A maintenance day?

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jbeth30
jbeth30 Posts: 42 Member
in Health and Weight Loss
Sometimes I have hungry days and sometimes I can go for days and not feel hungry. When I do have hungry days it's usually for a few days at a time and then I have a hard time staying within my calorie range which is 1450 -1700. Man I love those non hungry days and when those hungry days come it is quite a challenge. I don't know why it does this but it's annoying.Anyways I was wondering if anyone has ever gone up to maintenance calories on the days that they feel more hungry. I was thinking about doing it to prevent myself from going over and my calories.

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  • serindipte
    serindipte Posts: 1,557 Member
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    I eat less on some days, more on others. I watch my weekly average rather than each day by itself. It's helped me with those hungry days or days I simply want a full meal of something that would put me over my daily calories. (Like my Zaxby's last night) It keeps me from wiping out my deficit by watching that weekly average and allows me more leeway with my eating.
  • jbeth30
    jbeth30 Posts: 42 Member
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    Is there a way to change from seeing your calories from daily to weekly on fitness pal or do you just keep up with it on your own...that's a great idea
  • FreyasRebirth
    FreyasRebirth Posts: 514 Member
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    on PC, you can go to "Reports" and choose Net Calories or Calories to show up on a bar graph.
  • GauchoMark
    GauchoMark Posts: 1,804 Member
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    A day here or there at maintenance or even above is not going to hurt you in the long run. In fact, it will likely help avoid plateaus. Even a week or so is not going to hurt you, but might slow you just a bit.

    Read this - http://www.bodyrecomposition.com/fat-loss/the-full-diet-break.html/
  • __TMac__
    __TMac__ Posts: 1,665 Member
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    In the app, if you click on Nutrition, you can toggle between the Daily and Weekly view.
  • rileysowner
    rileysowner Posts: 8,150 Member
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    Going to maintenance will slow your progress a little bit, but will not reverse it. It actually sounds like a good strategy. With it, I would suggest trying to figure out why you are hungry on those hungry days. Are their certain types of foods that you are eating more of that are not satisfying you as long? Are you stressed? Are you doing more exercise that needs to have additional calories eaten? Are you not sleeping enough? All of those and more need to be considered. If you can figure out why you are hungry certain days, you may be able to reduce how often they occur.
  • sfa90
    sfa90 Posts: 105 Member
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    serindipte wrote: »
    I eat less on some days, more on others. I watch my weekly average rather than each day by itself. It's helped me with those hungry days or days I simply want a full meal of something that would put me over my daily calories. (Like my Zaxby's last night) It keeps me from wiping out my deficit by watching that weekly average and allows me more leeway with my eating.

    I've been doing the same for a month now, and it really works for me.
  • serindipte
    serindipte Posts: 1,557 Member
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    I lost 50lbs by eating Zaxby's every single Wednesday. :smiley: You don't have to be miserable at all.
  • rileysowner
    rileysowner Posts: 8,150 Member
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    jbeth30 wrote: »
    You guys are amazing! I am so glad I have reached out! I have options now. In my normal type behavior I would have just said " oh well I am hungry" and would have binged. Lately since counting calories I have really been trying to pay attention to my body and what it needs. Some days I just want to eat junk food and days like yesterday I just wanted vegetables. I feel like today needs to be a high protein day. One thing I have realized since counting calories is that I don't have to go hungry while doing it. I don't have to be miserable and that there are other options besides eating everything in the house or starving to death. There is a balance that needs to be achieved. I think I probably will try to go by the average of my week rather than looking at the day itself. That makes a lot of sense and won't slow down my loss. Perhaps just to use a maintenance day for special occasions or if I just really really really feel like I need a day. It seems like my hungry days come after a loss. I will have to start paying closer attention to all of those factors that Rileysowner mentioned to see if any apply to me on those days. I have been on countless diet all of my life but I think this is the first time that I think I can actually do this and keep it off this time. Thank you for all of your help.

    I am glad the advise helped. While losing weight is a fairly straightforward thing, and easy in concept, the difficulty comes in maintaining the loss. What helps is learning why you eat they way you do while losing, so that you can learn to eat better.

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