Am I the only one that doesn't like counting calories?

Katie3784

I have never counted calories, and I don't plan to. I just eat right and exercise, and it works for me, though I know that counting really helps a lot of people. Everyone is different.

vjrose

Lol, not much counting here, I spend more time worrying about sodium than calories, I eat smart all the time but get to dinner and wish I would have saved a bit more sodium, oh well. 1500 mg of sodium and 1500 or so calories, easy to stay under on calories, but it took a while on the sodium but now I'm usually way under. So, it can be done, just do some pre planning, log your day ahead of time and then add anything else at the end of the day. Took me a bit to get good add it and get a nice long list of recent, recipes, most used all built up, now logging is a breeze, I spend way more time cheerleading my friends than logging my food :drinker:

grinch031

I have never counted calories, and I don't plan to. I just eat right and exercise, and it works for me, though I know that counting really helps a lot of people. Everyone is different.

Works for me. I learned I only really needed to count calories when I wasn't eating right. Good food fills you up.

Elizabeth_C34

just plan your meals on here by calories and fat for the week and stick to it. easy.! if you dont plan what your gonna eat each day you will just eat anything and guess it.

What do you mean by planning meals on here? Do you mean making a sort of menu and entering it in the log ahead of time, then eating off of that, or is there a meal planning part of the site I don't know about? My understanding is that you just put in the foods you've already eaten.

You don't have to log it AFTER you eat. I log before so I know what I can have and how much. Helps keep me full and under control throughout the day.

Just FYI, it took me about a month before I was consistently under my calorie limit and feeling satisfied. Stick with it, and find things that work for you.

fiberartist219

No, you are not the only one who does not like counting calories.

I think that counting calories is a great experience to teach us to look at nutrition labels and to plan out our food, but after a couple months of doing it, I was tired, hungry, and kind of weak.

I stopped counting calories months ago.

When I stopped counting, I gained a couple pounds at first, but I didn't give up on my journey. I eventually started to work out more, and I still read nutrition labels and have a general idea of what I ate any given day. However, I don't have giant red numbers telling me the story. I don't have a little message each day that says, "if every day were like today" because honestly, each day is different, and everyone's bodies are different and a computer app just can't tell you how to live your life.

If you are hungry, you should eat. If you are not hungry, don't eat. If you don't even know what hungry is anymore, see a nutritionist or read a book like "Intuitive Eating" or "Mindless Eating" and see if you can figure out how much to eat without counting calories anymore.

I'm still losing weight consistently, and I don't need to track every morsel of food. I just need to look at what I'm eating, consider what else I have eaten or want to eat that day, and consider how much physical activity I'm going to get. If I can eat 9 Hershey kisses for 180 calories (I don't remember the actual numbers) then I might have one or two and go on about my business. If I want to eat half a bag, I try to get a good cardio workout in on the same day.

Counting calories is a wonderful learning experience, but I don't think it is realistic for most of us to do it forever. Some folks have to because they have a hard time gauging how much is enough, but if you can figure out how to lose weight without it, then by all means do so.

I mostly use MFP for the friends list and forums. I like to get on here and talk about what I've been doing and see what others are up to and how it is working for them.

fiberartist219

PS. if you have a poor memory and can't remember what you've eaten in a day, you might want to create a food journal the old fashioned way. Just get out a pencil and paper to write it down rather than dealing with the guilt you would get from seeing the bold fonts on MFP.

stubbysticks

I get what you mean about kind of being obssessive about the numbers. It can be stressful. I agree with what others say here about planning ahead. If you're having trouble staying under your calories, it's to your benefit to fill in your food diary in advance so you can plan what you're going to eat & when you'll eat it. Try to go heavier on protein & fiber to keep your appetite under control. Planning ahead prevents you from stressing later in the day when you're trying to figure out what to eat that will fit your targets.

If you go over on one day, you could spread out the overage through the rest of the week. If you go over by 400 calories on Monday, you could try to be under by 100 calories T-F. It's not the end of the world if you don't meet your targets exactly.

57rainbows

Interesting and helpful responses! Thank you guys for taking the time to reply!

I guess I never thought about planning out an entire day ahead of time. I'm actually not a very good meal planner right now at all - I have trouble with grocery shopping and such because I'm not used to it. Only been out of college for a couple years and I was dirt poor until recently so I just bought what I could afford and made it last! Maybe the key to making this work better is learning how to think about meals ahead of time and keep a better structure. Oy new skills are always hard to learn!

I really like the suggestion to think of each meal instead of just the day - if I know each meal can be about xxx calories, I don't have to keep a running total in my head. And if I plan a bunch of meals that are all about the same number of calories, that will make it a lot easier to feel like I know what I'm doing.


Thanks guys!! I feel like I have some more perspective on how to make this work now. Thank thanks thanks.

imkegoal

I can't say I like it, but if it helps me loose weight, it is worth the headache.

