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Neither. Weight gain happens when you’re in a caloric surplus.

CICO- Calories In, Calories Out. No way around it. To lose weight, one must be in a caloric deficit.

A. To lose weight (water, fat, and/or muscle): consistent caloric deficit + enjoyable nutrition plan.

B. To lose weight + gain/retain muscle: A + resistance training (home/gym).

C. To lose weight + gain/retain muscle + improve cardiovascular: A + B + Cardio

D. surgery

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Salt causes water retention and some are prone to a puffy face especially upon waking. But as others have said, you may have gained weight from the totality of what you’re eating. Drink water, get plenty of sleep, and avoid salty foods fir less puffiness in the morning

only the face got fatter? are you sure?

Honestly, move more, eat less, especially fats, salt, and sugars. All of those will bloat you but you just have to take in less than you burn for a while to lose fat. Good luck!

Carbs are not the enemy. Your body actually NEEDS carbs.

Don't listen to diet culture on the internet.

Yes and if any other parts of my body got better it is not as obvious

Reported as misinformation

It worked for me

It’s drastic to call carbohydrates “enemies” however. You lost weight because you ate less calories via less carbs. I’ve lost weight eating sandwiches, rice, and potatoes EVERYDAY. I’ve also lost weight NOT eating carbs, but in the end, it’s just an easy way to cut calories without tracking. It’s often said “Fat Burns in a Carbohydrate Flame”.

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Sugar. There's fucking sugar in everything. Natural sugar is still sugar.

You need to be at a calorie deficit. 40% protein, 30% carbs, 30% fat. Get proteins from lean meats like turkey and chicken, get carbs from vegetables and some fruits, get fats from avocados, olive oil, anything but seed oil and butter.

Also, the best diet is the one you can stick with. People go on fad diets that aren't inherently bad, tehy're just not sustainable.

The problem is it's easy to eat a shit ton of carbs. There is 25 grams of carbs in one slice of bread, same with an apple, a banana, etc.

So when people say low carb diet, they usually mean around 100 grams of carbs, which isn't that aggressive, it's just so easy to go well over that with the average american diet.

Also your body burns carbs before fat, so if you have little carbs, your body starts burning body fat. (ketosis)

Okay so what are foods that have calories that you would think I should avoid or severely limit?

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I had to educate myself about caloric content in the food I was eating. My wife got me a book called “Eat this not that” which helped a lot (especially at restaurants) but the same information is available all over the internet.

After I tracked my intake for a couple of weeks, I started to know what I was eating, calorie-wise. Then I set a budget of 2000 calories per day, but everyone will need a different number.

I imagine it as having $20 a day to spend on food (1 calorie is 1 cent) and thinking about it like “bargain hunting” helped me find foods I like that were “good deals” calorie-wise.

For example, mayonnaise is a terrible deal (150 cal per 2 tablespoons) , while salsa, mustard, hot sauce, etc are tasty but have few calories.

Like others said, you need to burn more calories than you take in to lose weight, and until you’re honest and accurate about what you’re taking in, the needle isn’t going to move.

Not true. You can eat thousands of calories per day from fruits and olive oil and you won't get fat

Michael Phelps- consume 10k calories per day, but he burned it off due to his training. But for the average person who has a 9-5 low intensity job, eating like Phelps will most likely lead to a caloric surplus, which will turn to weight gains.

At the end of the day, calories in calories out. No way around that.

Caloric deficit: lose weight

Caloric maintenance: maintain weight

Caloric surplus: gain weight

You mean it’s easy to eat a shit ton of CALORIES when when eating carbs? Carbs are just easier to over eat. It’s much harder to sit down to eat 600 calories of lean, grilled chicken breast (185 calories 4 oz serving size) than it is to eat 600 calories in typical “indulgent/mindless” carbohydrates, such as the aforementioned bread. 4 dinner rolls with 2 tables spoons of butter is easy 600 calories with little to no protein. However, I dare you to eat 600 calories of plain potatoes. It still comes down to overeating eating calories, and skipping skipping carbohydrates is just an easy way to reduce.

Additionally, from my understanding you need to meet a much lower threshold of carbohydrates (sub 30g) to enter ketosis. You can also enter ketosis with time restricted feedings (intermittent fasting) if that is desired.

That’s patently false

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Sugar and some non-sugar sweeteners are the primary cause of weight gain. Bear in mind that foods made from processed flour are converted into glucose (a form of sugar) when digested. When your blood sugar level gets too high, your body releases insulin which forces your fat cells to open up and take in all that sugar. Your face looks puffy or chubby because your body is full of inflammation caused by lots of carbs.

Agreed. You cannot get fat from eating dietary fat which is very high in calories.

Cut back on carbs like pasta, bread, breakfast cereal, desserts, etc. -- anything with lots of sugar and/or processed flour. Eat more of the good fat like animal fat, olive oil, coconut oil, butter, gee, cocoa butter, Macadamia nuts, walnuts, pecans.

Would you say that popcorn has a lot of excess carbs?

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Yes and no. It's a special case. A third cup of corn kernels would be less than a full cob, which if eaten as corn, would be just a fairly empty calorie side dish and leave you still hungry.

As popcorn, it takes up much more volume in your stomach, and can give you a feeling of being full with far less calories and carbs than similar snacks such as potato or corn chips.

In short, it's one of the healthier snacks, but still need to watch for excessive fats from popping, if you didn't pop it yourself.

Use real butter on your popcorn. You cannot get fat from eating dietary fat.