Im nervous about my first free meal help!
Replies
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Why don't you eat half of your food at the restaurant, and eat the other half the next day? Or order something you can share with someone else?2
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Every one has already addressed the view points arount "cheat" meals/days and I don't have much to add to that.
On another point, if you are planning to eat at this restaurant once in maintenance too, I think that starting to incorporate it into your diet from day 1 is a good idea. It worked for me. So now I know how to handle my portions and what can fit into my calorie allotment. It's all part of the learning journey.1 -
WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.0 -
Thanks everyone. I found a meal that was rather healthy it just had alot of cheese. I still made my calories goal.0
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rikkejanell2014 wrote: »WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.
To accurately log you need to weigh your food.6 -
rikkejanell2014 wrote: »WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.
So you're only eating 800-900 calories and exercising? If so, you're significantly undereating.0 -
Just so you know you probably only lost 1lb of true fat, the rest is water/food weight. Usually you see dramatic loss the first week or so and then it slows down and you see the actual rate. Don't be alarmed if you don't see a loss for the next few weeks.2
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Another thought: you can have a delicious pasta meal AND keep in low in calories. Some pasta... a nice salad... why not enjoy your meal because it's yummy AND works in your budget.0
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Enjoy your free meal. Eat as much as you can handle to offset the horrible deficit you achieved in the past 5 weeks (your aim shouldn't be to eat way under your calorie budget). After that, re-evaluate, set a reasonable calorie budget (likely 1 pound a week), and eat well... don't undereat. If you feel like going to a restaurant or eating something higher in calories just see if it fits into your day or if you need to bank for it in advance.2
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You can't track your food without weighing it. You are just guessing at this point.0
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rikkejanell2014 wrote: »WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.
You should be aiming to hit that net goal of 1290 a day, not be under it by hundreds of calories. Since it's a net goal, that means that when you exercise, you should also be eating some of those calories back as well.
Weighing food isn't required (confession, I didn't weigh my food and don't on a food scale), but it is the best way to ensure accuracy in logging, avoid frustrating plateaus, and make sure that your weight loss progresses on a predictable track. The people who weigh their food say it takes no more than 10 minutes a day and the scales can be found for less than $20 so it doesn't have to be a time consuming expensive investment which I know can be offputting for busy moms.
Have you taken some time to read the stickied "most helpful forum posts" at the top of each forum section? Maybe someone not on the app right now can do me a favor and post the link. You will find a lot of helpful information there.1 -
trigden1991 wrote: »You can't track your food without weighing it. You are just guessing at this point.
That's not necessarily true. I lost 30 lbs using MFP without a food scale (I do highly recommend them for those starting out and those struggling with "why am I not losing weight I'm only eating 1200 cals"). It certainly increases your accuracy but it isn't a requirement. When I first started on MFP I knew nothing of food scales, but I was losing weight. When I started reading on the forums about what a benefit they are, I said that as soon as I hit an unexplained plateau I would get one, but that never really happened and when I transitioned to maintenance I didn't see a strong enough benefit to starting weighing food at that point.
Again, as I mentioned to the OP, I do recommend weighing food if at all possible, but it is possible to be successful without it.1 -
rikkejanell2014 wrote: »WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.
It doesn't take long to weigh food especially if you want accuracy.3 -
WinoGelato wrote: »trigden1991 wrote: »You can't track your food without weighing it. You are just guessing at this point.
That's not necessarily true. I lost 30 lbs using MFP without a food scale (I do highly recommend them for those starting out and those struggling with "why am I not losing weight I'm only eating 1200 cals"). It certainly increases your accuracy but it isn't a requirement. When I first started on MFP I knew nothing of food scales, but I was losing weight. When I started reading on the forums about what a benefit they are, I said that as soon as I hit an unexplained plateau I would get one, but that never really happened and when I transitioned to maintenance I didn't see a strong enough benefit to starting weighing food at that point.
Again, as I mentioned to the OP, I do recommend weighing food if at all possible, but it is possible to be successful without it.
I thought I had written "accurately" in my comment but apparently didn't. You are absolutely correct that you can track or eat intuitively when you have a good grasp on portion sizes. I too would advocate weighing food for all beginners or those near their goal.2 -
Alatariel75 wrote: »rikkejanell2014 wrote: »WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.
