Gaining Weight. What's Happening to Me?

Im 47 this year.
Struggling with body comp issues despite watching my calorie intake, not eating crap/processed and lifting 4x a week with mainly the big lifts(in strength-hypertrophy rep range) with intensity in 70-85% range. My rest periods vary depneding on the intensities. At higher I rest at max 90secs, the least 30-45sec at lower intensities. Volume is moderate.
Workout is usually full body. A upper push/pull variant and a squat or deadlift variant. If i fell tired, its just upper or lower. 3-4 working sets max followed by 1-2 drop off sets.

Diet macros(Protein/Casbs/Fat)have been at about 50/20/30 on rest days and 40/30/30 on workout days. I keep carbs low as my bodyfat is rather high.

I got a shock when i stepped on the scale earlier this week at 80kg, at about 25% BF. Have always been in the 77-79kg range at 18-20% BF range for the last few years.

What has happened? Sluggish metabolism?
Should I change in the way I eat or train?

Advice much appreciated

Would not panic yet. More legit methods e.g. dexa are unreliable in determining body fat percentage never mind scales. A 5% body fat increase is enough to be picked up visually. You may have to compare pics from before to now but I really doubt you went up 5% and didn’t notice it. Look now. If it doesn’t look like you’ve got fat af then the scale is bullshit.

Highly doubt you’ve recompositioned fatter while more or less being the same bodyweight while still training intensely and dieting properly (see below).

Stop using the scales for anything other than weighing yourself. Unless they are highly advanced full body scanning scales like some MRI looking contraption they are only giving you estimates of questionable accuracy. Will throw you off and make it hard to track progress or make you second guess yourself and make all kinds of drastic changes e.g. this situation.

99% of time is people not being accurate, consistent or honest with themselves regarding calorie balance. Will give you the benefit of the doubt tho…

How many tho calories tho? Macros are three lots of how many grams of each macro nutrient not your percentage split. It could 50/0/50 or 40/30/30 or whatever: macro percentage split is of lower priority when dieting for body composition than caloric balance i.e. how much vs what. I mentioned people not being accurate with their macros before: is this you?

well you are 47

is what your doing at the moment been showing results?

You got a shock when you were 1-3kg over what you ordinarily have been? You may have just had a lot of… umm… waste still to be jettisoned.

I’d wait for more data but slowing metabolism, higher bodyfat and less muscle is where we all end up eventually.

Im on an average of 1800-2000 calories a day, slightly below maintenance.

I think its my diet. Ive to tweak it to my age, my activity level and metabolism.

Im afraid if I go on even lower calories(in a deficit) or bring my carbs down even further metabolism will slow down.

Im in a situation where I hesitant about bringing up my caloric intake or carbs as my bodyfat is in the 20% range.

If you legitimately gained weight than it wasn’t below maintenance man. Simple as that. You only need to be a few calories below maintenance to lose weight and 100 below will probably get you a nice slow consistent sustainable rate. Dropping by 50-100 calories may put you there if you are already close. It really isn’t that much I could look at a pizza and get more calories lel

If dropping calories isn’t an option…

Maybe increase activity levels instead? Cardio on a stationary bike is low stress on the joints and if you put on your favourite movie/tv show time flies by.

Ok I will try fasted cardio in the morning.

Fasted cardio no bueno. Have something fast digesting pre if possible