calorie shifting!

slimmingmom

Anyone here ever heard of calorie shifting? I want to start doing this and do it as a trial for myself for just one week and see if it's affected my body in any kind of way. For anyone who has done this or is doing it, how did you go about doing it? I'm trying to research it and everything but having a little bit of a hard time doing so!!!! HELP PLEASE!!!!!

shannahrenee

What is calorie shifting?

Schaff

I'm actually in the middle of zig zagging right now. I found a program online (I would include the link, but I forget what it is). I will share with you a breakdown of what I am doing. I have been doing it for two weeks and I think my 6 month plateau is starting to go away at last! Hope this helps!

First you need to establish you "baseline calories", that is what you have probably been eating for awhile now. I am at 1,430. Once you have that, then you adjust accordingly:

Week 1: Mon and Thurs.: increase calories 300: for me 1,730
Week 2: Tues and Fri: decrease calories 500: 930
Week 3: Wed and Sat: increase calories 400: 1,830
Week 4: Thurs and Sun: decrease calories 500: 930
Week 5 and 6: return to baseline
Repeat the cycle as much as you need to

A few tips that I have been doing that worked for me: I work out 6 days a week for about an hour, but on the days when I eat under 1,000, I do not exercise. The way I was able to stay in that 900 calorie range was to just eat the same things I usually do, I just cut portion sizes in half. Also, on high calorie days I do most of my "extra eating" in the morning and early afternoon. I definitely am a believer in the idea that the more you eat at night the harder it is to lose weight. So I added a banana to breakfast and added something extra to lunch and an extra snack. During dinner I kept things mostly the same as I do on "baseline" calorie days.

Like I said, I have been on a plateau since February, and I am now starting to see the scale move again the way I want it to! Hope this helps!

stormieweather

I've heard of it here...it's basically zig zagging your caloric intake to shock your body out of it's rut (expecting the same calories every day). Supposedly, it helps with plateaus, but I've not tried it myself.

Magenta15

Hi this sounds like something similar to what I did when I was doing weight watchers a while back,
where on weight watchers you would have a set point daily range, say mine was 26 points i could eat a day, but to keep my metabolism going and not getting used to what im eating, instead of eating 26 a day which adds up to a weekly total of 182 points, some days i'd eat 22 some days i'd eat, 25, 27, 28 and one really high day that would be like say 36 - as long as in the end it all adds up to 182 at the end of the week...so the days i'm only eating 22 points those extra points i didn't eat would go towards any of the higher days - here's the wendie plan WW link http://www.stormpc.com/ww/wendie_plan.htm

So I guess for calorie shifting it would be the same using calories instead of points

if your daily range is 1400 -- some days you would eat 1200, 1250, 1500...etc what ever, as long as at the end of the week it still totaled to 7 x 1400 = 9800

clear as mud? :flowerforyou: LOL

PS I guess I should mentioned it worked pretty well with WW when I tried it, i always had weigh in the morning of my SHD [superhigh day] and always planned my SHD to be around t he weekend or sometime i knew i was going out for supper, or on a day you are going to have a big workout and need the extra calories

weaverc

So when you are zigzagging do you use your mfp alloted calories? I get 1380, but that is with a 500 calorie deficit built in. If I decrease my 1380 by 500 calories, I would get 830 and I don't think that can be healthy. I wouldn't make it through the day without passing out.

Shanta1983

Yes I calories shift all the time Ive loose weight better that way:flowerforyou:

slimmingmom

Well, I know what zig zagging is (aka calorie shifting) I was just mostly looking for food ideas but if it doesn't matter about the food then I will do what schaff said!!! Eat my regular stuff, just change the servings! Thanks everyone! And schaff, is that your last name? Do you have a sibbling Anthony Schaff who lives in Oregon??? Just thought I would ask, it can be a pretty small world sometimes!

Schaff

Actually my last name is Schaffer, I am boring and just use the beginning part as a nickname. I do not believe I have family in oregon, but I wouldn't be surprised if I did!

In general, it does matter what you are eating. I would not recommend doing this zig zagging idea with nothing but fast food! I am a person that doesn't like to be limited as to what I can and can't eat, I like the "everything in moderation" idea. But I am a pretty healthy eater. I eat a lot of fruits and veggies, whole grains, protein. I try for balance overall.

I just thought it was easiest to just halve what I was eating on the 4 low calorie days. I found that it works for me, but everyone is different.