I just have to ask..what exactly is bulking and WHY?

[NYNessie]

Being new to this board, new to weight lifting and new to adding calories and counting macros to lose weight (ex WWatcher) I just have to ask...what is bulking and why would you want to do that? I mean no disrespect and am not being sarcastic...I just dont get the point. Is it to gain weight and then turn it into muscle?
Also I have seen the term..."skinny fat" often here...what is that? I thin person with little muscle? oh and "DOM"? ???

[mysticpenguin]

You bulk - eat over your maintenance calories while lifting hard & heavy - to gain muscle. A lot of us here don't like the skinny fat look - that is, skinny and soft, with no muscle definition/shape. Personally, I want to look like Erin Stern (pic: http://cdn.simplyshredded.com/wp-con...stern/6128.jpg ) - although it certainly takes years to build that much muscle & she is not photo-shoot-lean 365 days a year.

[oregonchick76]

Generally speaking, you are not going to be able to gain muscle in a deficit, and maybe only very slowly at maintenance. So many people eat a bit over maintenance to maximize muscle growth - it's so very slow for women to begin with! Muscles look hawt! And with them we can pick up heavy things! And that's why we want them... Skinny fat is a person who is at or below their ideal body weight but still looks flabby because they still have a relatively high body fat % and very low muscle. You cannot turn excess weight into muscle. You have to lift - tear the muscles, then feed them so that as they repair/rebuild, they get a little bigger with each new/increased stress. DOMS - delayed onset muscle soreness. A new lifter will often find themselves sore after lifting - as late as a day or two AFTER lifting.