Has anyone stopped counting calories and still lose
Replies
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I need the discipline & accountability. I love food too much.
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I have to count. When I stop I always gain. And I still suck at guestimating portion sizes.1
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[*] Consume protein with each meal, somewhere in a range of 20-40g per meal on average. More or less depending on your number of meals and protein needs. You don't need to track this, just eyeball it or use palm sized servings as a guideline. You can use the PN method which I'll link here, but I should mention that I don't agree with them on their rather negative slant on calorie counting which they also present in this article. I DO think the alternative they present is quite good and so that's why I posting this article: http://www.precisionnutrition.com/calorie-control-guide
I agree that the alternative looks good, but do they ever explain why they think a woman only needs to eat half as much as a man of the same size? That was the only part that felt "off" to me. My husband weighs 50% more than me and needs 50% more food. Not twice as much food and certainly not three times as much food!
Even if they wanted to incorporate the "men are a bit more muscular and need a few more calories" idea, they could have just given them more protein or just given them more starch. Giving them more veggies too is just bizarre to me.2 -
SusanMFindlay wrote: »[*] Consume protein with each meal, somewhere in a range of 20-40g per meal on average. More or less depending on your number of meals and protein needs. You don't need to track this, just eyeball it or use palm sized servings as a guideline. You can use the PN method which I'll link here, but I should mention that I don't agree with them on their rather negative slant on calorie counting which they also present in this article. I DO think the alternative they present is quite good and so that's why I posting this article: http://www.precisionnutrition.com/calorie-control-guide
I agree that the alternative looks good, but do they ever explain why they think a woman only needs to eat half as much as a man of the same size? That was the only part that felt "off" to me. My husband weighs 50% more than me and needs 50% more food. Not twice as much food and certainly not three times as much food!
Even if they wanted to incorporate the "men are a bit more muscular and need a few more calories" idea, they could have just given them more protein or just given them more starch. Giving them more veggies too is just bizarre to me.
That is strange that they gave the men double portions. I think men's BMRs, RMRs, and TDEES are higher than women's. My husband is my height and can eat more than me for instance. And when we diet together he tends to lose more weight faster. I don't think that it is twice as fast though. But I'd say it is definitely more. On the other hand, he is 30 pounds heavier than me at the same height.
The "portion method" works well for me to maintain my weight. It is also a good method for estimation when eating at a restaurant, family outing, etc where one might not have access to food scales. I would say though it doesn't help me personally to lose the last few pounds. I like it for maintenance though because it is very simple. I do the plate method for lunch or dinner in a pinch when I can't use a kitchen scale.
Note-- When in actively losing weight mode I have to weigh food and log carefully in order to be accurate.
ETA: Out of curiosity I popped in hubby's stats into the TDEE calculator. It gave him 2000 calories for his TDEE and it gave me 1600 calories at the same height and stats only with changing weight and sex. So he needs an extra 400 calories for maintenance than I do.
If I punch in my weight but only change the sex from female to male it says TDEE is 1800. So for a man at my weight and height there is only an extra 200 calories needed at the same activity level . I guess the difference lies in that the average man likely weighs more than the average female, has more muscle mass, and might be more active.0 -
I think of my relationship with food a little bit like a drug addiction. If I don't watch it closely, I get out of control every time. So, yeah, I may very well have to count calories for the rest of my life. But, I won't get diabetes, or heart disease, and I won't die an early death, at least not for reasons I can control.0
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I guess the difference lies in that the average man likely weighs more than the average female, has more muscle mass, and might be more active.
Right, but that's accounted for by the fact that you're using your hand to measure portions. Men who are bigger have bigger hands. But that site says men get two palms of meat, 2 fists of veggies and 2 cupped hands of starch - but women only get 1 palm of meat, 1 fist of veggies and 1 cupped hand of starch. That's the part that sounds fishy to me.
My husband has way bigger hands than me, and if we followed that, he'd be eating at least three (probably four) times as much food as me. He needs more, but not *that* much more.0 -
Yes! I actually lost 85 pounds not counting, it was not luck, it was totally awareness of food. But the only way to do that is to know portion sizes very well and know your nutrition well enough to make your meals with all the knowledge and awareness in your head, like having a meal plan in your head. I can do it, but I have yet to meet another who has done this. I mainly log my food now for all the people I help and it's not so bad either.3
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I like the idea of using hands for portion sizes, but agree that the article seems a bit off. It says that it's calculated on four meals a day, which means that men could be having eight palm-sized portions of meat a day (for instance). That seems an awful lot of meat! And I agree that it's odd that women only need half. I've tried to use this method before, but I do find that splitting it into meals like that isn't helpful. I will tend to eat the bulk of my meat and vegetables at my evening meal, and I only eat one to three meals a day, so it just becomes more confusing! It might be easier to show the totals for the day. I think it's not clear where some foods lie (are beans carb or protein? Are eggs protein or fat?).
