Calorie Hoarding

TribeHokie

Does anyone else find themselves eating "just enough" throughout the day so that they have a few hundred calories left after dinner "just in case"? I have had issues in the past where I get obsessive about calorie count in general, which I am getting much better about, but I still find myself unwilling at times to add in extras here or there so I have the calories available later if I want them. Then I have 200-300 left after dinner and am not always hungry for them. I know all the tricks - add in healthy fats, spread it out, snack on calorie dense foods instead of veggies. I'm just looking for others to commiserate with I guess.

MelanieCN77

When I am tracking this is exactly me, but it's more because I'm afraid to get to dinner and be hungry and not have enough. No matter that I know I've rarely made a normal meal over 600 cals, I feel weird if I have less than 1,000 left late afternoon. What helps me is knowing that if my deficit is too steep, my run the next day will suffer. I need to eat up my snacks so I can run and not hate it.

Strudders67

Not deliberately, no. But I often find, particularly at the moment as I'm not at work so don't have an endless supply of snacks to pick at, that I have spare calories left at the end of the day. If I have more than 50 cals left after I've weighed out everything for my dinner, I know I need to eat more.

Sometimes, I've eaten the appropriate number of calories but either feel hungry or just fancy something else. If so, I have something else. It doesn't have to be huge and in the grand scheme, as it's not a daily occurrence, it makes little difference to how much I'll weigh in a week or a month's time.

I always have apples, nuts, mini babybel cheeses, chocolate-coated rice cakes, small packs of lentil crisps and cans of beer available and will choose whatever I fancy based on what fits with how many cals and how many carbs I have left. Those snacks range in calories (and with my almonds I can have 5 or I can have 15 or more) so that I have options. Maybe try finding a range of snacks (that will keep for more than a week) of varying calories and have them on hand, just in case, then try to work your day so that you don't end up with a couple of hundred cals left over.

blue_killen

I do this a lot but often don't end up using them

sardelsa

This happens to me sometimes, but if I don't use them in the evening I will make sure to use them on the weekend

Strudders67

blue_killen wrote: »

I do this a lot but often don't end up using them

MFP has a deficit built in to the calories it gives you, so you should be eating that number per day (or per week). If you're regularly under-eating by a few hundred calories that has the potential to be unhealthy.