I generally try to stick with 'under 500 cal' for my evening meals (most health meals will easily be under that), have soup for lunch (hardly ever more than 250 calories) and porridge for breakfast (with half a sppon of sugar and a cupa tea and 2 sugars this is 240 calories) Knowing that that is my 'stables' I know that I can have a minimum of 500 calories on snacks every day.

and THIS is where you do the tracking. So the other day when I was given a doughnut, I check on MFP, and decided it wasn't worth the 280 cal- so I had half. If I wouldn't be tracking calories, i would have given in to the whole doughnut....

It either suites you or it doesn't. I do have to be in the right frame of mind to do this, but once I start loosing weight I soon get into it. I have tried many diets, but this is the only one which consistantly helped me loose weight. Maybe another one suites you better?

jadedone

I don't like counting. But if I don't I'll probably eat too much and not meat my goals.

I generally log on my phone, and log while I am cooking.

I don't really plan meals. I eat what I am in the mood for. I might plan about 4 meals out of the week -- everything else probably happens on the day of. I have few staples, so the recent items don't really help me much. Breakfast is the only meal that is fairly consistent for me. I'll go through a phase and use the same ingredients for 1 week or so, and after that I'll use completely new items that were mostly not on the previous list.

Logging does help me keep track of my fiber intake, and reminds me to get more. And to pay attention to my saturated fat intake.
I generally have a formula for my meals:
Breakfast: fruit + yogurt or protein + fruit or starch + fruit
snack: nuts, fruit or coffee
lunch: meat + 1-2 veggies + 1 starch
snack: fruit or treat
dinner: meat + 2 veggies + beans or starch
dessert: fruit or fruit + yogurt or tea or treat

I may not eat all of the snacks on a given day if I am not hungry. Or I might swap one of the fruit snacks for veggies. I try to cut back if I have too many treats. And limit them to one a day on the weekend. (This doesn't always work, so I try to make up for it the next day).

Treats: bread and oil or butter, chocolate, chips, pastries, cheese, candy

Eventually you will find your pattern. For me, measuring and logging is really key. Once I get to maintenance mode, maybe I'll focus on mindful eating.

I have noticed that these days, I can't handle more than about ~500 calories in a meal. Lunch and dinner are my biggest meals, but usually by the time I finish lunch, I am at 800-900 calories.

ninerbuff

Hey MFP people, I get a lot of inspiration from reading this board and I love that so many of you have made dramatic changes. I see that many of you use the calorie counting so effectively, and to be honest it baffles me! I want to learn how to think about this the right way so it can work for me.


I hate counting calories, as a rule. If I'm running out of calories, but I'm still hungry, then I feel like I still have to eat, so knowing it's over just makes me feel guilty. It's hard to plan meals based on how many calories they have. I can't keep numbers in my head all day (remembering how many I had for breakfast and lunch so I can have xyz for snack) because I have a very poor memory, so I have to pull out the app every time I want to eat something. I feel so limited, ineffective, and discouraged when I try to count calories. I'm not sure exactly what my hold up is, but I KNOW it works for so many of you so can you share any secrets? How do you *think* about the process so it keeps you going instead of discouraged? How do you stay in your goals without spending an hour a day figuring it out? Have you ever felt the way I'm describing, and how did you get over that sort of phsychological bump?


I'm 23, 166lbs, 5'7, and have dealt with double depression (major and chronic) my entire life.

I would ask how many calories are you counting?

A.C.E. Certified Personal Trainer
IDEA Fitness member
Kickboxing Certified Instructor
Been in fitness for 28+ years and have studied kinesiology and nutrition

57rainbows

MFP is recommending appx 1500 I think. I have it set to lose a pound a week.

JennieAL

I have a strange way of looking at it, and this will not work for everyone, but I started by seeing it as a project or experiment, and it just sort of stuck that way with me. I am a trial and error type of person, so looking at it that way really helps me stick with it. I even weighed several times a day the first few months, to spot patterns in my daily, weekly, and monthly fluctuations. I became obsessed with seeing what I could do to make sure I got a loss each week (and always making sure I ate at least 1200 calories!), and predicting how much the loss would be.
Then I added exercise into the equation and experimented with eating vs not eating my calories back. (Eating them back is definitely the way to go.) Just a couple of days ago I decided to increase my calories from 1200 to 1850, and now I'm experimenting with that. I don't focus as much on the end result, but on day to day results. What seems to make me retain water, what seems to energize me, and what makes me feel tired or less energetic.

I focused on everything EXCEPT the fact that I had 50 pounds to lose and it was going to take a long time and a lot of hard work to do it.

I think this is an excellent approach!!

AntWrig

Even the ones who say the don't count calories, have to work of some sort of caloric base line. Granted, it's much easier trying to hit your protein, carb, and fat totals for the day. However, before you do this you need to establish a general idea of calorie intake and work from there.