saturated, so it will probably take about 3-4 weeks for washout. If you have been taking more than 5 grams per day, then you may already be fully saturated and need a full 4-6 weeks for washout. Then you can keep your caloric intake and expenditure the same and just add creatine and then you monitor your weight and lifts and see whether you are gaining the couple pounds that you should from creatine.

Otherwise, just keep taking creatine and in about a week you will be fully saturated (assuming 5g/day) and then there should be no more additional weight gain being caused by creatine.

[blyon1990]

ive been taking 1/2tsp so i think thats like 2.5 to 3 grams. but im just going to stick with it and see where it goes. i am considering taking a serving out of my post workout oats because ever since i uped it a little ive felt a lil extra bloated but my body loves to do that with carbs when i have a change in my diet.

but thanks for the advise. reped.