Do I Need To Up My Calories Now Because I'm Already Losing Lots Of Weight?

Question: I've been bloated with stomach distended for almost 1-2 months now.

I've had a blood and stool test, confirmed nothing wrong there, no parasites apparently, or none that they tested for. No problems with blood or liver/kidneys.

I need to up my calories now because I'm already losing lots of weight and muscle on arms and legs, but the stomach remains the same size if not bigger now.

Pic 1: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1BVNjvhZrruFAPkgMp0_H2dY_JZjk8gW7/view?usp=share_link

Pic 2: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1lxQ6BARUpX4YMFs47Par_VcIvVfHcsKi/view?usp=share_link

I've tried lowering my calories for several weeks now to less than 2000 calories, I've lost muscle and mass on arms, back, legs shoulders, but not stomach. Stomach remains very bloated all the time.

I'm also taking daily probiotics and ginger tea, to try and improve digestion but nothing is working. I have regular bowl movements still, daily.

Gluten intolerance may be a reason for bloating if all the tests you mentioned above are normal. Gluten may often cause inflammation and bloating. In this case it is advised to reduce or better eliminate gluten from diet - I’ve tried not eating gluten for an entire day or even two days, it had no effect.

Lowering the calories to less than 2000 can't make you loose belly fat. You need to change diet reducing sugars, especially refined sugar, choose food rich in protein as chicken breast, turkey, fish, eggs , beans etc . Eat more vegetables and green leaves - I’ve always been able to lose or maintain weight by reducing calories, and the size of my stomach relative to the rest of my is very, very unusual. My arms have become thin now like my legs, but my stomach is still massively extended and bloated, and it’s hard to touch as well, unlike fat.

Also increasing physical activity and especially lifting weights will help you to put on muscle mass - That’s not the problem, I had been putting on muscle for several months, but as a result of my stomach issue suddenly swelling up, I reduced my calories to ‘lose weight’ calories for me, which is anything under 2000 calories and as such I’ve been losing weight steadily, and muscle as well. But despite that, my belly is still massive.

Any thoughts on the stool and blood tests? They didn’t show anything unusual, so I’m really not sure what it could be.

Why can't you access the pictures? I made them publically viewable, if you just click the link?

Or if that still doesn't work, how do I upload them to a report? Where do I find that?

The reports section doesn't work. The website forces me to answer a bunch of questions, but it never saves my progress when I click save. And the radio check boxes are broken, I click no to one of them, and it automatically removes my answer to another one.

This entire website is buggy and hard to use. Please can you click the links to view my photos that I sent above. Or I can send them by email. The reports section here simply does not work.

Hi, I just emailed them to you, did you get them?

I will try not eating gluten at all from now on, and se if that helps.

Food intolerance tests, how would that work, and where/how would I get those?

Is there anything else you can think it would be?

Can a gluten intolerance cause bloating of this size, constantly 24 hours a day for over 2 months?

thanks

I'll stop eating gluten from now on, and see if that makes a difference. Would you suggest I take a gluten test or something? to rule it out?

And with the muscles, I rarely exercise my abdominals with thigns like situps, in fact I never do those. Are you saying that by doing those, my stomach would actually get smaller and wouldn't stick out like this?

Surely this is something else though, I mean if I 'suck it in' I can use my ab muscles to hide it, but then when I relax, it goes back to how it was again. when I fully relax and breathe out, it shows as a huge sticking out belly like this

Hi, I'm still a bit unsure abot what you mean regarding a few things:

1: What is the main most likely thing you think is causing this?

2: Should I avoid or reduce fat? Or just reduce sugar and refined sugar or refined carbs? What should my macros or general diet look like, then?

3: Please comment on teh composition of the stomach, in the morning it's soft, like fat, but throuhgout the day and after big meals, the entire stomach gets much larger and hard. This shows it's both fat and bloating or something else...

4: I've steadily lost weight since I realised th stomach thing was a problem. I cut down my calories to 2000 per day and have lost weight steadily since then. About 2 kilos actually, but the weight has been lost from my muscles, arms, legs and back. And not from my stomach.

Knowing this, should I still keep my calories low and lose even more mass? Or is it not really connected,and I should keep my calories at maintenance levels at 2300 per day or so?

Please repond to each point labelled by the number so it's easy for me to keep track, thank you so much

Thanks

It's not flat in the morning. I'm bloated with the belly sticking out like that all day, every day. It never goes down.

But it's softer in the morning, but it's the same size still. Does that change anything?