Suggestions For My Diet?

angelinabreen

Hello,

This is my first time posting on here. I'm wondering if anyone can give me some pointers on my diet. For reference, my base goal is 1300 calories. I usually hit around 1100 or 1200 calories. I am a female and weigh 174. I am trying to lose weight and tone up as I lose fat. I do weight training 2x/week and fairly intense cardio 3x/week.

A very typical day for me is:

Breakfast: orgain protein shake and
banana
Lunch: Peanut butter and jelly sandwich

Dinner: orgain protein shake and 5
impossible nuggets

I know my diet is not the best but this is a big improvement for me. I don't feel hungry, but I am not losing the weight I feel I should be.

My favorite foods are cheese pizza and ziti, but I feel like eating them would sabotage my efforts. However, I feel like I may not be eating enough or not eating the right kinds of food. Even when I hit my all my macro goals, the weight loss is very intermittent. I am a picky vegetarian so the diet part can be rough. Any suggestions would be extremely helpful!

lesdarts180

Where are all the veggies? You should try to eat more whole foods, you will be missing out on all sorts of vitamins and minerals on this restricted diet.

You don't say how tall you are but unless you are very short* you probably don't have a lot of weight to lose, so you could probably increase your daily calories and get more proper nutritious foods instead of shakes and peanut butter.

*For reference, I'm only just over 5 ft tall but I can lose weight on 1400 calories a day (I lost a lot of weight 5 years ago and have kept it off, eating over 1500 a day)

angelinabreen

I am 5'3. My goal is 140, at least for now. I do take a multivitamin every day. I do like carrots and green beans. I should probably incorporate more of them into my diet. I try to add foods that have a lot of protein and fiber. I enjoy brown rice, but there isn't as much of those macros as I thought there would be. Is it possible I don't need to obsess over macros and just focus on whole foods and calories?

TracyL963

Weight loss is all about calories. Macros are for satiety, health and fitness goals.

I try to eat a varied diet. Measuring and logging different types of food will help me during maintenance. I need to learn portion control.
Look for lower calorie recipes for your favorite foods. Skinny Taste has lots of vegetarian recipes.

lisakatz2

There is no reason why you can't eat pizza while trying to lose weight. It's all about nutritional balance and portion control.

Justlivit_fit

Hi! I would love to help! I have a lot of clients come to me in a similar situation looking for some guidance on what they might be doing wrong. Without having much detail, I would venture a guess that you are not getting enough protein, micronutrients from fruits and veggies, or eating enough in general to support health hormone levels or metabolism. A healthy female of any age should not be eating sub 1200 calories. While some of the people that have commented above are not wrong, there is more to it that. Weight loss is calories in and calories out, but your diet history, sleep, stress management, and so many other factors are important to consider. I know MFP gives you suggestions for what you should set your goals at for progress, but I would be happy to share my calorie/ macro calculator with you as it might give you better goals to hit. Let me know if you might interested!

angelinabreen

Thank you for all of your suggestions! I will increase my calories and eat a more varied diet.i want to lose weight without overeating or starving my body. Hopefully this helps 🤞

Justlivit...I would welcome any help. It's much appreciated 🙂

AnnPT77

angelinabreen wrote: »

I am 5'3. My goal is 140, at least for now. I do take a multivitamin every day. I do like carrots and green beans. I should probably incorporate more of them into my diet. I try to add foods that have a lot of protein and fiber. I enjoy brown rice, but there isn't as much of those macros as I thought there would be. Is it possible I don't need to obsess over macros and just focus on whole foods and calories?

It shouldn't be necessary to obsess over anything! Calories are the key direct influence on weight loss, but of course well-rounded nutrition is important for health, energy level, body composition (fat vs. lean) and that sort of thing.

But you can evolve your way there by logging what you eat, noticing how it stacks up against the MFP default nutritional goals, and gradually tweaking your routine eating patterns in positive directions. As long as you're not starting out with a diagnosed deficiency or diet-related health condition, it's not essential to achieve perfect nutrition instantly.

Even in the long run, exact perfection every single day isn't essential. Pretty good (close to reasonable macros/micros) on average over a small number of days should be fine.

Most people do find whole foods more filling, and they tend to be more nutrient dense.
Start with the ones you like, review your logs when you have the time and mental bandwidth to devote, think about manageable changes you can make. Once you're staying reasonably full and happy on a sensible number of calories, maybe focus on bringing up protein intake if that's averaging low, and go on from there to other nutrients when protein average is tuned in pretty well.

Best wishes!

angelinabreen wrote: »

Thank you for all of your suggestions! I will increase my calories and eat a more varied diet.i want to lose weight without overeating or starving my body. Hopefully this helps 🤞

Justlivit...I would welcome any help. It's much appreciated 🙂

I'm glad to hear you're planning to increase calories: Adequate calories - even while losing weight - really is the foundation. There's no getting adequate nutrition on too-few calories!

I would encourage anyone who has info to share would just do that right here in your thread, rather than asking for personal contact to request the info. That way, more people can read it and benefit.

It used to be quite a common problem here to see posts that said "reach out for more information" from people who'd turn out to be selling services or expensive MLM supplements and things like that. I'm sure no one would like to be suspected of that kind of thing, either.

angelinabreen

Thank you, Ann! It's really encouraging to be reminded that I can gradually build better habits. I work out really hard and expected the weight to keep coming off. Like you mentioned, my body needs to have enough nutrition to keep it going. I feel like a weight has been lifted, not stressing over calories along with all the macros. I will focus on calories and protein for now, along with eating whole foods. This will hopefully give me a good starting point to ease into better habits. Thank you again! 🙂