Hunger

kerrimiller2018

I’ve been counting calories for two weeks now. The first week I had myself being sedentary so I was allotted 1400 calories which I found too restrictive. I changed the setting to be lightly active which i think is more accurate for my lifestyle and so my caloric limit was increased to 1600 cal/day. It was working great the first couple of days but now I’m hungry all of the time. Is this normal? Will my body stabilize and become used to the calorie restrictions or does it mean I need to change my activity level again and eat more calories?

toxikon

What's your height, weight, age and sex? What's a normal day look like to you? Desk job or on your feet?

There are a few potential reasons you could be hungry:

- Your calorie deficit is too steep
- You're not eating enough satiating foods
- Your body is still adjusting to being in a calorie deficit

MichelleSilverleaf

Focus on foods that help you stay full longer. Different things satisfy different people but once you figure out what it is for you you can build your meals around that.

kimny72

How much weight do you have to lose, and how many lbs per week are you set at? If your deficit is too aggressive, lowering it will give you more food and less hunger.

Your protein and fat numbers don't look particularly low. You're not tracking fiber, but if your fiber is low that can affect satiety too, worth a try at least.

You do have beverage calories on several days. That might be something to think about if you continue to struggle with hunger, as beverages generally aren't filling. When I was actively losing, I shrunk my coffee/tea add-ins calories to 50 per day and alcohol to once or twice a week in the evening if I had calories left over. I also tried to limit sweet snacks to 150 calories or less. Those three things bought me another 150 cals per day of food that would fill me up.

Try noting in your diary notes how you feel an hour or two after each meal and start to notice a pattern of what foods and macros are involved when you feel satiated and when you don't, and tweak from there!

JMcGee2018

I'd suggest changing your rate of loss, not your activity level, when you make any changes unless you are actually becoming more active in your daily life. You'll be able to eat more calories if you have it set to lose .5 pounds a week than if you set it at 1.5 pounds.

mulecanter

Yes, you will stabilize and adjust. After your fluid levels finish their swings I think you will find you get into a groove that is tolerable. Feeling a little hungry once in a while is normal. Go 6 weeks and see how you feel.

kerrimiller2018

@toxikon @kimny72 - thanks for the feedback!

I’m 5’2 and 177lbs. I would like to be under 140 and have my target weight loss set to 1 lb/week. I work in a lab so I am active at work about 30% of the day and am sitting/work on a computer the rest of the time. I’m not actively exercising yet but do housework/yard work etc at home. When I used to wear a Fitbit it said I would take anywhere between 8000-12000 steps per day depending on what I was doing.

I am working on reducing the calories consumed from drinking coffee. I drink 3 cups a day and was initially adding ~100 calories of creamer per cup and have reduced that to ~40/cup. I still want to enjoy a nice glass of wine or craft beer a couple times a week so I probably won’t be reducing that much further.

I think I will wait it out a few more days and see if my body gets used to a calorie deficit and go from there!

LivingtheLeanDream

It takes a while to adjust to less food, if you're choosing filling foods already then give it time, you will adapt to eating less and the hunger will ease. Drink more water or diet sodas - that always helped me through hungry days when I'd reached my calorie limit. I don't like to use more than 100 cals of my allowance per day on liquid cals.