Cheat days... what do you think?

ana3067

It could, but maybe it won't. You might want to consider upping your protein and fats if you are still hungry on 2000 cals.

i agree with this. 2,000 calories is a pretty good amount of food for a day.

According to an average day I get about 55g of fat and 56g of protein, which fits right into my recommended amounts. 2,000 is a good amount for a lightly active person, but I run 9 miles three times a week + walking to campus and back in addition to light weight lifting and walking on the days in between. So, I'm a very active person!

I am moderately active, and 2000 is my minimum deficit for 20% below my estimated TDEE (5 hours or so of structured exercise a week, most of which is weight lifting). Also a student, so also walking around. Unless you are doing a lot of endurance work (which does not seem to be the case) or you are very heavy (based on pic I assume not), then 2000 is a pretty reasonable deficit. I don't actually consider you to be "very active." I consider you to be moderately active based on what you've written.

The reason you are hungry is because you are eating way too many carbs. Carbs are not satiating. They are important, yes, but they are not satiating unless mixed with enough protein and sometimes fat. I personally need a lot of protein with carbs for satiety to kick in. Just fat doesn't help. 40-50% carbs is more than enough, at 2000 cals that'd be around 200g of carbs.

Lower your carbs, increase your protein, ditch vegan diet if needed in order to have optimal satiety and health, and if you are STILL hungry, then increase to 2100 or eat fewer calorie-dense foods.

And there is nothing wrong iwth a high-fat diet, either, health-wise.

You're also not weighing food or measuring a lot of things. So you could be a special snowflake and be under-eating compared to your log. e.g. if you say you eat 2.13 peaches, you might actually be eating 1.5 peaches' worth of calories. If much of this happens, then that can add up easily to a few hundred cals. Might want to invest in a food scale.

AND it looks like you don't eat back your exercise cals. So... if you were given 2000 cals as your goal based on non-exercise activity levels and then you don't eat back half or more of hte cals from exercise, you are undereating. Which would further explain your hunger.

akboy58

I try to limit my "cheating" to one meal at a time, and arrange the rest of the day so that I am not more than a few hundred calories over my daily allowance. So (for instance) today I had a Shake Shack burger and fries (960 calories) for lunch, but pared back my breakfast and lunch so that I was only about 200 calories over for the day -- an amount I can make up through careful eating in the next few days, and thus keep myself on track for the week.