So you're only eating 800-900 calories and exercising? If so, you're significantly undereating.
I eat when im hungry0 -
rikkejanell2014 wrote: »Alatariel75 wrote: »rikkejanell2014 wrote: »WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.
So you're only eating 800-900 calories and exercising? If so, you're significantly undereating.
I eat when im hungry
Eating when hungry doesn't necessarily mean you're getting what you need. Eating very very low calories, exercising and chasing 4 kids about is a recipe for disaster.3 -
So I'm a bit unhappy with some people's automatic negativity here.
My guess at what's going on here is the OP is socialising with friends and this involves going out for a meal and she's deciding what to do. If this is the case cheat meal is perhaps the wrong word, rather a meal over which you don't have control. For single people who live alone this can be pretty important activity. For people with partners and/or children and living nearby family this is less of an issue.
The question here is likely not "I want to eat a cheat meal", so much as "I want to socialise with people and not be a freak". I feel this needs proper addressing
Generally I would refer you to Lyle Macdonald's writings on the concept of Flexible Dieting (there's a book, but also a lot available online), which introduce some concepts: i. Planned periodic free meals, ii. Planned periodic refeeds (days with higher calories), iii. Longer term periods off a diet. The idea here is that you design a diet that doesn't drive you crazy.
Other posters have mentioned intermittent fasting (IF), you might be interested in the 16/8 variants (though I would note that I've read comments that longer fasting periods can be less suited for women). This is relevant because once you are used to not eating for an extended period (something that you may be able to build up to), then you can apply this approach to eating out (skipping other meals and just eating one higher calorie meal in a restaurant).
Regarding actually buying things in the restaurant, if they have calories then all the better, though you may find issues with the calorie counts being inaccurate. One of the staples of restaurant cooking is adding slightly more fat and salt to make things taste nicer. In the absence of the ability to track you can fall back to some habit based approaches. If you can't track then you can fallback on habit-based approaches:
i. Protein suppresses appetite (lean proteins include cod, salmon and chicken)
ii. Non starchy vegetables suppress appetite
iii. A modest amount of fat suppresses appetite
iv. Portion control can be helpful
So you might eat something like a chicken salad with dressings on the side that you apply with moderation. Or you might take an approach where you eat a massive undressed salad before starting anything else.
Of course the annoyance is that you lose the hand-holding certainty that calorie tracking provides, you which is a shame. But one should not that you didn't really have this anyway because calorie reduction (and a range of other activities) can cause changes to the amount of energy you are expending as can losing fat itself. And you could be losing weight from muscle rather than fat (though this isn't really a problem if you have a modest deficit and a reasonable amount of body fat). For certainty that things are working you can track weight, which can be infuriatingly noisy in the short term but becomes more stable in the long term.
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rikkejanell2014 wrote: »WinoGelato wrote: »OP others have already addressed the concept of cheat meals vs preplanning to fit foods in on a regular basis and how logging those indulgences can help ensure they don't derail your progress.
I wanted to inquire about something you said in your first post, that you have been doing this for 5 days, lost 5 lbs, and are always under your goal. It is common to lose weight quickly initially as you will often have water weight loss at first and then that slows down. It's good you said you're giving yourself a year to lose the 55 lbs, that's a 1lb/week rate of loss which is perfect for your goal.
When you say you are always under, what is your calorie goal? How far under? Are you logging accurately, ideally weighing your food with a food scale?
No i don't weigh my food. I don't have time for that as a single mother with 4 kids. I log everything I eat. I was given 1290 a day. Today i was like 300 under o
Day 400. Depends. I work out everyday.
It doesn't take long, and as you get closer to your goal it will be more important.0 -
trigden1991 wrote: »You can't track your food without weighing it. You are just guessing at this point.
True but ...... I have only just started weighing my food as I am fast approaching my goal weight and what to transition into maintenance successfully. It is quite scary on how accurate I have been with my guess work. I have just let the bathroom scales and my waist size do the talking about how accurate I have been.0 -
Choose whatever meal you want, but eat only half of it. Take the rest home and have it for 2 more meals. Watch the bread, booze & chips, they can really pack on the calories.0
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