But I do agree that there's no need to calorie count if you can visually control your portions. And I like that it makes it clear that these are maintenance portions, and you'll need less if you want to lose.0 -
I logged for several months and then stopped for several months, and while my weight loss has slowed, I'm still in a downward trend. I do some mental math in my head every day because I know approx. how many calories are in my go-to foods. If I have a new meal, I do log just that one meal sometimes so I can get an idea how many cals is in it.
My husband, however, can't do that. If he stops logging, he gains - and quickly! I'm not sure what is different between us, but I have somehow learned over time to eat a more appropriate amount, and he just can't do that. He will probably always have to log, even when he hits maintenance.0 -
If you are done losing weight and want to just maintain I'd say sure go ahead and stop counting and try to just estimate proper portions - but keep an eye on your weight and start counting again if it starts to creep up.
If you're still trying to lose I would say don't stop counting yet, but maybe give yourself 1 day a week or just weekends off of counting to get a little mental break. Or maybe just don't count dinner... whatever works for you.
This is fine as long as you keep losing weight- if it stalls or starts coming back on then go back to tracking.3 -
I've never used a food scale, I simply used labels and online nutrition data but also knew there was a margin of error of 300-500 so I factored that in. Your weight loss results give you all the facts you need to know. If you're not losing, you're eating too much so eat less or move more.
I'm in maintenance now but even before I finished losing, I never logged food daily, but I always have a ballpark estimate of calories coz I read labels, or I already know from previous counting and that's good enough.
Also, it's not your body that somehow magically learns how to lose or maintain. It's your eyes! You can see what you're putting on your plate and already know from counting or weighing, what the calorie density of various foods are so just continue choosing the right foods and quantities and you'll continue getting results even without counting or weighing things.3 -
SusanMFindlay wrote: »[*] Consume protein with each meal, somewhere in a range of 20-40g per meal on average. More or less depending on your number of meals and protein needs. You don't need to track this, just eyeball it or use palm sized servings as a guideline. You can use the PN method which I'll link here, but I should mention that I don't agree with them on their rather negative slant on calorie counting which they also present in this article. I DO think the alternative they present is quite good and so that's why I posting this article: http://www.precisionnutrition.com/calorie-control-guide
I agree that the alternative looks good, but do they ever explain why they think a woman only needs to eat half as much as a man of the same size? That was the only part that felt "off" to me. My husband weighs 50% more than me and needs 50% more food. Not twice as much food and certainly not three times as much food!
Even if they wanted to incorporate the "men are a bit more muscular and need a few more calories" idea, they could have just given them more protein or just given them more starch. Giving them more veggies too is just bizarre to me.
That is strange that they gave the men double portions. I think men's BMRs, RMRs, and TDEES are higher than women's. My husband is my height and can eat more than me for instance. And when we diet together he tends to lose more weight faster. I don't think that it is twice as fast though. But I'd say it is definitely more. On the other hand, he is 30 pounds heavier than me at the same height.
The "portion method" works well for me to maintain my weight. It is also a good method for estimation when eating at a restaurant, family outing, etc where one might not have access to food scales. I would say though it doesn't help me personally to lose the last few pounds. I like it for maintenance though because it is very simple. I do the plate method for lunch or dinner in a pinch when I can't use a kitchen scale.
Note-- When in actively losing weight mode I have to weigh food and log carefully in order to be accurate.
ETA: Out of curiosity I popped in hubby's stats into the TDEE calculator. It gave him 2000 calories for his TDEE and it gave me 1600 calories at the same height and stats only with changing weight and sex. So he needs an extra 400 calories for maintenance than I do.
If I punch in my weight but only change the sex from female to male it says TDEE is 1800. So for a man at my weight and height there is only an extra 200 calories needed at the same activity level . I guess the difference lies in that the average man likely weighs more than the average female, has more muscle mass, and might be more active.
