Tracking calories on Thanksgiving day?

psychod787

I plan on cutting cals for a few days. Then on lunch day, focusing on lean meats, veg, and some fat until lunch. Still track it and be mindful.

NorthCascades

You have to track in Thanksgiving, how else will we know who won?

hesn92

I actually don't log my food at all anymore but I think I will on thanksgiving just for fun lol

GottaBurnEmAll

I tracked my first Thanksgiving I was losing weight, and it was a pain. But I was fresh into losing weight at that point in time and I still wanted to stick to eating at deficit for the day.

Normally, I don't mind weighing ingredients and scribbling things down and then using the recipe builder, but with a lot of Thanksgiving recipes being made, it can get to be ridiculous. We also don't have traditional Thanksgivings at our house, and the menus vary from year to year.

So, no, I will just enjoy cooking and throwing in a bit of this and a bit of that and not worrying about it. I will eat but not go crazy.

I have one rule, and I've kept it on every subsequent holiday after that first year. I eat what I want the day of, and that's it. I do not eat leftovers. I find sticking to this rule is enough to limit the damage.

HGALlife

I plan to stick to OMAD on Thanksgiving but eat what I want. I am not too worried because I know I will get full more quickly than I did a month ago. I will then look forward to my OMAD leftover plate the next day. I think I enjoy leftovers more than I do the actual meal.

kimny72

ellioc2 wrote: »

I want to enjoy my Thanksgiving this year and at least have some pie and mashed potatoes. I’ve been keeping my caloric intake quite minimal (1200) and really been avoiding carb-heavy foods. I know I should enjoy myself on Thanksgiving and I don’t have to restrict per se as long as I get back on track the next day. I don’t intend to gorge myself but I don’t want to not eat certain foods since I’m dieting. I don’t think it’ll be too hard, especially if I’m having my normal breakfast which is super filling (eggs) and then that one big meal. As far as weekly calories go I don’t think having a big meal will make that much of a difference. My question is, should I still try to track my calories though and set a limit for myself (say 2000)? Or would it be okay to just give myself the day off, enjoy the company, and eat all the Thanksgiving-y foods without tracking them?

It depends!
Do you find logging stressful or tedious? If so, then giving yourself a day off when you don't really care anyway might be a good idea. For some people, that occasional day off helps a lot with compliance.
If you don't really mind logging, and you can separate logging the food from any guilt over what you're logging, I think it can be really informative and interesting to see what you do when the rules are lifted. I'm the type that finds it fascinating to have that data and see the effects (if any).

Some folks here have mentioned you should not track and just enjoy the food. That's an issue for some people and if it is for you, don't log. Logging has never kept me from enjoying my food though, so I just keep logging logging logging

siobhanaoife

The thing I try to be mindful of is eating slowly enough that I can tell when I'm getting full. Eating 1200-1400 calories a day, I am never full. Eating a lavish meal and drinking wine and there's a cheese plate before and dessert after, I need to keep an eye on pacing myself, or I can get full too soon in the meal, or drink more wine than is good for me.

The upside is that eating mindfully you get to really notice how wonderful the food is and how it makes your body feel.

psychod787

kimny72 wrote: »

ellioc2 wrote: »

I want to enjoy my Thanksgiving this year and at least have some pie and mashed potatoes. I’ve been keeping my caloric intake quite minimal (1200) and really been avoiding carb-heavy foods. I know I should enjoy myself on Thanksgiving and I don’t have to restrict per se as long as I get back on track the next day. I don’t intend to gorge myself but I don’t want to not eat certain foods since I’m dieting. I don’t think it’ll be too hard, especially if I’m having my normal breakfast which is super filling (eggs) and then that one big meal. As far as weekly calories go I don’t think having a big meal will make that much of a difference. My question is, should I still try to track my calories though and set a limit for myself (say 2000)? Or would it be okay to just give myself the day off, enjoy the company, and eat all the Thanksgiving-y foods without tracking them?

It depends!
Do you find logging stressful or tedious? If so, then giving yourself a day off when you don't really care anyway might be a good idea. For some people, that occasional day off helps a lot with compliance.
If you don't really mind logging, and you can separate logging the food from any guilt over what you're logging, I think it can be really informative and interesting to see what you do when the rules are lifted. I'm the type that finds it fascinating to have that data and see the effects (if any).

Some folks here have mentioned you should not track and just enjoy the food. That's an issue for some people and if it is for you, don't log. Logging has never kept me from enjoying my food though, so I just keep logging logging logging

https://youtu.be/0iAzMRKFX3c


Lol

kimny72

akronrick

Eat what you want and track. Tracking is a habit...or it ought to be...not just something you do to provide yourself good feedback. If you eat way over your calories...so what? You know it's not going to make a difference in the long run assuming your health habits are in place.

Don't tie your mood to what the number is at the end of the day. Track because it's the right thing to do and it works over the long haul. The practice of tracking is healthy....obsessing over tracking or not tracking isn't.

Lounmoun

I have logged Thanksgiving the past couple of years.
My habit is to prelog food so that is what I did. It helped me plan out what I would have. We pretty much always have the same stuff and I am cooking most of it. I adjusted my food diary if needed.
I did not skip anything I wanted but had reasonable portions. I felt full. I did have a higher calorie day... maybe 500-800 calories over my normal calorie goal. So I ate at maintenance level for me or slightly above. The rest of the week I ate pretty normal. I also remained active.
One high calorie day did not cause me to gain fat.
If you don't log it'll be okay.
I was not eating low carb and then suddenly eating a bunch of carbs. You may retain some water doing that so don't hop on the scale and freak out. It is temporary.

lemurcat2

I usually don't track on Thanksgiving when I'm otherwise tracking (I also don't always track at maintenance, but I also did not track on Thanksgiving when I was losing). The reason is that for me using the recipe builder can be a pain, and that our Thanksgivings are at my place with most food prepared by me, but others prepare food too or are there while I am cooking. Trying to estimate items made by others with lots of ingredients or trying to write down ingredients for logging when cooking a million things at once and trying to time everything and socializing ends up stressing me out. I know others like to just estimate, but I don't, which is why I found logging more fun with a food scale (although I was losing fine before I got one).

That said, I've recently started tracking on Cron again, mostly to give myself some accountability and because I find the nutrition tracker fun. That requires more estimating since you have to log whole foods to get the nutrition, and while I mostly cook from whole foods I buy lunch sometimes and go out to dinner at least once a week (interesting local restaurants, so no calorie counts or nutrition info), so I've started estimating more, but am also not focused on always hitting a specific calorie number -- it's more informational. So I may actually log on Thanksgiving this year (it's also going to be a smaller gathering than usual).