The Aftermath

panda4153

Hello, it’s the morning of December 26 where I am, and I have definitely got the overindulge hangover haha. Now I put absolutely no restrictions on certain days of the year. I allow myself to have any or all of the treats I want. Let me tell you, I can eat!! I have never been and will never be one of the people posting questions about how to add calories to their day. I eat every last calorie I can. Christmas Eve and Christmas Day are two of those all in days. Today I feel it, but I regret NOTHING!! It was so so good! I’m posting this because I know someone out there is worried about what theirs Christmas Treats did to their progress. They are questioning if they can get back on the wagon. The answer is yes you can. I allow the Holodays themselves but not the whole week of them. Today I am back to my normal healthy habbits. I will eat under maintenance and get back on track. Sure my couple of days probably slowed my progress by about a pound or so this month, and I fully expect the water weight retention to be high for a few days, but it was two days out of my month, and I enjoyed every bite. I’m here to say this is part of life, and our outcomes we see are from the choices we make. I chose to eat like I did and I had a ton of fun with it. Today I am choosing to eat under maintenance because I know for long term health I still have some weight to lose. I can and do choose both in my life, and I know that you can find that too. Good luck everyone!!

AndreaTamira

I ate well over calories Christmas eve and Boxing Day (Boxing Day is "second celebration day of Christmas" in Germany, and while I no longer live there I still consider it part of the holidays). Surprisingly not on Christmas day itself. Like you I don't feel bad about it.

People who never had problems with their weight overeat on holidays. And then they go back to eating regular portions. So, it has to be possible to manage weight despite occasional indulgence.

Lietchi

Over three days, I ate more and also wasn't able to be as active as usual. Result: I probably ate enough above maintenance to gain half a lb. The scale, strangely, tells another story, since I reached a new low weight. Go figure 🙂

Anyway, it's my second Christmas-New Year while losing weight, and both times my goal was/is to enjoy the food, without going overboard. I do go over maintenance occasionally the rest of the year, but never by a lot. So there are 3 or 4 days per year where I just enjoy myself in moderation with family/friends and then I log (approximately) afterwards.
And back to business as usual afterwards.

I don't feel bad about overeating on a special occasion, at worst it will set me back a few days or weeks (or, like this year, the scale doesn't even budge). It's just food, nothing 'sinful' to feel guilty about. Just enjoy it and move on 🙂

charmmeth

Lietchi wrote: »

Over three days, I ate more and also wasn't able to be as active as usual. Result: I probably ate enough above maintenance to gain half a lb. The scale, strangely, tells another story, since I reached a new low weight. Go figure 🙂

That is my story too. I ate more and moved less, and ... hit my goal weight yesterday morning. My weigh-in this morning was up again a bit, but I expected that, and tomorrow, or some time next week, it will be down again and in a week or two I'll be adjusting to maintenance.

AnnPT77

Having been doing this for a few years, I don't worry about it, either. NBD.

Especially this year (first solo holiday), I went full-on indulgent, cooking/eating whatever I wanted, eating as much of it as I wanted, for both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day (plus there had been some lead-up indulgence). I didn't log, but I'm fully capable of consuming 2-3x maintenance TDEE, and I'm pretty sure I did. In theory, that ought to be at least a pound of fat, maybe more. Last workout was 12/23, been averaging < 4k steps since. Back on my usual maintenance calories (which include a routine calorie bank of about 150 calories) starting 12/26.

Weight on 12/26, up around 3 pounds from recent days, highest AM weigh-in since mid-September. Today, down 3 pounds from there, lowest AM weigh-in since mid-November.

Maybe all the dust (fat?) hasn't settled yet, but meh, it'll be fine, no self-recrimination, no drama. 🤷‍♀️

gradchica27

The aftermath of a 5 weeks of eating all the things all the time: up 7lbs. The aftermath of day 1 of eating at a slight deficit and continuing exercise: down 1.6lbs. I’m sure there’s another pound or two of water weight/ovulation bloat. So, worse than I had hoped but not insurmountable. At least I know what to do—log food, eat at deficit, be active—and I’m not in a panicked desperation state, willing to try any fad that promises to get rid of this badness quickly. It’ll take a month or so, but it’ll happen.

Anabirgite

What I have learned, it is the bloat that plays with my mind. I know tomorrow night, my husband and I will be having one of our favorite dinners, I will probably be fine the next morning then bloat up for 3- 4 days after that( 3-4 pounds). I wish I could say it does not stress me out like you do, but it will provide me incentive to eat at my goal the next few days after this indulgent delicious dinner I am looking so forward to having NYE.

4ajguthrie

I'm at 50 something days of using MFP and the Christmas 'binge' has brought me 3 + extra pounds and highlighted the fact that I'm questioning the MFP programs accuracy to be quite honest, here is why :-

Brief background.

My BMR is 1493 calories/day. In August this year I was at 85-86kg (189lb) and having to deal with lower back pain and fluid retention every day. Skipping the details of why, I made the decision to change what I was eating, and to do strength exercise for my back.

I live and work on a rural block that requires a lot of maintenance so I'm pretty active. I found to my shock and horror that my actual strength and fitness was woeful, so I set about correcting that.

How its rolling day on day so far:-

As said I am at 50 something days now and without much effort hit 73.8kg (163lb) on 19th Nov. its December 31 today and I weighed in at 76.4kg (168lb)
Setting aside December 25th-27th each and every day I faithfully log my calories in and out, EVERY day including 25th-27th I have run calorie deficit !! EVERY day MFP tells me that in 5 weeks I will have lost weight, in fact it predicts that I will be below my Goal weight of 73kg (160lb)

Well 5 weeks is 35 days and 15 or so 35days have come and gone and today I am 76.4kg (168lb)....