On average, men are larger...taller...weigh more...have more muscle mass, etc. I'm surprised you only came up with 2000 calories for your husband...my TDEE, depending on the time of year and my training is anywhere between 2800 - 3500 calories...on average it's around 3000 - 3200 calories. My wife on the other hand, who is an active runner and lifts needs around 2200 - 2300 to maintain...she's 5'2" and I'm 5'10"...on average I eat around 1,000 calories more per day than my wife.1 -
But she's saying that for a man and woman of the same height and weight. She's already accounted for "men are larger, taller, weigh more...."
I knwo that men have more lean body mass than women, so that a man who weighs 150 will have less fat, more LBM, and burn more calories because more LBM - but I'm not sure that accounts for all the math she's talking about.1 -
courtneyfabulous wrote: »If you are done losing weight and want to just maintain I'd say sure go ahead and stop counting and try to just estimate proper portions - but keep an eye on your weight and start counting again if it starts to creep up.
If you're still trying to lose I would say don't stop counting yet, but maybe give yourself 1 day a week or just weekends off of counting to get a little mental break. Or maybe just don't count dinner... whatever works for you.
This is fine as long as you keep losing weight- if it stalls or starts coming back on then go back to tracking.
I have managed to lose without counting, so I think if it works it's fine. But I do love your suggestion of not counting dinner! I had forgotten, but I've also done this. I've counted the first two meals of the day (and anything else, such as milk in tea), then roughly estimated the last meal of the day. If I had, say, 600 calories left, and the evening meal looks to be about 500 then there's no real need to meticulously weigh and log. You just need to have a deficit. As you say, if it turns out that you're not losing at the expected rate, then you're maybe massively underestimating that meal and need to be more precise. But if you're not worried about precision, then it's fine. Great idea for mixing it up a bit if you're fed up with counting, but still want to use calories as a guide!
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He is the same height as me. I put in the same activity level just to compare apples to apples. But you are right, I think that he burns a lot more than I do!cwolfman13 wrote: »SusanMFindlay wrote: »[*] Consume protein with each meal, somewhere in a range of 20-40g per meal on average. More or less depending on your number of meals and protein needs. You don't need to track this, just eyeball it or use palm sized servings as a guideline. You can use the PN method which I'll link here, but I should mention that I don't agree with them on their rather negative slant on calorie counting which they also present in this article. I DO think the alternative they present is quite good and so that's why I posting this article: http://www.precisionnutrition.com/calorie-control-guide
I agree that the alternative looks good, but do they ever explain why they think a woman only needs to eat half as much as a man of the same size? That was the only part that felt "off" to me. My husband weighs 50% more than me and needs 50% more food. Not twice as much food and certainly not three times as much food!
Even if they wanted to incorporate the "men are a bit more muscular and need a few more calories" idea, they could have just given them more protein or just given them more starch. Giving them more veggies too is just bizarre to me.
That is strange that they gave the men double portions. I think men's BMRs, RMRs, and TDEES are higher than women's. My husband is my height and can eat more than me for instance. And when we diet together he tends to lose more weight faster. I don't think that it is twice as fast though. But I'd say it is definitely more. On the other hand, he is 30 pounds heavier than me at the same height.
The "portion method" works well for me to maintain my weight. It is also a good method for estimation when eating at a restaurant, family outing, etc where one might not have access to food scales. I would say though it doesn't help me personally to lose the last few pounds. I like it for maintenance though because it is very simple. I do the plate method for lunch or dinner in a pinch when I can't use a kitchen scale.
Note-- When in actively losing weight mode I have to weigh food and log carefully in order to be accurate.
ETA: Out of curiosity I popped in hubby's stats into the TDEE calculator. It gave him 2000 calories for his TDEE and it gave me 1600 calories at the same height and stats only with changing weight and sex. So he needs an extra 400 calories for maintenance than I do.
If I punch in my weight but only change the sex from female to male it says TDEE is 1800. So for a man at my weight and height there is only an extra 200 calories needed at the same activity level . I guess the difference lies in that the average man likely weighs more than the average female, has more muscle mass, and might be more active.
On average, men are larger...taller...weigh more...have more muscle mass, etc. I'm surprised you only came up with 2000 calories for your husband...my TDEE, depending on the time of year and my training is anywhere between 2800 - 3500 calories...on average it's around 3000 - 3200 calories. My wife on the other hand, who is an active runner and lifts needs around 2200 - 2300 to maintain...she's 5'2" and I'm 5'10"...on average I eat around 1,000 calories more per day than my wife.
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