Obsession: counting calories, weighing, food-centric...

FourIsCompany

I just want to get this out and see if anyone has any suggestions or feedback.

When I started MFP and EMTWL, I was doing fine. Not worrying about weight gain or anything. Lately, since I cut, I have become obsessive about counting calories, weighing myself and it seems my whole life revolves around food and exercise. I have a tendency to obsess a little about things, but I feel it's come to the point where it's an unhealthy obsession. Because...

- If I don't get all my calories in, I worry about it until I eat something (that I really don't want) just for fear of throwing the numbers off. Then I feel "wrong" about eating when my body isn't calling for it.
- I weigh myself nearly every day, waiting for the cut to have a positive effect. (*forehead smack*) I've lost 2 lbs and I feel great - I don't know what I'm hoping the scale will tell me! :explode:
- I'm going on a little trip next week and I'm freaking out about what I'm going to eat away from home. There will be restaurant eating and I don't want to take my food scale in there OR feel guilty/worried about enjoying some time with my sister. :noway:

I just want to relax a little bit! But in the past, relaxing a little bit is the first step to tossing out the whole thing... The one thing that I'm not willing to go back on is my weightlifting. I love it and I have 2 months solid effort into it (not to mention a bunch of money) that I'm totally invested in.

What I WANT to do is take a month in which I stop logging my food, stop weighing myself, eat healthy foods and really listen to my body as far as how much protein I need, instead of chasing a number, keep lifting, swimming and concentrate on NEAT and see where I am at the end of a month.

Has anyone done this? Does it sound like a recipe for disaster? Any feedback at all?

conniedj

It's just "Freak Out Mode"....chalk up to changes in any pattern where you hope for a particular outcome...and it doesn't happen FAST! lol. You're fine, you've got yourself on the right track.

My best course of action when I reach borderline OCD thinking about logging....switch gears. I often tell my 5 year old something from a Berenstain Bears story book~"Don't let your imagination control you---YOU control your imagination"!

Practical things you can do to prepare for the weekend of eating out:

--check and see if restaurants have website with menu/nutrition info listed
--take your own healthy snacks and beverages with you


As far as taking a month off? Only you can decide if that would derail your efforts. Do you feel like you are good enough about gauging your macro's and micro's? I can tell you from my perspective....I still have a hard time with this! There are days that I feel like I have eaten Waaaaay too much...only to log it and find that I haven't. And vice versa--days that I have thought that I haven't eaten that much--only to find it was way more than I thought! And if I weren't logging I would intermittently have feelings of beating myself up over it, or patting myself on the back.

Weighing yourself? This sounds like a better plan! Just measure once a week/month, or whatever to gauge your results. And good for you for digging in to your workouts! That is for sure the way to go!!

AnitraSoto

What you are thinking about doing is exactly what I am doing right now... Like you, I become obsessed with the numbers and knew I could not spend the rest of my life doing that.

After close to 2 years logging on MFP, I feel like I have a pretty good grasp on how much I need to eat each day. I have found that in order to maintain and feel good, I need between 2,000 and 2,200 calories a day. I can also tally up my numbers in my head and know pretty quickly where I am (since I am a creature of habit and always seem to eat the same things...) If I ever question my goals, I can always log a day or two, just to be sure.

I also want to make sure I get my protein in each day, so I just make sure to plan each meal around a main protein source.

Like you, I am also committed to my weight lifting, so that part is no problem knowing I will continue. I really dislike cardio, so have promised myself I will get in at least 10,000 steps a day six days each week - this helps to keep me moving. I have a BodyMedia, so I am pretty confident in how much I burn each day, so I just run a report each month to make sure my activity level is pretty much where I am eating.

The one thing I continue to do to make sure I stay on track and don't get out of control is that I still allow no "junk food" in my home. I have never been a person that can just have a little bit of something and then stop. Once I start, I have trouble stopping. Since I don't have any really tempting foods in my house, I never really have to worry about binging or random snacking on things I shouldn't be eating. This helps me feel in control and takes most of the fear out of not logging...

I have totally stopped stressing about how many calories I burn in each individual workout or how many calories are in every morsel I eat. I concentrate on my lifting, getting in my 10,000 steps or more a day and eating (lots of) healthy food choices. I know I can always go back to logging if I ever feel out of control, but for now, it is liberating... (When I repeat STS and start bulking next month, I will definitely log for a while to make sure my I am on track calorie-wise, likewise when I start my cut).

beachgirl172723

Try Nia Shanks Sane and Simple Nutrition. You should never be eating when you are not hungry. Unless you want to gain.

FourIsCompany

Try Nia Shanks Sane and Simple Nutrition.

I just ran across her name in another thread and I'm LOVING her blog. Thanks for the tip.

In the 12 days since I started eating intuitively and not weighing myself (plus a one week break from lifting) I gained 1/2 of a lb. I was also on vacation during that time and I did eat out a few times, so I think I did pretty good. I wanted to weigh before starting back into lifting just to have a baseline. I don't plan on weighing or tracking calories for the month of November. It feels kind of scary, but from what I've learned about myself and my eating in just a couple of weeks, I feel very hopeful.

What has impressed me so much is how I'm thinking about food. I always ask if I'm really hungry or if I'm trying to fill another need with food... and if the food I'm about to eat is going to serve my end goal of meeting my body's needs or detract from it. It's more of an organic way of "dieting", I feel.

Lifting has changed my life! I love doing it and to do it right, I need to eat right to fuel my body. After 2 months of lifting, I'm still excited on lift days! LOL I'm just so glad I decided to give it a try.

perky12415

Awesome! I am really focusing on the same thing in terms of eating style. It's great. I too can become obsessive...