On 24th Dec I weighed 75kg (165lb) and so my gain due to a change of content, not calories is 1.4kg.. that is a fraction over 3lb whilst maintaining at least a 900 calorie 'buffer' deficit !!

Again this morning I log in and the program tells me, that BEFORE I input anything at all my calorie goal is 1970 calories!!!!! When I exercise it will add 'bonus'' calories that I know will lead me into putting on more and more weight??
If I go above 1600 calories a day regardless of how much exercise I do, my weight will rise. At 1600 calories I maintain the weight I am at on the day, and below I lose slowly.

Its quite obvious to me that the program avoids setting controls that respond to results and evidence.

How is this so? Surely if the program is designed to support wellness, fitness and health it should be able to at least prompt some feedback by way of calorie reduction.

Sure I have worked out what I need to do, but for me it makes the effort of inputting to MFP a bit less meaningful as a guide.

Every person is different, but are universally the same, in that their numbers will tell how the program is working, and where it does not respond to the input data.

So for me post Christmas is back to a guessing game.

So to summarise, I'm a bit disappointed that MFP does not 'learn' as each day unfolds. It is by no means a deal breaker, linked with my Garmin Instinct I will eventually reach and maintain my goal.

As for health outcomes.... My lower back pain is gone, I am getting much stronger, and sleeping better and retaining far less fluid. My back pain came from misalignment of my spine and I believe that was due to my lack of strength. I'd become very right sided, the left was very much weaker and that it seems was driving the misalignment. My spine is straighter as are my hips, and the supporting muscles are getting stronger every day.

Hope 2021 is a better year for all out there

AnnPT77

4ajguthrie wrote: »

I'm at 50 something days of using MFP and the Christmas 'binge' has brought me 3 + extra pounds and highlighted the fact that I'm questioning the MFP programs accuracy to be quite honest, here is why :-

Brief background.

My BMR is 1493 calories/day. In August this year I was at 85-86kg (189lb) and having to deal with lower back pain and fluid retention every day. Skipping the details of why, I made the decision to change what I was eating, and to do strength exercise for my back.

I live and work on a rural block that requires a lot of maintenance so I'm pretty active. I found to my shock and horror that my actual strength and fitness was woeful, so I set about correcting that.

How its rolling day on day so far:-

As said I am at 50 something days now and without much effort hit 73.8kg (163lb) on 19th Nov. its December 31 today and I weighed in at 76.4kg (168lb)
Setting aside December 25th-27th each and every day I faithfully log my calories in and out, EVERY day including 25th-27th I have run calorie deficit !! EVERY day MFP tells me that in 5 weeks I will have lost weight, in fact it predicts that I will be below my Goal weight of 73kg (160lb)

Well 5 weeks is 35 days and 15 or so 35days have come and gone and today I am 76.4kg (168lb)....

On 24th Dec I weighed 75kg (165lb) and so my gain due to a change of content, not calories is 1.4kg.. that is a fraction over 3lb whilst maintaining at least a 900 calorie 'buffer' deficit !!

Again this morning I log in and the program tells me, that BEFORE I input anything at all my calorie goal is 1970 calories!!!!! When I exercise it will add 'bonus'' calories that I know will lead me into putting on more and more weight??
If I go above 1600 calories a day regardless of how much exercise I do, my weight will rise. At 1600 calories I maintain the weight I am at on the day, and below I lose slowly.

Its quite obvious to me that the program avoids setting controls that respond to results and evidence.

How is this so? Surely if the program is designed to support wellness, fitness and health it should be able to at least prompt some feedback by way of calorie reduction.

Sure I have worked out what I need to do, but for me it makes the effort of inputting to MFP a bit less meaningful as a guide.

Every person is different, but are universally the same, in that their numbers will tell how the program is working, and where it does not respond to the input data.

So for me post Christmas is back to a guessing game.

So to summarise, I'm a bit disappointed that MFP does not 'learn' as each day unfolds. It is by no means a deal breaker, linked with my Garmin Instinct I will eventually reach and maintain my goal.

As for health outcomes.... My lower back pain is gone, I am getting much stronger, and sleeping better and retaining far less fluid. My back pain came from misalignment of my spine and I believe that was due to my lack of strength. I'd become very right sided, the left was very much weaker and that it seems was driving the misalignment. My spine is straighter as are my hips, and the supporting muscles are getting stronger every day.

Hope 2021 is a better year for all out there

Not guessing, just math.

The calculators (like MFP) just give you a starting estimate. After 4-6 weeks, adjust based on experience. IME, it works.

Yes, it would be nice if MFP did predictive adjustment based on results. From using a weight trending app for several years now, I can assure you that that concept would have flaws, too. And that's true even if food/exercise logging is accurate, but there's a lotta quicksand over in that neighborhood, too (even with a tracker).

IMO, it's easy enough to adjust based on results - just a fun science fair experiment. (If I believed MFP's estimates - or my good brand/model fitness tracker's - and stuck to them, by now I'd be in the hospital or dead - from undereating, in my case - rather than at a healthy weight for around 5 years now after multiple decades previously of obesity.) Someone was trying to put together an app that did what you're describing; if I remembered the link, I'd give it to you - apologies, I don't recall.

Congratulations on the improvements on the health front: Powerful stuff!