Newbie Question

Kiaana

I have been using this for about three days now and I find it relatively impossible to eat all the calories I am allowed. As I am very weighty I get a large allowance and as I am moving around like 200% more than I used to I am burning up between 400-900 per day(might not sound a lot, but it's more than I used to! ) and I haven't even begun going to the gym yet.

Do I HAVE to conmsume all the calories allowed to me if I am not hungry?

Kiaana

I have been using this for about three days now and I find it relatively impossible to eat all the calories I am allowed. As I am very weighty I get a large allowance and as I am moving around like 200% more than I used to I am burning up between 400-900 per day(might not sound a lot, but it's more than I used to! ) and I haven't even begun going to the gym yet.

Do I HAVE to conmsume all the calories allowed to me if I am not hungry?

JJAE53

Kinda new myself (joined March), but I've had the same kind of problem. Especially when I add my exercise calories. I try to get as close as possible, but I don't over eat. I try to go for higher calorie foods that are still healthy when I see I need a lot more.

Of course, you could eat something high calorie that you just want. I don't do that because my primary goal has changed from seeing the scale numbers drop to seeing myself with a healthy life style. Feeling better than I have in a long time is another perk.

Hope this helps. Maybe some who have been at this longer can come back to you.

dhayes

Al lot of us wrestle with this issue. I started out with the attitude that I would not force myself to eat mainly because I am so overweight that I felt the psychological/emotional aspects to my obesity were at least as important to my long term health as the actual weight loss.

This often led to days where I would have a 800 or more calorie deficit . I lost weight anyway i had a 2 week peiod where I stopped losing and upped my calories . I gained a pound then began losing again. I have recently had a 3 week period with no loss have steadlily increased my calories by a few each week and have finally lost 4 pounds this week.

I say all of this because it is important to eat your calories to keep your metabolism going strong . I now eat most of my calories with perhaps A DAILY DEFICIT OF 0 - 400 CALORIES. I am learning to know my bodies needs which is an important part of this journey for me. Everyone is different so you may have to ezperiment with your own eating to learn how much of your calories to eat.

I consider myself as still learning.!!!!

LokiFae

I'm fairly new, but I've had this problem before. If you eat less than 1,200 calories a day, your body goes into starvation mode and you won't lose anything because your body will think that you won't get anything to eat and it needs to hang on to what you've got. You need at LEAST 1,000 calories a day just to live (breathe, go to the bathroom, get out of bed, drive, etc.) so you should at least try to eat 1,000, but definitely 1,200. And that will give you results as long as you're moving...And probably even if you're not! It's been getting me results when I eat 1,400, and I don't feel very hungry.

breakingthepath

Make sure you're at least eating your BMR (probably more than 1200) but other than that eat what you're hungry for. There's a calculator for it under Tools here.

Might be your exercise killing your appetite, by the way. I've had the same problem ever since starting my current job.

Kiaana

Great thanks for the input guys I'll keep at it and get myself evened out

banks1850

It's really a question for a nutritionist or doctor to answer, but I'll give you what I have learned through my research on this, very talked about, subject.

If you have a BMI in the mid-30's or above, and you are otherwise generally healthy, many doctors will, for a short period, put you on a very low calorie diet. Usually these diets restrict the obese person to somewhere around 1200 calories a day, but this is only for a short time, very controlled via the doctor, and has a very strict set of nutritional requirements. I wouldn't necessarilly recommend doing so without the aid of a doctor or at the very least, a nutritionist monitoring your progress. These programs usually work like this:
2 weeks of very low calories followed by a period over a month (generally) of gradually ramping calories up to a point where the deficit is somewhere between 500 and 800. I wouldn't ever recommend trying something like this on your own as the doctor will be testing you regularly for any body chemistry issues that can pop up with these kind of plans. When the BMI has reduced itself to a reasonable area (say around 30 or below) a general exercise and a healthy nutritious diet is completely integrated into the program (continuing with a deficit of usually around 500 to 700 calories a day NET deficit)

Something to note about eating your calories. If you have problems getting to your calorie count, there are things you can do. I usually recommend slowly adding food to your diet, try to raise your calorie count by 100 or so for a week before taking another step up, this gives your body time to adjust to the new level and you won't feel like you're stuffing yourself. Also, some foods are more calorie dense then others, try these types of food to fulfil caloric needs without packing in the volume, things like cheese, nuts, legumes, and some types of fruit are all very calorie dense and can help you reach your goals without maxing out your stomach.

hope this helps!

-Banks