Please look at my diary and help!! What am i doing wrong?

jasminethemouse

Hi! This is my first day logging (this time round!). I've put my breakfast in and my snack and lunch in advance as I've planned what to have . To me it seems healthy but I only have 348 cals left for dinner?? This seems a bit harsh.

I've had porridge with semi skimmed milk eith banana and honey for breakfast, a boiled egg as a snack later and for lunch a veggie burger wrapped in lettuce with half an avocado.

Is this seriously too much? I remember last time I lost weight I did 1500 instead of 1200 because of this problem and I did lose weight fine but I'm just a bit confused why mfp has given me this target if it's so unachievable.

(Also I am taking into account that I have 8 month old twins to chase after all day...so I don't really want to feel hungry all day)

Any advice appreciated, even if it's telling me I'm eating too much!

fr33sia12

Firstly did you set to lose 2lb a week? and what activity level did you set?
Secondly are you weighing your food? If you added milk for breakfast I don't see it in your food list. You need to weigh and log everything you eat, don't estimate from the packaging information.

2metraninja

1200 Kcal a day is indeed not much. If MFP gave this to you, you must have set really high goal with losing weight too quick. Maybe give yourself a bit longer period to reach your weight goal?

On the other hand, you are not making your task any easier by eating porrige with milk and honey and hamburgers, which are packed with a lot of calories. Instead of the hamburger, you could had 3 eggs with a whole letuce salad. Or 200g curd with tomatoes. Also, did you set your activity coeficient higher to compensate for you running after 2 kids all day? That may qualify for similar activity as a waiter for example.

Additional advice is to make some training if you want to eat more.

Ricksh1000

Personally given the option, I wouldn't go for the burger purely based on the calories.
Anything I eat is with this in mind: What is the bang for the buck? I mean for the calories you had in the burger you could have had a small meal if chosen wisely.
Your breakfast, I too have porrige every single day. This is what mine looks like:

Generic - Dried Raisins, 0.5 fluid ounce
Generic - Raw Sunflower Seed, 1 Tbsp
Pumpkin Seeds - Pumpkin Seeds, 1 Tb
Spices - Cinnamon, ground, 1 tbsp
Scott's - Porage Oats Original,, 16 g
Linwoods Organic Ground Flax Seed - Seed , 1 Tbsp (30g)
Skimmed Milk - Milk, 140.42 ml

This equates to 316 calories.

mlinci

I wouldn't last a day on as little as 1,200 calories. I don't know your full stats, OP, but I'm a moderately active 41 year old, starting weight 185 lbs, I was losing a pound per week on 1550 calories, I'm still losing about 1/2 pound per week on 1800 calories per day. I'd recommend bearable and slow rate over fast and ravenously hungry. But I appreciate personal styles differ.

lemonychild

Your input to lose 2lbs a week is that's causing your cals to be at 1200. If you're excercising u should log and eat those cals

lisamerrison

I just looked at your diary. Firstly, glad to see you have increased your calorie allowance to 1500 - 1200 calories is the absolute minimum recommended and certainly not for someone who is actively running around after kids!
Secondly, I agree a burger (with mozzarella in it) high in calories and then to add a whole avocado which although is healthy in moderation is also high in calories. I do a really lovely salad with avocado in it that I found on MFP called cowboy caviar - it serves 4 and has a whole avocado in it.
I tend to bulk up on vegetables and fruit as they are low calorie and you can have a lot of them and I eat chicken and pork mainly. Occasionally I will have red meat and if I am having a meat free day I tend to get my protein from beans and eggs. Think about what you can have instead of 2 eggs for a snack too. Take a look at the blog tab on this site, then eat and look at all the recipes. Also, you can't go far wrong by googling slimming world recipes.

Usually, low-calorie-dense foods are high in WATER and FIBER. These foods are very filling, but don’t ratchet up a bunch of waistline-busting calories. Examples include vegetables, fruits, cooked whole grains, oatmeal, cooked beans and legumes, nonfat dairy and soy products, and lean animal proteins.

smotheredincheese

You need to be weighing all your food. '0.5 medium avocado' could be anything! With such a calorie dense food you need to be accurate or you could end up completely underestimating (or overestimating) how much you're eating.

Trish1c

Do you really need porridge and a banana? Pick one not both.

Can you eat half the burger instead of the whole thing & supplement with some veggies?

ShrinkingScientist

My personal opinion? You'd feel a lot better eating more fruits and vegetables. They'll keep you full longer and are less calorie dense.

Francl27

Find a way to make your breakfast less calories... that's a lot of carbs and not much protein and fat at all.

Otherwise, yeah, 1200 is overkill for most people. You're supposed to eat back exercise calories too.

BoxerBrawler

Ricksh1000 wrote: »

Personally given the option, I wouldn't go for the burger purely based on the calories.
Anything I eat is with this in mind: What is the bang for the buck? I mean for the calories you had in the burger you could have had a small meal if chosen wisely.
Your breakfast, I too have porrige every single day. This is what mine looks like:

Generic - Dried Raisins, 0.5 fluid ounce
Generic - Raw Sunflower Seed, 1 Tbsp
Pumpkin Seeds - Pumpkin Seeds, 1 Tb
Spices - Cinnamon, ground, 1 tbsp
Scott's - Porage Oats Original,, 16 g
Linwoods Organic Ground Flax Seed - Seed , 1 Tbsp (30g)
Skimmed Milk - Milk, 140.42 ml

This equates to 316 calories.

I agree with this (above)

Think about eating foods that are lower in calorie but nutrient dense. Add a big variety of vegetables to your meals. Another example for breakfast I have 4 egg whites scrambled with a variety of veggies, comes out to around 270 calories and 20 + grams of protein. It's big and filling. Not everyone likes eggs in the morning but there are good alternatives to downsize your calories and up size your nutrition. As far as the burger goes... are you a vegetarian or Vegan? (I don't eat red meat), but you'd better off with a lean turkey or chicken burger. Unless you made it yourself a lot of those veggie burgers have huge calories and very little nutrition value.